The New Zealand Transport Agency is refusing to release a law firm's report which has found another 150 cases where motorists could be at risk.
1 NEWS has revealed taxpayers are paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to law firm Meredith Connell which is keeping an eye on the troubled transport agency.
NZTA has apologised over the case of a Dargaville garage, Dargaville Diesel Specialists, which it says gave a Warrant of Fitness to an unsafe car that was involved in a fatal accident weeks later. NZTA says it should have suspended the garage earlier.
Meredith Connell has been brought in to help do the NZTA's job and has already been paid more than $400,000 by taxpayers.
But the agency says it doesn't think it's in the public interest to release Meredith Connell's report which has found another 150 cases where motorists could be at risk.
The National Party doesn't agree with the secrecy.
"I would have thought that they would want to take every step they can to address those concerns with the public. And releasing that information I would think would go some way to helping to do that," Brett Hudson, National's Associate Transport spokesperson said.
The transport agency is expected to release more details about the 150 at-risk cases next week.
In the Dargaville case, NZTA chief executive Fergus Gammie says the family of the man who died when the car crashed "should have been able to rely on their local garage doing the inspection for the warrant correctly. They didn't."
The transport agency says it knew the garage was issuing deficient warrants in 2017.
"We should have acted then and suspended them then. We didn't," Mr Gammie said.
Dargaville Diesel Specialists' licence was suspended in August.
But in October the agency was still confident its neglect hadn't resulted in harm.
"Based on what we have found to date, none of the people who we have suspended or revoked, those issues have not led to any deaths or injuries," NZTA chairman Michael Stiassny said.
Dargaville Diesel Specialists says it has no confidence in the agency's inspection process.
"They can't really see what you're doing. They stand outside the door and they say, 'you didn't do this and you didn't do that'. And a lot of times you have done it," Rodney Wilson of Dargaville Diesel Specialists said.
Mr Wilson has hit back over the agency's criticism of the company.
"Very disappointed 'cause it's been totally unfair and biased," he said.
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