Hilda.
I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a daily podcast presented by the New Zealand Herald. Whistleblowers at the Civil Aviation Authority have issued a dire warning about aviation safety in New Zealand. Staff describe a toxic culture with the CIA's director asleep at the wheel. Data obtained by The Herald has revealed over six hundred thousand dollars has been spent on legal fees related to employment issues, complaints and investigations, and its prompted warnings that the agency's
investigative approach could mean more people will die. Today on the Front Page ends at Herald, Senior investigative reporter Michael Morritt joins us to discuss what he's learned about the.
People meant to keep us safe in disguise.
Michael, can you just remind us what the Civil Aviation Authority is?
What are they tasked with doing?
Yeah, so they are a Crown entity and they are charged with both overseeing aviation regulatory performance in New Zealand, but also they oversee ABSEEC or our aviation security service at the airports.
How did this story come about?
How many people have you actually spoken to for this investigation.
So I've spoken to seven sources for this investigation. They are a mix of current staff members and some former staff members. I guess the important thing to point out to listeners is that it is highly unusual for government employees to go on the record with a journalist, and I think that speaks volumes that they have done that. They are obviously very nervous about being identified, so I
won't be revealing who those people are. But they felt and have told me that they came to me because it was the last option and they could not get change or action through senior leaders at CIA about their concerns.
Well, one thing that the whistleblowers have told you is that they believe that the CIA is turning their back on being.
As safety regulator. What's happening here and why are staff so concerned?
Yeah, there are two sets of concerns. One is around the changes to the organization from an investigative approach, and the second set of concerns relates to what staff describe as a toxic culture where bullying and harassment is an ongoing problem. Let's deal with the first issue. The main thing that's happening at the moment is that there has been a significant change program undertaken at the CA that has involved combining the safety investigation team with the enforcement team.
My sources are concerned that the CIA is going to take a greater enforcement role. It is more focused now on prosecutions. Historically, how the civil aviation has worked, and this has been the case for many years, is that they haven't had a system of what's called just culture.
Now just culture is a system where they work with industry and if there are mishaps or mistakes or problems like near misses or if a door falls off an airplane or something like that, they feel that they can come to the CIA and not to fy authorities about
that freely without facing any sort of punishment. The concern is that CIA is moving towards more of an enforcement focus, and in turn that industry or aviation operators, people who fly helicopters and planes, people who crew them, will be less likely to be transparent and open with the CIA
about what's going on. And that is a significant concern by my sources because they believe that will ultimately lead to aviation in New Zealand becoming more unsafe, and it ultimately puts at risk New Zealanders who travel on planes every day.
The culture or the direction of the organization has changed from being more of a safety regulator, if you like, to a compliance and enforcement type regulator, and so we've sort of turned our back on that now and gone more towards a punitive type approach. That's ultimately what's going to potentially cause more accidents to happen.
If we don't get it together. The outcome is a catastrophic accident, another Fox Glecia, another cartertan Bloon accident, like our traveling public is going to die because we can't get our shit in one sock.
Now, it's important to point out that the CIA has told me that the changes are not about increasing enforcement activity or taking a more punitive approach to investigations. They say that they have made these changes based on a review by Mike heron KC and that they are following all their obligations and are still very much dedicated to safety outcomes. In fact, they believe the changes will improve safety for all New Zealanders. So their side of the
story is very different to what my sources say. It's worth pointing out, however, while I have seven sources raising concerns about this. Their concerns are also backed up by a leaked PSA survey that I have been given.
Now.
This survey details comments from dozens of other current staff members, and I'll just read you one of the comments from one of the staff members in that because I think it encapsulates the concerns of staff at the CIA. They have said that the proposal exposes the authority to unacceptable risk at the expense of the flying public of Alted New Zealand. They go on to say that this could have reputational damage or cause reputational risk to the organization.
And how have people's concerns about the direction of the CIA or what it's taken led to what's been described as very toxic.
The overriding concern, and this has been the case for some time, is that when concerns are raised, they are not dealt with properly and quickly by the senior leadership at the CIA. They feel like the changes that are being proposed have essentially been forced through and those who have had different opinions have been isolated or excluded, and in some cases good staff have been effectively forced out of their position.
I've decided to talk about what's happening internally at CIA. Because good people are leaving, good people are being pushed out. It's going to impact public safety. If someone raises a concern, be very careful, you will be exited. That's why a lot of people don't want to speak up anymore.
We were all encouraged to be upstanders, not bystanders when we're missing inappropriate behavior. And when you did upstand, you were ignored. And it got to the point where I just had to leave. I knew that I wasn't going to change the system.
Now, just talking about this concern about a sort of a toxic culture, which is what my sources say prevails at the Civil Aviation Authority. This is in some way verified by official information that I have obtained. And this is basically looking at the time period from June twenty twenty two until June twenty twenty four, so very recent.
It's the last two years, and that reveals that there were sixty four complaints raised by staff about behavior at the CIA, sixteen complaints related to inappropriate behavior, twenty seven complaints related to bullying and harassment. Now, the CIA says, well that official information you got actually represented complaints by staff at both CIA and ad SEC, and if you split them, which they have done for me, the number of complaints from actual CIA staff is less. It's about
seventeen complaints. In saying that the CIA still acknowledges that any complaints are still concerning to it.
Well, what's it costing the CIA those complaints?
Well, I was pretty shock, to be honest, to see what is being spent on dealing with employment issues. My sources have pointed out, of course, that the CIA does have internal employment lawyers, they have internal staff who could
deal with this. However, the official information shows that six hundred and forty four thousand dollars was spent on external lawyers to deal with employment issues, internal complaints or investigations, and that, according to my sources, is in their words, unbelievable, in a horrific amount of money when you consider that the CIA has their own legal.
Team and that money was that over that two years.
Correct, that's just the past two years.
But given that is taxpayer money, what role does this organization have with the government and can the gover government step in?
Ultimately, it's a crown entity, government agency. It is answerable to the Minister same and Brown, and there are calls because of the perceived inaction by senior leaders at the CIA, for the Minister to intervene. All my sources have said it is critical that he does because in their mind and in their words, the CIA is a train that is out of control and about to wreck. So the
concerns are great from my sources. They have serious concerns about major, serious dysfunction within this government organization.
And this is all coming after a twenty twenty ministerial review by the then Transport Minister Phil Twiford that revealed a culture of bullying and harassment at the organization. What was done in the wake of that report and seemingly, why hasn't it worked?
Yeah, look, it's a good question. And I was the reporter responsible for exposing concerns in twenty nineteen that prompted this ministerial review. In twenty nineteen, I was approached by a completely separate and different group of whistleblowers from within the CIA, and they spoke to me about complaints being covered up, about sexual harassment and bullying, complaints being disregarded by managers, and at that time, the Transport Minister Phil
Tweyford intervened and launched a ministerial review. The review verified my reporting that essentially bullying and harassment had been enabled by senior leaders and that it had continued for some time, and the issue there was that it was essentially the leadership who had failed now in this case. After that there was the resignation of then Director of the CIA, Graham Harris, and Nigel Gould, who was the chair woman of the board, was effectively sacked by Transport Minister Phil Twyford.
He was sacked because he questioned the motives of the whistleblowers who had spoken to me, which of course didn't go down very well with the Transport Minister at the time, so there was big talk of changes. There was a special project setup to try and make it a more safe and inclusive working environment, to try and improve culture. Evidently, it appears in recent years that has not worked as it should have, and the bullying and the words of my sources is worse than it's ever been.
In places it is horrendous. Where I know there are people who simply will not go into the office because of the attitude and having to see certain people. Managers have literally berated other people for their thoughts, their opinions, their views on things in front of other staff. Currently, it does feel like we're on a train that's out of control about to wreck, and they're just sitting back waiting to see where it ends.
So while the focus has been on this special project called to Carcino to try and improve culture, it has not worked essentially. And the concern from my sources is that when they raise complaints, sometimes they are actively discouraged from raising complaints, and other times when they go right up to the director, they are concerned that he doesn't always act on what he's being told. So it's pretty disappointing as a journalist. You know, I worked really hard
on that story. I felt that the minister at the time did the right thing by stepping in and launching this ministerial inquiry, and a lot of work was done to improve culture and there was a new focus. And yet here we are in twenty twenty four and the same problems are playing out where my sources say there is a toxic undercurrent within the CIA.
Well, the current director and chief executive now is Keith Manch and people have described him to you as being asleep at the wheel, going so far as to call him Joe Biden.
What's the issue there with him?
I think the main concern is my sources say he's trying to put out so many fires, in their words, with problems at the agency, that he's just not being effective at his role as director. They don't believe he's been effective at reducing the number of bullying or harassment complaints. They don't believe he's been effective at making CIA's culture and working environment a lot better, and they just sort
of think he's essentially, you know, missing an action. And they also believe that complaints that have gone directly to him have been downplayed or disregarded, given responses like hey, thanks for your feedback, we'll look into that, but then nothing eventuates. And that's the concern here, is that my sources have done the right thing. They've tried to, you know, stand up as they were encouraged to do post the twenty nineteen twenty twenty minister and inquiry, stand up and
be heard. Yet when they are standing up, they're not being listened to, or sometimes when they're standing up, they're actually being encouraged not to lay a complaint because it might come back on them. And that's the worry is that people who are raising concerns end up themselves they feel being targeted.
It's about being put into the cross heres of these people. I've been made aware of growing men in tears because of what has been done to them, and people are just kind of backing off now. They don't want to stand up, They don't want to say anything because you know that you'll be the next person that's going to be targeted by them.
We're seeing a huge decline in reporting because they are fearful of reporting.
More people will die if industry stop all the free reporting.
How has the CIA responded to these claims?
Well, look, I sent a series of very specific questions to the CIA. Unfortunately they did not answer most of them, but they did say that they're still working on culture issues and that, in their words, having a respectful, safe and inclusive workplace remains a key and ongoing priority for the CIA's director, Keith Manch and that they've introduced a whole lot of things and initiatives to try and improve
workplace culture. For example, ninety eight percent of all staff have completed an online bull being, harassment and discrimination course, and most senior leaders have completed a development program with special assessments and coaching, so they're very clear that they have a zero tolerance approach to this sort of behavior and are still working on this as a priority. As is evident from my sources, it doesn't appear to be going very well.
What do you expect will happen next in this well?
I don't know, but I suspect that there may be others within CIA who have relevant information about the goings on at the agency, and if they do, I would encourage those people to get in touch with me. I think that the new Transport Minister, Siman Brown, will find the story of interest and I would expect that he would want to have a discussion with the Civil Aviation Authority its leaders about what we have exposed in this exclusive story this morning.
Thanks for joining us, Michael.
That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage at enzed Herald dot co dot z. The Front Page is produced by Ethan Siles with sound engineer Patty Fox. I'm Chelsea Daniels. Subscribe to the Front Page on iHeartRadio or wherever you get your podcasts and Tune in tomorrow for another look behind the headlines.