'Should get the best people available’

Press, 6 July 1983, Page 3

'Should get the best people available’

PA Wellington New Zealand should move away from its traditional immigration policies, said the Minister of Foreign Afffairs, Mr Cooper, yesterday. “Where we have to draw on outside skills anjj expertise it is in the country’s hard-headed interest to get the best people available globally, not just draw them from so-called traditional sources,” Mr Cooper said. “I think we are going to have to take a good, hard look at some of our immigration policies.”

In an address to a Wellington conference on New Zealand prospects in the Pacific Basin, Mr Cooper said, “Look at what good citizens the Indo-Chinese refugees are making, and draw some conclusions for yourselves. “Let us get more contact at the personal level. Someone once said that it is possible to dislike or fear only those you do not know."

Mr Cooper said he was hopeful that New Zealand might soon be able to get a youth exchange scheme —

“a sort of working holidays exercise” — going with Japan. “A more flexible policy on entry into New Zealand educational institutions of private students from all round the Pacific is in the final throes of formulation,” he said.

The conference brought together leaders in business, government administration and research to discuss how New Zealand can make the best of its opportunities in the Pacific region in its domestic and international policies.

Mr Cooper said that the Atlantic was the ocean of the past, and the Pacific the ocean of the future.

“The most dynamic economic growth round the world, now and for the foreseeable future, will occur round the shores of the Pacific. The purchasing power of many Pacific Basin countries is expanding fast, at a time when others are stagnating.” New markets and good profits existed in the Pacific Basin, he said, but New Zealand had to become “more market-orientated, more consumer-orientated,

if we are going to get into the Pacific Basin potential and lift earnings.” Mr Cooper urged New Zealand interests not to make the mistake of thinking this country could make its name as a trader by economic policies alone. “Developing the political relationship is also involved.” Governments resented a single-minded concentration on developing the economic relationship. “They often seek a wider anti deeper relationship, less self-in-terested indications of goodwill and friendship.

“So New Zealand has to fashion a track record in the Asia-Pacific region in all senses.”

Mr Cooper said that round most of the Pacific Basin there were positive political bonds which “will facilitate the expansion of economic ties.”

The Minister argued for a blending of public and priv-ate-sector skills to create a cohesive approach in opening up new markets. “We have to get our act together as a country if we are to exploit the opportunities."