Larry Williams Drive

How good is this idea of bringing Michelin to New Zealand in the hope that some of our restaurants will get some stars awarded?  Now, this is not free. We have to pay for it and we have to pay actually quite a lot of money for it. It's costing Tourism New Zealand nearly six and a half million dollars, and that's just for the first three years. And I don't know how much you have to pay after that.  But take a look at what the Aussies did when they looked at this  last year. It was going to cost them $4 million for the first year, $5 million for the second year, $7.5 million for the next year, and then basically for a few years thereafter, something like another three years, it was going to cost them another $7.5 million.  By my calculations, in the space of five or six years, they were going to have to fork out to Michelin about $40 million. Aussies looked at it, said, nah, but we've said yes, and I reckon we are doing the right thing.  This is grown-up, first world tourism.  I th