N.Z.’s welfare ‘vital to Australia’

Press, 26 March 1979, Page 4

N.Z.’s welfare ‘vital to Australia’

NZPA ' Sydney | New Zealand and Australia are a classic case of! close economic inter-: dependency and each can help its own welfare by advancing the other’s, according to a report in the “Australian Financial Review.” In the third article of a series on New Zealand’s “economic mess” a writer for the newspaper Robert Haupt, says that the neces-i sary ingredient is political • will. “To exercise it politicians! on both sides of the Tasman will need to break out of their comfortable pre-con-ceptions in muca the same way as the relationship itself has sprung on to a new track,” he says. He says that the Minister of Foreign Affairs (Mr Taiboys) seemed to have grasped the point most explicitly during his Australian visit a vear ago. Haupt’s article continues on from two earlier reportsi by Christopher Jay. He says that the truth about New

I Zealand has been slow to i dawn in Australia: that •“New Zealand’s economic problems are grave and they [’matter.” Emphasising that New Zealand is by far Australia’s biggest market for manufactured goods, .he says that Australia has a vital interest ; in having New Zealand take ! the (economic) cure. He says Australia has ! little to contribute towards i New Zealand’s problems as (long as the New Zealander | leadership maintains its present stance, “which boils • down, really, to blaming its ! economic problems on , other nations and fate.” But he says that as Aus- , tralia’s economy picks up there will be suggestions . that more New Zealand . goods should he allowed into , Australia duty-free. “This would require unii lateral concessions on Australia’s part, something quite i outside the agreement that tigoverns trade, the New Zeas: land-Australia Free Trade I I Agreement (N.A.F.T.A,).”