No penalty clauses paid on stalled Waiouru army base housing project
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The Defence Force (NZDF) says it has not paid any penalty clauses associated with its
housing project at Waiouru army base
.
Penalty clauses can be paid when contractors or subcontractors sign up to projects that do not then go ahead.
The $50 million-plus project
has stalled
, though both defence and Ngāti Rangi iwi consider it urgent, and the force issued a tender over a year ago for 50 new homes.
No building has taken place.
The NZDF once again refused to tell RNZ why it was still in negotiations with the iwi over the housing. It had appeared the talks were settled before it issued last year's tender.
"Negotiations in relation to this matter remain underway. Accordingly, this information is withheld in full... to enable negotiations to be carried out without prejudice or disadvantage," it said in a response to a request under the Offiicial Information Act.
"The NZDF's relationship with local iwi has not changed and remains vital to our use of the Waiouru Military Training Area," it added.
It also said no penalty clauses had been paid, either related to the new builds or the retrofit upgrade of existing army rental houses.
Defence housing and other facilities were very rundown, interfering with its military performance and leading to some personnel quitting, its own reports showed.
It had an Estate Investment Committee that "provides performance monitoring, oversight, and direction", according to its annual report.
But when RNZ asked for the latest three performance management reports by the committee, NZDF replied: "No reports are generated by the New Zealand Defence Force's Estate Investment Committee."
It repeated this in relation to its Technology Governance Committee, when RNZ asked for its latest reports, too.
A lot of the NZDF's information technology was old and needed replacing, or were in the middle of years-long projects. Funding was set aside in Budget 2025 for this.
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