No 'magic hula' for NZ: Bollard

By IRENE CHAPPLE

"Who is that man?" asked the Knowledge Wave participant as she wandered past the talkfest's reception monitor showing Alan Bollard mid-speech.

The Reserve Bank Governor was, after all, barely recognisable without his suit.

The slicked down auburn fringe was still there, but it swept out, surprisingly, from under a sports cap.

"He seems very nervous," she said, and walked on.

Bollard might have been a little nervous as he opened yesterday's discussions among a disparate group of economists, businesspeople, academics, a unionist and an ideologue.

But he did warm up, and by the end of his speech he was making jokes.

Going through bullet-point judgments on New Zealand's performance, he produced the headline "Culture".

"How is New Zealand performing?

"I don't know," he answered himself, flicking a question mark up on to the overhead screen.

"I'm just a shallow, conservative ex-Treasury economist."

Not so conservative that he could not dump the white shirt and tie in favour of the black cap and a long-sleeved polo-shirt emblazoned with Team New Zealand logos.

The Team New Zealand/yachting theme was more than slightly stretched by the end of the session.

New Zealand was coming 20th in the "OECD Regatta," said Bollard, producing a slide where countries were indicated by yachts, streaming past Rangitoto.

New Zealand's yacht was black, all the others were red.

Unfortunately, there would be "no magic hula" helping New Zealand sail faster, opined Bollard as he closed his speech.

Surely, with Team New Zealand trailing Alinghi 3-0, Bollard could have just as easily pointed out that grand schemes do not always work anyway.

Bollard's speech took a major chunk of the 45 minutes scheduled for the panel discussion, leaving the potential for heated debate between such opposing forces as the Council of Trade Unions' Ross Wilson and the Business Roundtable's Roger Kerr cut unfortunately short.

After Bollard wound up, discussion was opened by one-minute speeches from each of the panellists.

But the time limit was largely ignored as each panellist charged through an average two and a half minutes of rapid opinion.

The panellists were economics professor Paul Romer, of Stanford University; Scott Perkins, Deutsche Bank's co-head of Global Corporate Finance for New Zealand and Australia; Chris Liddell, vice-president finance, International Paper; Alex Sundakov of the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research, Kerr and Wilson.

Their introductory points ranged from Sundakov's discomfort with the cumulative effect of smaller decisions, such as the implementation of the aquaculture moratorium, to Liddell's chart showing that New Zealand export companies earned twice the cost of their capital.

Kerr unsurprisingly suggested the Government's growth targets were unachievable without a freer market and a less hands-on approach.

Wilson bristled and pointedly remarked he would "not go back to fundamentals as Roger had invited", but instead pointed out New Zealand has the third-lowest compliance costs in the OECD and that social investment was a priority.

Issues were then briefly canvassed.

New Zealand's "change in tactician" - referring to government but playing on the morning's announcement that Team New Zealand tactician Hamish Pepper was to be replaced by back-up helmsman Bertrand Pace - was discussed.

All made different points.

Liddell complained about New Zealand's slackness toward attracting investment.

Sundakov worried that politics was becoming too urban, while much revenue came from beyond the cities.

Romer mused about his father's position as Governor of Colorado, which he considered to have an economy similar to New Zealand's.

Then Kerr and Wilson started pulling out examples of "free and open economies" compared with ones which have "more active policies".

In their discussion, Singapore, Ireland and Brussels, according to Kerr, fell into the former category. Australia, said Wilson, fell into the latter.

And, then, within a few minutes, time was up and the panellists were asked to leave the stage quietly.

They cleared out, and it was announced that the America's Cup race would be televised to the conference. The sound was to be off, but at least, if they got bored, delegates could watch the race.

They might find it easier to agree on how to speed up the black boat than on how to get the economy moving faster.

Herald Special Report - February 18, 2003:
Knowledge Wave 2003 - the leadership forum

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