2. Question No. 2—Prime MinisterDAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT) to the Prime MinisterQuestion No. 2—Prime Minister2. DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by her statement regarding an alert level change in Auckland that We need to be confident we don't have Delta circulating undetected in the community and we need to be confident any cases we may have are contained and isolated"; if so is this the same for the South Island?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes and yes. It is essential that we have confidence that there's no undetected transmission in our community. This is true for the South Island as it is for Auckland as it is for any other part of the country. There is just no margin of error with Delta—a lesson many jurisdictions have unfortunately learnt the hard way. I've repeatedly said that level 3 is a watch and wait level—it's a crucial insurance policy. If there's something we've missed despite our high levels of testing and waste-water sampling we can surround it quickly contain it and isolate it and I would rather be in a level 3 environment to discover that than a level 2 environment which would be a major setback.David Seymour: Does the Prime Minister have any idea how devastating that so-called watch and wait level is for businesses and people going about their personal lives their education and in some cases even seeking healthcare in the South Island?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Yes but I also know that prolonged lockdowns and outbreaks that become uncontrolled are even more devastating.David Seymour: How many contacts have been identified in the South Island and are any of them still awaiting a test result?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Five hundred and eighteen and yes.David Seymour: How many are still awaiting a test result?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: A small handful are not due their day 12 test but I would caution the member that those are the contacts we know about. When you have over 400 locations of interest and when you have over 30000 contacts you of course do everything you can to ensure that you have all of them but it may well be the case that we didn't. Now we have extra assurances—surveillance testing waste-water testing—but I would much rather be on the side of caution to discover that we had potentially got something wrong than be in a position of being in a level 2 environment where essentially things go back to a much more normal status and discover a case because that would mean potentially yo-yoing back into a level 4 and that would be devastating.David Seymour: How is it possible that the Government still has not traced and tested only 518 contacts in the entire South Island after 15 days of high-level restrictions and what does that say for the future of New Zealand's strategy?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: The member completely misunderstands the answer. We have they have been tested some are not due to return second tests—so the member misunderstands. So the system has worked well but what the member also misinterprets is the idea that when you have a situation where over the course of a week from the time of arrival to the time of detection of case A and over 400 locations of interest we have absolute confidence that we have every single—single—individual who was at one of those locations of interest. Now an enormous job has been done and I pay tribute to those involved—over a thousand contact tracers alone involved in this situation and people in our call centres—but I would rather be cautious and there will be some who disagree with that. But if we find a case in the South Island we have the potential and the ability to contain it at this level. It would be much harder if we were free of restriction."