Fire and Emergency New Zealand (FENZ) spent $90,000 on an outside PR person and a lawyer to help prepare for a hearing about the state of its firetrucks, CEO Kerry Gregory confirmed on 20 July 2026. RNZ

A group of MPs had been investigating FENZ and its trucks for four months. They started the inquiry in April 2026 after firetrucks kept breaking down and because FENZ had spent seven years trying to buy new ones without getting a single one of 30 planned trucks on the road.

National MP Melissa Lee asked Gregory why he needed to hire outside help to answer questions about the organisation he runs. Gregory said FENZ needed outside assistance to understand what the inquiry was asking for and to pull information out of old computer systems. The PR consultant and lawyer helped prepare an 80-page document for MPs.

The spending came as FENZ was dealing with changes at the top. Raveen Jaduram, who used to run Watercare, became the new board chair three weeks before the hearing. National manager Mike Moran and deputy chief executive Sarah Sinclair had both just resigned. Green MP Mike Davidson asked about exit packages for the two departing leaders. Gregory said Sinclair did not receive one.

FENZ's own document to the committee admitted to a long list of failures: poor truck-buying systems, poor contract management, maintenance records still kept on paper, and poor IT and document systems. Gregory admitted under questioning from National MP Tim Costley that a new buying system introduced in 2022 "didn't work." FENZ has since produced a plan in 2025 to fix its buying process.

Costley was blunt about the board's grip on the situation. "The board appeared to be tracking nothing," he said. Jaduram, in his first appearance before the committee as chair, told management the years of problems were "not acceptable."

Acting Minister of Internal Affairs David Seymour told Parliament in November 2025 that FENZ had inherited a faulty tracking system from 2017, pointing to problems that started before the current leaders arrived. Gregory repeatedly answered MPs' questions about what went wrong by saying "We will do better" and describing the problems as having "a long tail" going back years.

The professional firefighters' union offered a sharper view. "FENZ's corporate structure is fracturing because they cannot answer for the crisis on the frontline," the union said in a statement.

The bigger question is whether FENZ can sort itself out. The $90,000 spend on outside help is likely to make MPs ask what FENZ's own staff are actually able to do, and whether the new board chair can hold people to account the way he says is needed. With a new buying plan in place but the 2022 system already called a failure, the committee's findings will show whether MPs questioning an agency can actually push it to make real fixes.