The Government is unveiling plans for the creation of a new Ministry of Cities, Environment, Regions and Transport (MCERT), which it says will support an "ambitious reform agenda" in housing, transport, urban development and the environment.
The MCERT will pull together the existing Ministry for the Environment, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, the Ministry of Transport, and local government functions from the Department of Internal Affairs.
A Chief Executive will be appointed during the first half of 2026, with a target for the Ministry of Cities, Environment, Regions and Transport to be fully operational by July. The MCERT unveiling closely follows details of the Government's Resource Management Act reform plans.
Housing, Transport, RMA Reform and Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop says MCERT will be at the centre of tackling some of New Zealand’s key economic and environmental challenges including housing affordability, the infrastructure deficit, and adaptation to climate change.
"The Government has a series of ambitious and complex policy reforms underway across all of these areas, from Going for Housing Growth, a renewed emphasis on transit-oriented development, congestion pricing and the transition to electronic road user charges for all vehicles, Local Water Done Well, City and Regional Deals, and the National Adaptation Framework. Underpinning it all is planning and local government reform," says Bishop.
"Responsibility for many of these reforms currently spans multiple agencies. For example, solving our housing crisis is impossible without fundamental planning reform, which is currently the responsibility of the Ministry for the Environment (which looks after city, district and regional plans). It is also impossible without reforms to infrastructure funding and financing," says Bishop.
He says MCERT will combine the key levers shaping economic growth and productivity, including planning, land use, housing, transport, water, and the interface with local government, making advice integrated and accountability clear.
The last National-led government established the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) in 2012. MBIE combined functions from the Ministry of Economic Development, Ministry of Science and Innovation, Department of Labour and Department of Building and Housing.
The then-Economic Development Minister Steven Joyce said MBIE would; "assist the Government drive forward its business growth agenda and make it easier for businesses to engage with the Government."
Public Service Minister Judith Collins says uncertainty and change can be unsettling but Cabinet has agreed on plans for MCERT, and public servants working at the four affected agencies deserve transparency and honesty.
The Government's announcement on the establishment of MCERT also quotes Local Government and Climate Change Minister Simon Watts and Environment Minister Penny Simmonds. The press release makes no specific mention of potential public service job cuts.
Staff 'fearful about their job security'
Public Service Association (PSA) National Secretary Duane Leo says given the scant detail in the announcement, staff at the affected government agencies will have a lot of questions about their future.
"These changes will affect hundreds of people working at the Ministry for the Environment, Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, Ministry of Transport, and in the local government and digital functions of the Department of Internal Affairs," Leo says.
"That uncertainty is leading to unease among staff. We are already hearing from our members that they are fearful about their job security and frustrated that this is being done right before Christmas."
Leo says Public Service Commissioner Brian Roche has acknowledged staff concerns and a commitment to work closely with the PSA.
"The Government must ensure these vital public services are properly resourced so the new agencies and the public servants who work for them can deliver for all New Zealanders," says Leo.
Meanwhile Labour's Infrastructure spokesperson Kieran McAnulty says the Government is creating a new mega-ministry nobody asked for.
"The lack of progress on transport and housing has nothing to do with the need for another MBIE-like mega merger and everything to do with the Government’s poor decisions and lack of funding," McAnulty says.
"If they funded the transport announcements they’ve made
"How are we going to see any results in these crucial areas when the Government is busy working on a restructure? This is the wrong focus at the wrong time, from a government that is totally out of touch with Kiwis," says McAnulty.
Heed the lessons from MBIE
Dom Kalasih, Chief Executive of Transporting New Zealand, says the road freight lobby group is cautiously welcoming the establishment of MCERT.
"As the national road freight association, Transporting New Zealand has been providing input on congestion pricing, the transition to universal electronic road user charges, and City and Regional Deals, just to name three," Kalasih says.
"Navigating across different agencies, officials and Ministers gives us a good sense of how the current structure isn’t well set up to deliver effective reform."
However, he says the Government needs to heed the lessons from the creation of MBIE.
"A 2024 Treasury review of MBIE noted that the agency’s large size could ensure economies of scale in its provision of services, but cautioned that addition of work programmes and portfolios risked making MBIE unwieldy and fostered internal competition for policy resources. Avoiding similar risks for MCERT will require careful management," Kalasih says.
22 Comments
Hopefully it won't become an ineffective inefficient empire building job creation scheme for jobsworths like another govt dept starting with M___
I don't share your optimism.
An existing super ministry is still running a heap of separate systems with managers protecting their silos to the death.
This is ideological desperation.
Reeks of Douglas, Richardson et al, a generation earlier. 'We only failed because we didn't go hard enough'.
Bollocks.
And Gareth - this is the downside now, of global GROWTH (and consequently, of NZ GROWTH). Note very carefully, Trotter's latest piece; we are about to fight over 'what's left'. That goes inter-nationally, inter-incomely, inter-generationally; what do you expect on a plant only capable of supporting 1-2-billion long term? This mob of neanderthal ideologues are attempting GROWTH (another doubling, and another doubling, ad absurdum) where GROWTH has come to an end.
You might have a word to DC, re his morning rhetoric; it's now dated. As to the 'proposal'- we are in triage territory, compound and accelerating. And the proponents of GROWTH - Bishop well to the fore - will subsume all and everything societally, in the attempt to pursue the now-unpursuable. They get away with it because the MSM fiercely choose not to challenge.
Have an introspective Xmas.
If they dont have growth they have nothing...
While humans have the option to migrate to better pastures, people will deny growth has limits or they'll simply flock elsewhere as we have seen in recent years. If, say, we had no fuel for airplanes an couldn't migrate with such ease, the mentality would shift drastically. Path of least resistance and all that.
Access to aircraft migration will be the least of everyones worries as reality bites.
Oh absolutely, I was just using an isolated example to emphasis that everyone takes the path of least resistance as we have historically been nomadic as a species while evolving.
A pitiful homage to 1980's supply side economics. This is the core of what the current government does - announce the creation of new ministries. Will tinkering with public sector administrative efficiencies move the dial in terms of the NZ economy? Is this how economies grow and diversify and build resilience?
Not a bad idea IMO, as it does recognize the interconnectedness of all of these things - all of these disciplines/matters are dealt with in terms of the professional planning degree curriculum at universities.
But the success of any such umbrella organization first depends on the clarity (and subsequent implementation) of the replacement RMA.
Neither of which were well handled with respect to the 1991 RMA legislation. Hence, the mountains of case law and the complexity of plans we have now under that Act.
I just hope the government recruit a highly experienced, well respected and distinguished planner to run it. The departmental structure and work flow methods will be crucial to pull it all together and defeat the classic silo policy and operational bureaucratic habits that can build up into these super ministries.
Agreed Kate. The loss of efficiency I've seen in govt from siloism is staggering and bereft of reason, mostly IMO linked to people protecting their jobs and underperformers trying to keep the image up for the career advancement but without the talent otherwise to do the work.
Let us be very clear: We have yet to see an iteration of the RMA, which delivers REAL sustainability. Palmer/Brundtland fell well short; Bolger, Parker, they all missed the point (they have to, or they'd be out on their ear; the MSM tells the voters what to expect, politicians merely represent the populace' understanding.
All versions avoided energy and resource stocks (by avoiding imports, and by separating 'minerals', among other ploys). It also avoided entropy (waste energy, waste resources, both aka pollution). And it acknowledged no limits, while 'balancing' 'development' with 'the environment'. Which was bollocks; fast-forward what has happened since 1990, and it's been exponentially increasing human-infrastructure footprint (all requiring supporting acreage), and exponential reduction in what is remaining. Take this then 'balance' the rest; but be exponentially bigger next time.
Unless that draw-down slash reduction is addressed, no version is worth the paper it is printed on.
I'll be honest, I agree with many of your points as they overarch the limitations of human perception in one lifespan which is our fundamental flaw, and our scope is shortening along with the average attention span and worsening of the average diet. Yes, oil will eventually be too expensive to extract and adaptation will be forced. The only question is the timeline. The level of ignorance of this IMO will only change out of necessity vs education, as the general level of education in the western world is dropping, and the rest just want the same life as the west with the same resource availability which isn't physically possible.
That aside, your consistent claim of ignorance for the authors of this site come across as a tad more bitter and unnecessary, and lead me to wonder why pay for a subscription to berate the authors. If you are of such strong belief, I can appreciate wanting to spread the message, however as you yourself have already noted historically, change will more likely come from necessity vs planning, so why continue the repetitive messaging? Hope? A sense of saving the community? Genuine interest here.
I have been here longer than perhaps any other current commentator.
Started with the aim of raising awareness that physics trumps keystroke-issued proxy. And that exponential growth runs into limits.
My beef with DC (particularly) is that his daily comments suggest he has chosen not to be informed. I'm talking factual truths, not personal beliefs - depletion, degradation, entropy - they are all truths. They have given more space to the physics/limits awareness, than most other NZ sites (which isn't a high bar) but sooner or later...
Understood, however the optics are akin to a Jehovas witness banging on your door daily to share the good word, and then getting irritated each time you turn them down or don't open the door anymore, yet still turn up daily regardless. Seems the effort isn't worth the cause.
Makes sense. Having an NZTA and a Ministry of Transport was always a bit weird
Who checks the checkers?
Nobody - this is driven by the need to remove encroaching physical constraints.
That need can only self-justify in self-imposed ignorance; no monitoring; no transgression.
So away with the monitoring, away with public input, away with science. Why else do you think a tobacco-lobbyist fits the role?
The joke is that they are too late, already already.
Well too late....but I suspect only the smarter among them know.
Coastguard?
'We trained hard, but it seemed that every time we were beginning to form up into teams we would be reorganized. Presumably the plans for our employment were being changed. I was to learn later in life that, perhaps because we are so good at organizing, we tend as a nation to meet any new situation by reorganizing; and a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress while producing confusion, inefficiency, and demoralization.'
Bit of a discombobulated set of ministries to merge. And they criticised the Health merger happening when there was work to be done! This smells like they just have a chief executive they want to install who is onboard with their ramrod plans.
Think back to when NZ actually dealt with housing and infrastructure in major ways. And they did it under what was probably a more sprawled structure than we have now. And even had the Ministry of Works running the shovels.
They'll eventually run out of ministries to merge and still have to explain why it didn't fix anything.
Labour tries to merge just waters.
The ideologues wouldn't have a bar of it.
They're a joke.
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