Simeon Brown: Energy Minister launches investigation into Northland pylon collapse and power outage

The Energy Minister says there are clear signs of a communications failure at Transpower.

Simeon Brown's given officials 12-weeks to report back on investigations into a transmission tower toppling last week leaving thousands in Northland without power.

Brown says there was a significant lack of information last Thursday after the pylon fell.

"There was no explanation given, publicly, by this entity until Monday - I think that was, frankly, unacceptable. And actually, they should be owning up to what happened and explaining that to the public."

Transpower says maintenance workers removed the nuts from three of the tower's legs, before it fell.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Together do for ce Ellen nineteen past five. We've got
the terms of reference for the Electricity Authorities review into
that pylon collapse. It will look at the cause of
the event, it will look at how Transpower dealt with
the situation afterwards, including how Transpower communicated with the public.
Transport Minister and actually in this capacity, Energy Minister Simeon
Brown is with me now, hey, samn, good evening. It

(00:23):
suggests that you might think that transpowers Comms maybe not
up to scratch. Is that what you think?

Speaker 2 (00:28):
Yes? Why well, I think they are a stat own
enterprise and they operate, own and operate the transmission lines
in New Zealand. Ultimately, I was up in Northland on Friday.
Feedback very clearly was there was a significant lack of
communication in the afternoon of Thursday last week and actually

(00:51):
I expect also you know there was no explanation given
publicly by the entity entil Monday. I think it was
frankly unacceptable and actually nation but owning up to what
happens and explaining that to the public in a much
more open and honest way, couldn't agree more.

Speaker 1 (01:06):
When did they tell you what had happened?

Speaker 2 (01:10):
Well, I wasn't told formally until Monday morning, but I
visited the site on Friday morning and had one quick
look at it in new straight away.

Speaker 1 (01:22):
Did anybody was anybody at the site who was like yes,
I mean, can you see did anybody confirm it?

Speaker 2 (01:28):
I mean very clearly they pointed out what was happening
and why. And it was very clearly explained what had
been happening.

Speaker 1 (01:36):
Which is to say that Friday thene on Friday, Yeah,
not good enough. What's the punishment by the way that
they might get handed down?

Speaker 2 (01:45):
Well, ultimately this is about looking at the review, looking
at the circumstances and taking lessons from it. Ultimately, the
boarders accountable to the shareholding ministers and that they had
responsibility here on the governance. I'm looking at it from
an energy security perspective and saying this is unacceptable what happened.

(02:06):
There needs to be accountability. There needs to also be
a lessons learned and also we need to make sure
that you know, in particular Northland, the resilience of that
community is considered. And that's why part of the terms
of reference is actually looking at Northland and the resilience
of that community. It has had a tough few years,
whether it's energy, whether it's transport, and actually we need

(02:27):
to look at the energy resilience of that community.

Speaker 1 (02:30):
Yeah, hey, Simin, thank you very much. As always, Simon Brown,
the Energy Minister. For more from Heather Duplessy Allen Drive,
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