Auckland's mayor Phil Goff says there needs to be consequences for people who are not vaccinated.
He told Morning Report the city can't wait for the last reluctant person to be vaccinated before moving down alert levels.
"We need to maximise the number of people being vaccinated, but we can't wait for the last reluctant person to be vaccinated before we decide that it's safe to relax the restriction."
Goff said he supports a vaccine certificate as a way to force hesitant people to get vaccinated, alongside encouragement.
"It's got to be a lot of encouragement, making sure that people have got the opportunity, getting our camper vans out there, getting our buses out there to the more vulnerable and more reluctant communities.
"At the same time, there has to be a price to be paid for not getting vaccinated. That may be access to hospitality areas. It will be access to events, and it may be access to actually a whole lot of jobs that are public facing."
He said regions outside Auckland, such as Northland, need to see a maximum effort.
The region's current alert level 3 restrictions will stay in place for another two weeks, and the government is working on more support for Auckland businesses.
Goff said that is desperately needed.
"We're talking about 11 weeks of lockdown, they [businesses] just can't survive 11 weeks of lockdown.
"Absolutely acknowledge that the government's put well over a billion dollars into wage subsidies and hundreds of millions into the resurgence payments, but I've been saying that Minister of Finance, we need some extra help for those businesses that are otherwise viable but will go under if we've got a further prolonged period of restrictions."
RNZ
