Kirstie Hewlett

Kirstie Hewlett joined Maritime NZ in May 2021. Before joining Maritime NZ, Kirstie was Deputy Chief Executive, System, and Regulatory Design, at the Ministry of Transport, where she was responsible for areas covering transport safety, resilience, security, emissions, regulation, and the transport COVID-19 response.

Prior to the Ministry of Transport, Kirstie held a range of senior leadership roles in WorkSafe NZ, the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, and the Ministry of Economic Development leading regulatory, strategy, corporate, and governance functions, as well as policy responsibilities in health and safety, ACC, employment law, telecommunications, business law, regulatory systems, and regulatory impact analysis.

Career highlights include undertaking extensive health and safety, labor market, and financial sector reforms, establishing WorkSafe NZ, and the building of new functions within the regulator, design of the Ultra-Fast Broadband initiative, and working on improving regulatory frameworks and systems in the public sector. She also led the design, and implementation, of an international air freight scheme that has kept planes flying to, and from, New Zealand during COVID-19.