New Zealand’s vaccine roll out is going from bad to worse, with New Zealand now last in the developed world for the percentage of the population who have been fully vaccinated as well as for vaccination doses delivered per 100 people, National’s COVID-19 spokesperson Chris Bishop says.

“The Prime Minister’s regular excuse to the fact that New Zealand is last in the OECD for vaccination doses is because we are focusing on fully vaccinating people, not just getting jabs in arms.

“Well that rebuttal has just fallen by the wayside. Australia has now fully vaccinated 11.17 per cent of the eligible population, compared to New Zealand’s 10.41 per cent.

“Whichever way you cut it – New Zealand is now the slowest in the developed world. We are clearly not ‘at the front of the queue’ as we were promised.

“We’ve been told by the Prime Minister that this is the ‘year of the vaccine’. But just like the ‘year of delivery’ resulted in the KiwiBuild and light rail fiasco, the vaccination roll out is similarly failing.

“Our largely unvaccinated population is highly vulnerable to COVID-19 in the community, which is a serious possibility with Delta spreading around the world and causing mayhem in New South Wales.

“It’s very simple – the best way to protect New Zealand against future lockdowns and future community transmission is to vaccinate as many people as possible.

“More than 1000 port workers are still unvaccinated, half of our DHBs don’t know who has been vaccinated and who hasn’t, and the Group 3 roll out is shambolic.

“Timelines have been thrown out the window as the Government moves the goalposts to cope with its own incompetence.

“The Government has become complacent and content to rest on its laurels after the success of last year.

“The vaccine rollout is critical for opening New Zealand up to the rest of the world. The Government must get this right.”