Immigration – Fit for the Future

NZTech wishes to thank the New Zealand Productivity Commission for the opportunity to submit on the Immigration – Fit for the Future (Preliminary findings and recommendations).

NZTech is pleased that the Productivity Commission has recognised the significant economic and social contributions hat immigration has made to New Zealand, and the opportunity for it to make economic and social contributions in the future.

NZTech notes that immigration is only one element of the labour market. NZTech considers that the Government’s immigration policy should be better integrated and coordinated with the Government’s education and industry workforce planning policies to ensure that the Government is taking a holistic approach to the supply of labour in the future.

NZTech recommends that immigration policy should be simple, clearly signalled, permissive, progressive and designed to support the attraction of talent. This is particularly important for businesses in the digital, tech and entrepreneurial sectors given the pace of change and the difficulty in finding the supply of labour domestically.

With global talent shortages across many industries, NZTech recommends that New Zealand’s immigration policy should signal that New Zealand is open for business and wishing to attract the world’s best talent, in particular globally scarce digital, tech and entrepreneurial talent.