Jacqui Lloyd: NZ Cruise Association chief executive says costs are largely to blame for pared-back cruise season this year

A pared-back cruise season is underway in New Zealand.

The Diamond Princess has docked in Lyttelton this morning, after being in the capital over the weekend.

The New Zealand Cruise Association says port calls and passenger numbers are expected to be down 20 percent overall this year.

Chief executive Jacqui Lloyd told Mike Hosking costs are largely to blame.

“What we’ve seen over the last year is increases in port fees, increases in government levies, increases in regulation, but also we need to throw across the top of that geopolitical concern.”

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
A little bit of controversy around this year's cruise season.
A couple of issues. One, port calls are expected to
be down twenty percent, to the levees are eating these
and newish levees or more levees are eating into the
company's bottom lines. To the tune this season about three
million diamond Princess floated into Wellington yesterday. If you want
to have a lookout and christ heading that way today
you zill and Cruise Association boss Jackie Lloyd's with us,

(00:20):
Jackie morning, good morning. Why are we twenty percent down?

Speaker 2 (00:25):
Mainly increase cost to operate? So what we've seen over
the last year is increases and port fees, increases in
government levees, increases in regulation. But also we need to
throw across the top of that geopolitical concern. So at
the moment the Red Sea, no ships can access through
that way. So it's a very long and expensive way

(00:45):
to get to New Zealand at the moment.

Speaker 1 (00:47):
Okay, So tourism's mired at eighty five percent generally of
what it was pre COVID is what you've just explained
why cruising's down or is cruising suffering the same issues
tourism broadly suffering.

Speaker 2 (01:01):
Our issues are mainly the ones I'm talking about globally,
Cruises growing a great gumps and unfortunately New Zealand is
the only region globally that's actually seen the reduction. So
we're expecting about a twenty percent reduction in port cause
and passenger numbers this year.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
Are our fees out of line with the rest of
the world in some way, shape or form.

Speaker 2 (01:20):
Were talking to cruise lines and I was just speaking
to a handful of them last month. They have said
New Zealand has always been expensive, but this season we
are the most expensive region in the world that they're visiting.
And that is concerning because you're looking at an industry
that of course is you know, looking at their bottom
lines and making decisions on where they deployed due to costs,

(01:42):
and that deployment decisions are being made to go elsewhere.

Speaker 1 (01:45):
And who are these people putting these foots on and
what's their justification?

Speaker 2 (01:50):
A lot of it's costs recovery. So particularly after COVID,
obviously we know the border was shut and we did
have a reduction in arrivals and a lot of people
doing jobs that our guests. I need to look to
recover those costs in future. So it's increased costs around
the ports. We've seen an increase in customs levees which
starts on the first of December. That's going up by

(02:12):
about our one hundred and thirty six percent and an
additional eleven dollars per person.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
Overseeing this, I mean goes. I understand, like, if you're
the Customs to partner, you go, oh, yeah, let's sting
the cruise ships. They're all rich. But I mean, doesn't
somebody at Union, I don't know New Zealand Tourism go
hold on here, this is going to damage us.

Speaker 2 (02:29):
Look, I think it's more from a government levee. If
you level sorry, if you look at each individual costs
on their own, they make sense, but once you start
layering them together, it's actually quite a hefty chunk of change.
And I'd have to be honest too, it's not just
the cruise industry that's seeing this, it's the entire tourism industry.
You look at the increase in their international visitor levy,
increase in visa fees. They make sense to an extent,

(02:51):
but you pile them together, it becomes a very expensive
destination to visit.

Speaker 1 (02:56):
Good on you, Jackie, appreciate it. Do we hand out
the bullet when we shoot ourselves in the foot? Do
you get that from the government as well or do
you have to bring your own gun for that particular exercise.
God christa blux and I'll talk to him about that tomorrow.
Speaking of which, tourism numbers as I alluded to and
will come a moment to the business of the immigration
and that's a complete disaster. But we're seeing some numbers
from China up. We're seeing some numbers from Australia. This

(03:19):
is tourism up. But we're still stuck at eighty five
percent of what we were so for the year, at
three point two to three million people coming to the
country year on a year. The biggest change is China, Australia.
What can I tell that's about it? Really? Korea, Japan,
Taiwan's sort of up. But we're mid We're stuck shooting

(03:39):
ourselves on the foot. And what's more, the people who
do come, we charge them more. How weird is that?
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