Simon Bridges: Auckland Business Chamber CEO on the Government's focus on pulling in more Chinese tourists

There's a push for the Government to focus on increasing tourist numbers to maximise economic growth. 

Nicola Willis —the minister now charged with driving the growth agenda— is considering visa changes to pull more tourists through the door. 

She wants to see Chinese visitor numbers back to pre-Covid levels.

Auckland Business Chamber chief executive Simon Bridges wouldn't be drawn on whether increasing the international visitor levy last year was a good idea. 

He told Ryan Bridge the sector has real issues, and if the Government's looking to get the economy back on track, visa issues are a start. 

Bridges told Ryan Bridge incentivising airlines could be the answer. 

He says there's nearly as many flights coming in from China as the US. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Changes to the tourism visa process could be on the way.
Nikola Willis she's got that new remit as the Economic
Growth Minister, and she wants to make it easier for visits,
particularly Chinese visitors to come here. Here are the numbers
for you. Chinese visitor numbers still at around sixty percent
of pre COVID, which is pretty bad. That's the year
to October overall around eighty seven percent. Simon Bridges allcland

(00:21):
Business Chamber of CEO Simon, good morning, Hey morning, Ryan,
good to have you on. How hard is it for
a Chinese tourist to come here?

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Look, it's hard, and I mean I'll just go to
the wider issue, which is it's good we've got any
new Minister of Economic Growth who's listening, looking for ideas
to usually grow the economy economy, but look, actually she
needs to. We're in recession. It's really tough out there.
And you know I'm talking and I've been talking a
while about tourism. But it could be international education, it
could be a bunch of issues. It's just that tourism

(00:49):
is one of them that's low hanging fruit. It's really hard.
We've made it really hard. It's more costly since last
year from government is more complicated, it takes longer to
get a visa and these are you know, oftentimes last
minute travelers. Right, So we've definitely made it harder. And
contrast it with Singapore, right, you talk about Singapore there

(01:12):
they have gone visa free for thirty days for Chinese travelers,
as opposed to what we've done, where you know, it's
absolutely not that you need that costly complicated visa and surprise, surprise,
whereas we're you know, eighty percent and tourism back to
pre COVID levels, they're one hundred percent back when it
comes to Chinese tourists. And by the way you and

(01:33):
you have said it yourself, actually our issue is Chinese
were there are only whatever it is, were.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
We stupid then our government to put the visa fees
up on the visitor levy up.

Speaker 2 (01:45):
You know, I think I think what government kind of
needs to do for business for New Zealand as ultimates,
every decision they make have a pro growth lens. Right,
you know, does this help grow or does it does
it hurt it? And bear in mind with right, I
mean we're talking about a country that is rich They
have nearly double the gdpople capital than us, but they're

(02:07):
not too good for what some people here called sometimes
low value tourism. Right, they take it where they can
get it.

Speaker 1 (02:13):
Will we, I mean, was what we did last year
progress or anti growth?

Speaker 2 (02:19):
Well? Look, you know the answer for that. I mean,
I'm not suggesting that they don't have I'm not criticizing that.

Speaker 1 (02:25):
It's hard to criticize their old colleagues, I understand, but
I mean it's look.

Speaker 2 (02:28):
Look anyone, and in the end, they've got very real issues.
You know, they do have cost pressures. You know there
are valid reasons. But in the end, you know, if
you're looking to get the economy, as they would say,
back on track, and we urgently need to to keep
Kiwi's here tourisms low hanging fruit. There's visa issue is one,
but actually, don't just think about China, think about India.

(02:49):
Their tourism market's been growing massively. Are they're fundamentally not
coming here as tourists? What about for them any business
class traveler visa? Again, I cannot see any good reason
why you wouldn't sort of start doing some of these
moves that other countries do.

Speaker 1 (03:06):
We is air capacity of problem here because we're not
back to pre pandemic levels. Do we need to incentivize
airlines or get them back on board?

Speaker 2 (03:13):
Yes we do. I mean it's good news to see
you know, some hints about Turkey to Turkish airlines. I
think coming that though my sensus is not an issue
around China. Right we have, I mean we have nearly
It's remarkable when you look at the numbers, and obviously
geopolitics plays a role in this. We have nearly as
many flights coming into a New Zealand from China as
America does. Right, So in my sense of it is

(03:36):
is they will not be at full capacity, so fill
them up. We're not too good for tourism and get
your restaurants, your retail, your hotels back to that kind
of one hundred percent as opposed to probably the seventy
five eighty percent there at the moment, which is the
difference between profit and loss.

Speaker 1 (03:54):
Simon, thank you. Good to hear from your Simon Bridges
the Aukland Business Chamber of CEO. It is eighteen minutes
away from even five hundred and ninety dollars on fees
and English language translations. So any Chinese tourists who wants
to come here, they have to get all of their
documents translated into English first, and, as Simon said, their
last minute, Travis, who wants to do that?

Speaker 2 (04:14):
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