Gosche Mark: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Gosche Mark: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:619;Page:15100] 
4.  
Hon MARK GOSCHE (Labour—Maungakiekie) 
 to the  
Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade 
: What are the risks to New Zealand’s international reputation of any criticisms of New Zealand in Australia? 
Hon PHIL GOFF (Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade) 
: 
 There was a risk that New Zealand’s reputation might have been damaged and investor confidence diminished by Dr Brash bagging his own country to the business community in Australia last week. However as business reporter Bob Edlin wrote in the  
Independent 
 this week: “The more Brash says the more likely he is to expose his humbug and the more humbug he exposes the less likely he is to displace the Clark government.” In that sense the risk and the damage done was more to the National Party in New Zealand than it was to New Zealand’s reputation overseas. 
Hon Mark Gosche 
: Was New Zealand’s reputation with the Australian business community damaged by the argument that our labour laws and the proposal for 4 weeks’ minimum annual leave made New Zealand unable to compete with Australia? 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: No the Australian business community must have regarded Dr Brash’s attempt to undermine his own country in that regard as simply farcical. They would know as apparently Dr Brash does not that Australia has had 4 weeks’ minimum annual leave for 30 years and that the World Bank has put New Zealand ahead of Australia in terms of the flexibility of its labour laws. 
Simon Power 
: What effects does he think references to a paralysis in the process of New Zealand government warnings of social distress and gloomy predictions of fear and insecurity have on foreign business groups that might consider investing in New Zealand and has he received any reports on the ongoing effects on New Zealand’s international reputation of those statements made by Helen Clark the then Leader of the Opposition in Hong Kong? 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: Obviously those comments accurately described New Zealand’s plight in the 1990s. Clearly the international community has seen that this country has done better than practically any other OECD country under 5 years of extremely good Labour Government – led policies. 
Hon Mark Gosche 
: What evidence is there of New Zealand about to decline into becoming just another Pacific Island State? 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: There is of course no evidence to support Dr Brash’s attempt to belittle New Zealand in that way. As John Armstrong wrote in the  
Otago Daily Times 
 this “not only bordered on the ridiculous it was silly politics to boot.” The National Bank regional trend survey recently issued shows our annualised June economic growth at 4.3 percent which is one of the best in the OECD. The unemployment rate at 4 percent is the second-best rate in the OECD and Transparency International has consistently found that in terms of good governance and lack of corruption New Zealand is one of the top three countries in the world. Nothing that Don Brash has said to bag New Zealand denies those facts. 
Simon Power 
: I seek leave to table a speech by the Rt Hon. Helen Clark to the New Zealand Hong Kong Business Association in 1994 bagging New Zealand off shore. 
Document by leave laid on the Table of the House. 
Jill Pettis 
: Go and have a literacy test. 
Simon Power 
: Go and get a speech lesson. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: That is in direct reference to me. The member will now stand withdraw and apologise. She is a senior whip and should know better. 
Jill Pettis 
: I do apologise Mr Speaker.