Robertson Grant: Tariff (AANZFTA) Amendment Bill Customs and Excise (AANZFTA) Amendment Bill — Third Readings 
Robertson Grant: Tariff (AANZFTA) Amendment Bill Customs and Excise (AANZFTA) Amendment Bill — Third Readings 
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GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central) 
: 
 I also want to join in the congratulations that other speakers have given to the trade Ministers responsible for pushing this agreement along. People have referred to Lockwood Smith Jim Sutton and Phil Goff and to the current Minister of Trade the Hon Tim Groser. It is an enormous effort to get an agreement like this negotiated. It requires a range of diplomatic skills and technical knowledge. I know that all the Ministers have worked hard to get their heads around that portfolio. 
I will also briefly note the role of the officials who have negotiated this because if Ministers need to get their heads around technical details and the scope of these agreements then it is the officials who do the grunt work behind that. I particularly acknowledge Martin Harvey and Vangelis Vitalis from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. They are both excellent public servants. I am sure that my colleagues opposite would not be at all surprised if I took this opportunity to note that they represent backroom—as the National Government would have it—public servants; the very same ones who apparently are not doing anything useful. Bill English said yesterday that they were not doing real jobs. 
Phil Twyford 
: They’re gone. 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: They are gone; they are being capped or cut and everything apparently is about the front line. But in the end the value that Mr Hayes and others have talked about tonight—the dollar value in terms of exports and the jobs that could potentially be created out of this—owes an awful lot to those so-called backroom officials. I think everybody in this House should join in congratulating them and thanking them for their excellent work. 
I think that today is a cause for celebration. We are putting in place legislation that will give New Zealand and New Zealanders greater access to a market of 566 million people as has been said. It is a market place where $1.4 trillion in global trade takes place annually. That is a huge figure and it is something that we can now be a part of. For New Zealand it is a growing market. Over the last 3 years we have had a 24 percent per year increase in trade. But restrictions that are still in place until we pass this legislation today mean that $50 million in tariffs is being paid by New Zealand companies in this region. We can now work through and remove those. 
In time 99 percent of tariffs on exports to Indonesia Malaysia the Philippines and Viet Nam will be removed and that is an excellent outcome. Even on day one of this agreement coming into force 70 percent of exports to those countries will be duty-free and that is a fantastic beginning and a fantastic opening for a range of New Zealand companies. 
We know that 25 percent of Fonterra’s exports go to the ASEAN region. Fonterra is our largest company and 25 percent of its exports—about $2.2 billion worth of exports—go to that region annually. That region is an incredibly rich market that we can tap into further and I know that Fonterra and others are waiting anxiously for this legislation to be passed and put into action. I do believe that that is a cause for celebration. 
I also want to mention why this agreement is unique. When negotiations on this agreement began I am not sure that many people even those in trade circles thought we would be able to pull it off. I do not think that many people thought New Zealand and Australia could be part of a large regional body like this and negotiate with it. It is an important innovation. 
I think that our No. 1 goal—and this cuts to some of the questions raised by Dr Kennedy Graham—still has to remain a global deal and it needs to be a global deal that fulfils some of the “GOF” principles that Dr Kennedy Graham outlined in particular the open and the fair principles and also the green principles which I will return to in a few minutes. A rules-based trading scheme that is fair at a global level is I think the aim of both National and Labour and it must be something that we continue to pursue with vigour because it is only then that we will begin to fulfil the open and fair aspects of Dr Kennedy Graham’s vision. 
In the absence of a global deal high-quality regional agreements like this one are the next best thing. Bilateral agreements are important for sure and we continue to work on those and negotiate with a range of countries but a regional agreement can start to knit together the key building blocks of that global deal and this agreement is a high-quality one in that regard. 
New Zealand was able to enter into this agreement with ASEAN—and with Australia as well—in a way that had not been seen before and it made sure that we intensify those relationships in the growing markets of Asia. Other speakers have already talked today about the fact that in terms of our region in terms of the livelihoods of New Zealanders Asia is the place where we must continue to pursue and develop markets. This agreement will enable us to do that. 
I want to touch on three other areas in this contribution. One of them is to note as I did in an earlier speech on this legislation the side agreements on trade and labour and trade and environment that have been brought into force with the Philippines. These go along with agreements that we already have with Thailand Brunei and Singapore on trade and labour and trade and environment. 
I think it is very important that those agreements are worked on and developed as they acknowledge that trade does not happen in isolation. Trade happens as part of our overall relationships with these countries and indeed with how these countries develop. I know that in other agreements we have signed around trade and environment particularly there have been spin-offs for our companies. In the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement with Chile there has been a large amount of interaction discussion and development of ideas in the area of environmental and eco-tourism and in the use of environmental services. 
From the point of view of future trade negotiations we must keep up the momentum to have these side agreements—hopefully—incorporated closely and more often with the main trade agreement. They provide a whole other area of development a whole other area where we can increase our relationship with these countries. I congratulate the Government on the fact that it has gone through with the trade and labour and trade and environment agreements with the Philippines. National has not always been keen on these side agreements but it has gone ahead with this one and I encourage and urge it to continue to include considerations of trade and labour and trade and environment in future agreements. 
Other speakers have already referred to the issue of Burma. I know there will be a number of members in the House who will find it troublesome that Burma is part of this agreement. But I know for sure that by our engagement with the ASEAN region we will be able to ensure that we have more contact and more dialogue with countries around the importance for New Zealand of issues of human rights. 
I think it is important that we continue to build that dialogue and build those relationships because I know as I said that many members in this House myself included have some discomfort about what is occurring in Burma and some discomfort about whether we can continue to work with Burma as a country in a way that we would like to. But I feel that the engagement that we get with the wider ASEAN region through this legislation will enable us to do far more in that regard. 
I also want to briefly refer to a question that was raised in the select committee process around this legislation and that is about how we keep open dialogue and discussion with Parliament during free-trade agreement negotiations. A very brief time line comes into play once an agreement has been signed and then needs to be brought through a legislative process like this one The select committee is given a brief time to look at the legislation look at the agreement and then go forward and bring it back to the House. In a sense it is almost as if we parachute into a negotiation and a discussion. 
I know from my previous work at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade that there has been a dialogue over many years with both business and unions about free-trade negotiations. People are kept up to date. They are kept informed about those negotiations in a way that in fact Parliament is not. I think there is some cause for Parliament to be updated as to the process of a negotiation so that we are not simply parachuting in on it at the end of the negotiation when there may be issues and core concerns that we need to resolve. 
This is an issue that the select committee has been discussing and will continue to discuss and I hope that over time we can include more people in knowing about what is happening in negotiations and in ensuring that we build a wider and broader range of support. 
I commend this bill to the House. I look forward to seeing the benefits in terms of exports and in terms of the jobs that will flow on from it. I hope that in the future we can continue to build strong regional trade agreements and work towards the global deal with fair rules-based trade that we all know this globe needs. Thank you. 
Debate interrupted.