Summarised by Centrist
New Zealand has slipped to third place out of 180 countries, behind Denmark and Finland, in the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), an annual ranking by Transparency International. Since 2012, New Zealand has consistently been ranked first or first equal but has now fallen to third place.
Although New Zealand remains one of the least corrupt countries globally, Julie Haggie, CEO of Transparency International New Zealand says:
“There were a number of high-profile prosecutions during the last year in areas such as fraud, tax evasion and COVID subsidy related fraud prosecutions. This could point both to systems that are working as well as poor integrity systems that are enabling it to occur.
“New Zealanders have also seen a huge rise in scamming without sufficient response. People want to know that integrity systems are holding up against corrupt practices. And, despite improvement in transparency of public tendering platforms, much more effort is needed in improving the transparency of government spending and the governance of public infrastructure projects if community trust is to be sustained,” Haggie said.
While New Zealand’s score declined, Australia’s score remained unchanged at 75, placing it 14th.
