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So let's wrap this short week with hopefully some insight into the increasingly sticky
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FDA deal with India.
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So Trade Minister was here yesterday, seemingly confident what ever hurdles we have we could
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And you see, on first, of course, are out so Labor are better up in terms of numbers, but
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they've got a letter containing issues that Trade Minister Damien O'Connor who is with
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I've read the letter from Hipkins, or I think the latest letter from Hipkins to the Prime
0:27
So you've got migrant issues.
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Is that directly tied with a trade deal?
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In other words, are they not separate things that a government who are awake and, you
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know, with a good grip on the wheel would deal with any way?
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Look, there are guaranteed places, work permits into New Zealand in this trade deal.
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They aren't usually in a trade agreement.
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There's provision for migration and work permits, but not guaranteed numbers.
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So that is different, and it's something that has to be considered.
1:00
But clearly, once they've served up fears and concerns, and Chris Hipkins got a number
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of emails and letters saying, you know, we're going to let flood New Zealand with migrants.
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That's not the reality, but we had to ask questions about the provisions and the safeguards
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We don't want thousands of students coming in as happen under the tea government to
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shonky education courses being exploited in the workplace.
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We don't want to get back to that again.
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Once students do that up, we have to have assurance that that won't happen.
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And haven't you got assurance because I wouldn't have thought, given we don't have that
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and given we have tied that up?
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But government shrunk the little everyone's spectrum.
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Now, everything they have done has to remove, has been removed to protection for workers
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in our country, not enhanced them.
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So what we're doing is potentially bringing in another pool of young students and
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those who are enthusiastic and they'll be working, we don't want them exploited, we want
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to make sure there are people on the ground who are going to check the workplaces and make
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sure that exploitation is not occurring.
2:01
When you say students in workplaces, are you talking about students coming in and going
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to shonky education facilities, or are you talking about students coming in who might
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end up with a visa and doesn't, the visa solve the problem, going into some second
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There are two issues.
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There are student numbers.
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And they have, they have work rights with those, those axes.
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So, so those numbers are not capped, there was a little bit of confusion.
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Minister said they were capped, they're not actually capped, but of course we have the
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ability to control the quality of the educational institutes, making sure that they're not shonky.
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So there is an ability, but we've got to have labor inspectors out there making sure
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that that abuse is not occurring.
2:40
Modern slavery legislation is something that we raised, the government committed to Bill
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now that that to member from Labour and member from National have agreed, it's in the
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order paper, but the government bumped that bill down the order paper, that's the modern
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slavery legislation, we want to put back out so that these things are being dealt with
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properly in New Zealand, and we're not opening the door to a lot of well-meaning, well-intended
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Indians coming into the country who will be exploited, that's what's happened in the past
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across other nations too, we don't want it to be a repeat.
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The number of students, don't we want more students, I mean, because they come in,
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they pay, they go to university, it's good for the bottom line.
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Yeah we do, absolutely, but we just don't make sure when they come in, legitimate courses
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getting a proper education and a place to live and not being exploited.
3:30
I just, having read the letter, having talked to, you know, McLean a number of times now
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having, I just don't see this, you're sort of there, aren't you, really, I mean, we're
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not that far apart, this is too big a deal to cock up in the long term, isn't it?
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Because there's a commitment to best efforts, it's not an absolute commitment, we get that
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but we need some explanations to what happens, if in 15 years' time we haven't invested
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33 billion New Zealand dollars in India, what will that mean for exporters who might have
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committed less money than that but money to the Indian market?
4:03
So these are questions that we would have asked through the process had we been consulted.
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National, you know, Christian, Christian Relaxan held, tried his own hands by saying,
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I want this done deal done within three years and then hadn't done a deal with Winston,
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so had to come back in the last minute and ask us to support this without the knowledge
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and the background that we would normally have expected.
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Yeah, but, I mean, you're a decent bloke, you've been on the plane from Cameroon with McLean
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for hours on end, I don't know how long it takes to get from Cameroon back home,
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but I mean, didn't you sort this out over a drink on the plane for goodness sake?
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None of this seems to be a hurdle, you can't get over.
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No, no, absolutely, we hope we can get over that.
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But ultimately, you know, this is a political decision between the leader of my party
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and the leader of the National Party who needs our support, you know, it's not,
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we don't often as an opposition, you know, support the government,
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we're sensible, we do, we need to know that we're not opening door to some of the claims
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that Winston is wildly making about this.
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We need to be able to answer to the public
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and say this is a genuinely good deal for New Zealand.
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It's not the one that Labour will negotiate it,
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but nonetheless, it's a good step forward.
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Good on him, you have a good ease to appreciate it though.
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They're Damien O'Connor, Labour Trade spokesperson.