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If your main concern is “what happens to my specialist care between now and the completed Dunedin Hospital?”, there is a fairly important distinction in the 2026 election debate: the new outpatient building is already coming into service, while the major inpatient building is not scheduled to open until 2031. Parties differ more on how to reduce waiting lists during that period than on the basic existence of the project.

What the new Dunedin Hospital will actually provide

New Dunedin Hospital is being delivered in two stages.

• Outpatient building — Whare Mātūtū: the five-storey, 15,000 m² building opened in 2026. It brings together specialist outpatient and diagnostic services including orthopaedics, ophthalmology, respiratory medicine, children's and women's health, radiology/imaging and day surgery. Health NZ says it is intended to serve about 352,000 people across Otago and Southland. New Dunedin Hospital | Project Whakatuputupu
• Inpatient building — scheduled for 2031: this is the much larger 72,000 m², 11-storey building. It is to contain an expanded emergency department, operating theatres, short-stay surgical unit, ICU/high-dependency beds and inpatient wards. New Dunedin Hospital | Project Whakatuputupu
• Until then, some important services—including the existing inpatient wards, surgical theatres and emergency department—remain at the old Great King Street hospital. New Dunedin Hospital | Project Whakatuputupu

So, for someone dependent on specialist appointments, the outpatient stage is directly relevant now: the new building is specifically intended to increase capacity for specialist appointments, diagnostics and day surgery. But it does not mean the entire hospital has been replaced yet.

There is also a broader problem that the building alone cannot solve. Nationally, only 66.1% of patients were getting a first specialist assessment within four months in April–June 2026, against the Government's eventual 95% target. The Ministry says specialist shortages and geographic differences in capacity remain constraints. Health targets: five out of five moving in the right direction | National Party

What the parties are proposing for waiting times

Here's the most relevant comparison I can establish from the parties' published 2026 policies.

Party	Main mechanism relevant to specialist waits	What it means for Otago/Southland while the hospital is being built
National	Continue the national <4-month specialist and elective-treatment targets, expand workforce, use public/private capacity through the Elective Boost, and give regional health leadership more control over staffing and resources.	This is largely a “increase throughput now” approach rather than a special Dunedin interim programme. National points to the new outpatient building, additional doctors/nurses, overseas specialist recruitment, private-sector elective capacity and 2031 completion of the inpatient building. Health targets: five out of five moving in the right direction | National Party
Labour	Increase frontline staffing, notably a job guarantee for NZ-trained graduate nurses, with around 2,400 graduates a year eligible for health-system jobs from 2027. Labour also promises to repair hospital infrastructure.	Labour's approach is primarily more workforce capacity, rather than a separately announced Otago/Southland specialist-waiting-time programme. Its nurse policy explicitly argues that additional staff should reduce pressure and waiting. Graduate Nurse Job Guarantee - NZ Labour
Green	Substantial workforce investment, safe staffing, pay parity, mobile health/diagnostic services and stronger primary care; specifically proposes mobile healthcare, mental-health clinics and diagnostic services for rural communities.	This has a more explicit regional/rural-access component: some diagnostics and services would be taken to rural communities rather than requiring every patient to travel to Dunedin. But the manifesto does not specify an Otago/Southland specialist-wait target or interim Dunedin waiting-list fund. Health - Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand
NZ First	Its published health plan proposes a $925m-a-year GP-controlled Waitlist Reduction Fund, allowing GPs to purchase approved specialist appointments and operations; it also proposes mobile specialist services, digital clinics in hard-to-staff areas and accelerated recruitment of overseas clinicians.	Of the policies I found, this is one of the clearest mechanisms for directly buying additional specialist capacity while waiting lists exist, including capacity outside the normal hospital pathway. However, the published policy is national rather than a Dunedin-specific commitment. 2023 Election Policies - NZ First
ACT	Emphasis on productivity, performance measurement, expanded roles for pharmacists and other clinicians, and faster access through changes to how healthcare is delivered.	ACT's proposals could reduce pressure on hospitals by shifting appropriate work into primary/community care, but I could not find a published 2026 commitment specifically allocating additional specialist capacity to Otago/Southland during the Dunedin build. ACT New Zealand

National: continue the current waiting-list programme

National's strongest directly relevant policy is the system it is already operating: its Elective Boost, which buys additional capacity from public and private providers, alongside the four-month specialist and elective-treatment targets.

The Government reports that in April–June 2026, 66.1% of first specialist assessments were within four months and 72.6% of elective treatments were within four months. It also says more than 14,200 fewer people were waiting longer than four months for elective treatment than at the peak. Those are national figures, not a Dunedin-specific guarantee. Health targets: five out of five moving in the right direction | National Party

National has also shifted some Health NZ decision-making toward regions, explicitly giving them more control over workforce, budgets and service delivery, which could allow Southern to deploy staff according to local waiting lists. Moving health decisions closer to home | National Party

Labour: workforce expansion is the main lever

Labour's clearest 2026 commitment relevant to hospital capacity is its Graduate Nurse Job Guarantee. It says every eligible NZ-trained graduate nurse will receive a health-system job, with roles of at least 0.8 FTE from 2027, costing $525m. Labour argues that having more nurses in hospitals and community services will increase capacity and reduce pressure on existing staff. Graduate Nurse Job Guarantee - NZ Labour

That's potentially relevant to Southern, but there is an important distinction: more nurses are not the same thing as more specialist appointments. Specialist waiting lists also depend on consultants, operating theatres, diagnostics and clinic capacity.

Greens: take some services to rural patients

The Green 2026 health plan is more explicit about geographic access. It proposes mobile healthcare and mental-health clinics, diagnostic services and dental vans for rural communities, as well as safe staffing levels and increased health-workforce funding. Health - Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand

For Otago and Southland, that could matter particularly for people outside Dunedin and Invercargill who currently have to travel for investigations or appointments. But it isn't presented as a specific temporary specialist-waiting programme for the 2026–31 Dunedin construction period.

NZ First: a direct waitlist-purchasing mechanism

NZ First's published policy is unusually specific on the waiting-list question. It proposes $925m annually for a GP-controlled Waitlist Reduction Fund, through which GPs could purchase approved specialist appointments and operations. It also proposes mobile specialist services, digital health clinics in harder-to-staff areas and accelerated recruitment of overseas clinical staff. 2023 Election Policies - NZ First

That is conceptually the closest match to the question “how do we buy extra specialist capacity while the public hospital system is under pressure?” But the policy isn't a promise that a particular number of Otago/Southland patients would receive appointments through it.

One particularly important Otago/Southland issue

There is evidence that the Southern system has had particular problems with specialist access. A Ministry review found that in Southern, fewer gynaecology referrals were being accepted from late 2023, while the number of patients waiting more than four months increased. The Ministry flagged this as an area requiring monitoring, rather than concluding that the change was necessarily deliberate demand management. 1. Health targets: Monitoring for unintended consequences

That matters when assessing campaign promises because a national percentage can improve without every specialty or region improving equally.

For a patient in Dunedin, I would therefore pay particular attention to whether a party commits to:

1. A Southern-region specialist waiting-time target, not just a national target.
2. Extra consultant/specialist capacity before 2031—not merely nurses and GPs.
3. Additional diagnostics and clinic capacity, particularly MRI/CT and outpatient space.
4. Buying private capacity when public capacity is insufficient, and whether that includes specialist consultations as well as surgery.
5. Services closer to Southland and rural Otago, so Dunedin's capacity isn't the only answer.
6. A mechanism for long-term-condition patients already waiting, rather than policies that mainly increase future workforce supply.
7. Transparent publication of Southern's specialty-by-specialty waiting times, rather than just national averages.

The practical bottom line

The 2026 choices are not really a contest over whether the new Dunedin Hospital exists—it is already being built and its outpatient component is now operating. The more immediate political question for you is how much additional clinical capacity a party would put into the Southern system between now and the inpatient building's planned 2031 opening.

There is no clear, jointly stated “Dunedin interim specialist-access plan” across the parties that I could find. National's answer is principally the existing national targets, Elective Boost, workforce expansion and the new outpatient building; Labour emphasises additional frontline staffing; the Greens emphasise staffing plus rural/mobile diagnostics; and NZ First has the most explicit published proposal for purchasing additional specialist appointments through a waitlist fund. Health targets: five out of five moving in the right direction | National Party

For someone relying on regular specialist care, that distinction may be more useful than simply asking which party promises to “fix waiting lists.”

If you want, I can next do a Dunedin/Otago-Southland-only comparison of National, Labour, Greens, NZ First and ACT, including specific promises on Dunedin Hospital, Southern Health staffing, specialist waits, diagnostics, private outsourcing and rural access, with the parties' own documents linked side-by-side.

For a Dunedin voter who depends on specialist care, there are really two separate questions in 2026: what the new hospital will add during the next few years, and what each party says it will do about waiting times while the full project is completed.

What the new Dunedin Hospital will actually deliver

The project is now being delivered in two stages:

• Outpatient building — Whare Mātūtū: opened in August 2026, with patients beginning to receive care from October. It is a five-storey, 15,000 m² building bringing many specialist outpatient, diagnostic and day-treatment services together. These include orthopaedics, ophthalmology, respiratory medicine, women's and children's health, radiology/imaging and day surgery. Some services will transfer during early 2027. New Dunedin Hospital | Project Whakatuputupu
• Health New Zealand says the outpatient facility is intended to increase capacity by roughly 1,700 day surgeries, 13,300 medical-imaging appointments and 2,700 medical day-stay appointments a year. That is potentially relevant to specialist waits because it creates additional outpatient/day-treatment capacity before the main hospital is finished. Great Day for South as Dunedin Hospital Outpatient Opens
• Inpatient building: the second stage is under construction and is scheduled for 2031. The current design has 351 beds, capacity to expand to 404, 20 short-stay surgical beds, 58 emergency-department spaces and 22 operating theatres, expandable to 24. New Dunedin Hospital | Project Whakatuputupu
• Until then, inpatient wards, the existing emergency department and surgical theatres remain at the current Great King Street hospital. New Dunedin Hospital | Project Whakatuputupu

That means the outpatient building is not simply a replacement building sitting empty until 2031. It is the part of the project capable of increasing specialist/diagnostic/day-treatment capacity during the construction period.

There is nevertheless a significant problem to solve in the interim: a 2023 Health NZ document said Dunedin provided tertiary and subspecialty surgical services for both Otago and Southland and had a chronic shortage of acute theatre time, with elective surgery regularly cancelled to accommodate acute cases. Proposed mitigations included longer theatre days and more outsourced/private activity. 20 April 2023

What the parties are proposing

I've focused on policies that could plausibly affect specialist appointments, diagnostics, elective treatment and workforce capacity between now and 2031, rather than treating general health promises as if they were Dunedin-specific commitments.

National

National's approach is essentially continue the current programme of targets, additional activity, workforce recruitment and use of private capacity.

• The Government has a target that 95% of first specialist assessments should occur within four months by 2030, alongside the equivalent target for elective treatment. Health targets | Ministry of Health NZ
• Its current Elective Boost uses both public and private capacity to deliver additional procedures. National says more than 40,000 procedures have been delivered through the programme. Timely, quality healthcare | National Party
• Budget 2026 provides funding for 24,000 additional planned-care treatments nationally in 2026/27. Record health funding with patients at the centre | National Party
• National is also pursuing additional doctors and nurses, faster processing of overseas-trained specialists and more diagnostic equipment; it says 38 new/replacement CT, MRI and SPECT scanners are being provided over three years. National is delivering quality healthcare | National Party
• Crucially for Otago/Southland, the Government says Southern has already been seeing shorter waits and that the outpatient building is intended to increase specialist, diagnostic and elective capacity. Health targets: shorter waits for South Islanders | National Party

For your particular concern: National has the most explicit current mechanism for attacking waiting lists while the hospital is being built: measurable waiting-time targets plus extra public/private elective capacity and the new outpatient facility. But the targets are national, not a specific guarantee that, say, a Southern patient will receive a specialist appointment within four months.

Labour

Labour's 2026 programme puts considerably more emphasis on workforce and primary-care capacity, which could reduce pressure on hospitals, rather than announcing a Dunedin-specific specialist-waiting programme.

It proposes:

• Three free GP visits a year for everyone.
• A Family Doctor Loan Scheme to help establish and retain local practices.
• Changes intended to free up GP time and create 4.5 million additional GP appointments a year.
• A guarantee of a public-health job for every eligible New Zealand-trained graduate nurse from 2027. Labour's 2026 Election Policies
• Labour also says it would finish outstanding hospital repairs and continue hospital investment. Start Work Now - NZ Labour
• On Dunedin specifically, Labour has continued to say it would deliver the full Dunedin Hospital rebuild it originally committed to, rather than accepting the reduced configuration adopted by the current Government. Release: Labour will build Dunedin Hospital

The important distinction is that I haven't found a Labour 2026 commitment for a dedicated Otago/Southland specialist-waitlist fund or a specific number of additional Southern specialist appointments during construction. Its proposed route is more doctors/nurses, more GP capacity and completing the hospital project.

ACT

ACT's health policy is particularly focused on using public, private and community providers together and on accountability for outcomes.

ACT says it supports:

• greater use of private providers to reduce public waiting lists;
• measurable health targets;
• shifting more routine care to pharmacies and other providers;
• reducing waste and increasing accountability; and
• closing the medicines gap with Australia. ACT New Zealand

ACT has specifically supported long-term contracts with private hospitals for elective surgery, arguing that guaranteed work gives private hospitals an incentive to invest in staff and equipment. ACT New Zealand

For Dunedin, ACT previously raised concerns about whether the scaled-back hospital would meet Otago and Southland's needs, particularly given population growth in Central Otago. ACT New Zealand

So, for specialist waiting times, ACT's clearest mechanism is more competitive use of private capacity and greater flexibility about who provides publicly funded care, rather than a Dunedin-specific waiting-list promise.

Green Party

The Greens' 2026 health policy is broader and more workforce-focused. It proposes:

• universal, free access to diagnosis, treatment and management;
• timely access to modern procedures, medicines and diagnostics;
• investment in fair wages, pay parity and workloads that support health-worker wellbeing; and
• a properly supported public health workforce. Health Policy - Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand

The Greens have also opposed reducing the planned scope of Dunedin Hospital, calling for the hospital to be built to full capacity. Govt set to break promise on Dunedin Hospital - Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand

But, as with Labour, I have not found a 2026 Green commitment specifically promising a Southern-region specialist waiting-time target, extra Dunedin outpatient appointments or an Otago/Southland elective-surgery purchasing fund.

New Zealand First

NZ First has one of the more directly relevant waiting-list proposals.

Its health plan includes a GP-controlled Waitlist Reduction Fund, under which GPs could purchase approved specialist appointments and operations for patients. Its published policy proposes $925 million a year for this purpose. It also proposes:

• recruiting more doctors, including internationally;
• digital health clinics in hard-to-staff areas;
• faster diagnostic technology;
• mobile health buses bringing specialist services to communities; and
• greater use of virtual care. 2023 Election Policies - NZ First

Its 2026 campaign is also emphasising prevention and reducing the chronic-disease burden on hospitals. NZFirst Campaign Announcement: The Plan to “Make NZ Healthy” - New Zealand First

The important caveat is that the $925m Waitlist Reduction Fund comes from NZ First's published health policy rather than a Dunedin-specific commitment, so it isn't a promise that a particular Southern specialty would receive a particular number of additional appointments.

The practical comparison for a specialist patient

Party	Main mechanism relevant to waits before 2031	Dunedin/Southern-specific commitment found?
National	Health targets, Elective Boost, public/private capacity, more clinicians/diagnostics, new outpatient building	Yes — hospital/outpatient capacity and Southern performance are explicit parts of its programme
Labour	More GP capacity, 4.5m extra GP appointments, nurse jobs, hospital repairs; full rebuild	Hospital commitment, but no specific interim Southern specialist-waitlist programme found
ACT	Greater use of private providers, competition, targets, broader provider roles	Southern hospital concerns raised, but no specific interim waitlist allocation found
Greens	Public-system investment, workforce/pay/workload improvements, universal access to diagnostics/treatment	Supports a full-capacity Dunedin hospital; no specific interim Southern waitlist programme found
NZ First	$925m Waitlist Reduction Fund, GPs able to buy specialist appointments/operations, mobile specialists, faster diagnostics	No Dunedin-specific allocation found, but the mechanism is directly aimed at specialist/elective waits

One thing I'd watch particularly closely

For someone with a long-term condition, “95% within four months” is not the same thing as guaranteed continuity of specialist care. A first specialist assessment can be within four months while follow-up appointments, diagnostic tests or treatment still take considerably longer.

That matters in Southern: individual Healthpoint listings currently show quite different waits by specialty—for example, endocrinology describes average waits ranging from two weeks to four months depending on priority, while Southland general medicine reports an average routine outpatient wait of six months. Endocrinology - Otago | Southern • Healthpoint

So when comparing candidates, I would ask them a very concrete question:

“Between now and the inpatient building opening in 2031, how many additional specialist appointments, diagnostic tests and elective procedures will your government fund for Southern, and what maximum waiting time will you guarantee for people already living with chronic conditions?”

That gets beyond promises about the building itself and forces a party to explain how you get through the next five years of construction without your care being delayed.

For context, the latest national figures show improvement but still substantial waits: in April–June 2026, 66.1% of patients nationally received a first specialist assessment within four months, versus the eventual 95% target. Health targets: five out of five moving in the right direction | National Party

If you want, I can next do a Dunedin/Southland-specific comparison of National, Labour, ACT, Greens and NZ First, including their actual commitments on specialist appointments, elective surgery, staffing, private-sector outsourcing, diagnostics and the final size/services of Dunedin Hospital, so you can use it as a voting checklist.