The Green Party will today seek the leave of Parliament to introduce a Member’s Bill that would end the secrecy around foreign trusts in New Zealand, by imposing a registration and disclosure scheme on foreign trusts. The Income Tax (Foreign Trusts Registration and Disclosure) Amendment Bill would increase transparency by requiring trustees to disclose full information about the settlors, trustees, and beneficiaries of a trust. The IRD would publish this information in an online register. “Given the immediate risks to...

The Government must stop allowing the foreign trust industry to operate in secret here to prevent New Zealand becoming a tax haven for criminals, the Green Party said today. New Zealand foreign trusts have again been implicated in money laundering, tax avoidance, and criminal activity following a massive document leak from a Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca. The documents reportedly show that New Zealand is being used by overseas investors to keep tax secrets. “New Zealand is today being described...

“John Key’s got it wrong. The whole point of our policy is to strengthen Kiwibank to be a better commercial bank, not weaken it by encouraging non-commercial behaviour,” Green Party Co-leader James Shaw said. “John Key is being deliberately alarmist and making things up because he doesn’t have his own plan for improving banking for Kiwis. “The evidence from Kiwibank’s first few years shows how wrong John Key is. Back then, capital injections and lower dividends helped Kiwibank compete commercially...

Productivity growth under National’s economic management is the weakest it’s been since 1996, the Green Party said today. Productivity statistics released today by Stats New Zealand show that while productivity growth this year has been positive, productivity growth over the whole economic cycle is well below longer-term trends. Productivity is best observed in growth cycles rather than in single year figures, they say. “Productivity growth over this most recent economic cycle (2008-2015) is the weakest it’s been in twenty years,”...

The IRD warned the Government in 2013 of massive, systematic tax avoidance by multinational companies but National is still to act on it, the Green Party said today. The New Zealand Herald today released analysis that showed multinational companies operating in New Zealand could have avoided paying up to $500 million in tax last year. The IRD warned both the Ministers of Finance and Revenue in 2013 that multinationals were avoiding tax by profit shifting and that work to protect...

The gap between the tradable and non-tradable parts of the economy has grown to its biggest since 2000 meaning the economy is growing more unbalanced under National’s economic leadership, the Green Party said today. GDP statistics released today by Statistics New Zealand show that the tradable parts of the New Zealand economy (exporters and trade-exposed businesses) shrunk by 0.8 percent in the December 2015 quarter while the rest of the economy (the non-tradable sector) grew by 0.9 percent over the...

The Green Party welcomed today’s cut in the Official Cash Rate (OCR) but restated that the Government’s failure to take the heat out of the Auckland housing market meant risks remained for further house price increases. The Reserve Bank today reduced the OCR by 25 basis points to 2.25 percent. “We welcome the long overdue decision to lower the OCR which will be a relief to indebted dairy farmers and households paying off their mortgages,” Green Party finance spokesperson Julie...

The Government must rule out mass sales of New Zealand rural land to overseas buyers if it’s to avoid a double disaster as the dairying slump forces farmers to the wall, the Green Party says. Finance Minister Bill English this morning admitted the dairy industry is in an extreme scenario yet he had no solution to offer farmers other than that he hoped they’d “get through”. “New Zealand is facing the prospect of a double disaster as the dairying slump...

Record, excessive profits in the banking industry and the high level of foreign ownership of the banking sector is causing long-term damage to the economy, the Green Party said today. KPMG's latest Financial Institutions Performance Survey found New Zealand's banks posted record collective profits up 6.9 percent to reach an all-time high of $5.17 billion last year. Interest margins are also at ten-year highs at 2.28 percent. “The fact that over 90 percent of our banking sector is foreign-owned means...

The cost to New Zealanders of National’s asset sales has today hit $1 billion, according to figures released by the partially privatised power companies. The latest interim dividend figures from the partially privatised Mighty River Power, Genesis, and Meridian show that the Crown has forgone $945.14 million in dividends since the asset sales. The National Government spent $96 million on the asset sales programme, including bonus-share sweeteners for investors. Combined, that means the asset sales have a total cost of...