Sale of Lochinver Station declined
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- Date published:
12:58 pm, September 17th, 2015 - 38 comments
Categories: business, International -
Tags: china, credit where it's due, farms, overseas buyers, overseas investment
As widely reported:
Ministers reject advice – halt China Lochinver Station sale
Government ministers Paula Bennett and Louise Upston have gone against a recommendation by the Overseas Investment Office and turned down a $88 million bid by Chinese billionaire Jiang Zhaobai’s flagship firm to buy the Lochinver Station.
The Overseas Investment Office had recommended the Chinese-owned Pure 100 Farm Ltd be accepted in what Associate Finance Minister Paula Bennett described as a “finely balanced” decision. However, ministers did not believe the benefits to New Zealand were great enough and used their discretion to reject it. …
This was the right decision – surprisingly so:
It is the first time ministers have rejected a bid to buy a significant landholding in New Zealand since the rules were tightened in 2012 during the Crafar Farms decision to require the OIO to assess whether a foreign buyer could offer more than a New Zealand buyer would.
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No surprise this is announced now , after the SFF deal that came through yesterday.
AFter all the anguish from National when the Auckland Airport sale was stopped on political grounds by labour, this backflip will be easy to justify politically but hard to explain on ‘commercial terms’
“this backflip will be easy to justify politically but hard to explain on ‘commercial terms’”
Not really, apparently the proposed purchase agreement that went through to the OIO included one extra job coming from the purchase. I can only assume it was the 8,000 jobs in Drury that the Stevenson Group claimed the proceeds from the sale were likely to create, was the reason for the OIO rubber stamp.
http://voakl.net/2014/08/05/interesting-industrial-future-for-the-south/
Key knows that the sale of Lochinver Station would piss off already pissed off farmers. Key also knows that off shore buyers are not contributing to the farming economy long term. Possibly there is something Key wants to hide, no sale, off the radar.
Maybe a timing vote issue with the proposed 50% stake of Silver Fern Farms.
“Key knows that the sale of Lochinver Station would piss off already pissed off farmers.”
I think most people would say farms shouldn’t be sold to overseas buyers
but farmers like house owners want top dollar for their property and don’t care where the money comes from.
Yeah, selfish arseholes.
Of course, there’s also the fact that a number of people possibly want to become farmers but can’t afford the land because of offshore buying and the increasing number of them will be getting pissed off.
And a lot of us have known for a long time that offshore owners never contribute to the economy and never have done. They just take, take, take.
Yep Natz are happy to sell off all our assets, probably polling showed that Kiwis were getting a bit alarmed so they thought to try to show they are doing something.
At the same time, the Chinese investors were probably not known cronies of the Natz and therefore to made an example of.
The correct decision, made serendipitously for the wrong reasons. It may yet face legal challenge. Not mention intense
bribeslobbying at Cabinet Club.Does this mean in Joyce’s eyes Bennet and Upston are xenophobes
This was a discussion in the nation a year or two back
http://www.3news.co.nz/tvshows/thenation/debate-wealth-of-the-nation-2014080211#axzz3lxM0TtJ3
Even a stopped clock gets the time right twice a day……..
What self-important wankers. Acting like they own it.
Freehold title (if Lochinver is freehold and not leasehold) is a limited form of ownership. It is always trumped by the interests of the State and in the final analysis the Crown does own all the land.
I know, Grant. And they’re allowed to spy on you. And they don’t have to give you access to state funded education or healthcare. And they can imprison you. And tell you who you can marry.
Hey everybody, come and have a look at the hard right losing the plot.
Hahaha
Quisling.
Scoundrel. Patriotism. Refuge. And all that.
They’re up to something, for sure!
No they’re not. Government by focus group. They are barely right of Helen Clark. Wankers.
Hahahahaha
porka Bennett on tv3 about this turning down of this sale? (at this stage)
not much of a poker face!!! there is something bigger to come! and not just her.
this is a bluff to something alot bigger mark my words. can’t trust the fookers at all as they have proved ova and ova and all that support them should be flogged in their masses
So, your take away message is that Paula Bennet is fat. Good on you. That political correctness has gone mad!
take what u want dik whacker.
yeap she is a trougher IMO.
but more so a lying Tory hog.
this is a setup for some other public shafting that i am sure of!
[lprent: The only reason that is is allowed to stand is because of the use of pigfucker to describe particular political behaviours. I am unsure if that was just coincidental. You will be moderated for a while so I can see what your future behaviour holds. ]
I don’t really know where to start. I think judging women on their appearance is bad. But your grammar is appalling as well.
I’m sorry, but I think I am just going to have to write you off as appalling.
Pigs?, shafting?
Are you from Dunedin?
Joking aside I’d be really surprised rob is allowed to make such sexist and offensive comments.
Seriously, the guy’s a fuckwit and should be shit canned for writing what he has.
Hopefully the rules aren’t different when it’s not your side.
Damn, I thought you were talking about yourself there for a second.
So, you have no problem with his comments about Paula Bennett?
More interested in what happened to your self-awareness.
It is the usual thing, we look at the comments. The general criteria is in the policy and in the (mainly legislative) legal framework of NZ. Those both constrain us and tell us what to hammer.
But different moderators look with different weights at the same marginal behaviours. Gets to be luck of the draw.
But you are talking about a site that has a now long tradition of evocative phrases. And pigfucker is a political term of some long standing. It describes a political behaviour.
https://www.google.co.nz/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=thestandard%20pigfucker
Good.
There is no benefit in having absentee foreign landlords. Ever.
Apparently National are starting to get worried that people really don’t like seeing NZ sold to offshore owners. This will be one of those points where they’ll say Something needed to be done and, See, we did something followed up by them doing nothing else as we see foreign ownership continue to climb. After all, they can’t piss off their donors too much.
this .x100.
Sounds like the focus groups have spoken. Not a decision Bennett and Upston will have made under their own steam at their pay grade. Interesting, who knew it was even possible to contradict the Commission for Waving Through Foreign Investors? Has it ever happened before?
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/agribusiness/72135607/shanghai-pengxin-purchase-of-nzs-lochinver-station-rejected-by-government
“Interesting, who knew it was even possible to contradict the Commission for Waving Through Foreign Investors? Has it ever happened before?”
According to Paddy Gower on 3 News last night, it has only happened 3 times before, all three were attempted purchases by some German who lives in Coatesville…I can’t think why the Government would be against German investment!
Interesting decision from Nats. I never thought that they would do this. I wonder if the Chinese treatment of our Dairy industry has played a small part. I know Fed Farmers et al not happy with foreigners buying productive farm land but I struggle to understand how Lochinvar sale is different to the 1000’s hectares that have been sold to Europeans in North Taranaki and East Coast.
This does look xenophobic…..much more xenophobic than Twyfords thingy from a few months back. Just saying.
Caught a brief glimpse of Bennett on TV. Is he channelling jenny Shipley? Shipley hairdo and glasses. Trying on a new persona for size perhaps? Whatever happened to loud and proud leopard skin wearing Westie?
I hope the buyers take the NZ Govt to court.
Their bid passes every test the law puts before them. Ministers have made purely political decision which should be overturned by a Court of Law.
It can be a test case for when our gov gets sued when the TPPA comes in…