UPDATE ON THE LONG SERVICE AWARDS REVIEW

12 February 2020

Drafting of the new governing Royal Warrants and accompanying regulations has been completed, and the approval process is underway. An announcement will be made when the documents have been notified in the New Zealand Gazette and published on the New Zealand Legislation website. This is expected to happen in the middle of 2020.

As advised on 25 August 2015, the existing ten New Zealand military long service awards will remain, but the entitlement criteria will allow all eligible New Zealand military service to be counted. For example, service will be able to be accumulated rather than continuous (as is currently required for some awards). This will deliver a fairer system while maintaining the standing of the long service awards.

The appropriate long service award issued will reflect the majority of each recipient’s service. Persons who already have a long service award will continue to wear the award they have. There will be no swapping of awards.

Current serving military personnel will not need to apply for their long service entitlement to be assessed under the new rules. They will be automatically assessed via the data in their SAP HCM records. Please note that given the number of eligible personnel it may take around 12 to 18 months after the announcement to confirm and issue the medal entitlement for every current serving military Service person.

Applications from eligible ex-Service persons will be called for in 2020, once a project team of additional staff has been hired and trained.

Full information on the changes will be released at the time of the formal announcement.