Customs agreement to fight drug trafficking

Press, 16 August 1985, Page 5

Customs agreement to fight drug trafficking

By

CHRIS PETERS

NZPA staff correspondent Sydney

New Zealand and Australia yesterday afternoon signed a customs agreement that will smooth Tasman trade and tighten the net on drug traffickers.

The Minister of Customs, Mrs Shields, and her Australian counterpart, Senator John Button, put their signatures to the document officially described as a memorandum of understanding.

While both Ministers said the agreement merely formalised co-operation that was already taking place, Senator Button also said it was a necessary step if a customs union between the two countries, as envisaged by the architects of closer

economic relations, was to eventuate.

The memorandum provides a formal basis for cooperation in such areas as preventing and invesigating customs offences, researching and developing new customs systems and procedures, and training personnel.

It also follows a push on both sides of the Tasman against drug imports. The Ministers said that the greater co-operation between the two would help in the fight against drugs.

Mrs Shields said yesterday that much of the drugs entering New Zealand from Asia came through Australia, while the reverse was potentially true for

drugs entering Australia from South America. “When it comes to that, New Zealand is part of (the Australian) border just as Australia is part of our border,” she said. Mr Button said there were obvious connections between the two countries, and “drug traffic is probably proceeding more rapidly than C.E.R. has in terms of co-operation.” But Mrs Shields said that while New Zealand was buying the Australian Customs’ PASS system of passenger monitoring, the two systems would not be linked “initially,” although there would be exchanges of information.

The agreement was designed to streamline trade, help drug-enforcement

activities, rationalise training systems, exchange information, and make customs more cost-efficient in terms of resources.

Senator Button insisted, however, the customs agreement was not part of any current formal negotiation of a customs union where both countries had common borders for customs purposes. “But of course if you went forward in history and there was a customs union, this would be one element,” he said. He confirmed that the prospect of an eventual customs union was on the agenda for two days of talks in Canberra.

The impetus for the present agreement came with the beginning of the C.E.R. agreement on January 1, 1983, but formal negotiations of the actual agreements did not start until the annual Tasman customs meeting in Wellington in June.

It is regarded as a technical document that will smooth the way to full Tasman free trade by 1995.