Australian Ministers to attend N.Z. conferences

Press, 4 February 1987, Page 28

Australian Ministers to attend N.Z. conferences

PA Wellington A number of Australian Ministers and officials will visit New Zealand for a series of conferences over the next three months, the Australian High Commission has said. An Australian state Ministers’ agricultural council meeting will begin this week in Queenstown, and will be addressed by the New Zealand Minister of Agriculture, Mr Moyle, on Friday. On February 11, a party of 60 Australians, at state and Federal level, will start a four-day conference of planning Ministers in Wellington, to be hosted by the Minister of Works and Development,

Mr Colman. That delegation will be led by the Federal Local Government and Administration Minister,' Mr Tom Uren, who has been a Labour Party member of the Australian House of Representatives since 1958. After a meeting on March 2 and 3, between the Defence Ministers, Mr Kim Beazley of Australia and New Zealand’s Mr O’Flynn, Australia will send a delegation to the international Trade Ministers’ meeting at Taupo between March 22 and 24. The delegation will be led by the Federal Trade Minister, Mr John Dawkins.

More than 20 Australians are expected to attend an . Immigration Ministers’ conference in Wellington between March 25 and 27, and others will attend a Housing Ministers’ conference between April 7 and 9. A date has yet to be fixed for a Social Security Ministers’ meeting at Federal level, also in April. The High Commission spokesman said he did not think there had been such a concentrated number of visits by Australian Ministers before. He said it indicated the seriousness with which Australia took its relationship with New Zealand.