DOIA REQ 0020601 Chris McCashin Response.pdf

3 October 2025

DOIA-REQ-0020601
Chris McCashin
[FYI request #32243 email]

Tēnā koe Chris

Thank you for your email of 5 September 2025 to the Ministry of Business, Innovafion and Employment
(MBIE) requesfing, under the Oﬃcial Informafion Act 1982 (the Act), the fol owing informafion:

Total number of all visa types issued for entry into New Zealand, please provide the following data
for the most recent full calendar year (or please specify the available date range):

1.
Total  number  of  all  visa  types  issued  for  entry  into  New  Zealand,  please  provide  the
following data for the most recent full calendar year (or please specify the available date
range):
2.
Visa Type (e.g., Visitor, Student, Work, Resident, Refugee, etc.)
3.
Number of Visas Issued (for each visa type)
4.
Number of Visas Expired (for each visa type)
5.
Number  of  Overstayers  (i.e.,  individuals  who  remained  in  New  Zealand  after  their  visa
expired, for each visa type)
6.
Country of Origin (for each visa type, with numbers broken down by country)
7.
Age Bracket (for each visa type, using standard age brackets such as 0–17, 18–24, 25–34,
35–44, 45–54, 55–64, 65+)
8.
Number of Dependants Aftached (i.e., the number of dependants linked to the principal
applicant for each visa type, broken down as above where possible)
9.
Employment  Status  of  visa  holders  (e.g.,  employed  ful -fime,  employed  part-fime,  self-
employed, unemployed, not in the labour force), broken down by visa type and, if available,
by age bracket and country of origin

10.
For the Refugee Category speciﬁcal y, please also provide:
11.
Total Number of Refugees Accepted (including principal applicants and dependants)
12.
Breakdown of Refugee Numbers by Country of Origin and Age Bracket
13.
Total  Costs  Associated  with  Refugee  Housing  and  Beneﬁts  for  the  requested  period,
including:
14.
Government expenditure on inifial refugee reseftlement housing
15.
Ongoing accommodafion support
16.
Beneﬁt payments and other welfare assistance

17.
Are you also able to provide an esfimate of people in NZ on falsiﬁed visas.

On 16 September 2025, we wrote to advise you we had transferred quesfions 15 and 16 relafing to total
costs associated with refugee housing and beneﬁts to the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) under
secfion 14(b)(i) of the Act. We also sought clariﬁcafion on the remainder your request. We advised that
much of the informafion you had requested was already publicly available, and where informafion had been

requested beyond that which is publicly available, that fulﬁl ing such a request would necessitate substanfial
col afion or research. We advised that, unless you provided clariﬁcafion of the scope of your requests, that
quesfions 1-3 and 5-9, as wel  as quesfion 17, would likely be refused under secfion 18 of the Act. We have
not received a response from you to our request for clariﬁcafion.

Our Response

Quesfions 1, 2 and 3
As  noted  in  our  request  for  clariﬁcafion,  please  refer  to  the  Immigrafion  New  Zealand  (INZ)  and  MBIE
websites for the informafion you are seeking in quesfions 1-3. The fol owing links include stafisfics by visa
type and, in the case of the data explorer, al ow you to ﬁlter for the informafion you are seeking:

  INZ Statistics: https://www.immigration.govt.nz/about-us/research-and-statistics/statistics/
  MBIE Data Explorer: https://mbienz.shinyapps.io/migration_data_explorer/

Quesfion 4
Please see the table below for the informafion you have requested regarding visa expiries. This includes al
visas that expired between 1 January 2024 and 31 December 2024, as of 24 September 2025. Visa expiries
recorded  do  not  indicate  that  an  individual  has  overstayed  their  visa.  Depending  on  visa  type  and  the
condifions granted, visas may expire upon the individual leaving the country, or while the visa holder is
oﬀshore. Addifional y, visa holders may submit an applicafion for a new visa while onshore.

Table 1: Total number of visa expiries in the 2024 calendar year
Visa type
Expiries
Consular
111
Diplomafic
801
Military
890
Work
228,398
Limited
21,346
Resident
61
Visitor
1,673,021
Oﬃcial
162
Interim
64,041
Transit
1,207
Student
72,591

Quesfion 5
As noted in our request for clariﬁcafion, please refer to the INZ website for the informafion you are seeking
regarding overstayers:
hftps://www.immigrafion.govt.nz/about-us/news-centre/immigrafion-new-zealand-releases-2025-
esfimate-of-number-of-people-who-have-overstayed-their-visa/

Quesfions 6, 7 and 8
Please refer to the links provided above in response to quesfions 1-3 for the informafion you are requesfing.
The informafion available on the INZ and MBIE websites includes visas granted under the family categories.

Quesfion 9
As noted in our request for clariﬁcafion, employment status is not roufinely recorded for al  visa types. As
INZ does not record employment status for most visa holders, we are refusing this quesfion under secfion
18(g) of the Act, as the informafion is not held and we have no basis for believing it is held by another
department. As previously indicated, where employment informafion is held by INZ, this informafion is not
col atable without requiring substanfial col afion or research. To obtain the informafion, MBIE staﬀ would
need  to  manual y  review  thousands  of  applicafions.  Therefore,  where  informafion  is  held  in  scope  of
quesfion 9, we are refusing your request for this informafion under secfion 18(f) of the Act. I do not consider
that ﬁxing a charge or extending the fime limit would al ow us to fulﬁl your request for this informafion.

Should  you  wish  to  request  employment  data  that  is  held  by  MBIE,  you  are  welcome  to  do  so  in  a
subsequent  request.  For  example,  you  could  request  the  number  of  Accredited  Employer  work  visas
granted, broken down by occupafion.

Quesfions 10 and 11
With regards to your request for informafion relafing to the refugee category, we have interpreted your
request as referring to the number of quota refugees who were accepted for reseftlement in the ﬁnancial
year 2024/25. Please ﬁnd informafion in scope of your request below.

Table 2: Total number of refugee arrivals by nafionality 2024/25
Financial Year
Nafionality*
2024-25
Afghanistan
250
Colombia
66
Democrafic Republic of Congo
136
Eritrea
57
Ethiopia
11
Iran
99
Iraq
19
Myanmar
204
Pakistan
80
Palesfine
16
Somalia
47
South Sudan
6
Sri Lanka
11
Sudan
6
Syria
439
Venezuela
28
Vietnam
15
Other**
18
Total
1508
*Immigrafion New Zealand does not hold data on country of origin, so nafionality has been used as a proxy
**Includes the fol owing nafionalifies: Bangladesh, Cameroon, China, Ecuador, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Kuwait,
Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, Uganda, Yemen

Quesfion 12
Table 3: Total number of refugees accepted for reseftlement in 2024/25 by age bracket
Financial Year
Age Bracket
2024-25
00-04
110
05-12
329
13-17
217
18-30
314
31-40
249
41-50
187
51-64
88
65+
14
Total
1508

Quesfion 13
MBIE is responsible for ﬁnding quota refugees housing in the community as part of its reseftlement role,
and  funds  ‘pre-rent’  to  secure  rental  properfies  when  required,  ahead  of  accommodafion  costs  being
funded  by  the  Ministry  of  Social  Development.  The  total  pre-rent  costs  for  2024/25  were  $437,426.08
(excluding GST).

Quesfions 15-16
As quesfions 15-16 sit within the responsibilifies of MSD, we trust that you wil  receive a response from
MSD to quesfions 15-16 in due course.

Quesfion 17
As noted in our request for clariﬁcafion, we are refusing quesfion 17 under secfion 18(g) of the Act, as the
informafion  is  not  held  and  there  are  no  grounds  for  believing  the  informafion  is  held  by  another
department. Instances of visa fraud are unlikely to be known to MBIE unless reported on an individual basis
by third-parfies, in which case, acfion may then occur to cancel the visa (if a visa is held). As previously
advised, you could consider amending your request to be for data that may be held, such as the amount of
residence class visa holders who have had such visas cancel ed under secfion 158 of the Immigrafion Act
2009. As we did not hear back from you on our request for clariﬁcafion, you are welcome to request such
informafion in a subsequent request, should you choose to.

If you wish to discuss any aspect of your request or this response, or if you require any further assistance,
please contact [email address].

You have the right to seek an invesfigafion and review by the Ombudsman of this decision. Informafion
about how to make a complaint is available at www.ombudsman.parliament.nz or freephone 0800 802 602.

Nāku noa, nā

Catriona Robinson
Acfing General Manager Refugee and Migrant Services
Immigrafion New Zealand