Statement attributable to Margie Apa, Chief Executive Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora

Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora has made some good progress towards living within our means, but we are still spending more than we have in our budget.

We are also taking the opportunity in our reset to devolve more functions to regions to strengthen frontline clinical delivery to patients and communities.

We are resetting to strengthen our frontline; provide quality, compassionate, affordable healthcare at the right time and in the right place and, importantly, achieve the National Health and Mental Health Targets.

We took immediate steps to stabilise our finances, including working to get the best value for the products we purchase, and pausing or adjusting projects that may not provide immediate benefits.

Over the coming few weeks we expect to release a number of consultation proposals, with more to follow in the new year. Feedback is sought from our staff on how we reset our functions to get back to budget while also taking opportunities to strengthen how we work in regions.

This week we are releasing consultation documents for four business units. These are ‘Data and Digital’, the ‘National Public Health Service’ (NPHS), Hauora Māori Health Service’ and ‘Pacific Health’.

We know working through these changes will be unsettling for affected staff and acknowledge a large number of positions are proposed to be removed. We are committed to supporting people throughout this process.

In advance of these formal processes, 564 staff employed under individual employment agreements or covered by specific PSA collective agreements have accepted an offer of voluntary redundancy. Frontline clinical staff were not eligible for this opportunity.

We will publish monthly updates on our people changes.

While the consultation processes are underway, we do not intend to make any further comments, outside of our conversations with staff and unions.