A rift in New Zealand¡¯s governing coalition may stymie plans to open the country¡¯s third medical school, with prime minister Christopher Luxon and incoming deputy prime minister David Seymour at loggerheads over the issue.

Seymour, head of the coalition¡¯s junior Association of Consumers and Taxpayers (Act) Party, reportedly told business leaders that he opposed the new medical school because he did not want the country to go ¡°broke¡±.

¡°I stand here on the basis of careful use of taxpayers¡¯ money,¡± Seymour told a meeting of the Waikato Chamber of Commerce, according to the?. ¡°If there¡¯s a clear objective and the best way to achieve the objective to subsidise the University of Waikato is to build a medical school, I¡¯m all in.

¡°But the onus is on the proponents of the idea to show that it stacks up. They haven¡¯t come close to doing it, and if you want to blame someone, I would not blame the person who is standing up for careful use of taxpayer money. I would blame the person who made a promise that is maybe a bit harder to stack up than initially indicated.¡±

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Prior to the October 2023 election, Luxon promised to cover up to NZ$280 million (?124 million) of the school¡¯s estimated NZ$380 million capital establishment cost, ¡°pending a final business case¡±. But in a post-election pact with Act, Luxon¡¯s National Party committed to producing a full cost-benefit analysis ¡°before any binding agreement¡±.

A preliminary business case released in August found that a medical school at Waikato would have the greatest ¡°long-term benefits¡± of the various options to boost domestic medical training. But a Ministry of Health??recommended a ¡°detailed business case¡± to ¡°validate key assumptions¡±, saying it expected the extra analysis to be completed by the end of March.

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In September, Seymour??health minister Shane Reti he was ¡°dissatisfied¡± with the preliminary analysis because it had only modelled the costs of producing general practitioners and not other specialist doctors.

Opinions about the Waikato proposal are mixed. Some view it as a ¡°vanity project¡± that has driven the university to ally itself with the country¡¯s conservative political parties. They say that if a third medical school is established, it should be based in underserviced regional areas rather than Waikato¡¯s base of Hamilton, which is New Zealand¡¯s fourth-biggest city just 120 kilometres south of Auckland.

But doctors¡¯ groups say the decision is taking too long, according to?. ¡°We need more doctors and we need them as soon as we can get them so we need to be training more doctors here in New Zealand,¡± said Association of Salaried Medical Specialists executive director Sarah Dalton.

On 31 May, Seymour takes over as deputy prime minister from the leader of the other junior coalition party, New Zealand First¡¯s Winston Peters. Seymour told Hamilton business leaders that he had no time for the ¡°parochial route¡± where ¡°each area of the country should be out for what they get, regardless of cost¡±.

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¡°New Zealand has been there before,¡± he reportedly said. ¡°Every region had its thing from the government. And we went broke.¡±

john.ross@timeshighereducation.com