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I run a café with a small team. Food and power costs are squeezing margins, customers are spending less, and we've experienced a break-in. I am considering my vote in the 2026 New Zealand general election. How do parties compare on immigration settings for hospitality workers?
For a café, the key distinction is whether a party wants easier access to overseas hospitality labour, or tighter controls on temporary migrant workers. As of 4 October 2026, the major parties differ quite substantially.
| Party | Immigration approach relevant to hospitality | What it could mean for a café |
|---|---|---|
| National | Retains an employer-sponsored system but is tightening requirements in some areas. Since June 2026, English requirements have been extended to AEWV skill-level 3 roles. National has also introduced new skilled residence pathways for experienced workers. English language requirement extended to AEWV skill level 3 roles | National Party | More access to skilled migrant labour, but with more compliance requirements. The effect on cafés depends heavily on which occupations your workers fall into. |
| Labour | Wants immigration planned around workforce, housing and infrastructure capacity. It would strengthen the AEWV while allowing migrants to move between accredited employers after three months, and would put more emphasis on migrant protection. Release: Labour to ensure an immigration system that works for New Zealand | More worker mobility and protections, potentially making recruitment/retention easier for some businesses, but Labour also proposes tighter overall planning and a longer path to permanent residence. |
| ACT | Wants each AEWV skill category to automatically expire annually unless there is current evidence of demand. It would extend basic English requirements to all AEWVs and add a $6/day infrastructure charge to temporary work visas. ACT New Zealand | A more explicitly demand-driven system, but potentially higher costs and more uncertainty if café occupations aren't continually demonstrated to be in shortage. |
| Green | Favors a more migrant-friendly system, including fairer pathways to settlement and stronger protections against exploitation. Its 2026 manifesto describes migrant workers as entitled to fair treatment and pathways to make Aotearoa home. Manifesto 2026 - Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand | Greater worker protections and potentially easier long-term settlement, rather than using immigration primarily as a short-term labour supply mechanism. |
| NZ First | Proposes substantially reducing non-essential immigration, with a 20,000 annual resident-visa cap subject to a referendum, longer residence/citizenship qualifying periods and a 10-year welfare stand-down for non-citizens. NZ First Announces Immigration Reform Policies - New Zealand First | A significantly tighter overall immigration environment, which could make overseas recruitment and retaining migrant staff more difficult over time. |
The current system matters too
Regardless of which party you consider, the starting point in 2026 is the Accredited Employer Work Visa (AEWV). It permits migrants to work for an accredited employer, generally requires at least 30 hours a week, and can last up to five years depending on the job. Accredited Employer Work Visa » Immigration New Zealand
There have already been significant changes affecting lower- and mid-skilled hospitality jobs. English requirements apply to skill levels 4–5, and since 1 June 2026 they also apply to skill level 3. The Government says the baseline is IELTS 4.0 or equivalent. English language requirement extended to AEWV skill level 3 roles | National Party
The Government has also moved away from the old sector-specific wage exemptions: the tourism and hospitality wage exemption that existed before March 2025 ended, although some workers retain exemptions from particular skill requirements. Sector agreements and wage exemptions for AEWV workers :: Immigration New Zealand
For your particular situation
If your main immigration question is “How easy will it be for me to recruit a chef, cook, supervisor or other café worker from overseas?”, I'd pay particular attention to three things rather than simply looking at each party's headline migration numbers:
- Whether the occupation remains eligible for an AEWV and what skill level it is classified at. The occupation lists are being transitioned from ANZSCO to the National Occupation List, with further occupations added in March 2026. National Occupation List occupations used for an AEWV :: Immigration New Zealand
- Whether the party would impose additional English, wage, accreditation or labour-market-testing requirements.
- Whether migrant employees can change employers easily. This is particularly important for a small café: Labour's proposed three-month mobility rule is quite different from a system tightly binding a worker to one employer. Release: Labour to ensure an immigration system that works for New Zealand
One other relevant point for your business: National has previously explicitly identified tourism and hospitality worker shortages as a problem and proposed measures such as raising the Working Holiday Visa upper age from 30 to 35. Boosting Tourism Authorised by J de Joux, 41 Pipit
So, rather than treating this as a simple left/right immigration question, you could frame it as: which party's proposed labour-migration system best matches the staffing model of your café—short-term overseas recruitment, experienced skilled staff, or longer-term migrant retention? That distinction produces quite different comparisons between the parties.
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Captured 5 October 2026 · shown as ChatGPT gave it, not a verified account