Shane Jones on US ignorance, Winston Peters’ order to end the spat with Sam Neill, and SME tax rates
Wednesday, 6 May 2026
Resources Minister Shane Jones was supposed to tell members of the Auckland Business Chamber about the impact of the Middle East crisis on New Zealand’s economy.
However, he used his Wednesday breakfast speech and Q&A session to hint at NZ First’s policy agenda for the coming general election, and revealed why he’s backed off his battle with actor Sir Sam Neill over plans to establish a gold mine in Central Otago.
Among the tantalising titbits on his party’s policy plans for the election was a hint at lower tax rates for smaller businesses, and its plan to make the break-up of the power companies item number one in the next coalition agreement NZ First signs.
Demand for tickets from Auckland business luminaries was so great to see Jones that the event venue had to be moved twice, eventually ending up at the Cordis Hotel.
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And Jones did not disappoint, delivering am hour-long rapid-fire barrage of manifesto hints, big-picture thinking, political jibes and anecdotes.
Here are his top 10 talking points:
1. Silence is golden in Sam Neill spat
Jones said his enthusiasm for growth and mining had led him “to be depicted as a bully” by Sir Sam Neill, who has “decided that somehow my strong advocacy for mining in the South Island represents a mortal or fatal threat to the quality of life”.
However, Jones did send another barb Neill’s way, saying he believed he was “taking up the ladder of opportunity from other New Zealanders”.
However, Jones said NZ First leader Winston Peters gagged him on Neill, quoting Peters as telling him: “Shane, have you looked at how many Facebook followers and Instagram followers that Sam Neill has?”
“I said, ‘no’. He said, ‘three times the number of people that voted for New Zealand First. Shut up’.”
2. On the possibility of fuel rationing
“I don’t want to bring back the whole spectre of what drove Auckland to its knees, and drove Jacinda [Ardern] out of public life,” Jones said.
However, the Government had a plan for that eventuality, he said Finance Minister Nicola Willis would be making an announcement on Friday.
Jones said he had been reluctant to engage in discussions designed to catastrophise the situation, but he said: “At the back of our mind, of course, we've had to contemplate that they may come a point that five million people, our $440 billion economy … may face genuine absence of the physical material.”
“That's why we focus so much on supply,” he said.
He said the Government was working through fuel security options, including the ability to store fuel offshore in Singapore and Malaysia.
“There are options that have been made available to our advisers,” he said.
“The officials are already working through one, how enforceable will those options be and two, how reliable they are,” he said.
3. On the prospect of fuel crisis bailouts
“We do not have the fiscal headroom to write out the cheques,” he said.
However, he said: “We probably could in the midst of a genuine meltdown situation.”
That would be money that had to be borrowed, and that would limit future governments from being able to do things like maintain roads.
4. On coalition colleagues insulting each other
Jones got into hot water for a comment on Finance Minister Nicola Willis’ weight.
But Jones said he was on the receiving end of a similar barb from ACT leader David Seymour over his immigration stance, with Seymour opining that Jones did not look like a man who ever turned down an offer of butter chicken.
Jones said he shrugged that off, though stressed he was more of a boil-up man.
He felt there was an insults double-standard. He contrasted his comment on Willis’ weight to what people felt they could say about his party leader.
“You can attack the integrity of Winston Peters. You can say that he's confused. You can hint that maybe he's getting too old, but never comment in public about a wahine’s weight,” he said.
However, he made a serious point about coalition partners.
“We’re professional politicians.
“Obviously, as three parties we have to argue our corner or our segment of the New Zealand political ecosystem, but we're bound together by a higher duty. We made a promise to Kiwis that we would maintain coherence. We would endeavour to unleash growth until such time the election takes place,” he said.
“Please see through the frothy language,” he said.
5. On the rebirth of NZ First, and its ambitions
NZ First has surged, with 15% of voters backing it.
“This party has been rebuilt with a vigorous younger group of men and women, and this party has clearly stated it is not just a Doubting Thomas about immigration,” Jones said.
“It is a pro-industry, pro-development, pro-growth movement,” he said.
But it was also a party whose members expected it to protect workers.
It was willing to make trade-offs, and he said: “Quite frankly, occasionally the environment's going to come second.”
And it prioritised economic security and sovereignty.
New Zealand had one fertiliser-maker left and one concrete-maker, left, he said.
“I fear that if we lose too many of these key institutions, we're hollowing ourselves out, and we won't be able to cope with the next fiasco that strikes us,” he said.
But, he asked: “Are we up for meeting the costs of having more of these industries in our own country, or do we want to continually outsource it to other places, and wait till they start bringing in export controls to look after themselves, while we sit here in a disrobed state, whistling tunes to Ruth Richardson's puritan view about economics.”
6. New tax rates for small businesses?
Jones dropped some heavy hints about the policy platform NZ First would take into the election.
“I do fear for a lot of our SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises), not just in Auckland but throughout the motu.
“I do feel that we're going to have to come up with a dedicated series of policy interventions going forward to revive their fortunes, and that will be included in our manifesto.
“I do kind of feel that we've overburdened SMEs, I think there's a lot to be said for a tax threshold.”
He didn’t elaborate further.
7. Pledge to break up the power companies
NZ First says the country is de-industrialising, and it blames high power prices caused by mismanagement of the previous government, and the power of electricity gentailers.
Breaking up the power companies is priority number one for the party.
“That will be the first item on any negotiations in the event … the electors put us back in power,“ he said.
“We do not believe that New Zealand has a future capable of sustaining the rangatahi, the young people in New Zealand unless we break the stranglehold that’s given in the current structure of the electricity system.”
He recalled Helen Clark breaking up Telecom.
“It's been done before. It can be done again, and it worked,” he said.
8. On a coalition with Labour
Bridges asked Jones whether Labour was pro-growth enough for NZ First to work with.
He answered: “I can't stand the ideas that pass for the Green Party. I don't want anything to do with it. I'd rather not be in public life. And with Labour, I don't think that they are pro-development.”
9. Ordinary Americans don’t know NZ is suffering
US President Donald Trump’s government may be responsible for causing huge harm to friends and foes alike through its tariffs and Middle East war.
But, Jones said, the vast majority of Americans had no idea friendly countries like New Zealand were suffering.
“They don't know that things are this severe for Southeast Asia and the Pacific because they don't feel it. They don't see it,” he said.
“They don't seethe Iran thing as anything more than a small blip at some distant point in another area of the globe,” he said.
10. Building a club of small nations
The old rules-based trade system was “over”, Jones said. But small countries could carve out a new order for themselves.
“It behooves us now to club together with like-minded smaller nations. We don't have the power of China, we don't have the population of India, and we don't have the military might of America, but have shared interest in terms of economic resilience and economic reciprocity,” he said.
The deal inked with Singapore for the countries to support each other on fuel and food supplies was an example of how that could look.
“Trump said it's America first,” Jones said. “Nicola [Willis] went up to Washington and was told by a number of officials up there, ‘This is not America's problem, this is your problem’.
“Now it's staggering that people might believe that, but it's an indication, I think, that at this point in the arc of America's political journey, that there really is America first.”
Some had criticised the Government for not strongly condemning Trump’s military forays.
Jones said: “Yes, we did alienate a lot of Kiwis who can't stand the current regime in America, but our responsibilities are a bit bigger than the five minutes of glory opportunity to shoot down people they regard as the aggressors.”
He said Trump took exception to “ill-considered remarks”, and his treatment of Canada showed what could happen.