Clark tells Blair of OE benefits

Prime Minister Helen Clark returns from Sweden today with good news for young New Zealanders - her British counterpart is not aware of plans to change the working holiday scheme.

Helen Clark and British Prime Minister Tony Blair were among leaders attending the Progressive Governance Summit in Stockholm at the weekend.

The British Government recently announced a review of the working holiday scheme, including expanding it beyond "white Commonwealth" countries to include the rest of the Commonwealth and the European Union.

But Helen Clark said from Tokyo last night that she had discussed the review with Mr Blair and was "most relieved to hear [it] had not come anywhere near his level".

"It means that it hasn't got to the point of the British Government having a fixed view," she said. "So we're in at an early enough stage."

Mr Blair asked Helen Clark to write to him putting New Zealand's case and she hoped to have a draft ready when the two met in Brisbane for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting early next month. The letter would outline the benefits of the scheme to both countries, because the overseas experience was a tradition for young New Zealanders and a benefit to the British economy.

"The Kiwis come in and often do ... jobs that others wouldn't, in the service sector in London in particular," she said. "They use London as a base for touring Europe and they bring a lot of their own money, which they spend."

However, there was a danger New Zealand would get swept up in changes being made for others.

"Sometimes when people try to rationalise policies, some of us who have had a good arrangement get swept up in it."

Helen Clark said the Stockholm meeting had been successful.

It was originally scheduled for last September but was postponed after the terrorist attacks on the United States. Helen Clark was on her way to the summit when the attacks occurred and she turned for home after landing in Rome.

This time she stopped in London on the way to give a lecture to the London School of Economics on developments in New Zealand. She then headed for Stockholm to meet other centre-left leaders including Mr Blair, French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroder and South African President Thabo Mbeki.

Helen Clark said she left Mr Mbeki in no doubt about New Zealand's feelings over South Africa's lack of action regarding problems in neighbouring Zimbabwe, which has been racked by violence since President Robert Mugabe's forces began occupying white-owned land.

Human rights groups say 36 people died in political violence in 2000, another 89 last year and more than 70,000 were displaced after being driven from their homes or having their houses torched.

Other issues the group discussed were the agendas for this year's Financing for Development conference in Mexico and the Sustainable Development conference in South Africa, plans for ratifying and implementing the Kyoto Protocol and the World Trade Organisation's new trade round launched at Doha, Qatar, last year.

- NZPA