Rt Hon Winston Peters

New Zealand First Leader

Member of Parliament for Northland
3 AUGUST 2015

Can the TPPA Be Rebooted?

New Zealand First believes the only way to save the Trans-Pacific Partnership is to go back to the small group of countries who came up with the original concept and base an agreement on trade without various non-trade projects and agendas getting in the way.

“The TPPA fell over because the big countries like America, Japan and Canada tried to screw the trade scrum to their advantage,” says New Zealand First Leader and Member of Parliament for Northland Rt Hon Winston Peters.

“Mr Groser’s performance as Trade Minister resembled a third-pick reserve in President’s grade Rugby. He was out of his depth, for while New Zealand helped to instigate the TPP, we were shunted to one side as a bit player.

“New Zealand and Mr Groser were embarrassingly out muscled and out played in Hawaii.

“We need to go back to the other Pacific 4 countries from whence the TPPA sprung, Singapore, Brunei and Chile, and build a wider free trade agreement devoid of ‘comprehensive investment outcomes’.

“We do not see any reason why Australia would not want in either.

“Remaining TPPA countries like Canada, the United States and Japan would become candidate members. This way, we would have the aspiration and ground rules unambiguously set without sovereignty-threatening projects and agendas,” says Mr Peters.

ENDS

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