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Speaker 1: Now the government's boosting incentives to bring Hollywood back to

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Speaker 1: New Zealand. Overseas productions can now claim a twenty five

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Speaker 1: percent rebate on what they spend here. That's up from

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Speaker 1: twenty percent, and it's all about making New Zealand more competitive.

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Speaker 1: On the other hand, Australia offers up to forty percent,

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Speaker 1: Canada and the UK around thirty percent also, and this

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Speaker 1: is a change for the first time. Post production and

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Speaker 1: visual effects companies like Wetter Effects can apply for this

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Speaker 1: as well. Now with us to discuss, we have Annie Murray,

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Speaker 1: the head of the New Zealand Film Commission, and Harry Harrison,

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Speaker 1: who's the vice chair of Screen New Zealand International. Hire

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Speaker 1: you too, Harry, Are we actually competitive though? Because I

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Speaker 1: just read you those numbers right, we're at twenty five percent,

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Speaker 1: but Australia is at forty percent.

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Speaker 2: Well, not all of Australia is at forty percent, And

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Speaker 2: there are some underlying factors here in New Zealand that

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Speaker 2: do a low ust A punch above and wheat. So

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Speaker 2: there's an exchange rate differential anyway between Australia and New

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Speaker 2: Zealand straight away that's usually in our favor of five

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Speaker 2: cents six seven cents, and there are some ease of

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Speaker 2: doing business benefits of being in New Zealand that don't

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Speaker 2: exist in Australia, unionization and penalty rates. We're a more

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Speaker 2: efficient business model here in New Zealand, which it's kind

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Speaker 2: of triple bottom line. You have to look for the benefits,

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Speaker 2: but we can sort of stack up. The forty percent

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Speaker 2: in Australia really doesn't apply to all productions. There are

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Speaker 2: some states that offer a bit of a kicker, but

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Speaker 2: that's not even guaranteed either. So I think what we

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Speaker 2: have as a twenty plus five incentive that gets you

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Speaker 2: to twenty five, that's certain. It's quite straightforward. It does

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Speaker 2: allow us to punch a bobber weight. It's if we

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Speaker 2: were at thirty or forty percent, we would be the

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Speaker 2: most globally competitive country in the world. I wish we

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Speaker 2: were sort of higher, but it's it allows us to

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Speaker 2: play in the sandpit.

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Speaker 1: What's brought us on Harry. Has there been a lack

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Speaker 1: of interest?

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Speaker 2: There has been There has been the last since September

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Speaker 2: October November last year, there's been a marked decline and

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Speaker 2: inquiries and studio bookings. There is a global is the

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Speaker 2: business model, the studio streaming business model has changed. It

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Speaker 2: wasn't sustainable. There's been consolidation, fewer projects, lower budgets, and

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Speaker 2: you know, when the world is busy and newsually't got

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Speaker 2: quite a lot of activity. When the world is a

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Speaker 2: bit quieter, it's a lot harder for us to win

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Speaker 2: projects down here to southern Hampshire and turning a distance

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Speaker 2: makes a difference. Yeah, I believe that.

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Speaker 1: Annie, listen, can you explain to me this change about

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Speaker 1: the visual effects companies and stuff like this? I mean

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Speaker 1: this has been read by some as just a backdoor

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Speaker 1: bailout for wetter effects. Is that what's going on?

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Speaker 3: No? Yeah, what happened here is that the visual effects

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Speaker 3: companies have always been able to apply for a rebate.

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Speaker 3: What this does is it brings the very high value

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Speaker 3: ones into line with other productions for the live action productions.

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Speaker 3: So live action have always been able to apply to

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Speaker 3: the extra five percent. So now we're matching that if

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Speaker 3: the visual effects companies able to do the same.

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Speaker 1: Now, Annie, do you think what are you hearing? Are

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Speaker 1: people interested in this? People want to make some films here?

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Speaker 3: Very interested?

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Speaker 2: Yes, we have names for us, Annie.

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Speaker 3: Oh I can't do that. I'm sorry. They are all

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Speaker 3: confidential business discussions. But Philip and Mossman from my team

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Speaker 3: was in Los Angeles in the last months having conversations saying, look,

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Speaker 3: these are some of the things that we may be

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Speaker 3: able to change. If we did, how would that look

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Speaker 3: for you? And there was a lot of interest. So

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Speaker 3: we're really optimistic that these changes are going to make

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Speaker 3: the different.

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Speaker 1: Harry, do you know anything about what's going on with

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Speaker 1: Trump's one hundred percent tariffs?

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Speaker 2: I don't know if anything's going on with them. It

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Speaker 2: was it was a tweet. It's not policy, and my

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Speaker 2: contacts in Los Angeles are they're quite clear that there

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Speaker 2: are a number of other initiatives that they would prefer

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Speaker 2: the administration tools.

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Speaker 1: Harry, you sounding you're making it sound like he said

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Speaker 1: tweet and he's not planning to do it. Is that

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Speaker 1: what you think is going on?

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Speaker 2: I believe that the US industry is urging the government

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Speaker 2: over there to look at other initiatives well ahead of

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Speaker 2: doing that, and I believe that he's got buy in

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Speaker 2: from his Hollywood ambassadors have agreed sort of come around

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Speaker 2: to some of the initiatives that they're suggesting.

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Speaker 1: Are you as hopeful as this any.

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Speaker 3: Well, what we've seen is that some American jurisdictions have

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Speaker 3: increased incentives in the last few months, so there has

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Speaker 3: been a response. California's done that New York has as well.

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Speaker 3: So Harry's right, there has been an industry response which

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Speaker 3: has meant that more production is staying in America. He's

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Speaker 3: the need for us to make some change to make

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Speaker 3: our offering a bit more competitive.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, hey, guys, listen, Thanks very much. I hope it

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Speaker 1: goes as well as you think it will. Annie Murray,

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Speaker 1: New Zealand Film Commissioned CEO, Harry Harrison, Vice Chair of

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Speaker 1: Screen New Zealand International. For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive,

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Speaker 1: listen live to news talks. It'd be from four pm weekdays,

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