A meal delivery service which provides heat-and-eat dinners to a mainly elderly clientele said it is worried it will be told it is a non-essential service and must close during the nationwide lockdown.
Eat, a Wellington business which provides freshly-made vacuum-sealed dinners is worried it will be forced to close on Wednesday evening, after hearing that the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment planned to allow mealkit delivery services to continue, but would define pre-prepared delivery meals as non-essential.
Eat boss Alison Macaulay said that stopping work would place vulnerable clients at risk.
The MBIE has stated that it is working through a complete list of businesses which will be permitted to remain open after the lockdown.
With Alert Level 4 coming into effect in a matter of hours, thousands of Kiwis have rushed to get their last meal at McDonald’s. At the Greenlane McDonald's in Auckland, hungry punters waited for as long as 30 minutes or more for their lunches. It was a similar story in Ponsonby, where queues backed all the way out onto Great North Rd.
Meanwhile, an Indian restaurant in Auckland is dishing out free meals to customers wanting to get a last professionally-cooked feed in before non-essential businesses close.
Satya South Indian restaurants is offering a free curry meal at two of their Auckland locations, Ponsonby and Sandringham, as a way of giving back to the community and not letting any of their food go to waste.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s decision to go into lockdown is unprecedented in New Zealand’s history. A state of emergency was officially declared at midday today.
