*POLITICAL PARTY RESPONSES*

On 31 March, Jubilee Aotearoa wrote to the General Secretaries of each of the political parties currently in government asking them to commit their party to:

  • The 100% cancellation of the unsustainable debt of poor countries
  • The withdrawal of harmful donor economic "conditionalities" on future loans
  • The support of the UK Proposal to cancel debt through (among other measures) the sale or revaluation of IMF gold reserves, and not at the expense of existing aid budgets, and
  • Contributing financially to multilateral debt cancellation.

Read Jubilee Aotearoa's full letter to political parties

By June 2005, Jubilee had heard from only three political parties: the Progressive Party, United Future, and ACT. Their responses are summarised below.

Progressive Party

The Progressive Party said:

…we are committed to international equity and justice in dealings between nations, and we recognise that onerous international debt commitments can be a very significant barrier to the social development of poorer nations. We therefore support the initiatives both through the G8, largely led by Gordon Brown, and through the United Nations to significantly reduce this debt if it cannot be cancelled completely.

Also included was the Progressive Party International Affairs policy which states on debt:

In line with the United Nations Millenium Development Goals which all the world's leaders signed at New York in 2000, the Progressive Coalition supports the cancellation of least developed countries' official bilateral debt, and the restructuring of international finance and aid, to promote self-reliant and cooperative development in the Third World. We see the introduction of a Tobin tax – a tax on speculative international financial transactions – as a credible way forward in this area. We see a role for the United Nations sponsored international debt-monitoring agency to secure a global perspective on debt cancellation and poverty reduction, as proposed by the United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan.

United Future New Zealand

United Future stated:

United Future has historically been very sympathetic to initiatives in this area, and I am happy to assure you that we will be considering this matter favourably once more when putting our final election policy together.

ACT New Zealand

ACT acknowledged receipt of the letter and will pass the letter on to ACT MP, Ken Shirley who was out of the office at the time.