Photo: RNZ / Unsplash
The boss of the Ministry for the Environment believes most New Zealanders are more concerned about immediate challenges, particularly pressures on households, than the environment.
Ministry officials faced questions about its mahi and people by the Environment select committee on Thursday, as part of Scrutiny Week.
Hundreds of jobs were cut during recent restructures, with full-time employee numbers falling by nearly 27 percent off the most recent peak of 1010 full-time employees in 2022/23 to 738 in 2024/25.
During the Ministry's annual review, Green MP Lan Pham asked outgoing chief executive James Palmer if the environment had been de-prioritised as a result of reduced environmental spend.
Palmer said public opinion on environmental matters had shifted.
"What we have seen over the last couple of years as a consequence of the stress on households and businesses and communities has been a reduction in the priority of environmental action and investment in the environment for New Zealanders," he said.
"And I think that just reflects the priorities and the issues that people are facing.
"I'm incredibly sympathetic to the fact that for most New Zealanders, there are more near-term pressing priorities for them."
It was a ministry behind a number of significant pieces of work this year, including Resource Management Act reform and climate change adaptation.
Palmer, a former Hawke's Bay Regional Council chief executive, said the ministry had worked with less, but delivered more.
"Overall, I have to say it was a record volume of deliverables by the ministry, despite the reduction in resources," he said.
"The ministry produced in terms of outputs to ministers, parliament and the public, 4822 items which included 896 briefings, 62 Cabinet papers, 452 [Official Information Act requests] and many more parliamentary questions and pieces of ministerial correspondence."
Labour's Rachel Brooking cited a report that showed 54 percent of the ministry's staff often reported stress.
"In terms of the statement that you're working with less but doing more, it seems like there's a lot more stress as well."
Palmer said the teams worked extraordinarily hard with dedication to public service.
He said the public service itself had become very agile and "very good at running sprints", particularly following the Covid-19 pandemic, but recognised this put pressure on workers.
"I think it's to do with the pace at which we're working.
"I do think that the cadence of the New Zealand parliamentary system, particularly the three-year term, does result in governments on all sides of the house moving at pace.
"There are things we can't control and those are particularly the timeframes that the parliamentary process demands of us."
Palmer said the challenge for New Zealand, given relatively poor economic performance in recent years, was to sustain investment in areas that required a long-term focus.
From next year, Palmer will be chief executive of Earth Sciences New Zealand.
