Government quizzed over US trade deal progress

Opposition MPs questioned the Government in Parliament yesterday about why it had not achieved a free-trade agreement with the United States and were told everything possible was being done to get one.

Australia announced an agreement with the US on Monday, and since then there has been intense interest in the impact it will have on the New Zealand economy.

National MP Lockwood Smith, a former trade negotiations minister, wanted to know when negotiations would begin and what the Government was doing to minimise the risk of investment and trade being diverted from New Zealand.

Foreign Affairs Minister Phil Goff said a negotiating date depended on when the US agreed to start talks.

"What we are doing about it is taking every reasonable step to try to enter into such negotiations," he said.

"The Government has worked very closely with the private sector to build a constituency in the US in favour of an FTA with New Zealand.

"As a result of the work that we've done, 314 leading US companies have come out publicly in support of an FTA with New Zealand, and 21 senators and 50 members of the House of Representatives have written directly to President Bush urging that such negotiations commence."

Act deputy leader Ken Shirley asked Mr Goff to acknowledge that the main reason for not getting an agreement was that the Government had bungled its foreign affairs and defence policies, and because of that had been left behind.

"That's simply not true," Mr Goff said, and he went on to quote reported comments by US deputy chief of mission in Wellington David Burnett, who said the nuclear issue had been overblown.He did not think it had much of a role in trade relations.

- NZPA