Flood protection funding cuts under Luxon
Luxon’s Government has cut flood protection funding just as extreme weather gets worse — and the numbers now show just how deep those cuts go.
This Government has cut flood protection spending by 41% compared to the last Government, even as climate-change-charged extreme weather events become more frequent and severe.
“Luxon’s Government gets up after each extreme weather event to talk about how much they’re spending on flood protection – spending that they’ve almost halved in comparison to the last Government,” says Green Party Co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick.
Documents OIA’d by the Green Party confirm Budget 2020 committed $217 million, Budget 2023 committed $122.9 million, and $647.5 million for North Island Weather Events Category 2 risk mitigation was confirmed and signed under the previous government.
This Government’s contribution has been $200 million through the Regional Infrastructure Fund.
The previous government committed $340 million over three years to flood resilience, excluding one-off disaster recovery funding. This Government has committed $200 million total across three years, spread across 74 projects nationwide. That is a decrease of $140 million.
The climate funding cut is bigger than they admit
“Every other week we’re experiencing yet another ‘one-in-100-year weather event.’ We need climate resilience now. Luxon’s Government has not only poured fossil fuels on the fire, but cut flood protection funding and last year decided to kick any meaningful decisions on climate adaptation funding until after the next election.”
Delay now, pay later
“Treasury is telling us there’s an 80 per cent chance of another Gabrielle-scale event in the next 50 years, as Luxon’s Government quietly delays and defunds any real work on resilience.”
“Every dollar we fail to invest in flood protection now is a dollar communities pay back many times over when the next event hits.”
“New Zealanders are sick of being told the Government is investing in keeping them safe when the reality is the opposite. They deserve an honest Government who does the real work to fix the entangled climate and cost-of-living crises; a Government that works for regular people, not the profit of mega corporations,” says Swarbrick.
You can’t cut flood protection in a climate crisis and call it prudence — that’s just passing the bill to whoever gets flooded next.
Severe climate events are here to stay! So how come this corrupt, devious CoC is again lying to the NZ public. Labour committed $340m over 3 years to flood resilience, to be spread across 74 projects nationwide, while is CoC has committed $200m, a shortfall of $140m! When will this govt wake up and realise that intelligent NZ LW voters are not stupid. They don’t suck up the BS like the RW voters do. We all know climate disasters don’t give a stuff how much money you have or what your property is worth. If you are in the ‘disaster path’ it will still get you! So why does this evil CoC continue to secretly sneak around making cruel and dubious changes to everything they don’t like? That is why their time is up – their dishonesty is beyond belief!