TPP meets none of Labour's bottom lines — Little
Groser says he would like Labour's support and will meet with the party's senior leaders tomorrow. PLUS: Groser says investor-state lawsuits "almost inconceivable."
None of the bottom lines marked out by Labour have been met in the TPP including the right for future Government's to ban the sale of land to foreign buyers, Andrew Little says.
However, his party isn't ruling out support for the document until they look at the final deal, the Labour leader says.
"We are opposed to what we see at the moment but we're taking a reasonable and measured approach, there's a lot of complexity to it," he told TVNZ's Q+A programme.
When asked by Michael Parkin about the foreign-buyers issue, “Grant Robertson suggested you may flout those restrictions and still impose a ban. You’d do that?”
Mr Little responded, “Yes. We will. It comes down to this in the end – that the fundamental moral obligation of every government is to act in the best interest of its citizens.”
Earlier, Trade Minister Tim Groser told TV3's The Nation that while he would not support such policies personally, the TPP did allow for measures such as a tax or stamp duty on foreign buyers.
In a Q+A interview, Mr Groser said he would like Labour’s support and is meeting with senior Labour leaders tomorrow.
Investor-state lawsuits 'almost inconceivable'
Mr Groser also told Q+A "It is almost inconceivable, given the safeguards that our international lawyers have negotiated, that anyone will take a case against New Zealand in the next X years."
He conceded that the United States is more litigious than China or South Korea with whom NZ already has FTAs, " and that’s why we put so much emphasis on the safeguards, and then we went this extra mile to try and get—first of all, nothing in Australia will be subject to ISDS. We have a bi-lateral agreement. We don’t need this. Secondly, we’ve got this big tobacco exemption, which stops big tobacco hunting for us.’
Watch Little & Groser's Q&A interviews here.
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TPP meets none of Labour's bottom lines — Little
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