COVID-19 vaccine passes and mandates will become an "employment issue" after they are scrapped by the Government, according to a prominent lawyer.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern on Wednesday, announcing Australian tourists will be able to return from next month, hinted restrictions including vaccine passes could be scrapped then too.
"We see that the role of vaccine passes, once we come through that first wave, changes," she said at a press conference.
The Government has been under pressure to justify mandatory immunisation for sectors of the workforce now that more than 95 percent of New Zealand's eligible population has had two doses of the vaccine. The primary purpose of the vaccine mandates across health, education and other critical workforces were to help reduce the impact of the virus that's killed more than 6 million people and infected nearly 463 million worldwide.
But they've been highly contentious - prompting a three-week protest at Parliament that ended in a violent standoff with police.
Speaking to AM, lawyer Marie Dyhrberg said vaccine passes and mandates will soon become a personal decision for businesses.
"I see it as more an employment issue where employers might want to keep their places safe and only have vaccinated people," she said on Thursday.
"It will become very much a personal choice, say in restaurants, shops and so forth, as to whether they want to check - for their own staff - that people are vaccinated."
Government ministers had previously signalled the intention to roll back mandates once New Zealand's Omicron outbreak has peaked.
But we haven't peaked yet, Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield told AM on Thursday. The Ministry of Health reported 19,542 infections on Wednesday and 21,616 on Tuesday - up from 15,540 on Monday.
Dr Bloomfield said he didn't want to pre-empt any Government decisions around vaccine passes and mandates.
"I'll just leave that to the PM and Cabinet to make that decision and I'm sure she will communicate it once they have."
The Opposition has questioned the need for mandates due to a highly-vaccinated population.
COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins told AM earlier this month the Government was keeping mandates and all other coronavirus restrictions under "regular review".
"Ultimately, that's going to be dictated by the public health considerations - by making sure we're dealing with COVID-19.
"One of the challenges that we're grappling with, of course, is… the peak that we're dealing with and currently climbing towards - we don't know what that peak is going to be and we don't know how long that's going to last."
