Audrey Young: How latest privacy breach will impact on Jacinda Ardern's Government

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern will face questions in Parliament over the breach. Photo / Marty Melville

The digital security breach at the Ministry of Culture and Heritage is a headache on many fronts for many people, not least Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.

First are the 302 individuals concerned.

Knowing that copies of their identity documents such as birth certificates, passports or drivers' licences could still be floating around the internet and could still be exploited for fraudulent use will be unsettling at best and highly distressing at worst.

From June this year, they applied to take part in waka and tall ship voyages around New Zealand, as part of events marking James Cook's landing 250 years ago.

Between June and last Thursday, 373 documents for proof of identity were uploaded to what turned out to be an insecure website, purpose built for Tuia 250, but with a coding error that made those private documents publicly visible.

It was a very sombre Bernadette Cavanagh who conducted the press conference in Wellington this morning to outline the breach.

She began her job as ministry chief executive only in February, having come from the upper echelons of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, where she was a former High Commissioner to Singapore and took a leading role in the campaign to get Helen Clark elected as United Nations Secretary-General.

Cavanagh conducted herself very well today, fronting up, making no excuses, apologising and deflecting any suggestion of resignation until more facts are known.

To have had such a mistake occur in Cavanagh's ministry, and so early in her five-year term, will be mortifying for her.

As a leading public servant and daughter of former Prime Minister Jim Bolger, Cavanagh is also experienced enough to know that while she has taken responsibility, this will become a political weapon to be against her minister, Ardern, in the hands of the National Opposition.

Following the example of Clark, Ardern opted to take the portfolio of Arts, Culture and Heritage.

Ministers Carmel Sepuloni and Kelvin Davis are more involved in Tuia 250 than Ardern herself but don't have formal delegations for it.

As Prime Minister and as the primary minister responsible for the Ministry of Culture and Heritage, Ardern will face questions in Parliament about the latest breach.

It may not have the political impact or significance of the Budget breach in May, when National acquired confidential Budget material through a simple website search, but it will add to National's narrative of a Government that is riddled with basic failures.

It will certainly contribute to an undermining of confidence in Government systems.

The other unfortunate victim of the website security breach may be the Tuia 250 programme itself.

It has been an incredibly carefully planned anniversary to mark the landing of James Cook in New Zealand in a way to avoid it becoming a magnet for disharmony over the effect of Europeans on Māori.

It is a series of events to "commemorate" not "celebrate" the first onshore encounter between Cook and Māori, the voyages being one part of them.

"Tuia – Encounters 250" is billed on its website as a time "to share, debate and reflect – to enable a more balanced telling of our stories. So that we speak openly and respectfully about our history".

"Tuia 250 is an opportunity to hold some honest conversations about Māori and European settlement of New Zealand to guide us as we go forward together."

There is no obvious reason why the privacy breach should materially affect those conversations.

But it is an unfortunate and negative start to a series of events that have been years in the planning.