United Arab Emirates Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’m glad of the opportunity to make a contribution in this debate about the United Arab Emirates Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill. I want to devote my remarks in the debate to the issue of human rights in this trade agreement. I want to respond to some of the comments made by submitters at select committee and by colleagues in the House tonight who have questioned whether we should be making a trade agreement with the United Arab Emirates when the UAE falls well short of the human rights standards that we hold ourselves to.

Labour is supporting this bill. My colleague Damien O’Connor started the exploratory discussions to get the negotiations under way when we were in Government, and credit to him and to Todd McClay, the current Minister, for the progress that’s been made. It needs to be said that the United Arab Emirates are one of our top 20 trading partners, and this agreement will, within three years, move 99 percent of our exports to duty-free status and eliminate tariffs.

Now, I don’t need to labour the point, but it does need to be said that the United Arab Emirates’ human rights fall well short in areas of labour rights, the rights of migrant workers, freedom of expression, and freedom of assembly. It’s easy for the members of this House to go and read any number of reports from the likes of Human Rights Watch or Amnesty International or others to see those things documented.

Why do I raise this? Because, for me and my colleagues in the Labour Party, we want to see human rights given more weight in New Zealand and in New Zealand’s foreign policy. We oppose, as have done successive Governments, the terrible human rights abuses in Myanmar right now, or in Afghanistan. We’re outspoken about Israel’s human rights abuses in Gaza, and we advocate for sanctions as a response to Israel’s egregious and ongoing breaches of human rights and international law in the occupied Palestinian territories. I’m in favour of autonomous sanctions as a policy so that New Zealand in future can take concrete action in the most egregious situations.

Why aren’t human rights concerns an obstacle to a trade agreement like this, in our view? Well, here’s the thing: human rights should play a bigger role in our foreign policy. New Zealand can do more to be a stronger voice for human rights internationally, but we cannot only trade with countries who share our views of human rights and democracy or measure up to a certain standard. If we did that, we would go broke very quickly.

Look at China, by far and away our biggest trading partner. China is not a paragon of human rights and democratic standards. Across Asia, a region where we have stronger and stronger trade, diplomatic, and security ties, many countries in the region—for example, some of the members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations—don’t share our views about human rights and democracy. But, as a country, we have to make our way in the world. We have to trade to survive, literally. If we don’t trade, it would be an existential threat to our nation. We have to be pragmatic, and I think this is a powerful example in foreign policy of where consistency risks being the enemy of good policy.

Now, having said all that, we can do more to integrate social, environmental, moral, and ethical concerns into our trade policy. I want to acknowledge the work that was done first by David Parker and then by Damien O’Connor in developing and growing and promoting the Trade for All policy, which went a long way to involve a range of different stakeholder groups in society behind a holistic approach to our trade strategy and what it could deliver to New Zealand and our partners. I want to acknowledge the progress that’s been made pursuing labour and environmental standards in what is now a series of trade agreements. Progress has been good. I’m pleased to see that the National Party have come around to Labour’s point of view on investor-State dispute settlement—ISDS— provisions which would allow private sector firms to sue Governments in what are, essentially, private sector tribunals, and it’s great to see that that seems to have become a bipartisan feature of trade policy for New Zealand. There’s no doubt that we could, through our diplomats, be a much stronger voice for human rights in the world through our foreign policy.

I think that, in the most egregious cases, we should be implementing and putting sanctions in place, as our Government did in the case of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and I think that the current situation in relation to Israel’s illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories is crying out for that approach. You could make the argument, then, that these are contradictions, but I think that they are in fact an argument that we have to be pragmatic in our foreign policy, and our foreign policy must be grounded in our national interests. We must recognise that we share values with some countries, and with others we share interests, and we have to cooperate and work on the basis of both, but often not both at the same time. At a time in history when international law and multilateral institutions are breaking down, we are seeing the rise of authoritarian Governments around the world, including amongst the great powers, and foreign policy is becoming more transactional and more coercive all the time.

I want to finish with this: I believe it is within our capabilities in New Zealand to do more and better when it comes to being a strong voice for human rights in our foreign policy, and we can do more in relation to trade. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Look, I’m pleased to be part of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee that heard this bill and spent some time deliberating over it. Look, it’s essential to the Government’s vision for doubling the value of exports from New Zealand—the fastest trade deal done to date. We’re not here to muck around and I’m not here to muck around. There’s no point belabouring the point. I commend the bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take the final call tonight on the United Arab Emirates Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill. I’m sure there’s a very good acronym for this trade deal. Can I congratulate the Minister, Todd McClay, on the speed at which the deal was begun and concluded around a year ago, and also acknowledge my colleague Damien O’Connor, who kicked off the discussions back in September 2023. So it actually is quite remarkable that within two years of those discussions beginning, we actually have a trade bill that is now progressing through this House.

I do want to just draw briefly on some of the comments made by my colleague Phil Twyford, just in response to some concerns raised by the Green Party around human rights and the connection between human rights and trade deals. It wouldn’t surprise members of this House to hear that of course we should be concerned with the human rights conditions in countries that we trade with, and there’s no question about that. Certainly, it can bring a strong level of discomfort when we do know that we’re engaging with countries where the human rights standards are nowhere near those of New Zealand. What I would say is that, actually, these trade deals can begin an opportunity for us to engage with other countries to improve human rights and other important areas of law—like environmental standards, for example; like animal welfare provisions—not just for the countries we’re trading with. Sometimes, those countries will actually have asks of us. We have to acknowledge that there are times where we also as a nation fall short and may be required to improve standards in some of the areas where we work when we are trading with a nation. So I think we also have to be careful not to stand here and be too holier than thou around that, that somehow we have everything perfect, because we don’t.

I’d also comment that often the time that is taken to see improvements—for example, if we consider human rights or labour laws with other countries—can feel like it takes far too long, and I do want to acknowledge that. Improvements that we can see through mechanisms that are introduced in a trade deal, alongside the relationships that we build, the dialogue that occurs, it feels and it does often take decades for change to occur. I do acknowledge that, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be working in dialogue in order to make that change. One of the things that trade does is it opens up the door for dialogue. It opens up the door to build relationships with other countries and, of course, it makes a significant contribution to the economy of our nation, and globally.

So, as others have noted, Labour supports this bill. I do particularly want to acknowledge, as I said at the beginning of this speech, just how fast it has been progressed. It is significant for New Zealand. It’s around $1 billion of revenue for us annually that this deal will deliver for New Zealand. We have to acknowledge that that’s important for our economy in order for us to be able to invest in the things that matter to us as New Zealanders.

So, absolutely, we should always be working with countries that we partner with to improve human rights; to improve labour laws; to improve environmental laws; and, one of my personal interests, animal welfare laws; and many other things as part of those trade agreements. But that doesn’t mean we should be backing off from having trade agreements in the first place. That does a disservice to New Zealand. It does a disservice to our opportunity to use our influence in a constructive way. Therefore, I commend this bill to the House.