Senior team involved in Immigration IT scandal may still be in public service

Wednesday, 17 June 2026

Public Service Commissioner Sir Brian Roche says his review of the IT scandal at Immigration NZ will find out whether the senior people involved are still working in the public service.

He declined to offer a fulsome view on Winston Peters’ comments suggesting some of them should imprisoned, other than to say it was usually courts that decided such matters.

Immigration Minister Erica Stanford released a review on Tuesday into a bungled seven-year IT project at Immigration New Zealand, which saw $33 million spent with no actual outcome.

The review revealed that ministers had potentially been misled over the project and staffers who questioned its viability moved on.

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The Public Service Commission is now conducting a review into the matter.

Roche told media following a select committee appearance that the “senior people” involved in the project were no longer working at Immigration.

But when asked if they were still in the wider public service, Roche said he was still working that out.

“That’s a question I’m still working through. As I said in the committee, we’ve had a report, let’s do an investigation, let’s get the evidence, and then we’ll take whatever actions are justified from that,” Roche said.

He did not want to discuss whether or not staff would be stood down following the report.

“If I look like I'm leaping to a level of predetermination, that will undermine the integrity of the report. The integrity is what we're trying to preserve here.”

Asked about Peters’ comments, Roche said he was not aware of them.

“I think the courts determine who go to prison. I mean, at this point, let's get the investigation done, and whatever flows from that will flow.”

Asked if police should be involved, he said this was not necessary at this point.

“This is a report on an IT project that went bad, that looked like people manipulated and bent rules and did that with a lack of the integrity that you would expect.”

Peters told media earlier on Wednesday that those who misled minister should both lose their jobs and be imprisoned.

“Of course you'd lose your job. They need to be put in prison as well. It's a conspiracy against the people, for goodness' sake,“ Peters told RNZ.

Stanford called the project to update Immigration’s biometric systems “doomed from the start”.

'The report is very clear that ministers were not given full information, that in cases we were misled, that people were removed from the project when they asked questions about its viability, and that whole-of-life costs were not put to ministers for proper approval,“ Stanford told a select committee on Tuesday.