Covid 19 coronavirus: Simon Wilson: Which tourists and migrants do we need now?

Ed Sheeran and Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern: If he became a Kiwi, could he handle the jandal? Photo / supplied

The desperate need to restore tourism has given oxygen to the old complaint that we need more of the right sort of people and fewer of the wrong sort. Trouble is, we don't agree who the right sort of people are.

There's a petition circulating to ban non-resident freedom campers. Wrong sort, apparently: they don't spend money on restaurants or accommodation and they've been very badly toilet trained. More golfers in hotels, please.

But hang on. New Zealand's an outdoor and adventure paradise, also green and clean and proudly egalitarian, despite some evidence that's not 100% purely true. Assuming travel becomes possible, we will always attract hordes of budget tourists. Why shouldn't we?

All tourists spend some money; many of the budget ones also work in hospitality. If they come here once and love it, they'll probably come back, with more money in their pocket each time they return.

Freedom campers on the Tutukaka coast in Northland. Photo / John Stone

Honestly, I don't mind if our tourism marketing, when it starts up, targets wealthier people. But to go as far as banning other categories?

For probably a long while, our post-Covid tourists will come from Australia and the Asian countries that have handled the pandemic well: Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea and perhaps China. We want them all. We need them all. As many as we can get.

Provided they're not carrying the Black Death, of course. Border controls like you've never seen.

The same debate has arisen over immigration, in relation to the world's most wealthy people. Investment banker Troy Bowker suggested last month that we invite the super-rich to apply for citizenship here, provided they invest "$50 million of capital, (equity not debt ) into productive New Zealand-based assets and employ more people".

Why only $50 million? was my first thought.

Bowker suggested they'd have to undergo a character test. That would be interesting. Assuming you set the bar higher than a prison record, how exactly do you judge the character of a billionaire?

Still, it's not wrong in principle to ask the super-rich to put their money to good use, or to ask them to do it here. It sure would help us hold down debt levels. But it may be wrong in practice.

The Prime Minister has scotched the idea: citizenship is not for sale, she says.

In fact, investor visas are available, although not on the scale Bowker proposed. I suspect the PM means that what a bunch of billionaires could buy here, under such a scheme, is far more than just the right to stay. If the economy depended on them, their influence on the Government and the country could become enormous.

Who needs the ultra-right libertarian Peter Thiel telling us what to do?

Ironically, Thiel himself highlights another problem with Bowker's proposal. The founder of PayPal and one of the world's richest people is already a citizen here. And what's he done with that honour? Maybe, or maybe not, built a bunker somewhere so well hidden that even some very good investigative sleuths can't find it.

In two other reported cases this past fortnight, some overseas families who bought land here have been forced to sell it again. They did not do the environmental and economic improvements they were obliged to under the terms of their purchases.

Freedom camping in Whanganui. Photo / Bevan Conley

There's much more to come. When travel restrictions are relaxed we'll be hit by a tsunami of would-be migrants, most of them wealthy. And as climate change wreaks ever more havoc, there will be refugees, especially from the Pacific and Asia, and more waves of the world's wealthy.

Everything has changed. Twenty years into the new century, we finally have our defining moment. We, the country and the world, are not going back. But how well will we go forward? Who are we going to let in?

The Financial Times has just told its readers, those who run companies, to think about moving here and bringing everyone with them. "Foreign tech firms, research departments and marketing agencies," it said, "could airlift their locked-down staff to a gorgeous tourist resort with good coffee such as Queenstown, now devoid of tourists."

You have to say it's better than selling land to billionaires who simply want a bolthole.

Ardern herself addressed the issue three years ago, when the singer Ed Sheeran announced he wanted to become a citizen. She said she had some questions.

Did he like pineapple lumps? Did he even know what they were? Was he prepared to wear jandals in "semi-inappropriate situations"?

Two things there. First, the attitude. Bit of self-deprecation, bit of wit, nothing too fancy but just maybe we'll startle you with something awesome. There's a Kiwi way of meeting the world and it's quite good when you have it.

Second, let's welcome the artists!

When half the world wants to live here, we should favour those who need to come – refugees especially – and those with material things to contribute, like a business. And also creative people. Those who bring only abstract things: their talent and their brains.

History shows the way: in the 1930s, when a wave of Jews and other Germans fled the Nazi regime for America, they gave New York and Hollywood an enormous artistic and intellectual electric shock.

Could we do that to ourselves? Become a world centre for the ferment of ideas and artistry and real-world problem-solving?

• Covid19.govt.nz: The Government's official Covid-19 advisory website

And if so, could we make sure we include urban designers in that? Also city theorists, community organisers and everyone else with good ideas about how to build cities and live well in them.

We've got many of these people here already, but not yet a critical mass. Councils – looking at you, Auckland and Wellington – have a habit of squashing them. But we need them in the ascendant.

It's not a nice-to-have and nor is it just about building bike lanes. As populations pile on the pressure, we'll have to get very good at building strong, connected, resilient communities. The built environment, serving the needs and enlivening the hopes and dreams of citizens, is critical to that.

We've got a moat, which certainly helps, but we'll need to become really good at living together inside it.