Mike's Minute: We are open to the world – it's about time

Well, here we go and welcome to International Investment day.  I found it somewhat bewildering, if not sad, that Ginny Andersen on this show yesterday said foreign investment wasn’t the answer to our problems.  Because, actually, it is.  What we don't have as a country is size and scale.  If we want to participate in the world, we need the world involved in what we do.  We are not like America where you can, at least partially, pretend that you can produce everything you need locally and whatever it is you do produce is sold to a local market.  In fact, Ginny's lack of basic economic understanding may well give some insight into why we are having the event we are over the next two days.  Labour's view of the economy is so small and insular. It is why the borders were closed for so long, why tourism has not bounced back, why the world has moved on without us and why this new Government has had to travel so many miles to knock on so many doors, saying "don’t forget about us".  It could also be a clue, if you have noticed, as to why they are currently exercised in Parliament over the idea of the public health system using the private health system to churn through some elective procedures.  Forgetting of course that even they did the same thing and that it has in fact been common practice for ever, and if you have a bed and a team sitting there with capacity, do you really care whether the place you get the knee done is public or private?  Anyway, the Prime Minister will be relishing this next week, given he is pitching not just here but India as well and will be able to get back to doing what, by all reports, he does best - hustle and sell.  The polls might be problematic for a variety of reasons, but you can't possibly mark this lot down for not getting out into the world and re-engaging both trade and foreign policy-wise.  Between the Prime Minister, Winston Peters and Todd McClay, many circuits of the globe will have been completed. He is also right that the world is awash with cash looking for a place to land.  We once were that place to land. We were once that rock star economy. We once had our act together.  Today and tomorrow, hopefully, is about restoring our rightful place as progressive go getters. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.