Camilla Belich: Labour's Public Services Spokesperson on the Government's proposed overhaul

Early Edition with Ryan Bridge · May 19, 2026 · 4m · transcript

The Labour Party is criticising the Government’s proposed public service overhaul, saying its “arbitrary” target will hurt Kiwi families.

Willis announced yesterday the Government would reduce the number of departments, increase artificial intelligence use, and cut public servants by nearly 9000 over the next three to five years.

Labour’s spokesperson for public services Camilla Belich told Ryan Bridge the Government’s target of reducing public servants to about 1% of the population was “arbitrary”.

“We have a significantly larger number of public servants than 1% at the moment.”

Belich said…