Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (New Zealand)

The department serves the Executive branch of government (the governor-general, the prime minister and the Cabinet) through the provision of impartial advice and support services.

In addition to serving the Executive, a major role of the department is to help co-ordinate the work of the core public service departments and ministries.

The department formally came into existence on 1 January 1990, as a result of a report which recommended establishing structures to provide two separate streams of advice to the prime minister; one, a new Government department to supply impartial advice and support to the prime minister and Cabinet (DPMC), and another, a Prime Minister's Private Office (which is not part of DPMC), to provide personal support and media services, and advice of a party political nature.

The DPMC website describes its primary objective as “helping to provide, at an administrative level, the 'constitutional and institutional glue' that underlies our system of parliamentary democracy.” New Zealand has an ‘unwritten’ constitution which is characterised by its reliance on disparate pieces of legislation, norms, and structures that underpin the distribution of governmental power. The DPMC plays a central role in the application of these foundational aspects of government in New Zealand. and therefore, as an institution serves as a part of these constitutional arrangements itself.

Government House was added to the department in August 1990. The National Assessments Bureau (formerly known as the External Assessments Bureau) became part of the department on 1 July 1991. Responsibility for civil defence and emergency management was consolidated in the department in 2014 through a business unit called the Ministry for Civil Defence and Emergency Management (MCDEM). MCDEM was superseded by an autonomous departmental agency hosted by DPMC in 2019, the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA).

The department is often responsible for coordinating government responses to significant events. It leads the All-of-Government Response to the COVID-19 pandemic in New Zealand and the Government response to the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Terrorist Attack on the Christchurch Mosques.[6] It previously led and coordinated central government's ongoing role in the recovery and regeneration of greater Christchurch following the earthquakes of 2010 and 2011. The department's Greater Christchurch Group operated from April 2016 until January 2021.[7]

In February 2018 the Child Wellbeing and Poverty Reduction Group became a business unit of the DPMC to support the then-Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in her role as Minister for Child Poverty Reduction and to support development of New Zealand’s Wellbeing Strategy for children and young people. As the current Minister for Child Poverty Reduction, Jan Tinetti is now the lead minister for this work

Following review by Cabinet of the Health and Disability System Review/Hauora Manaaki Ki Aotearoa Whānui a business unit known as the Health and Disability Review Transition Unit was established in September 2020 to lead the response to the review. This business unit ceased to operate in September 2022 with its monitoring function handed to the Ministry of Health.

The most recent addition to the department’s portfolio of business units is the Implementation Unit which began operating in June 2021 with the goal of supporting the implementation of selected priority programmes and ensuring that key relevant figures and agencies are kept regularly and accurately informed on the progress of these programmes.

The DPMC through its Honours Unit contained within the Cabinet Office also administers the New Zealand Royal Honours System. Made up of the following awards, the final Honours list is approved by The King of New Zealand on the advice of the Prime Minister:

• The Order of New Zealand
• The New Zealand Order of Merit
• The Queen's Service Order and associated Queen's Service Medal
• The New Zealand Bravery and Gallantry Awards
• The New Zealand Distinguished Service Decoration
• The New Zealand Antarctic Medal.

Time to time there have also been one-off or special awards such as the New Zealand 1990 Commemoration Medal, and the New Zealand Suffrage Medal 1993.

The DPMC (Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet) runs eight business units headed by the Chief Executive, Rebecca Kitteridge. Each of the following eight serves a different purpose and set of relevant Ministers or other office-holders:

A number of groups have been established and disestablished throughout the time that the DPMC has served the Government. After a significant earthquake in Canterbury in early 2015,[12] while the city was still recovering from the 2011 Christchurch Earthquake, the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (CERA) was established, followed by the Greater Christchurch Group (GCG) in 2016. The disestablishment of CERA occurred in 2016 and GCG in 2021.[13] The groups will have supported the Minister supporting Greater Christchurch Regeneration, initially Gerry Brownlee, then Nicky Wagner, and finally Megan Woods.

Many responsibilities have been shifted from the COVID-19 group to Health New Zealand and Ministry of Health. It's likely that the COVID-19 group will be disestablished, in the same way as CERA and GCG at some point in future, as the threat from COVID-19 fades and the pandemic ends.

The Head of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet has a "unified purpose to advance an ambitious, resilient and well-governed New Zealand". Their role is to be advisors, leaders, and stewards for the executive government.[9] A key difference between the head of DPMC and those within the DPMC is that the head is part of the public service therefore their core job is to support the government of the day. They must remain non-partisan and will continue to serve the government no matter the basis of who is in the government of the day. The current head of the DPMC is made up of these crucial roles; Chief executive, Deputy Chief executive: of the National Security Group, Deputy Chief executive: Policy, Secretary of the Cabinet/ Clerk Of The Executive council, Executive Director, Strategy, Governance and Engagement Group and Child Wellbeing and Poverty Reduction Group, Executive Director: Implementation Unit and Deputy Chief Executive, COVID-19 Group.[9] The clerk of the executive reports to the governor-general and the chief executive reports to the prime minister. To see current members and their roles refer to the table above.

The Chief Executive of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet works for public service. The main point of contact between the Ministerial Department and the public service represented by the DPMC is the chief executive.[14] The Chief Executive of the DPMC holds the core role of leading and managing the department. They hold many responsibilities including accountability for the departments' performance and the conduct of staff within the department including areas like understanding conflicts of interest that staff may hold. Furthermore, they are also responsible for allocating and tracking resources that government provides the DPMC. Additionally, they are the chair of the officials' committee for domestic and external security cooperation (ODESC).[15] In conjunction with other team members of the leadership section in the department, they work to improve public service performance and work collaboratively amongst themselves and across multiple agencies. This department must lead and communicate crucial information to other agencies and departments within the government and the Chief Executive supports the prime minister of the day to enable this to happen well.[16] The Chief Executive regularly holds meetings with the prime minister to discuss issues that are relevant to the DPMC. The Chief Executive also meets regularly with the Security of the Cabinet to establish the agenda for Cabinet meetings.

Heads of the DPMC (formerly Secretary, now the Chief Executive) are:

• Officials Committee for Domestic and External Security Co-ordination
• Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (Australia)

• Official website