"We can't tell you exactly up front. It will make it certainly more attractive, I don't know the exact numbers. I do know that there is capacity in the regions, that there is demand in the regions, and we've seen migration flows be very successful there."
However, the July Treasury briefing to Mr English had warned the policy changes were unlikely to have a consequential impact for regional development.
Masterton District Council economic development programme manager Tina Nixon still believes the policy will advantage the regions.
Treasury's briefing said most migrants currently didn't go to non-urban areas. Of the Skilled Migrant Category migrants that had jobs or a job offer in 2013/2014, 47 per cent were based in Auckland.
Of the remainder, 18 per cent were in Canterbury, 11 per cent in Wellington and 5 per cent in Waikato.
The briefing said there was currently no mechanism to ensure migrants stayed in regions even if they claimed the bonus points.
"Once a migrant has a residence class visa they are free to move around the country as they choose."
The small number of extra bonus points was unlikely to push over the line many migrants who weren't currently meeting requirements.
It said a far greater amount of points could be claimed for meeting other criteria such as age, education, employment or capital investment.
"Against that context, we don't think it is likely that many regional migrants who currently don't meet requirements will be granted visas after this change."
Treasury team leader Hayden Fenwick noted the briefing was drafted in relation to an early version of the migration proposals. At that time the Government proposed increasing points for settling in the regions from 10 to 20 under the Skilled Migrant Category. That had now been increased to 30. It had proposed an increase of 20 to 30 points for the Entrepreneur Work Visa. That had since been increased to 40.
Ms Nixon said the council had readily been able to identify at least two people in Masterton who would directly benefit from the Government's new measures. The council was considering looking at skill shortages across the region and matching them with migrants.
She said there were strong networks around migrants in Wairarapa and migrants would be more likely to stay in an area when they had support. "We certainly have some evidence that that will happen in the Wairarapa." There was a case for more work to be done around attracting less-skilled migrants to the regions.
The Treasury briefing also noted there wasn't likely to be large risks from the policy changes. "Firstly, there aren't likely to be a large number of migrants to whom this policy would apply."
About 20,000 migrants were approved each year under the Skilled Migrant Category and most settled in large urban areas. Skilled migrants and Entrepreneur work migrants were not likely to compete with those at the lower end of the New Zealand labour market, because the criteria rewarded those who were likely to be in high-skilled occupations or running businesses.
Economist Shamubeel Eaqub said regional migration measures had only been successful elsewhere when migrants were matched with labour shortages. Those matching measures were already in place in New Zealand and the question now was whether the new points system would work in concert with the skills matching system.
