Fay v China
August 14th, 2011 at 10:58 am by David FarrarDavid Fisher reports in the HoS:
One of the country’s richest men has emerged as a white knight investor with a $105 million bid for big dairy farms that could otherwise be sold to China.
Sir Michael Fay has declared his interest in buying nine of the 16 farms once owned by Reporoa’s Alan Crafar.
This amuses me, as the sort of people who passionately don’t want Chinese interests buying the farms, tend to also passionately hate Sir Michael. If he turns out to be their white knight, it will be a bitter medicine for them.
August 14th, 2011 at 11:05 am
so Fay is doing this for New Zealand?
Vote:Trev wants Landcorp to buy the farms, must have got the idea from Farmer Goff
August 14th, 2011 at 11:06 am
There’s more rust than white on this knight.
JC
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 11:27 am
Don’t be fooled.
Vote:Buy the farms, ask Fonteera for their share money and then sell the milk to the new dairy factory starting down there. Owned by a Maori incorporation or to Talleys.
August 14th, 2011 at 11:28 am
Yes, he’s doing this for “New Zealand”….bitter medicine? How? Because a NZ owner is there means that all the arguments in favour of not selling land to foreigners are suddenly null and void? Because the patron saint of Crony Capitalism (capitalised, if you’ll notice), has swept in, suddenly people who think that the Land in NZ should only be locally owned have just been disproved?
If you’re going to make arguments, it would be nice if you actually made them.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 11:31 am
He’ll asset strip them & eventually they will be offered back to the government….it worked last time.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 11:37 am
The only reason I’m against China is cause the reason they want it and it’s the state ultimately behind all these bids is cause they want our IP and the Crafar properties are a serious step toward getting that and once they have it, game over as far as our leverage over them is concerned. OTOH this, as in, the regime allowing Chinese investment, is part of the pound of flesh for the FTA and we do owe them for that.
With respect to Fay I dispassionately dislike him because of what he did over Railways which is indicative of the man and his sense of ethics, to greatly enrich himself and his partner at NZ’s considerable expense. No wonder they went to live in Switzerland for awhile. I thank V2 for his insight into the A + B factors at play here. Let’s keep an eye on that one. The fact Fay’s not offering to buy all the properties, may be related, but I don’t know the details myself. But lets find out which ones they are.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 12:08 pm
His daughter would make a very presentable dairymaid and she could serenade the cows while she worked.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 12:13 pm
Good to see the campaign manager at red alert supporting asset sales. Wonder if the media will pick up on his post that landcorp should buy them then flick them on, perhaps he could explain how selling all of a dairy farm is different to selling part of a power station.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 12:20 pm
Her voice would turn the milk quite sour.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 12:20 pm
Fay gets them cheap, because the govt blocks competing bids from overseas. Nice work Labour.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 12:28 pm
His daughter would make a very presentable dairymaid and she could serenade the cows while she worked.
Can she yodel?
When in Switzerland and all that.
Is she a latterfay Mary Poppins?
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 12:51 pm
Not being a fan of Sir Michael (the undefendable poster boy of bad big business) I still think this is delicious! If this goes ahead Winston Peters will have a stroke.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 1:20 pm
The most prosperous of societies are those where they own the land on which they live and work.
The least prosperous of societies are those where they do not own the land on which they live and work.
Simple. Which would you rather live in? Applies right across history and mankind.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 2:30 pm
good one vto.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 2:39 pm
Yes but vto we’re not talking the entire country. The Chinese aren’t interested in dirt, anyway. That’s not what they want. And if we turn them down what happens to the FTA?
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 3:49 pm
I think the reason for wanting only 9 farms is that they are reasonably close to the new dairy factory just north of Taupo. The others are scattered around the country.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 3:57 pm
Interesting comment vto.
Who owns Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia?
Who owns China, Germany, Brunei, Saudi Arabia, Kuwhait?
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 4:54 pm
reid, let them lease the land. There are any number of structures that allow foreign investment which do not allow foreign ownership of the land.
And what about the FTA? Look again reid, the chinese do not let foreigners own their land so I’m sure it would not prove an obstacle.
Do not let this issue be framed in terms of foreign investment, as David Carter deceivingly described it last week.
Foreign investment is a completely different matter from foreign ownership of land.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 5:02 pm
vto, yes, we could lease it. I don’t really care and they don’t either. That’s not what they want.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 5:37 pm
Michael Fay and his buddy Richwhite? should be hung for what they did to NZ Rail. No wonder they had to leave NZ..and we knighted one of them!..What a joke.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 5:42 pm
Thank God we can’t dub Micky Cullen for what he did for us with NZ rail.
A sideways stroke with the sword would look rather messy.
Vote:August 14th, 2011 at 8:46 pm
Winston Peters will be doing flips in his lounge, Fay picked up NZ Assets for chickenfeed when we were disposing off them at bargain basement prices, I don’t think they were even put on the market.
Fay & Richwhite basically just took them off the Governments hands, and sold them picking up a margin.
How did Fay & Co create their wealth, I don’t know of any businesses they established which actually produced anything.
Wealth creation in NZ is often based on who you know in Government and how the deals are put together.
NZ is not the squeaky clean little country we think it is.
Vote:August 15th, 2011 at 8:37 am
White knight is the perfect term, because to the racists who don’t want Chinese owning a NZ farm because they’re ‘different’, white is synonymous with good.
Vote:August 15th, 2011 at 1:49 pm
Is Fay a Swiss citizen ? because we do not want bloody foreigners buying NZ land.
Vote: