Woolerton R Doug: New Zealand-China Free Trade Agreement Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Woolerton R Doug: New Zealand-China Free Trade Agreement Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 15 May 2008. Volume:647;Page:16025. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
R DOUG WOOLERTON (NZ First) 
: 
 New Zealand First opposes the free-trade agreement with China. Just in case people do not know our policy is to oppose free-trade agreements with low-wage economies wherever they may be found. That is for a very simple reason. I have to say we admire China greatly and we admire the Chinese people greatly. One of the reasons we admire the Chinese is that they know how to look after their people and they are doing just that. They do not elect governments over there—in fact they do not elect governments at all—that see their role as looking after New Zealand Australia England Germany or anywhere else; they know what their job is and that is to look after China and Chinese people. New Zealand First respects that view absolutely. We also understand that China sees its job as getting products into China at the lowest cost possible—below world prices in most cases. 
When a country forms a free-trade agreement with a low-cost economy it is essentially looking at an emerging market and those markets do not return the highest value to New Zealand. The countries that return the best value for our products which are mainly agricultural products at the top end of the scale are Europe and America. That has always been the case; it is the case now and it will be the case for years to come. New Zealand First believes that New Zealand should make every endeavour to open up the markets in China and work has been going on around that. But they are emerging markets and that means they will cost money to develop. It is all very well to say that New Zealand will have a huge advantage with China but we will not have that unless we work for it. That will not happen unless we put money into the market and unless we earn it. There is no free lunch here. 
I might point out to people that— 
John Hayes 
: That’s really perceptive! 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: It is perceptive actually. It is something that Mr Hayes missed. It is a fact that New Zealand lowered barriers to China nigh on 20 years ago. So China has had a half a free-trade agreement with us for nearly 20 years. This free-trade agreement is playing catch-up. I point out before everybody becomes too excited that it is close to 17 years before China will lower the barriers to a significant degree for our agricultural products going into China. 
Pita Paraone 
: How long? 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: It will be nigh on 17 years before that happens. So I do not know what people are getting so excited about. We suggest the work that is being done by our agricultural producers would produce a positive result in that time anyway. Otherwise they would have been wasting their money. So we believe the free-trade agreement with China is in China’s interests. Before anybody jumps up and down and says that obviously New Zealand is a small player in world markets I say we know that. We know the trade balance between China and New Zealand. We also know the trade balance between Singapore and New Zealand and Thailand and New Zealand and we know that they are growing. The trade balance deficit in the case of trade between New Zealand and China will grow as well just like with those other two free-trade agreements because it is simply easier for those countries to get their cheap products into New Zealand than it is for us to get our expensive products into their low-wage economies. 
We in New Zealand First are not presuming to comment on anything internal in China. We are not commenting on anything internal in China be it Tibet or anything else. We are talking just about the advantages that New Zealand is perceived to have with this trade agreement which are not nearly as great as is painted. If we were to have a free-trade agreement with America which—dare I say it—my leader is working on as we speak then we would be trading with an economy that can pay the sort of money that we need for our agricultural products and likewise with Europe. Then we would be really applauding an agreement such as that. However we have this agreement with China and we must make the best of it. New Zealand First is putting up its reasons for opposing it and we will be proved right again but we are not going around slagging off the agreement. We are not putting spokes in the wheel and if I can say so to use Martin Gallagher’s words we are opposing it with respect because we do not believe it will be in New Zealand’s interests. 
We do not believe we are elected here to forge agreements for some wider purpose that might help world trade and that others would take advantage of. We need to forge alliances that make this country wealthier—not open up world trade for China or anything else. When one looks at what China would seek to gain from this agreement—and it has been touched on by other speakers when they talked about its influence in the South Pacific—we see that it is that here in New Zealand we are a microcosm of an almost ideal little democracy. What we give China and have always given China—let nobody make any mistake about it—is respect. We give China face. That is what we do for China. It is not about trade as far as China is concerned because China can pick up and is picking up trade everywhere in the world. Mr Hayes himself mentioned that China has something like 25 percent of world trade. We know that. So why is China forming a free-trade agreement with New Zealand? It is because we give China face. This little democracy at the bottom of the South Pacific gives China face. Maybe it is not face to be used in America maybe it is not face to be used in Europe but it absolutely is face to be used in the South Pacific. Mr Hayes knows that and so do we. That is what China gets from us. It is not about money; it is about respectability and it is more important about respectability in the South Pacific which is the area where we have some influence. It is the area where we have huge respect and it is the area where China intends to make a mark and is doing so. 
I think that we will watch this free-trade agreement grow and we will see that New Zealand First is right. That will not make any difference to anybody. Years from now people will be saying what a wonderful thing the agreement is when our trade deficit has grown by huge percentages. We will not knock the agreement; we will go along with it but we will point back to these words we have spoken today.