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Speaker 1: So the price of coming to the country as a

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Speaker 1: tourist is going up, that the visitor levy goes from

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Speaker 1: thirty five to one hundred bucks, And so the great

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Speaker 1: debate begins. New Zealand Airport Association CEO Billy Moore's well,

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Speaker 1: this's Billy morning to you.

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Speaker 2: Good morning.

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Speaker 1: The Minister argues, everybody submitted wanted it. Did you submit absolutely?

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Speaker 2: We did, yes.

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Speaker 1: And did you ask for an increase?

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Speaker 2: No? Absolutely, night. So the airports and airlines are pretty

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Speaker 2: united on this where we asked for it to remain

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Speaker 2: remain at thirty five dollars, particularly in light of all

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Speaker 2: of the other cost increases that are coming through on

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Speaker 2: the border that actually pay for functions like border processing

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Speaker 2: secretly these things like that. So we didn't see any

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Speaker 2: case for bumping this up, particularly when what it's actually

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Speaker 2: used for is not even defined in the consultation.

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Speaker 1: Most people did say they wanted an increase. The problem

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Speaker 1: appears to be many of the people who wanted an increase,

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Speaker 1: they'd say, how about fifty bucks, not one hundred, and

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Speaker 1: the hundred is the one that's killed it. Is that fair?

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Speaker 1: Is in your estimation?

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Speaker 2: It is fair? They're right there in the submissions process

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Speaker 2: that you know, a lot of individuals submitted wanting visitors

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Speaker 2: to pay more. I think ultimately we have a bit

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Speaker 2: of an attitude problem about tourists which has permeated government

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Speaker 2: agencies thinking as well over the years, where they're very

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Speaker 2: much focused on how to get visitors to pay more

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Speaker 2: more at the border and into the crown, rather than

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Speaker 2: getting visitors to pay more into the economy, which would

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Speaker 2: better contribute to businesses and jobs around the region.

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Speaker 1: Well, listening to Ducie yesterday, there's one hundred and something

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Speaker 1: million going into the regions and they're the national parks

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Speaker 1: and the facilities that the tourists use. That's good, isn't it.

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Speaker 2: Look any money that goes into the regions is good.

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Speaker 2: The problem is that this international Visitor Levy hasn't been

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Speaker 2: used where it's meant to have been used since twenty nineteen,

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Speaker 2: So no money has ever made its way to local

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Speaker 2: government from this fund, and that's what it was expected

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Speaker 2: to be used for. So addressed the visitor preators in

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Speaker 2: those locations.

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Speaker 1: Takes that bit, would you be more on board?

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Speaker 2: Look, maybe under previous circumstances we'd be more open to that,

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Speaker 2: but under the current circumstances where visas have already gone

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Speaker 2: up so much where it's now costing visitors double even

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Speaker 2: last year to cross the border and it's seventy percent

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Speaker 2: more expensive then Australia. So our problem is that while

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Speaker 2: there might be some good intentions by some of this stuff,

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Speaker 2: ultimately we could lose out on the GST spend and

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Speaker 2: the visitor spend that we actually want in the economy

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Speaker 2: rather than at being scooped up at the border for

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Speaker 2: these Crown funds.

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Speaker 1: I appreciate your inside. There's always Billy Moore, who's the

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Speaker 1: New Zealand Airport's Association Chief executive.

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Speaker 2: For more from the Mic Asking Breakfast, listen live to

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Speaker 2: news talks.

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Speaker 1: There'd be from six am weekdays, or follow the podcast

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Speaker 1: on iHeartRadio