We’ve made two Official Information Act requests to Tourism New Zealand, again asking what the “Estimated Advertising Value” (EAV) of the most recent Royal tour, which cost taxpayers about NZ$1.4 million. EAV is the metric used to measure the value of Royal tours and other visits. And for comparison, we’ve requested the EAV for the visit of Stephen Colbert, which cost taxpayers $100,000.00.

It will be interesting to see what the relative returns for the Royal tour and Stephen Colbert are. Royal tours used to be about our links with the monarchy, yet in the past decade, that’s changed to how much the monarchy can benefit New Zealand tourism. This change ironically came under the ministry of John Key. Key was, of course, Minister of Tourism as well as being pro-monarchy.

The problem with turning the monarchy into a mere economic proposition for attracting tourists is that inevitably the comparison will be made between Royal tours and other spending to promote New Zealand to tourists. So that’s what we’re now doing…