Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins told Breakfast on Thursday morning vaccine mandates have "served their purpose".
It comes after the government's announcement on Wednesday to lift all gathering restrictions on outdoor settings, scrap vaccine passes and remove vaccine mandates for some workforces.
Hipkins told Breakfast: "If you look at the sort of restrictions we're talking about, removing the gathering limits on outdoor gatherings, removing mask use in the outdoor area, the evidence suggests those are very low risk or now much, much lower risk environments in terms of the spread of the virus.
If you look at the removal of vaccine passes and vaccine mandates, to a large extent we've got the gains that we're looking for from having those in place in the first place.
"We've got very high rates of vaccination across those key workforces, we've got very high rates of vaccination across the country and people don't suddenly become unvaccinated just because we've removed the passes and removed the mandates."
Earlier this month epidemiologist Rod Jackson told 1News "there has never been a more important time for all of the mandates."
But Hipkins told Breakfast: "The advice we have relied on has come from the Ministry of Health and from the expert advisory group that we've got in place that's chaired by Professor Skegg, and you will have heard Professor Skegg himself make comments on these sorts of issues in the past.
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"I acknowledge that within our health community there continues to be a range of different views as there have been right the way through the pandemic about what the best way forward is."
However when speaking about mandates at a media conference in February, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said: "I think the most important point is I don't think you'd hear any public health expert saying that now, when we're in the middle of thousands of cases a day is the time to let down our guard."
Hipkins defended this however, telling Breakfast: "I don't think we are letting down our guard, if you look at one of the things that makes the biggest difference you know wearing masks can cut down the rate of transmission by half and we're continuing to wear masks and we're continuing to do a lot of the things that are actually making a difference."
He added, "our environment, our context has changed over the last few months."
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"I do think we are doing well as a country, we continue to do well as a country and we want to make sure that we're protecting as many people as we possibly can," Hipkins said.
Gathering limit changes will come into effect on March 25 at 11.59pm, including raising indoor limits from 100 to 200 under Red.
It will also mean all vaccine mandates will be removed for workforces, except for health and disability, aged care, Corrections and border workforces.
From 11.59pm on April 4 vaccine passes will no longer be required and from this weekend QR codes will no longer be enforced, meaning people do not need to scan in at shops and venues.
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