Media Release ACT Party 11 September 2014 Immediate Release

Dr Jamie Whyte ACT Leader

ACT is and always has been the pro-immigration party.

ACT continues to be a pro-immigration party honouring our heritage as a nation of immigrants and the contribution that they make to our society.

ACT’s policy is that immigrants come to New Zealand on the condition that they are prepared to accept New Zealand’s values of free speech, free assembly, freedom of conscience, freedom of religion, property rights and the rule of law. ACT views these as non-negotiable conditions that all immigrants must accept.

ACT’s policy is to ensure that immigration remains a good deal for the domestic population and that immigrants are welcomed within an overall annual quota set at a level that the country can absorb.

That is why ACT supports the points system for new immigrants. By qualifying immigrants to New Zealand ACT wants to ensure that those who come will find work suited to their skills. We will work hard to see that skilled immigrants do not wind up as taxi-drivers in our major cities, unable to get jobs that would use their skills. We are determined to ensure immigrants do not come to New Zealand to spend their lives on welfare. ACT will introduce a 5-year probation period whereby an individual can be sent home if they commit an imprisonable offence.

Immigration has exposed weaknesses in our occupational licensing arrangements. ACT believes the best way immigrants can get integrated into the New Zealand economy is to reduce the current fad for occupational licensing. There is no need for Government's heavy hand to be involved in the licensing and vetting of the most mundane of occupations.

Immigrants will prosper in the same way as all other New Zealanders from ACT’s policy of lowering the tax burden. In particular ACT’s lower company tax will help companies attract the highest earning individuals, talented entrepreneurs and people with international connections.

Immigration policies affect what sort of society we want to create for our grandchildren. They are not something to be turned off and on like a tap for short-term political gain. Migration enriches our lives in both directions.

ACT’s immigration policies are the best fit for New Zealand and those it welcomes as immigrants.

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