Finance Minister Michael Cullen said today that the government’s best advice was that the $885 million rescue package for Air New Zealand would be sufficient to meet the company’s recapitalisation needs.

“There is no reason to believe that any more money will be required,” he said.

Dr Cullen was responding to media reports of an interview he gave the Australian television programme Business Sunday. He said he never implied that Air New Zealand might need up to $150 million more.

He had been replying to the interviewer’s assertion that the $885 million may not be adequate and that two to three times that amount may be needed.

“The due diligence process will reveal whether the $885 million is enough. At this stage, I have every confidence it will be at or very near requirements.

“I made it very clear to Business Sunday that, if more was required, the $150 million figure was well toward the top end of the range the government could tolerate,” Dr Cullen said.

Ends

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>