In the wake of several high-profile cases of being bitten by the immoral behaviour of companies it has outsourced to, the New Zealand government is planning to impose a code of conduct requiring its suppliers to behave lawfully and ethically and not engage in corruption. Of course, Business NZ thinks that this is too onerous:
However, Business NZ chief executive Kirk Hope said some businesses may just pull the plug on contracts with government departments if a new code of conduct is too stringent.
"If there are additional obligations and things they have to do in their business to meet standards, additional auditing of small to medium businesses, particularly if they're only a small supplier then they might say this isn't going to work for us," Mr Hope said.
So, just to get that clear, Business NZ thinks NZ companies not committing crimes is too much work. Nice to have that on the record. New Zealand businesses meanwhile might want to reconsider the wisdom of being "represented" by a body which publicly portrays them all as corrupt, unethical criminals.
