Assistant Commissioner Richard Chambers:

Police would like to thank our community for their cooperation as we continue to operate 11 checkpoints in North and South Auckland under Alert Level 3 restrictions.

While the rest of the country remains at Alert Level 2, Police continues to work with our partners to ensure there is only essential travel in and out of Tāmaki Makaurau.

Between midnight on Sunday 14 February 2021 and 4pm on Monday 15 February 2021 Police processed 14,142 vehicles through these checkpoints.

At the southern checkpoints, of the 8607 vehicles which came through, 779 were turned away.

At the northern checkpoints of the 5,535 vehicles which came through, 715 were turned away.

Police did have one incident where a person failed to stop for staff at the Mercer Checkpoint on State Highway 1.

They were arrested sometime later when they stopped in Hamilton.

The 26-year-old is currently assisting Police with our enquiries and we cannot rule out the possibility of charges being laid.

Outside of this, the community has been overall understanding and cooperative.

We continue to remind our community to make sure they have the correct documentation or if required, have applied for an exemption to enter, leave or drive through Auckland.

Information on this available on the Covid-19 website.

There were expected delays yesterday but reports today are that wait times have decreased but motorist should expect delays at peak hours.

Police have been busy across the region undertaking reassurance patrols across essential facilities such as supermarkets, pharmacies and Covid-19 testing sites.

Outside of the arrest mentioned above, there has been no other arrests or warnings in relation to the Alert Level restrictions that we are immediately aware of.

Either in Auckland or across the rest of New Zealand.

The locations of the checkpoints are available and maps of these can be viewed on our website – www.police.govt.nz

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