Greens see red at sock rebirth

By SUZANNE McFADDEN and SCOTT KARA

The rebirth of Team New Zealand's red socks promotion ran into rough seas yesterday, with the Greens urging people not to buy the socks because they are made overseas.

America's Cup campaign boss Sir Peter Blake, who made red socks an unlikely fashion in 1995, relaunched the promotion yesterday to raise at least $600,000 for the New Zealand syndicate.

The socks are made in Korea. Team NZ wanted them made here but found it was too expensive.

Greens co-leader Rod Donald said people should boycott the campaign and demand that locally made socks be used.

"This is the only way New Zealanders can show Team New Zealand that it should be buying a locally made product.

"The problem with free trade is it allows goods to be made overseas and undercut the local product.

"This is symbolic of the malaise this country is in. We are willing to save a few cents in the short term but in the long term we lose out."

Alliance trade spokesman Matt Robson said it would be a pity not to support the campaign.

"It's a shame they can't buy New Zealand socks but it's not the fault of the America's Cup campaign."

Mr Robson said that with the move towards free trade, Government policies needed to support local industries so they could compete with countries such as Korea.

"A boycott of the red socks is not going to achieve this. It's not going to help either the America's Cup campaign or get our population buying New Zealand goods."

The red socks funds will be used to pay for a radical new mast for the cup defenders.

Sir Peter said Team New Zealand had a solid budget of at least $40 million, but it needed more money for the new mast, yet to be built.

"We have a very good budget, but as you go through this programme you come across a project like this that is not in the original figures.

"Now people will see something on the boat that they were part of. We'll stick a couple of red socks at the bottom of the mast so they know."

In 1995, the New Zealand challenge sold 120,000 pairs of socks in two weeks. This time 300,000 have been made.

They go on sale at $9.99 next week.