The Government needs to take action to ensure Coastguard New Zealand isn’t unnecessarily charged compliance costs, National’s Associate Transport spokesperson Brett Hudson says.

“The recent decision to require Coastguard New Zealand to pay the maritime levy is simply absurd.

“Coastguard New Zealand provides a critical service to New Zealand and helps to secure the safety of thousands of New Zealanders along our coastlines.

“The work they do is valuable enough to attract the support of Kiwis who donate their money to Coastguard New Zealand every year and even gets support from the Government.

“To now have a bureaucratic decision made to treat them as a commercial operation and punish them with a levy that has traditionally been waived is a punishing blow.

“The Government’s job should be to fix problems, not create new ones.

“Smacking Coastguard New Zealand with a new levy is not reasonable and we need some clear direction from the Minister over how the Government is going to fix this problem they have made.”

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