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A tax bill introduced to Parliament today will allow information on student loan borrowers living in Australia to be shared between Inland Revenue and the Australian Taxation Office, ensuring defaulters pay their outstanding loan balances.  

Economic Development Minister Steven Joyce and Associate Trade Minister Todd McClay will today join senior business and government representatives at the second New Zealand-China Partnership Forum in Beijing.

“The New Zealand-China Partnership Forum is an important platform for deepening and strengthening the economic and political relationship between our two countries. This Forum will build on the successful inaugural Forum held in 2013, which I attended alongside Prime Minister John Key and several of my ministerial colleagues,” Mr Joyce says.

Overseas-based Kiwis with student loans have collectively repaid more than $200 million in additional repayments towards their outstanding balances through the overseas-based borrowers initiative, Tertiary Education, Skills and Employment Minister Steven Joyce and Revenue Minister Todd McClay announced today.

Economic Development Minister Steven Joyce and Associate Trade Minister Todd McClay today welcomed the opening of the 2015 New Zealand Trade and Enterprise Better by Design CEO Summit.

Featuring the world’s top design minds, together with 400 CEOs and senior managers from a range of New Zealand businesses, the Auckland summit this year marks the 10-year anniversary of the Better by Design programme.

“Better by Design’s purpose is to inspire and enable New Zealand businesses to succeed by design,” Mr Joyce says.

Tertiary Education, Skills and Employment Minister Steven Joyce and Revenue Minister Todd McClay have welcomed the announcement of an arrangement that will see Australia and New Zealand share data to assist New Zealand to recoup unpaid student loans of defaulters in Australia.

Prime Minister John Key and Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott announced the information-sharing arrangement at their annual Leaders’ Meeting today.

Tertiary Education, Skills & Employment Minister, Steven Joyce, has welcomed the signing of an agreement to strengthen New Zealand’s education relationship with Qatar.

Associate Minister of Trade, Todd McClay, and the State of Qatar’s Minister for Education and Higher Education, Dr. Mohammed Al-Hammadi, signed the agreement in Doha.

"Qatar is investing significantly in the future of its education sector and is becoming an increasingly important market for New Zealand export education organisations.

The Government initiative aimed at encouraging overseas student loan debtors to start repaying their loans has now netted $150 million in additional payments, and the pace of collection is picking up.

Tertiary Education, Skills and Employment Minister Steven Joyce and Revenue Minister Todd McClay say the initiative took three years to collect its first $100 million, and just six months to collect the next fifty million. It now has a year-to-date return of $16 for every $1 invested in it.

A Government service to help businesses raise capital and accelerate their international growth is turning its focus to the investment needs and opportunities of highly innovative firms and mid-range companies valued at up to $25 million.

Better by Capital was developed following research that revealed some potentially high-growth firms find it difficult to access capital. Under the programme, New Zealand Trade and Enterprise works with companies to develop a tailored plan to identify the work they need to do to prepare for new capital investment.