Press conference held on the 800th anniversary of the Magna Carta by NZ Prime Minister John Key
Photos by Francis Cook.
John Key announced NZ is investing $125 million in a Chinese led Asian Infrastructure Bank.
He then discussed possible legal challenges from Iwi groups over the Government's plan to sell land in Auckland to new home buyers saying that the Govt. is confident in its legal advice that the Iwi do not have first right of refusal over the land in the circumstances which have arisen in this case - and pointed to a recent Ngai Tahu precedent.
He answered questions about the alleged bribing of people traffickers to take a boat which had been bound for NZ back to Indonesia He said the Government had no knowledge of any bribing and hadn't asked any questions. Pushed on the issue later in the press conference he said that the only issue for NZ was what would happen if the boat arrived. It hadn't considered issues of bribing traffickers and probably wouldn't do so. "That's a matter for Australia", he said.
The PM also answered some questions from TV3 about last night's 3D Investigates report into an NZDF battle. And from TVNZ asking whether the Governnment was going to do a review of the HASNO legislation (which governs the use of GMOs in NZ) saying that it was a sensitive issue and he had no plans to do a review at this stage as called for by the Treasury Secretary and Mfe.
Audio here:
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ENDS