In March 2022, the Report of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee on the 2020/21 Annual Review of the Ministry of Defence and the NZDF, noted in the section headed ‘Strategic competition in the Pacific’ that, “We heard that there will not be a white paper in 2022. However, Defence will be recommending to Ministers terms of reference that look at the development of defence policy settings in a more proactive approach, and the force structure that would support those settings.” Does this mean that there might be a new white paper in 2023, will we see another government defence policy statement, or will there be a revised defence capability plan?
The Ministry of Defence website notes that Defence policy settings in New Zealand's are reviewed on a regular basis, and that “The results of these reviews, Defence White Papers and Strategic Defence Policy Statements, are the highest-level expression of Government's Defence policy settings.” It notes that, “these policy documents will present an assessment of New Zealand's strategic environment and set out at a high level the range of activities the New Zealand Defence Force must be prepared to undertake” before adding that “[t]he most recent formal expression of New Zealand's Defence policy is the Strategic Defence Policy Statement 2018,” which was released by the Labour-led Coalition Government.