REVEALED: Climate bureaucrats burn $303,000 jet-setting to Brazil’s COP30 junket

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through Official Information Act requeststhat the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Ministry for Primary Industries and the Ministry for the Environment spent $303,026.78 sending 17 staff to the 2025 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30) in Belém, Brazil.

Key facts:
-The Ministry for the Environment sent 2 staff for a total cost of $56,706.78.
-The Ministry of Foreign Affairs sent 14 staff for a total cost of $221,596.
-The Ministry for Primary Industries sent 1 staffer for a total cost of $21,724.
-The average cost per night of accommodation was $1,310.38 per person.
-MFAT flew six staff business class to the conference.

Taxpayers’ Union Investigative Lead Rhys Hurley said:

“Each agency says it scaled back its delegation compared to COP 29, but with four more delegates, costing nearly $80,000 more in taxpayers money than last year, the numbers don’t lie."

“The irony of six highly paid foreign affairs officials flying business class to this ‘green’ gathering wont be lost on anyone. Are these the flights the Minister of Foreign Affairs was so determined to save from budget cuts?"

“At an average of $1,310 each per night on hotels, apparently saving the planet doesn’t come cheap. That’s five times the $260 nightly cap for MPs staying in first-world Wellington or Auckland.”

"Zoom is apparently good enough for working-from-home days, but when there’s a taxpayer-funded trip to Brazil on offer, only face-to-face will do. With COP31 only 12 weeks away, ministers should be telling a few more bureaucrats to put their passports back in the drawer."