Fran O'Sullivan has been busy. She has another column in the Herald today, this one looks at our investment regime. She calls for some certainty over what is deemed a 'strategic asset'.
All investors - New Zealanders and foreigners alike - should be pressuring Finance Minister Michael Cullen to designate forthwith the list of strategic assets that the Government wants to maintain within New Zealand control, or, subject to additional covenants before allowing control to pass overseas.
Right now New Zealand's hard won reputation as a "fair dealer" towards foreign investors is in jeopardy as the Government - with the aid of New Zealand First - sets about re-erecting Fortress New Zealand by using the results of political polls to determine which bids get over the line rather than rational criteria.
The least Cullen could do is give investors the courtesy of spelling out which assets will henceforth have to stay under effective Kiwi ownership control.
This is an important issue as the global credit crunch has increased the price of debt funding.
And
No sensible investor knows whether the Government has simply been whipping up anti-foreigner sentiment for electoral reasons as was clearly the case with the doomed Dubai and Canadian bids for Auckland Airport, or whether it has genuinely reached the view on the basis of observed practices that it's time to place a cache of New Zealand assets in the "strategic" camp and protect them against foreign control.
This is an important distinction.
Cullen's stance that there is no need to isolate which assets fall within the new category of "strategic infrastructures on sensitive land" - a "trust us" approach - leads investors to the belief that the Government has no intention of making a rational assessment of overseas investment applications.
We don't know either if Cullen's refusal to stipulate an asset list is because he genuinely wants to play his cards close to his chest, or if he is simply going along with the anti-foreigner sentiment to keep other players like New Zealand First close until after the election.
