Alan Hulse: Employment Advocate says if whistleblowers didn't stand up for what's right the census report would've never happened

Vindication for whistleblowers, following revelations officials lack census data safeguards, when sharing with third parties. 

An inquiry shows multiple data-keeping failures from Stats NZ, Health NZ and the Ministry of Health, and has led to the head of Stats NZ stepping down.  

Employment Advocate Allan Hulse told Andrew Dickens all whistleblowers faced retaliation during this process. 

Hulse says they stood up and told the truth, and without them, the report wouldn't exist. 

An investigation was ordered following claims Manurewa Marae misused Census and Covid-19 vaccine data. 

 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, it's a very damning inquiry, wasn't it. And
it found that public service agencies shared Kiwi's personal information
with third party agencies. Now, this inquiry followed allegations that
census and COVID vaccination data collected at Manyawa Marai was
used to target Maori voters and the Tumma Chemikodo electorate.

(00:20):
So the report says STATS New Zealand had insufficient safeguards
in place to protect the personal data. You know this
is serious because the boss of Stats New Zealand, the
big Boss, fell on his sword immediately. Health New Zealand
and the Ministry of Health were also criticized for their
roles in sharing the data. Now, Alan Holds is an
employment advocate who represented six Marai workers and one MSD

(00:40):
in the inquiry and joins me.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
Now, hello Allen, good morning Andrew.

Speaker 1 (00:45):
So what does this outcome mean for say, the whistleblowers.

Speaker 2 (00:50):
Vindication? And I guess what it means is that the
abuse that has suffered probably for eighteen months has been vindicated.
I think the real sad part about the entire story
is that the whistle blowers were telling the truth the
entire time, and without their bravery. And I'm talking about

(01:13):
bravery because all of them are faced retaliation and in
different ways abused in public, discredited publicly. I've been discredited
publicly on multiple occasions for actually standing up and telling
the truth. And without the whistle blowers, we wouldn't have

(01:35):
this report. And I think it's a bit disappointing that
the Prime Minister and the people involved having said thank you,
brave whistle browers for bringing this evidence to us in
the format that we could understand. Now.

Speaker 1 (01:52):
Okay, but surely, surely the westse want we want more,
because while this inquiry says it should not have been
it doesn't actually say what the information was in leased
to do. So it seems incomplete in terms of the
total misuse of it. There's there's a lot that is unfocused.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
I think it's pretty clear the report, and I've read
the sixty eight page report, it sees that information was
shared private information of New Zealanders, A completed census form
was shared with people that it shouldn't have been shared
with and is a complete breach of privacy.

Speaker 1 (02:33):
Yes, so how contentious does that Tommikimikodo seat result seem?
Now to you?

Speaker 2 (02:41):
I think a number of us have believed for some
time that that if it wasn't for the data being
excess by Dupai Mary, that would be a different person
in Parliament right now in that seat.

Speaker 1 (02:59):
How much distrusted is this causing.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
I think all it's doing is is proving what a
lot of people have thought for a long time about
some of the processes that have operated, that there isn't
the confidence in the public service. And I say that
because this particular case is only the tip of the iceberg.

(03:28):
We have so many more whistle blower cases within the
public Service of serious wrongdoing and that's what we're talking about,
and the report this is only the initial stage where
they're actually saying what the Public Service investigator found.

Speaker 1 (03:48):
A thank you for your work, thank you for your
time this morning. That's Allen wholesou represented the whistleblowers.

Speaker 2 (03:54):
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