OIA20491 Grayson Reply.pdf

National Headquarters
Fire and Emergency New Zealand
National Headquarters
Spark Central, Level 7
42-52 Wil is Street
Wel ington Central
Wel ington 6011
Phone +64 4 496 3600

13 March 2026

                        Ref: 20491

Mark Grayson
[FYI request #33479 email]

Tēnā koe Mark

We refer to your request of 9 January 2026 to Fire and Emergency New Zealand requesting
information relating to fire incident F4374653, which occurred on 9 January 2026. Your request
has been considered under the Official Information Act 1982 (OIA), and we respond to each aspect
of your request below.

1.  Incident Report for F4374653;

Please find attached, as Appendix One to this response, a copy of the SMS Incident Report (SMS
Report). Some information has been withheld from the report under section 9(2)(a) of the OIA, to
protect the privacy of natural persons. In making this decision, we have considered the public
interest considerations in section 9(1) of the OIA. We have also redacted the names of personnel
involved with this incident and these have been label ed as out of scope in the attached PDF.

Please note the SMS Report provided to you is generated by Fire and Emergency’s electronic
station management system. In SMS Reports, ‘Notifications’ and ‘Message Log’ fields are reported
in real time as fire crews and our communication centres communicate with each other during the
incident. They may contain spelling errors or commonly used abbreviations.

2.  Total number of:

a.  111 calls received by the Communications centre for this incident;

We can advise that a total of 23 calls was received by the Communication Centre (ComCen) for this
incident.

b.  111 calls received by the Communications centre between 12pm and 1pm on 09
January 2026;

A total of 64 calls were received during this period.

c.  personnel in the Communications Centre, broken down by centre;

i.  Provide a number of personnel prior to strike action commencing;

The number of personnel in each ComCen, just prior to strike action commencing, is as fol ows:

•  Northern: one shift manager and four dispatchers
•  Central: one shift manager and three dispatchers
•  Southern: one shift manager and three dispatchers

ii.  Provide a number of personnel during strike action

Each ComCen had two shift managers during the industrial action.

iii.  Can Fire and Emergency confirm a 111 call took 3 minutes to be answered?

We can advise that we have no record of a 111-cal  taking three minutes to be answered.

iv.  Can Fire and Emergency confirm a voicemail message was played,
diverting calls from being answered?

The ComCen non-emergency lines were redirected to a non-monitored number (i.e. no message
can be left) when the strike hour commenced.

d.  111 calls or incidents that were recorded and not responded to;

We can advise that four automatic fire alarm activations were recorded but not responded to by
Fire and Emergency as per the contingency plans that we have in place during periods of ful
withdrawal of labour.

3.  What Fire and Emergency NZ resources attended this incident?

We can advise the fol owing resources attended this incident (F4374653):

•  ACCOUMA03 – Assistant Commander
•  ACCOUMA05 – Assistant Commander
•  AUCKOSU3 – Operational Support
•  CLEVEDON461 – Volunteers
•  AUCKOSU2 – Operational Support
•  LAINGHOLM701 – Volunteers
•  PATUMAHOE561 – Volunteers
•  WAITAKERE771 – Volunteers
•  PUKEKOHE551 – Volunteers
•  POKENO507 – Volunteers
•  BEACHLANDS437 – Volunteers
•  ANCTEHIK – Region Manager
•  FICOUMA01 – Fire Investigator
•  MT WELLINGTON237 – Career
•  ELLERSLIE274 – Career
•  HOWICK321 – Career

•  AUCKOSU4 – Operational Support
•  CDCOUMA – District Commander
•  FICOUMA06 – Fire Investigator
•  VSOCOUMA03 – Volunteer Support Officer

a.  Was the first arriving vehicle/personnel a fire manager who had limited to no
firefighting capability?

We can advise that the first arriving personnel at the incident was an Assistant Commander.

b.  What firefighting actions took place by the first arriving vehicle/personnel?

The Assistant Commander assessed the fire, considered necessary evacuations, provided tasking of
resources as they arrived, considered traffic cordons and identified water supplies.

c.  Did the first arriving fire truck take approximately 30 minutes to arrive?

We can advise the first arriving fire truck took 32 minutes to arrive.

d.  Was the closest Fire and Emergency career resource responded to this incident?

The closest Fire and Emergency career resource did respond to this incident when the strike action
finished at 1pm once the strike action period was over.

e.  Was the closest Fire and Emergency volunteer resource responded to this incident?

The closest Fire and Emergency volunteer resource did respond to this incident.

4.  What coverage in the Auckland area was maintained by Fire and Emergency while
resources attended this incident?

5.  What coverage was provided to communities where resources were taken from?

Consideration was given by ComCen for coverage while resources attended fire incident
F4374653. For example, for those brigades in Franklin that have two appliances (Pukekohe,
Tuakau, and Waiuku) only one was responded to attend the incident and Kawakawa Bay were left
on station to provide coverage to the Eastern suburbs.

6.  Were any personnel called back or were trucks moved from other stations?

We can advise that personnel were not cal ed back, nor fire trucks moved from other stations.

7.  Was a Emergency Mobile Alert issued for the incident mentioned above?

An Emergency Mobile Alert was not issued for this incident.

8.  Was there consideration for Fire and Emergency managers to take fire trucks to an
incident, rather than personal response vehicles with limited firefighting capabilities?

Yes, however, during the planning stages this option was discounted.

9.  Can Fire and Emergency provide the number of, position title and salary for all personnel
hired within the last 24 months?

Please find attached, as Appendix Two to this response, a table providing the job title and number
of employees hired per job title between 10 January 2024 and 9 January 2026.

Regarding your request for the salary of all personnel, we consider this to be their personal
information. We are therefore withholding the salary received by the employees in Appendix Two
under section 9(2)(a) of the OIA, to protect the privacy of natural persons.

10. What was Fire and Emergency's contingency plan to respond to incidents between 12pm
and 1pm?

Fire and Emergency has developed contingency plans that involve a range of actions that include:

•  Deploying the next closest available appliances to respond to an incident from
neighbouring volunteer areas.
•   Responding Commanders to support the public and provide additional command and
control support for developing incidents.
•  Reducing our response to activities defines under section 12 of the Fire and Emergency act
2017. Which includes medical response.
•  Not responding to Privately Monitored Fire Alarms – PFAs during the period of the strike.
•  Centralised call taking for non-emergency calls.

a.  Where were executive officers located for the strike, and did this ensure sufficient
response capability?

Executive officers were located in the following areas of the Te Hiku region during industrial action
on 9 January 2026:

•  Otahuhu
•  Papatoetoe
•  Botany
•  Mangere
•  Onehunga
•  Auckland City
•  Avondale
•  Regional Coordination Centre (RCC) Te Hiku
•  Takapuna
•  Albany
•  Henderson
•  Local Coordination Centres (LCC) Whangarei

Regarding your request for our view on whether this ensured sufficient response capability, we
consider this to be a request for an opinion. The primary purpose of the OIA is to allow requesters
to seek information that is held by an agency. It is not a mechanism for requesters to seek an
agency’s explanation or opinion. These are not covered by the OIA as they are considered the
creation of new information.

b.  Was Fire and Emergency given sufficient notification of the planned strike action
taking place?

Fire and Emergency was given sufficient notification. There is a 15-day notification requirement for
the strike action, and the New Zealand Professional Firefighters’ Union (NZPFU) are proactive and
consistent on the notification of strike action.

c.  What actions is Fire and Emergency taking as a result of F4374653, to prevent this
from happening in future?

We interpret this portion of your request to be for what actions are Fire and Emergency taking to
ensure fires like this don’t happen again, particularly as bargaining with the NZPFU remains
ongoing. We can advise that Fire and Emergency will continue to have availability of Commanders
for initial Command and Control support in the event of a significant fire. We will also be
responding our closest available Volunteer firefighters to undertake operations.

Our paid public information campaign advising New Zealanders to be extra careful during the
planned industrial action and what to do in the event of a fire is also central to our approach to
reduce the risk for the communities we serve.

d.  When did Fire and Emergency and the New Zealand Professional Firefighters Union
last meet regarding negotiations?

At the time this request was received, Fire and Emergency had last met with NZPFU at facilitated
bargaining on 9 and 10 December 2025.

e.  Can Fire and Emergency provide a financial breakdown on the expenditure towards
advertising of the Career/Paid Firefighter Strike across all platforms and media
types?

Please see the table below for a breakdown of expenditure on the paid public information
campaign, as at 9 January 2026 and across all platforms and media types. The campaign advises
New Zealanders of the paid firefighter industrial action and reminds them to be extra careful,
including what to do in the event of a fire:

Al  platforms and media types
Expenditure
Online Media
$147,189.94
Out of Home Digital
$233,330.00
Radio
$197,419.00
Social media
$106,495.00
Total
$684,433.94

Please note, the totals do not include fees (agency, ad serving and All of Government fees) to
deliver the paid public information campaign. This information is being withheld under section
9(2)(b)(ii) of the OIA, to protect information where the making available of the information would
be likely unreasonably to prejudice the commercial position of the person who supplied or who is
the subject of the information.

In addition, two staff members are wholly or partially involved in supporting the creation and
delivery of the paid public information campaign. The salary ranges for these employees are
$83,155 - $92,394 and $96,998 - $107,776.

11. Can Fire and Emergency provide a report or number of appliance breakdowns over the last
24 months, separated by Career and Volunteer trucks?

On 12 February 2026, we advised you that this information is not held in a way that allows us to
generate a report. To provide it, we would need to manually review every invoice for each
appliance, identify any recorded faults, and then categorise these by year and station type.

To avoid refusing this part of your request in full, we asked if you would you be willing to refine
this portion of your request to be for ‘the number of occasions across New Zealand where an
appliance was unable to respond immediately to a call due to a mechanical fault or lack of crewing,
broken down by region, Volunteer or Career, and reason for delay or failure to respond.’ To-date,
we have not received a reply.

Fire and Emergency operates more than 1,000 appliances, so this process would involve a
significant manual review of documentation and would require staff to be diverted from their core
duties. We consider that this would have an unreasonable impact on our normal operations. For
this reason, this part of your request is refused under section 18(f) of the OIA, as the information
requested cannot be made available without substantial collation or research.

a.  Brooke van Velden MP made a Facebook post on December 19, 2025 regarding 14
fire trucks being prepared for deployment. This post included a picture with Chief
Executive Kerry Gregory and Deputy National Commander Megan Stiffler. Can Fire
and Emergency provide all recorded communication between the Minister and
FENZ leading up to this?

We can advise that there are no recorded communications between Minister Brooke van Velden
and Fire and Emergency regarding the Facebook post that was posted on 19 December 2025.
For this reason, we are refusing this aspect of your request under section 18(e) of the OIA, as the
document al eged to contain the information requested does not exist.

12. Provide all written communication (E.g. emails or texts) regarding this incident to/from the
Fire and Emergency Executive Leadership Team to other personnel, and the Fire and
Emergency Social Media Team to other personnel.

Please find attached, as Appendix Three to this response, communications involving Fire and
Emergency’s Executive Leadership team, and the Communications team up to the date your
request was received. Some information has been withheld under the fol owing sections of the
OIA:

•  9(2)(a), to protect the privacy of natural persons.

•  9(2)(g)(i), to maintain the effective conduct of public affairs through the free and frank
expression of opinions by or between or to Ministers of the Crown or members of an
organisation or officers and employees of any public service agency or organisation in the
course of their duty.

In making this decision, we have considered the public interest considerations in section 9(1) of
the OIA.

Some information that is embedded within our release to you is outside the of scope of your
request and does not relate to the requested information. Where this has occurred, it wil be
labelled as out of scope.

Please note, the text message exchange on pages 1, 3 and 4 are between Megan Stiffler (Deputy
Chief Executive, Operational Response/Deputy National Commander) and Kerry Gregory (Chief
Executive/National Commander). The text exchange on page 2 is between Ms Stiffler and our
Senior Media Advisor.

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

We trust that the information being provided is of assistance. If you require further information,
please email [FENZ request email]

Please note that because of the identified public interest in the information that you have
requested, we intend to publish this response (with your personal details removed) on our
website.

Nāku noa, nā

Aidan Saunders
Manager, Information Requests