The Police minister is seeking answers from police as to why officers falsely listed a car as stolen, in order to trace the women who sent Northland into a Covid-19 lockdown in October 2021.
Three women from Auckland, who were visiting Northland for work during the Delta outbreak, sparked the lockdown after one tested positive for the virus.
At the time, it was thought the women were sex workers with gang links, who entered Northland on falsified documents.
However, it was later proved the women entered Te Tai Tokerau with the correct documents after a clerical error approved their travel.
READ MORE:
* Covid-19: Northland ‘held to ransom’ as level 3 is extended over case’s ongoing silence
* Covid-19: Search for contact of Northland case ‘extraordinarily frustrating’
* Covid-19: Northland moves to alert level 3 for four days after case ‘moved around widely’
The women at the centre of the allegations later asked for an apology.
Police also falsely listed the women’s vehicles as stolen, in order to access Automatic Number Plate Recognition systems run by private companies with CCTV cameras to track the women, the NZ Herald reported on Tuesday.
Ricky Wilson/Stuff
Ngāti Hine and Tai Tokerau Border Control run a checkpoint with police north of Whangārei as Northland entered alert level 3 in October 2021. (File photo)
Police Minister Chris Hipkins, who was also the Covid-19 Response Minister at the time, has asked police about the false listing but could not yet say how serious it was.
“[Police] are obviously looking into exactly what’s happened here,” Hipkins told reporters on Tuesday.
Police have emergency powers to use the number plate recognition systems, Hipkins said.
“The use of the number plate ID, in order to find the women and find where they had been, they could use the platform for that, but they [police] may not have used the appropriate avenue,” he said.
ROBERT KITCHIN/Stuff
Police Minister Chris Hipkins was Covid response minister at the time of Northland going into the 11-day lockdown. (File photo.)
“They’re [police] having a look now to find out exactly what happened to make sure that everybody who uses that platform knows exactly what the rules and protocols around the use of it are.”
Hipkins said he would wait for police to properly investigate before passing any judgement about whether or not a mistake was made, but he expected a response back.
Police have not responded to questions from Stuff.
The 11-day lockdown in Northland was estimated by Infometrics to have cost Northland’s GDP $23 million.
All three women later tested Covid-19 positive, but there was no recorded community transmission in Northland after their trip.
Hipkins later said the decision to place Northland into lockdown was about protecting the area at the time.
