Todd McClay - Foreign Affairs and Trade

11 December 2018

The Government’s confusion over the United Nations Global Compact on Migration shows an absence of accountability, National’s Foreign Affairs spokesperson Todd McClay says.

“Overnight, world leaders, foreign ministers and New Zealand’s UN representative have gathered in Morocco and adopted this Compact, but instead of telling New Zealanders what its position is, Winston Peters today simply denied that the compact had been adopted.

“This is despite the Secretary-General of the United Nations issuing a statement from Morocco welcoming the adoption yesterday.

“Staggeringly, the Minister of Foreign Affairs has denied being briefed on the Compact, despite MBIE publishing a briefing to Winston Peters from 7 March 2018 asking him to agree to the final negotiating parameters.

“The Government has had the final text of this agreement since July this year.

“It defies belief that a Government who has been so deeply involved in negotiations has had the text of the agreement for months and has sent a representative to Morocco to adopt the compact still refuses to tell the public its position.

“In contrast, National Party Leader and Leader of the Opposition Simon Bridges has been very clear on our position and announced our opposition to the agreement last week.

“New Zealand has an excellent immigration system and our country should be proud of our openness. But the Global Compact on Migration is not in our interests.”

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