9 October 2023
MBIE ref: DOIA 2324-0566
Erika Whittome
[FYI request #24092 email]
Tēnā koe Erika
Thank you for your email of 11 September 2023 to the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment
(MBIE) requesting, under the Official Information Act (the Act), the following information:
1 What budget was allocated for any Covid 19 health and safety activities and positions at MBIE
during for the 2021/2022 financial year? For example Covid advisors, Covid specialist roles, Covid
Risk specialists, dedicated webpages and online tools etc
2 What designations did MBIE receive under section 191 of the Health and Safety at Work Act
2015 in order to act as a regulator for health and safety matters?
Please find my responses to your questions below.
What budget was allocated for any Covid 19 health and safety activities and positions at MBIE during
for the 2021/2022 financial year? For example, Covid advisors, Covid specialist roles, Covid Risk
specialists, dedicated webpages and online tools etc.
We have interpreted your request as being for activities relating to personnel and staff communications
costs associated with COVID-19 budgeted for the 2021/2022 financial year. Where possible, MBIE
leveraged internal employees for this work including our health and safety, people and culture, and
property/facilities teams. When it was not possible to leverage internal resources, we supplemented our
in-house capability with external expertise.
There were eight staff members whose work falls within scope of your request, with the percentage of
their working week dedicated to COVID-19 related activities ranging from 30 percent to 100 percent. The
total cost of these personnel and their work for the 2021/22 financial year was $439,995.
We utilised our existing MBIE intranet site ‘Te Taura’ to communicate key information to our people and
made some changes to our CAMMS system to monitor our environment. The CAMMS system is the
primary tool for incident and accident reporting and enables us to record and report strategic,
operational and portfolio risks, as well as critical health, safety and security risks faced by MBIE staff in
the workplace and in field and front-facing roles. Approximately $50,000 was spent on technical changes
to CAMMs (external consultant spend) for all dissemination of COVID-19 information. CAMMS also
enabled us to manage and report on the vaccination status of our employees by site/location, in line with
recommendations from the Ministry of Health.
There was no additional budget for any other MBIE webpages and online tools regarding COVID-19 as this
was incorporated as part of MBIE’s business-as-usual communications function.
What designations did MBIE receive under section 191 of the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 in
order to act as a regulator for health and safety matters?
MBIE was not designated under the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015. Any roles carried out by MBIE as
part of the response to COVID-19 were either as the policy agency responsible for health and safety, or
under the various COVID-19 Public Health Response Acts.
If you wish to discuss any aspect of your request or this response, or if you require any further assistance,
please contac
t [email address]. You have the right to seek an investigation and review by the Ombudsman of this decision. Information
about how to make a complaint is available at www.ombudsman.parliament.nz or freephone 0800 802
602.
Nāku noa, nā
Adrian Regnault
General Manager, Workplace, Safety and Security
Corporate Services, Finance & Enablement
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