Goff: 'New Zealand is not for sale'

Labour Party leader Phil Goff says New Zealand needs its state assets to help get the country out of debt. Photo / Dean Purcell

Labour leader Phil Goff this afternoon implored party faithful to help him spend every minute between now and the election "to save our precious public assets from the auction block".

"Labour's position is crystal clear - New Zealand is not for sale."

Mr Goff was speaking to a sea of red in Newton -comprising 800 supporters and activists rallying before the last week of the election.

He said two words had defined the election campaign - "asset sales."

He ran through a series of Labour's policies this election, including raising the minimum wage to $15, lifting the pension age to 67, a capital gains tax and taking GST off fresh fruit and vegetables.

But he said of all the policies one stood above all others - asset sales.

National is proposing to sell up to 49 per cent of three state-owned power companies, Meridian, Genesis and Might River Power, and mining company Solid Energy, and to reduce the Government's shareholding in Air New Zealand.

New Zealand was billions of dollars in debt, Mr Goff said and "we need these assets to get us out of the hole".

"Selling them may give us a short-term sugar hit but does nothing to prepare us for the future."

"We have to use every minute between now and [the election] to save our precious assets from the auction block.

"The clock is ticking."

He referred again to his wife's late father whom he said had returned from the war to help build dams on the Waikato River - "the very dams that John Key wants to sell to foreign banks".