Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Jason Walls: Newstalk ZB Political Editor on the relationship between New Zealand and the Cook Islands

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Jason Walls: Newstalk ZB Political Editor on the relationship between New Zealand and the Cook Islands · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Now, last night of Wellington, Winston Peters delivered a speech
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: that showed he's not missing around with the Cook Islands.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: He said, we need to reset the government to government relationship.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: We need to formally restate responsibilities, obligations and the overall
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: parameters of the free association model. Or this no small task,
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: so does it be political? Editor Jason Walls is listening
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: to the speech enjoins me, now, good morning to you, Jason,
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: good morning. Does Winston want an apology for Mark Brown
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: or does he just want a conversation?
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: Oh, listen, I think he probably wants a bit of bolls.
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: It's clear that Winston is well passed fed up at
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: this stage. I mean the fact that Mark Brown went
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: to China, he signed this agreement with that practically no
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: oversight from New Zealand, no consultation or anything of the
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: sort has obviously, so I think of grave concern in
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: Winston has been quite upset about this for a number
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: of weeks now, and I can underte I can understand
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: why it's no small feats to completely snub New Zealand
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: in a sense and signed such a major agreement with
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: China without giving New Zealand much of a heads up,
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: and the government is still in the dark about the
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: details of this agreement. I mean they've released essentially what
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: can be described as the executive summary to New Zealand,
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: but Winston Peter's his officials in the Prime Minister for
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: that matter, are still waiting for some more information on
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: this one. So quite worrying times between the relationship between
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: the two countries and why the reset is occurring.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: So yeah, it's a real telling off, but to some
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: diplomatic language, but that's the way you do it. So
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: that's the big thing, the restating the parameters of our
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: free association model. What could that look like?
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: Well, that's the thing. We need to wait and see
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: what that is. We've had about sixty years of this model,
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: and it's quite fitting that the that the Winston is
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: looking to reset it now in terms of what it
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: looks like, I mean, that's exactly the question that we're
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: asking at this stage. And with New Zealand and the
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: Cooks are extremely close. We've got say, passports, same currency,
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: various different things like that. So what it actually looks
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: like we'll be asking win Pete is that very question today?
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'm quite interested to see is we actually
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  Speaker 2: at this situation is this is sort of almost a
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: block that he could make to say, if they actually
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: give us the details of what they signed with China,
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: can he go back on this and is using this
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: as just a bit of a trump card to say,
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: if you don't play by our rules, where we're going
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: to drop you.
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: Yes, if New Zealand's two hash, there is a real
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: risk that the Cook Islands will go okay. Well, China's
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: that mate, Well.
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: There is that risk and is the sort of the
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: trade off here because China have been sort of muscling
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: their way into the Pacific with their seemingly limitless amounts
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: of money. New Zealand, what we do have with the
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Cook Islands is a long history of cultural connection with
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: the country. I mean there are a hundred thousand Cook
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  Speaker 2: Islanders in New Zealand for example. So that is our
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: real trump card in this situation. But you know, is
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: it enough when China come calling with just bottomless pockets?
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: Jason Walls, thank you so much for getting up early
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: for us. That is Jason Walls, our political editor. For
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: more from early edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live to
• 3:15
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• 3:18
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