Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern meets Australia’s opposition leader Bill Shorten before a dinner at SkyCity last night. (Photo/Chris Loufte)

09 December 2017

Ardern met with Labor leader Bill Shorten for the first time since she became Prime Minister at SkyCity in Auckland on Saturday night, to discuss issues including social justice, affordable housing and climate change.

Ardern said the rights of Kiwis living in Australia, particularly in relation to tertiary education, also featured highly on her list of dinner-table conversations.

Shorten said he believed there was “real merit” in reviewing a measure in the Australian budget which would see Kiwis planning on studying at a tertiary level, treated as international full-fee paying students.

“There are some anomalies now in the treatment of New Zealand citizens in Australia in terms of access to higher education… I think we need to actually bite the bullet and Australia needs to make a decision – do we want to support New Zealand permanent residents in terms of their access to higher education in Australia or are we going to treat them as second-class residents in Australia.”

[Read the full NZ Herald article].