The FENZ Board, executive leadership, Public Services Commission and the Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden have no shame in boosting the FENZ Board members' payments up 79% while many firefighters languish just above the minimum wage and well below the living wage.

It has been publicly released today that Minister Brooke van Velden approved the huge increases for Board Director fees in December last year.  In the FENZ context, the Board Chair would receive a 42% increase in the annual fee with a rise from $64,150 to $91,560 for an “expected commitment of 50 days responsibilities” .  The Deputy Chair and Board members have an even bigger 79% increase with an increase from $31,762 to $57,000 (for an expected 30-50 days commitment to responsibilities) and $25,410 to $45,600 (for an expected 30 days commitment) per annum respectively.

Based on 50 days commitment, the Board Chair will go from being paid $1283 a day to $1831.20 a day.  That is nearly $100 more than the wages for a 42-hour week for a Senior Firefighter with up to 10 years’ experience.

Media reports that FENZ has confirmed the huge jump in the Board members' director fees can be “afforded from within its baseline budget”.  Clearly, Board members and executive leadership can cream off massive increases while they tell the NZPFU members there is no money for reasonable wage increases.

This despicable conduct, on top of recent wage theft behaviour with FENZ unlawfully deducting wages for strikes that have not occurred, and a proposed restructure to disestablish more than 150 jobs, outs FENZ leadership’s priorities to pay themselves first and on the backs of effective wage cuts, or job cuts, for the workers. 

• The NZPFU members have not had a pay increase since 1 July 2023. 
• The recruit and lowest firefighter ranks are paid $25.86 an hour and $27.71-$28.92 an hour.  The minimum hourly wage is $23.95 and the living wage is $29.90.
• The largest group of firefighters are Senior Firefighters (with qualifications and up to 9 years of experience); base wages are $80,682 gross p.a. working 42 hours a week.   

Compare that with the below salaries of senior management, or with the CE Kerry Gregory’s annual salary (as reported in September 2025) As $518,070.  That equates to an average of nearly $10,000 a week.

The remuneration range steps for each DCE every year, since 30 June 2021 as reported in September 2024:

And for those that say you can’t compare senior management or Board wages with firefighters – the comparison with non-NZPFU non-management roles is just as damning.

A project manager in FENZ starts at $136,000 for 40 hours a week on appointment.   

Compare that with the highest Officer rank of Senior Station Officer Executive Officer Qualified who earns up to $113,608 for a 42 hour week.  They are likely to have had 15-45  years’ experience,  have significant qualifications, and are required to make complex decisions quickly that could impact the safety and lives of the firefighting crews and the public they respond to.  They can be responsible for complex and long duration events requiring a range of specialist appliances and can have dozens of firefighters under their command. 

The NZPFU met with the Minister earlier this year who was clear the Board was not moving on its position that the public sector had to demonstrate restraint in pay rises, including for the NZPFU members, and that Treasury and Public Sector guidelines, included a cap of any increase to 2.2% of FENZ’s current personnel costs.  

It also appears that FENZ has not been wholly accurate in responses to information on the issue.  In an Official Information Act response dated 1 September, FENZ stated “there were no plans for remuneration ranges (for the CE Role and Board) to be increased in the next 12 months.  The OIA request was made because the Government had given Boards the ability to award themselves the new increased rates set by the Minister of Internal Affairs.

Meanwhile, FENZ is yet to propose dates for ongoing bargaining.

NZPFU members will be striking from 12 noon today, including Wellington members heading to Parliament.