NZ PM Luxon visits Australia for security talks

Ben McKay | December 20, 2023

As Chris Luxon talks up New Zealand’s “new urgency and intensity” in international relationships, foreign and defence policy experts have told the prime minister that other countries, including Australia, will want action to match.

Mr Luxon makes his first official trip abroad as New Zealand prime minister on Wednesday, arriving in Sydney for a one-day visit to meet Anthony Albanese.

The Kiwi leader said security was “first and foremost” the issue he wanted to discuss with Mr Albanese to ensure New Zealand was “contributing in the region”.

“We really need to work together on our region and, obviously, security and a contested Pacific is really a focus where a lot of our conversations will take place,” Mr Luxon said in a press conference on Monday.

“I want to make sure that we are a very good partner in that regard.

“I want us to be higher intensity, higher engagement. I don’t ever want to take the relationship with Australia for granted … I want to be aligned with our closest ally.”

University of Otago international relations professor Robert Patman said Australian governments had heard that language before.

“Saying you want to improve the security relationship probably will not move minds in Australia,” he said.

“They will want to see greater military expenditure on the part of New Zealand.”

New Zealand is sometimes viewed as a laggard in defence spending, contributing around 1.2 per cent of GDP compared to Australia’s two per cent.

David Capie, director of the Centre for Strategic Studies at Victoria University of Wellington, said that rankled many in Canberra but Mr Albanese was unlikely to call out Wellington on that publicly.

“I am sure Australia is concerned about the pressures on the NZDF and the growing capability gap – more of a chasm – between the two countries,” he said.

“It would like to see some sign from its ally that it is prepared to invest in its defence force given the much more challenging strategic environment.”

Mr Luxon’s government was sworn in three weeks ago, with veterans Winston Peters and Judith Collins appointed to the foreign and defence ministries.

Ms Collins raised eyebrows one week into the job when she said the previous Labour government was “somewhat anti-American”.

Dr Patman said that claim was “nonsensical” and Massey University senior lecturer Anna Powles agreed.

“Suggesting that the previous government was weak on defence and security is disingenuous as we saw a significant alignment from 2018 onwards with Australian and US strategic concerns,” she said.

“Luxon and his defence and foreign affairs ministers, Collins and Peters, will need to be careful that they don’t lead with rhetoric but fall short on delivering.”

Dr Powles said Mr Peters, in his third stint as foreign minister, would know “that if New Zealand wants to be taken seriously in Canberra, there will be expectations that New Zealand lifts its game as a security partner”. 

The trip fulfils an campaign pledge by Mr Luxon to make Australia his first destination if elected, a nod to the importance of the relationship to New Zealand.

Australia is New Zealand’s only formal ally, its second biggest trading partner, and around 700,000 Kiwis, or 14 per cent of the population, live in Australia.

Conversely, Australia primarily views its defence ties through a military alliance with the US, has less significant trade ties (New Zealand is Australia’s eighth biggest partner) and fewer than half a per cent of Australians live in New Zealand.