The Country 20/07/26: David Seymour talks to Jamie Mackay

The Deputy Prime Minister and Act Party leader denies the election will be fought by celebrities more interested in glitz than graft. Plus, he comments on NZ First’s oil and gas policy and why we should make life easier for agricultural drone users.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
David Seymour is the Act Party leader also Deputy Prime
Minister David What is it about this twenty twenty sixth
election with the celebrity candidates Winston Scott, Tayanne Randall, Stu
Nash if you can call Stewart celebrity and Michael laws
but bat Well, I think you might have trumped them
with Paul Henry.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
Yeah, I think I think most people have been saying
Paul's in a slightly different category. I'm not really following
what they're doing. Good luck to them, but there's very
few people who understand that we need the rule of law,
property rights, open markets, the ability to accumulate capital, trade

(00:38):
freely and actually make money. That's what makes the world
go around. Most people in politics are trying to do
some version of robing Peter to pay Paul. So when
you get someone like Paul Henry who is a genuine
true believer, his philosophy is act, He's a great communicator,

(00:59):
huge pro file and he's just piercing some of the
gloom over New Zealand politics, of course you grab him
with both hands and we couldn't be happier. He's home.

Speaker 1 (01:09):
Did he come to you or did you come to him.

Speaker 2 (01:12):
Well, we've been talking for about three years. He wrote
an opyed before the twenty twenty three elections saying he
was going to vote for US. Then a couple of
years ago he spoke to his our conference and there
was a total smash at the twenty twenty four act conference.
And we've been talking over the years, and I don't
think anyone really went to anyone. That just kind of evolved.

Speaker 1 (01:32):
He's obviously going to get an electable position on your list.
Is that going to chuck out a good act candidate?
And I do note, I do note that you're losing two,
in my mind, really good act MPs, both retiring stepping
aside Brook van Walden and of course mister Mark Cameron.
You're our guy, the old Northland farmer. Got a lot

(01:53):
of time for him.

Speaker 2 (01:55):
Well so do I. And you know they're both going
for the different reasons, and they're both massive talent, some
massive losses. But on the other hand, you know actors
now are going concerned. So Andrew Hogart I think has
just come into his own the way he's been managing
this arrival of bird flu and farm environment plans and
just about every issue you think about if I was

(02:16):
in law in New Zealand, I'd be pretty happy that
you've got someone who actually knows what he's talking about
at cabinet, like Andrew Hogart. So you know, we can
replace people. And as far as Brock goes, huge lost
huge talents. I'm as a friend very happy for her
and I do consider a long term personal friend. But
obviously has a colleague that annoyed that she's leaving us.

(02:37):
So look, we keep going and those two will be missed,
but they will also be replaced by great talent.

Speaker 1 (02:43):
Do some of these celebrities bring glitz rather than graft?

Speaker 2 (02:48):
Look? I think if you look at Paul, he's been
interviewed about a whole lot of policy stuff and he
gets it right, So you know he's a genuine acts person.
You know, we're thrilled to have him. I think he's home.

Speaker 1 (03:00):
Do you support Winstonce and Shane's pitch for one billion
dollars to survey are offshore oil and gas fields? That
was the big announcement from New Zealand first yesterday? Your
brother in arms of course, those two brothers in arms,
your coalition partners. David, I know that you get along
with them, famously.

Speaker 2 (03:21):
Well potentially. I mean a couple of questions. Number one is,
over the last few decades, oil companies have surveyed most
of New Zealand. So you'd have to ask, first of all,
for a billion dollars, what problem are we solving that
isn't already What are we going to find that it's
not already nun by people that have paid for the survey?
And I guess the second issue is I don't want

(03:41):
to dwell on the past and people go back and forth,
and he said, she said, but it is a genuine
policy issue that the reason people aren't investing in New
Zealand as because the government eight years ago now, but
still people have a long memory because oil and gas
exploration has it long time frame. That government that those

(04:02):
guys were part of, you know, scared the Jesus and
said maybe you can't trust New Zealand. So whatever you
make of that, I only go into the politics of it.
But it's a genuine problem. Let's assume that you know,
people don't know where the oil and guesses and the
governmance neends a billion dollars and does find some potential,
then you have to actually persuade people to come here.

(04:24):
If they're not prepared to come and look for it
for it themselves, will they make the much larger investment
in extracting it. So, look, there's a lot of questions
around it. You can't fault the intent. We do need
more energy and we are going to need fossil fuels
for a long time. But you know, there's a few
questions there that I think probably need answers before we
sign up to it.

Speaker 1 (04:43):
Let's talk a week bit of policy if we can.
You are interested in drones, particularly agricultural drones.

Speaker 2 (04:51):
Yeah, Look, some people will have seen Clarkson's farm his
frustration with the regulators up there in England. Not much
different here, a huge potential for surveying and spraying and
so on, but the CIA is very tough on them.
We're promoting a new policy that we want to roll
out in a lot of areas after the election. That's
innovation trials, where you basically say here's a bunch of rules.

(05:13):
We don't want to go through two years of negotiating
rule changes. We're just going to delete a bunch of
rules in a select area for a select time make
it easier to use an agricultural drone and hey, look
if in a couple of years time people have used
this innovation trial and the world hasn't ended, maybe we
make it permanent. So it's just a faster way of deregulating.
And I think it could be very good because ultimately

(05:35):
Keywi Farm is the most innovative community in the world,
but they can't be held back by red tape. If
we're going to unlock New Zealand's potential, then we've got
to start doing more stuff with better technology than we
have been so far.

Speaker 1 (05:47):
David Seymour, thank you very much for your time. Good
on you for bringing Paul Henry into the election. Love
them or loath them, and everyone seems to have an
opinion on him. He's certainly going to liven up the campaign.

Speaker 2 (05:58):
Yeah, what a pleasure. Good on you. Uh Jesus, I
got all on my line. Good on you day.

Speaker 1 (06:03):
Thank you, David.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
Where is he gone?

Speaker 1 (06:07):
I think that's a bit of a fraudian slip there.
Thank you. David Seymour.