No, you just suggested that as I chose to live outside NZ, I got what I deserved.
I didn't say any such thing. My perspective would be that as you live outside New Zealand, you might expect that returning suddenly during a global crisis may involve challenges.
Both capacity and efficiency could have been increased by purpose building an MIQ facility that could later have been used for emergency housing. Efficiency and transparency could have been improved by having a queue, rather than a lottery.
It would take the best part of a year to build a facility of the size and technical capacity required. Obviously initially a wait-and-see approach was required as it wasn't obvious how long the pandemic was going to last. If they'd started building it in, say December 2020, it would only just be ready recently – at a point where MIQ is being wound up anyway.
And they did try a queue system and people hated it so they changed to the lottery.
Yes, my field is that specialised. Does that bother you?
No, just the drama of suggesting you were virtually forced to leave the country in order to make a living and it's terribly unfair that you can't come back whenever you want now.
I didn't say I'd paid tax to woe is me, though--just to point out I had maintained ties with, and done the morally right thing by, NZ (unlike many who structure their finances to not contribute).
Again, not a woe is me, but a demonstration I've done the right thing by NZ because it is the right thing to do. Is this an alien concept to you?
No, the concept isn't alien to me. I just don't see why you seem to think paying tax on income and repaying a loan you chose to take out the same way you'd be expected to do anywhere in the world has anything at all to do with citizenship entitlements. If you took out a loan or became a landlord in a country you're not a citizen of you'd be expected to pay tax or pay it that back too.
One visit in 3 years.
Borders closed in March 2020 so it has not actually even been 2 years. I'm sure that was just an honest mistake and not an attempt to exaggerate your situation though.
And if I had wanted to come back in the past 10 months? People in Australia were not even eligible to apply for MIQ, except under emergency circumstances. That is neither reasonable nor proportionate, which as outlined above, probably makes it illegal.
10 months? The travel bubble ended in August so do you mean seven months tops? At a time where a variant suddenly emerged that was immensely transmissible with the potential to cause widespread death and data needed to be gathered to assess risk? Yeah good luck with the 'not proportionate' argument.
As it stands, I have had the good fortune to maintain and improve my employment situation, but that hasn't been the same for all kiwis. While things were insecure, I applied for several University jobs in NZ (my sector having grown a bit), but was given the feedback that they were not even interviewing even citizens outside the country, because they needed some assurance that the people they employed would be able to begin work in a reasonable timeframe. For clarity, the typical notice period for academic staff in Universities is 3-6 MONTHS. They had genuine reason to believe that citizens overseas would not be able to return in this timeframe.
So in short no actual emergency occurred but maybe hypothetically could have and you're cross about it?
Like my colleague who watched his Dad die on Zoom you mean? There are hundreds of stories like this.
And there would have been thousands of people doing exactly that if Covid had gotten loose in NZ, which is what MIQ was designed to mitigate. I'm sorry your colleague wasn't there with his Dad, I really am, but you have to be honest that if you live overseas, there is always a risk of a family member dying at short notice and you not being able to be there. It is part and parcel of choosing to live overseas.
Yeah, legally they also have a responsibility to me and my family, should we wish to enjoy those same protections, but again, I guess that's inconvenient.
If you actually needed protections, they would be available to you but you are not talking about protections but a lack of convenient access and unfortunately in a global crisis, convenience is the first thing to go.
to shrug off what the rest of the team of 6 million have had to deal with "because we chose to live outside New Zealand" is callous at best, and xenophobic, jealous and heartless at worst.
What you personally have "had to deal with" is not being able to come back to visit with complete freedom and flexibility and yes I sympathise to a degree with the frustration there, but you have not been genuinely denied any rights or protections. I find it so annoying when people act like the extraordinary saving of lives and livelihoods the government has achieved has not been worth the relatively minor hardship of limiting free travel.
I sympathise more with people like your colleague who was not able to travel back suddenly. But It's. A. Pandemic. Not everybody's distressing situations can be prevented. It sucks. I know. In a little over a month it will be over as borders will be open again. Two years is not a lifetime.