Prime Minister Chris Hipkins says the true extent of devastation and loss of Cyclone Gabrielle becomes clearer every day, with 11 confirmed dead and crops across Hawke’s Bay and Tairāwhiti badly damaged, many completely destroyed.
At least 3200 remain unaccounted for - registered as being uncontactable - although this number is expected to drop.
“This is going to be big,” Hipkins said of the disaster as he spoke at a National Emergency Management Agency (Nema) briefing in Wellington.
As the immediate emergency response shifted to recovery, Hipkins said New Zealand had failed to invest enough in infrastructure “and this has to change”. The country had to build back better, so some tough calls had to made “and I’m absolutely committed to doing that”.
“There is no doubt that as a country we have a steep mountain ahead of us, and we will climb that together. We know this recovery is going to come with a big price tag. We will build back better but we will also need to build back more resilient than we have before.”
Asked if he was going to rewrite the Budget, he said the Government would have to reprioritise decisions and make some “big Budget calls”.
Alongside this long-term reprioritisation agenda, Hipkins made some immediate changes to his schedule and signalled decisions to come. He will no longer attend the Pacific Forum in Fiji next week, as he believed he needed to stay in New Zealand. Deputy Prime Minister Carmel Sepuloni would go in his place.
A decision would need to be made within a week on whether the 2023 Census could go ahead as planned in just over two weeks.
Hipkins said 28,000 homes, mostly in Napier and Hastings, remained without power in the aftermath of Cyclone Gabrielle. At least 3200 people remain unaccounted for.
Nema has deployed 60 Starlink internet devices. The HMNZS Canterbury is due to arrive in Napier on Tuesday with further supplies and equipment for temporary bridges.
The Australian emergency responders are helping Fire and Emergency New Zealand (Fenz) with a 27-person team, 25 of whom are already on the ground in Hawke’s Bay. Their focus will be finding those still to be contacted. An Australian Air Force C-130 will also form part of the international response.
New Zealand had also today accepted an offer of help from Fiji, Hipkins said.
Police have arrested 42 people in Hawke’s Bay and 17 in Tairāwhiti for looting and dishonesty offending.
The Prime Minister’s briefing came as the death toll from the cyclone continues to mount. Eleven people are now confirmed to have died in the cyclone. Police have “grave concerns” for 11 more.
This afternoon the police’s Eastern District Commander Superintendent Jeanette Park said more than 3000 people have been found, but there were more than 6000 reports of people who cannot be contacted.
Park also made a plea to people taking advantage of the floods to loot shops and homes. “It’s cruel, people shouldn’t be doing that,” Park said.
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Police Minister Stuart Nash, who is also Napier’s electorate MP, said that if Park needed greater resourcing to keep the peace, she would get it. “The district commander has the ability to pull in as many resources as she sees fit,” Nash said. “There’s over 100 more police officers on the ground to support the effort, if the district commander wants more police, she will get more police.”
Nash said he had heard reports of “a certain gang” creating havoc.
“What I would say to that is, ‘pull your head in - this is not the time for that sort of behaviour’,” Nash said.
“What I would say to the gang leaders in the city is ‘show some leadership - get your guys out of the cars and out of these communities because this is not the time for that sort of behaviour’.”
Hipkins spoke ahead of tomorrow’s Cabinet meeting, the first since the destruction of Gabrielle was laid bare. The Government is expected to roll out further support for businesses following that meeting.
Finance Minister Grant Robertson told Q+A with Jack Tame that the cyclone was “the biggest weather event this century” and that it would have a “multi-billion-dollar price tag”.
He hinted at “sector-by-sector” support for industries hit by the floods.
Robertson, who was in Hawke’s Bay, told reporters today he would be “taking stock with all the different ministers who have been here” ahead of making decisions about what sort of support to roll out.
“You’ll see a continual evolution of the response. There will be more support and more funding where it is needed immediately and then some planning around how we manage our process from here,” Robertson said.
“I expect it will roll out over a number of weeks. It won’t just be a one-off.”
Robertson said he was “reassessing” this year’s Budget in light of the storm. He opened the door to changing the amount of overall spending in the Budget if necessary.
“That’s what we’re reassessing now. You can imagine the pressure that responding to a massive event like this will have,” Robertson said.
“We save for a rainy day, we happen to be having a lot of them at the moment and we will respond,” he said.
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