Dialogue: Build business for the people

GILBERT ULLRICH*, a vocal critic of the previous Government's hands-off policy, says he is equally despairing of those now running the country.

I hate to say it, but I have sat waiting for the Government to give some indication that it is not some sort of throwback to the 1930s. So far, I have been disappointed.

The unfortunate consequence of this is that we have a country governed by a group that clearly has no original ideas and is incapable of copying good ideas from overseas. Just as unfortunately, we have a government-in-waiting that demonstrated it was also bereft of ideas during its term in office.

It is all somewhat depressing.

We have spent a long time believing that whatever happens, we will get by on scenery and good intentions. We are quite possibly doomed now to hit rock bottom, like some alcoholic in denial. We should admit that we really do have a problem.

I read a recent Weekend Herald column by Gordon McLauchlan putting forward the view that business groups are just another petulant special interest sector prone to whining. That is probably fair comment.

So when business people react to government actions with alarm because they see them as impinging on their ability to do business, we shouldn't necessarily see these warnings as the whining of a special interest group.

Business people are far less cohesive than columnists would suggest. Their "whining" is frequently the result of large numbers of small and large businesses hurting simultaneously. If that is happening, it does not indicate good job prospects for this country's young people.

New Zealand has never really recovered from the 1987 crash. Business has never been easy here because we don't give any credence to it.

I criticised the National-New Zealand First Government for its absolute hands-off approach to our need to promote our exports at a time when we slowly but steadily built up an overseas trade deficit of well over $100 billion.

I, and other business people, welcomed the election of the Labour-led Government on the grounds that it could not be more bereft of ideas than its predecessor.

Surely, I reasoned, it must see that promoting business is not promoting one special interest group. Everybody in the country has a special interest in seeing our businesses do well, whether they are owners or employees. It now seems I was wrong.

Our previous Government had simply long run out of innovation. This Government is driven by ideologies that the rest of the world abandoned years ago, and runs the risk of putting us through the pain that engendered many of those ideas in the first place.

There was a real opportunity in the Budget for the Government to establish research and development tax incentives and also a form of export guarantee system.

At least temporarily that opportunity has gone, but I don't now believe it will be revisited. It is interesting, again, to compare us with Australia, where the Government backs its EFFIC finance corporation and guarantees exports, to produce export sales into what is a risky global market.

Companies like BHP New Zealand Steel use this system to cover exports from New Zealand, and this is yet another reason why New Zealand companies are moving their head offices to Australia.

I now believe that all those various people who make up the business community in this country will do what they have become specialists at doing. They will see this Government for what it is and hunker down, trying to survive through another period of in-your-face government.

The small businesses have no choice. The larger companies will do what they have been doing over the past few years and quietly drift overseas to climates that are more welcoming.

Governments in other countries want to see successful business in their communities. They like the jobs it creates and the money that it brings in, so they offer New Zealand companies special deals.

With this income, they build schools, hospitals, industrial parks service and other items which continue to build a better infrastructure.

We, as New Zealanders, need to convince the Government that successful New Zealand businesses benefit the country and its people before it is too late.

* Gilbert Ullrich is the managing director of Ullrich Aluminium.