M.P. urges haven

Press, 25 May 1984, Page 4

M.P. urges haven

PA Wellington New Zealand should let “poets, writers and dreamers” live in New Zealand tax-free, a Labour Party frontbencher, Mr Mike Moore, suggested yesterday. “Ireland lets its poets, writers and dreamers live in that Emerald Isle taxfree. Why don’t we?” said the Opposition’s spokesman on tourism, trade and marketing.

In a speech to the Recording Industry Association’s annual meeting in Auckland, Mr Moore said: “Ireland has tax holiays for authors. They rejoice and promote their history — so should we.”

Ireland was building its culture again after 400 years of persecution by imperial Britain, he said.

“Just as the monasteries in Ireland provided shelter for Christian culture during the barbaric Dark Ages, New Zealand can be a haven for culture, writing, arts and thinkers during these dark hours where reason wrestles in the shade of the nuclear holocaust,” Mr Moore said. “That is the vision I have for New Zealand — a nuclear-free haven for thinkers, poets, artists, a place that celebrates the soul as well as the wallet.”

He said that the recording industry had “magnificent potential,” and that it must put pressure on the Government for its share of the investment dollar.

Cinema, video and recordings were the twentieth century’s “most powerful cultural force, and the economic benefits are potentially enormous,” he said.