July will have to go into managed isolation. On 2 August, Prime Minister Ardern announced that seasonal workers from Tonga, Samoa and Vanuatu will be allowed to enter the country without having to undergo managed isolation from September 2021 onwards. This is to address the labour shortage in the agricultural and horticultural sector. Tonga, Samoa and Vanuatu have reported low transmissions of COVID-19. On 22 August, the Government began voluntary home isolation of suspected and verified community cases with available quarantine capacity used primarily to house healthy and COVID-19 free returnees. On 25 August, Radio New Zealand reported that the number of MIQ rooms available to returning New Zealanders had declined due to a cohorting system that was introduced in April and May 2021 to minimise the risk of users spreading COVID-19 to later users. Between 350 and 500 MIQ rooms each fortnight are set aside for large groups such as sports teams, seasonal and construction workers, and refugees. Other factors affecting the availability of rooms including maintenance, an increase in the number of emergency allocation rooms from 250 to 350, and people not turning up for MIQ bookings. On 1 September, COVID-19 Response Minister Hipkins confirmed that the Government had extended a pause on MIQ bookings to accommodate community cases from the Auckland August 2021 Delta outbreak. Hipkins also advised New Zealand expatriates abroad to cancel their holiday plans to return to New Zealand due to pressure on the MIQ system. On 2 September, the opposition National Party proposed five changes to the MIQ system including banning bots and third party providers, creating a new points system to allocate space, the introduction of a waiting list, transparency over room release dates, and the establishment of a Kiwi Expat Advisory Group. On 27 September, Ardern announced that the Government would be launching a home isolation trial for 150 selected travellers. Expressions of interest would be open from 30 September to 8 December. Participants must be New Zealand residents. In addition, Ardern confirmed that the quarantine-free travel for Pacific Recognised Seasonal Employer workers from Vanuatu, Samoa, and Tonga would resume in early October to address the agricultural and horticultural sectors' demand for migrant workers over the summer period. In October 2021, the Delta variant began spreading widely in New Zealand with community cases quickly outpacing cases detected at the border. By 22 October, the country had recorded a record of 129