Iran war: MPI boss Ray Smith to take over fuel crisis response
Friday, 17 April 2026
Career public servant Ray Smith is taking over the operational leadership of the Government’s fuel crisis response.
Smith is the head of the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI), which he has led since 2018.
He started at the agency soon after it began its - seemingly successful - response to the Mycoplasma Bovis outbreak.
Smith has worked as a public servant since he was 17, including stints as the head of Corrections, the head of Child, Youth, and Families, and a deputy chief executive at the Ministry of Social Development.
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He will be leading the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment’s (MBIE) portion of the response to the fuel crisis.
A spokesperson for the Public Service Commission confirmed the news.
“The Commissioner has appointed Ray Smith to lead the fuel response recognising the priority of this work and the need to transition to a more sustainable model with a dedicated chief executive,” the spokesperson said.
This will additionally allow [MBIE head] Nic Blakeley who successfully led the establishment of the initial fuel response to focus on his substantive role leading MBIE, one of the largest public service agencies.“
MBIE is the lead agency responding to the fuel crisis, with an incident response team of around 100 people set up to support Nicola Willis’ Ministerial Oversight Group, which meets daily at 7.30am.
MBIE looks after energy policy and have been publishing the fuel stocks updates throughout the crisis.
A spokesperson told The Post MBIE’s role included “operations, policy, commercial fuel supply, data and communications”.
MBIE is one of six agencies at the core of the response - alongside the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet (DPMC),The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT), Treasury, the Ministry of Primary Industries (MPI), the Ministry of Transport (MoT).
DPMC is playing a coordination role, while MBIE actually leads the response.
As of early April MBIE chief executive Blakeley was leading the response, with Iain Cossar as the policy lead. ACC’s Andy Milne was also on hand as the operations lead.
Smith told The Post last year he always tried to remember his time at the lower end of a response.
“I've been very fortunate that public service has given me a massive amount of opportunities across different departments, and taken me to lots of places and met all sorts of interesting people.
“But I've never forgotten what it's like to be a person right at the base of an organisation that didn't have any power or any particular authority, but had to learn their way into a job.”
MBIE directed queries to the Public Service Commision. The Public Service Commission has been asked for comment.