Immigration New Zealand (INZ) is "playing catch-up" because the government had not taken steps to scale its staffing levels up when it was clear the border was reopening, according to the National Party.
National's immigration spokesperson Erica Stanford says the border restrictions have been a handbrake on the economy. Photo: 123RF
Its immigration spokesperson Erica Stanford last night told Parliament INZ was employing 500 more staff but 100 fewer in visa processing compared to 2017.
Minister of Immigration Kris Faafoi was answering questions in Parliament about why travellers who needed visas to visit New Zealand - those from more than 50 countries, including India and China - would have to wait another six months.
Faafoi said he would have needed "a crystal ball" to increase capacity in visa processing earlier and was still hopeful the border would be fully re-opened before October.
Border restrictions were the single biggest handbrake on the economy because tourists and migrant workers could not come, Stanford said.
"Suddenly we are hiring and training more (INZ) staff, when it was obvious to everyone that we were going to need to process visas this year to get our borders open.
"The minister for Covid response and the prime minister have consistently said the only reason for our slow border reopening is the fact that we are unable to process visas. It is the minister's job to make sure that we have staff to process visas.
"We are processing two thirds fewer visas than we were pre-pandemic, how can it be that we are unable to process visas to get those people who are in stage five (of the border re-opening) processed earlier in the year? The biggest handbrake on our economy right now is his department's inability to process visas - we can't get the tourists and ... we can't get split families together till the end of the year."
Faafoi said investments in online systems would cut visa waiting times once the border re-opened, and in the meantime INZ staff had been working on critical purpose and new residence visas.
"If we had a crystal ball, we would have been able to make sure we were preparing for timeframes, to make sure we had that processing capacity," he said.
"I would just like to reiterate that in early February, the government outlined its five step plan. At that stage, the government said this is the worst-case scenario, but we are committed to reopening the borders and to date every step has happened ahead of schedule.
"We saw scenes of joy at the airport as those from visa waiver countries and others arrived in the country and we are looking forward to being fully open. And if you look at the track record, we're ahead of schedule and hopefully we can commit to that for the final step. And hopefully that isn't too far away."