Last year, 2020, was a difficult year for all of us and especially so for those of us who have family, friends and loved ones who live overseas. New Zealand has done a good job of keeping our people safe from Covid-19 by going hard and early to stamp down on the virus – and a key measure we took to do this was to close our borders to non-citizens and require managed isolation for people coming back into the country.

We now feel that it is safe to re-open our borders if we take some sensible steps to stop the virus entering New Zealand. The first step and most important point in our plan is to get everyone aged over 16 getting vaccinated this year. We have enough stock of the vaccine to offer all eligible New Zealanders a free vaccination and we are speeding up the vaccination process to ensure everyone is at least partially vaccinated as soon as possible to avoid the risk and impact of Delta strain which is circulating in other countries.

Once everyone in New Zealand has had the opportunity to be vaccinated, and health officials are confident sufficient numbers have done so, we will be able to start to open the border in a phased way. Early in 2022 we will be able to introduce low, medium and high risk pathways people entering the country will use. If you are vaccinated and coming from low risk countries you won’t have to quarantine, there will continue to be reduced quarantine or self-isolation requirements for vaccinated travellers from medium risk countries, and only those travelling from high-risk countries, or who have not been vaccinated, will continue to be required to do a full 14 days in MIQ.

To help as many people get at least one dose of the covid vaccine the gap between shots for new appointments will now increase to 6 weeks. Moving to a longer gap allows us to give a first dose to more people faster, giving partial protection sooner which is important in a world where the more infectious Delta variant of the virus is circulating outside New Zealand. If you already have a second vaccination appointment booked there is no need to change the gap between doses.

The government has also changed the eligibility dates for those who have not yet had a first vaccination. If you are over 50 you are now able to book your appointment and we are opening bookings for people 40 and over this Wednesday, and 30 and over from next Wednesday. From the start of September everyone else will be able to book a free vaccination appointment.

We can safely take these steps because we have worked to keep Covid out of New Zealand – we are in a strong position unlike so many other countries. – Shanan Halbert, Labour MP for Northcote (Please note this column was written before the alert level 4 lockdown)