Winston Peters: NZ First leader reveals why he's opposed to asset sales

As one coalition partner speaks against asset sales, another is keen to welcome them with open arms.

The Prime Minister reiterates he's ruled them out this term, but is keen to reconsider them in future, saying legitimate conversations should be held.

New Zealand First's Winston Peters says he's going to stop the country's assets from being sold.

"The reality is, the name of this game is getting an asset and extracting the maximum amount of value out of it for your your workforce, for your wealth, for your economy. Other countries do that, why don't we?"

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Asset sales are shaping up to be a major election
battle next year. Christopher Luxen says he's open to selling
big state owned assets to raise cash, a move that
Winston Peters are slamming as silly. The longtime critic of
privatization says the government should fix the economy first. The
Prime Minister's already hit back, Well, it's not surprising he's
been here fifty years for going to say he has

(00:20):
a lot of different views on a lot of different
things that are pretty entreged. New Zealand First leader Winston
Peters is with us now, Hi, Winston, Hello, I have
to feel like that was a dig at your age.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
What do you think, Well, actually got the fifty years wrong,
But I do admire as understanding that experience matters.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
Yeah, I like that, listen. Can we do it differently
to what you saw in the eighties and nineties and hated,
which was the sale of the complete sale of things
one hundred percent out. What about if we go for
a forty nine percent sale of something?

Speaker 2 (00:51):
Well, the reality is if you run the thing properly,
like they do in Singapore, they get proper top class
businessmen and woman to run the TEMISEK model and then
sure they get the maxim out of it. You don't
have these sort of outcomes. But when you have what
we've got, what I call lacks less than adequate management,
and you put up with that, and the outcome is
almost certain you're not going to get the performance you

(01:11):
should get. But the reality is that the name of
this game is getting an asset and extracting the maximatic
value out of it for your workforce, for your wealth,
and for your own economy. Do you know what other
countries do that? What are we Winston?

Speaker 1 (01:25):
Don't you accept though, that if you leave things in
the control of the public sector, they inevitably do not
run as well as if you inject the private sector
into it, right, And that's what we've seen with the
power companies. A minute that they got floated, they doubled
in value, they paid heaps more and dividends. So you know,
couldn't couldn't all of these assets that we aren't actually
be better run if we had a bit of a

(01:46):
bit of listing going on.

Speaker 2 (01:49):
Listen it's nine night, remember, yeah, and Max Badford was
going to plato future power costs. Well, the plata was
vertical when he finished that the exactly what happened, and
we're being screwed big time. We used to have a
national asset for our business and for our homes, which
was cheap, affordable power, and one of the major costs

(02:09):
is now being rolled on us in there in the
name of privatization. If I had my way out.

Speaker 1 (02:15):
Well, don't you think it was the Bradford the Yeah,
I mean, don't you think it was the reforms of
the nineties that were partly to blame rather than the
asset sales a decade ago.

Speaker 2 (02:25):
But I'm talking about the privatization that happened straight then.
You know. The first thing that happened was that Jennie
Shipley made one power company private. Right now, where did
it all go? It was all forecasters were all predictable.
In fire men Saudi Arabia, I don't pay world costs
for fuel, and I in Zealand we weren't paying world
cost There was a cutting edge advance for our businesses

(02:46):
and built it up on decades by politicians who knew
what they were doing when we were number two in
the world.

Speaker 1 (02:54):
Okay, what do you think about it?

Speaker 2 (02:55):
It doesn't have a ring about it. It has a
ring about it. So a previous group of politicians run
a far better economy and built all these asses up,
and then the modern group group come along with their
neo level experiment. They're not running the economy downd for decades,
and then they start saying, oh, I not will do
We'll disguise our failure by selling off the assets our
forefathers built. Is this rather convenient?

Speaker 1 (03:16):
How do you feel about selling off some of land
Corp's farms which are being poorly like not I mean
maybe not poorly, but not that well run by land
Corp and then giving young farmers the opportunity to get in.

Speaker 2 (03:27):
Well, have you looked and see what land Corp Is
required to do? They're aquired to do all sorts of
things excepting one of the farms efficiently for the maximum profit.
You go back to what they should be doing, they'll
do it. But if you give them a whole lot
of out of left field criteria woke stuff, you know,
in performative stuff to do, then they're never going to

(03:49):
make a profit.

Speaker 1 (03:49):
Hey, can I ask you a question. It's a fair
point that you actually make their Winston I don't disagree
with you. Can Andrew cost to survive what's been revealed
right now.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
It's look, I can't come on this because it's a
matter that you know will be unveiled on proof. But
if you say, would I be concerned? Yeah, I am
seriously concerned at the background to this.

Speaker 1 (04:12):
Yeah, totally, Winston. Thanks very much, Winston Peters, New Zealand
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