Rt Hon Winston Peters
New Zealand First Leader
26 February 2013

High Dollar is Killing New Zealand’s Future

New Zealand First says Prime Minister John Key is living in Lala Land if he believes that the popularity of the NZ dollar with currency speculators is proof of our economy doing well.

Mr Key said on television this morning that life was good for New Zealand consumers, and that the trading of our dollar was a positive sign.

Rt Hon Winston Peters says Mr Key missed the entire economic point when making his seriously misguided comments.

“Mr Key is talking about consumption of goods which are largely imported into the country, but is totally ignoring the plight of our manufacturing and export sector.

“There is no way to increase the prosperity of the country, and make life better for New Zealanders, if we don’t tackle our overvalued dollar.

“In that way we go right to the heart of the matter which is about boosting our manufacturing sector, creating more jobs and real wealth.

“To stick with National’s hands off approach will see a continuation of big job losses such as those either announced or flagged at companies such as Mainzeal, Telecom, Solid Energy, Summit Wool Spinners, Transpacific Industries, Geon Group, ANZ, NZ Post, and APN.

“Closure after closure has one common factor – they all mention the high dollar.

“Mr Key should ask those workers what they would rather have. A cheap flat screen TV or a good paying job to feed their family,” says Mr Peters.

ENDS

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Arguably Reassuring: Inspector-General Finds GCSB "Arguably" Legal

Of the 88 individuals:

• 15 cases involving 22 individuals did not have any information intercepted by GCSB.

• another four cases involving five individuals were the subjects of a New Zealand Security Intelligence Service warrant and the GCSB assisted in the execution of the warrants. The Inspector-General is of the view that there were arguably no breaches and the law is unclear.

• the Bureau only provided technical assistance which did not involve interception of communications, involving three of the individuals, so no breach occurred.

• the remaining cases involved the collection of metadata, and the Inspector-General formed the view that there had arguably been no breach, noting once again that the law is unclear.
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