Nats acted with sheer vindictiveness - Clark

NICHOLAS ROBERTS

HELEN SAYS HI: Former prime minister Helen Clark in New York, with the distinctive Chrysler Building at centre behind her.

Relevant offers

Politics

State of economy top of Kiwis' concerns Transmission Gully ruling waits upon five wise heads Prime Minister John Key wins hearts if not minds Shake-up heading in EQC's direction Will bill make food safer or be a form of control? Brownlee turns up heat on council over rebuild Agency mulled to run emergency 111 system MPs' travel bills leap during election Remedial work for navy's problem ship Wait for new oil law before awarding permits, Govt urged

Eight months on from Labour's election loss, former prime minister Helen Clark has no regrets and she rejects suggestions that Labour alienated voters by pushing through measures such as the child discipline bill.

Now in New York as head of the United Nations Development Programme, Miss Clark has also revealed unease at the National Government's direction on climate change and says its scrapping of her flagship sustainability agenda was motivated by sheer vindictiveness.

Her worry now is that going too far in the opposite direction will hurt New Zealand's international brand and prospects.

"If it's not at government level, then at the consumer level you run into resistance. Protecting the brand image of your country as clean and green is critical; critical for tourism, critical for our food exports, for industry, for exports.

"For me, the sustainability agenda is important on its own merits. But we've also got an enormous interest in getting it right."

She has taken up the UN job at a time when aid budgets are under pressure, as countries are afffected by the economic recession. But she says aid has never been more vital, as developing countries are hit even harder.

The New Zealand Government's response has been to trim its aid budget a point Miss Clark said she intended to raise with Prime Minister John Key when he was in New York next month.

"The figure I was given was that it was down about $190 million-plus over a three to four-year horizon. That's a pity."

On the "anti-smacking" bill, she said that suggestions that backing the repeal of section 59 was a strategic mistake were "wide of the mark".

"For a Labour government, eight years in, not to have moved on that issue, it's not tenable. At some point you have to grapple with that. The long-term result will be some change in what actually happens for children. But it is long term."

- © Fairfax NZ News