Audrey Young: Govt misstep on user-charges for coronavirus Covid-19 isolation

Winston Peters' description of the charging plan for New Zealand's isolation and quarantine facilities as "dreadful public policy" is widely shared but for different reasons.

Those who think it's wrong to force anybody to pay for their two-week mandatory detention, such as the Greens, believe it is unjust.

Those who think everybody should be charged for their two-week mandatory detention, such as New Zealand First and the National Party, believe it is a woeful imitation of what is required.

And those looking for some consistency in its application are not likely to be satisfied either.

The three partners of Government, Labour, the Greens and New Zealand First, have three different views and the compromise has ended up pleasing no one.

Quite why the Government felt the need to address the issue before the election when it was so divided is not clear.

Nobody was marching in the streets demanding part-charges.

Deputy Prime Minister and New Zealand First leader Winston Peters. Photo / Mark Mitchell

With such divergent views, it would have been better to make it a policy issue for the campaign.

The charge of $3100 for an individual, $950 for an extra adult and $475 for additional children will be applied to Kiwis returning for 90 days or less; and to anybody who leaves and returns after the fee-setting regulation is passed.

There will be a potential for a waiver of the fee depending on individual circumstances.

The power will reside in Carolyn Tremain, who heads the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment – at least it is not a politician.

But the inconsistencies are present at the outset.

Greens co-leader James Shaw. Photo / Pool

Take for example a Kiwi living in Sydney with a 95-year-old mother living in Auckland.

There are different charging regimes depending on the state of the mother. If she is lonely (yes, charged), has been hospitalised with a broken hip (unclear if that means sick); terminally ill (unclear how sick they have to be); at death's door (exempt) or awaiting burial (exempt).

A Kiwi leaving New Zealand on a business trip to perhaps expand the business and possibly help to take on more workers in New Zealand would be charged on arrival.

Someone returning to live in New Zealand after living five years in Britain would not be charged.

The minister, Megan Woods, has repeatedly said it is a fair system but the potential for unfairness and inconsistency seem far greater.

At present, with the borders closed to everyone except New Zealand citizens and residents and essential workers, the fees would apply only to them.

But the numbers are tiny. Of the 30,000 who have been in managed isolation, only 3000 would have been charged under the proposed payments, it is estimated.

The estimates of how much it will raise vary between $2.2 million at the lower end and $10m at the upper end to offset costs of managed isolation, for which $479m has been budgeted this calendar year.

When the offset is so puny it can only be seen as token gesture. Public policy as a token gesture is indeed dreadful public policy.