Update on RSE flights

BE2.0 MIQ Flights

The two deferred MIQ flights from Vanuatu (4 October and 11 October) have landed with all the quarantine free requirements are being met.  The deferred MIQ flight from Samoa arrives this Saturday, 16 October, and is also quarantine free. Each flight is bringing in around 150 workers, meaning that 450 workers will have arrived in two weeks. 

The two remaining BE 2.0 MIQ flights are on track for November:

• 4 November: Solomon Islands Flight 7
  This will still go through MIQ as the Solomons are not part of the NZ Governments Quarantine-Free Travel (QFT) agreement – only Vanuatu, Samoa and Tonga are part of that agreement.
• 21 November: Deferred Samoa Flight 8
  This is a deferred MIQ flight, that we have been able to convert to QFT due to this countries involvement in QFT.

QFT Flights

The start date for QFT flights pre-Christmas (November and December) is waiting on confirmation from Immigration New Zealand and off-shore processing that they can manage the number of workers and condensed time frame for processing.  This plan includes recruitment of workers from Vanuatu, Samoa and Tonga. 

Allocation of these flights, and the flight date, has been done by the industry working group, and is ready to be confirmed to those employers – industry is waiting on final confirmation from Government. We anticipate this will be this week (week ending Friday 15 October).