Woolerton R Doug: Debate on Budget Policy Statement 
Woolerton R Doug: Debate on Budget Policy Statement 
[Volume:645;Page:14846] 
R DOUG WOOLERTON (NZ First) 
: 
 New Zealand First is in favour of the Budget Policy Statement and when the Budget comes around we will be voting in favour of that as well. But I will take the unusual step of pleading with Dr Cullen and Mr Parker who are the Ministers in charge of the Overseas Investment Office. I will plead with them publicly on behalf of the farmers down in South Canterbury who are about to lose a dairy company called New Zealand Dairies Ltd. They are to lose that company to a group of Russians who want to increase their investment beyond what they already have. They will do that under the auspices of a so-called rescue package with which they say they had to put money into the company a wee while ago to save it. In fact the farmers and shareholders in that area have the money to ensure that the company lives and prospers. It is appropriate that the previous couple of speeches in this debate have been about asset sales as we would ask Dr Cullen and Mr Parker to please please please turn down the application to the Overseas Investment Office from Nutritek for it to take a major shareholding in this company because we do not want to see any part of the great New Zealand dairying industry going to overseas owners. It is not just the fact that these people are Russians; it would be the same situation if they were Americans English Chinese or anybody else. New Zealand belongs to New Zealanders. The sweat of those farmers’ brows should earn them a return and if it is their intent to set up a dairy company to enhance that return then so be it. We do not want to see the Russians coming into this country in an overseas ownership situation that ensures that this company New Zealand Dairies Ltd continues to produce commodity products that are then shifted to Nutritek the Russian-owned company in Singapore for further processing into baby food thus enhancing its value throughout Asia. 
I will just take a minute here to correct some noddy who wrote in a newspaper that the processing of New Zealand dairy products could not be taken over by overseas owners because we would have to put in a pipeline for the milk or we needed something else. The people who make those sorts of statements have not a clue. The first process is to reduce the water from the milk producing powder. It is that unrefined powder we are talking about. It goes off our shores and is further refined in other countries. We want that to be done here. That is what New Zealand Dairies Ltd was set up to do: to take the product to its final stage and thereby reap the benefit in a vertically integrated fashion to the farmers in that area. They have the money to take this company back. It was a vote of their board which unfortunately got the majority to take the money from the Russians instead of taking the money from the bank. It was a dumb decision. I cannot in any way excuse it but that decision was taken and this company should be bought back by the farmers in that area. They want to do it and for that to be able to happen we need Dr Cullen and Mr Parker to turn down the application made by Nutritek to the Overseas Investment Office. We in New Zealand First take these things seriously. This is a precedent-setting decision. I ask what we will see going to overseas owners next. Will we see Synlait AFFCO and companies like that going to overseas owners? 
I will just reply to a letter that I received today—I will reply formally but I want to reply publicly—from Mr Peter Lavery the chairman of New Zealand Dairies Ltd. He said that he wants to give me a briefing on how the company was formed and how it operates. I would just tell Mr Lavery—and members must excuse me if I do not pronounce the name correctly—that it is not the way the company is run that New Zealand First has concerns about. It is not about any of that. It is about ownership and only ownership. Furthermore it is about New Zealand ownership. It is not about whether this group of farmers or that group of farmers owns this company; it is about New Zealanders owning this company. Those are the concerns we have regarding this issue and I want to make that absolutely clear. I am not involving New Zealand First in the running of the company or criticising those who are running it in any way for that. If I was to do that then I could criticise the previous board for letting the issue get into this state. But the matter is in the Government’s hands now and we plead with the Government to protect New Zealand’s interests. 
Exporting is what this country is about. The success of our exports decides our standard of living. The New Zealand dairy industry as we all know contributes in excess of 20 percent of those exports. So to set a precedent by selling off a little bit of it to another country is a bad precedent indeed and it should not and cannot happen in our view. I made these statements again when Fonterra was talking about listing that company on the stock market and we said then—publicly as well—that there was no way we could hold that company in New Zealand ownership if it was to be listed on the stock market. It appears that Fonterra has backed away from that ridiculous proposal and I say “Thank heavens!” for that. 
In talking about asset sales I say that only one party in this Parliament has an unbroken record of opposing asset sales and it is great to see that other parties are now coming on board with that stance. New Zealand First has been talking about the need for us to hold the wealth of our companies in New Zealand hands. Previous speakers have talked about Auckland airport today so I do not need to go on about that but that is just another case in question. With New Zealand Dairies Ltd we appeal for reason and we appeal to our Ministers to keep this company in New Zealand hands. The local farmers have the money and they need to buy this company back. 
Just in the last couple of minutes I have remaining and on the same sort of subject I will address an editorial in the  
New Zealand Herald  
of 11 March in which we had a most amazing diatribe from the editor who said in effect that even if a policy of asset sales into private hands failed it was still a success. That is absolute nonsense and it is just absolutely outrageous and sad that a newspaper especially one with the coverage the  
New Zealand Herald  
has is joining in an argument that has been proven to be wrong by successive Governments. We are going to the expense of buying Air New Zealand back we have gone to the expense of buying New Zealand’s rail network ONTRACK back and it seems that it will be the same situation with the railways themselves the rolling stock. But for this newspaper to set out as I said to my leader a form 6 diatribe—and he said that it was more like standard 6—is upsetting in the extreme. If the  
New Zealand Herald 
 staff think that they are helping the National Party in some way with that sort of editorial then I have to say to them that the opposite is true. There is no will in this country for us and whichever Government of the day to be selling assets and it should stop.