Panel Discussions
Hosted By Susan Wood
In response to John Key interview
SUSAN WOOD
Back with the panel. Dr Bryce Edwards, Fran O’Sullivan and Matt McCarten. Bryce, very interesting seeing him [John Key]
using the emotional ties, the Korean War, the soldiers who fought there, to push our free trade agreement.
DR BRYCE EDWARDS - Political Scientist
Yeah, I mean, we should congratulate John Key for achieving the restart of the talks. But make no bones about it, he had
used it as a Trojan horse - using the commemorations, using NZ’s war veterans going over there, basically going in with
direct talks and saying, ‘Look, we lost 45 people who died in this war. Now it’s time for payback. We want free trade
talks.’ It’s a Trojan horse, and it’s really what wars are for. NZ goes in and then comes back and says, ‘Now it’s time
for payback,’ and he’s got it.
SUSANPretty important for us, though, Fran, isn’t it, that we get in there, given that it is our fifth largest market?
FRAN O’SULLIVAN - NZ Herald Columnist
Yeah, it is important, and, frankly, I wrote after he came back empty-handed last time that he should do exactly this
and that he should stress it.
SUSANThat’s interesting.
FRANWell, Helen Clark did exactly that. All those trips to Europe. Spilling blood on European soil, trying to protect our
access to markets there. You know, we have fought for democracy in other countries, so there is an importance. But I
think also this is interesting. It’s been a stalled FTA, but it’s not the only one. Canada’s been stalled, Australia’s
been stalled. In the background, a very powerful figure, Han Duck-Soo, has been to NZ, and he came on a prime
ministerial fellowship, and he’s a former prime minister of Korea. He was active in Washington to get the US-Korean FTA
over the line, and he now prominently heads the Korean International Trade Association. They have made an ally of him.
He says it’s going to be done. He’ll muster his company, 65,000 companies, and they will put pressure on the Korean
government. I think that makes just as much difference as the emotional plea.
SUSANCertainly something that we see both sides of the political divide. It doesn’t matter who’s in power. They are singing
from the same song page.
MATT McCARTEN - National Secretary, Unite Union
Everyone wants to do a deal for us, and so they should. I like Bryce’s thing about that we want to have payback. I would
have thought the Koreans would have said, actually, our whole wool boom and dairy boom was based on the Korean War, and
we did extraordinarily well. I would have been more impressed if the Prime Minister had popped across the border and
done a deal in the north and set up a trading partner.
FRANWell, the problem is that at the moment, our companies are being really seriously disadvantaged as a result of the
preferential deals given to US and others on the deals they’ve got. So it’s not as if we’re just getting access; it’s
that we’re just trying to get back to where we were before everybody else got better.
BRYCEAn even playing-
SUSANA level playing field, yeah. All right. Very interesting also, Matt, I’ll bring you in on this. The GCSB - the Prime
Minister essentially said the protestors, they are politically aligned or misinformed. Is he underestimating the
strength of opposition to this?
MATTYes, I think. I’ve been quite surprised the opposition’s taken quite a while to actually catch up. And when I was here
last time, it was interesting with this Peter Dunne and the trust thing. I remember when I was here last time, he said,
‘I’d like to trust him, but I just don’t.’ And so now it’s he does trust him. I did say as a quip on my way out, I just
said, ‘He’ll get it through with Dunne’s vote,’ and that was when Dunne was being done. And that’s exactly what’s
happened. This is just cynical politics. This is the problem he’s got. Labour and NZ First, they’ve both offered a
negotiated agreement to get the essentials of this done. He’s spurned them, and he’s just going for it. I think it’s
more about him being miffed because he’s been annoyed about how it’s run out with Kim Dotcom, the embarrassment, and he
just wants to retrospectively do it, and he’s got himself into a corner, and he can’t get out of it. And now Dunne has
seen his opportunity to get back in the game, and, yes, Jessica [Mutch] is quite right - Dunne wants to get
Ohariu-Belmont, and this is the price. Wants his cup of tea.
SUSANBryce, there will be some Supplementary Order Papers that do come in. We will see some changes to it, perhaps, and a bit
of political face-saving. And Winston Peters? His role in all of this?
BRYCEYeah, I mean, I think all these politicians are actually quite vulnerable, Peter Dunne, Winston Peters and John Key, on
this because there is a growing rise and social movement almost. We saw that with the protests yesterday. And John Key
has tried to say, ‘Oh, no, this is just politically aligned, informed people.’ But it’s increasingly people of the
establishment. It’s the Law Society, it’s QCs, it’s dames, it’s NZ Herald editorials saying things.
SUSANNew Zealander of the year.
BRYCESo I think he’s undermined-
MATTNo, no, no, you’re right. I go to all the protests in Auckland.
SUSANReally?! (ALL LAUGH)
MATTAnd this was the first protest I didn’t know everyone’s first name. It was a different mix.
SUSANHow many people in Auckland. It was hard to tell.
MATT5000, 4000, 5000.
SUSAN5000. Is that significant?
FRANIt’s small.
MATTNo, no, no. People don’t march now. They don’t. In the old days, we did. They don’t. And it was a nationwide thing. It
was organised in a week. I’m just saying. It’s early days.
SUSANLet’s get Fran in here.
FRANI think it was actually a pretty miniscule march.
MATTWhat was the last march you’ve been on, Fran? (ALL LAUGH)
SUSANIt might have been at university. (ALL LAUGH) Do you think the Prime Minister is underestimating the opposition, or do
you think this will go through and go away?
FRANWell, it will go through, because he’ll push it through.
SUSANYeah.
FRANI think there’s still issues there, and there’s issues- I think one of the untapped potential issues is really the use
of metadata to crack down on journalists.
BRYCEAbsolutely.
FRANIn a story this weekend about snooping around the finding who Jon Stephenson had spoken to, admittedly not by the use of
metadata in NZ but offshore through US affiliates of the defence. These are the things that will raise hackles, and it
will get into also other people like journalists having to-
BRYCESo, it has been beltway issue, absolutely, but it is mainstreaming.
SUSANBut you think it’s going to spill over?
BRYCEWell, it’s still to be seen to what extent, but it is mainstream.
FRANBut also a lot of people are worried about terrorism and things like that. It’s a bit part of why you actually have
security services.
SUSANThank you, panel.
ENDS