The National Party is promising to supercharge the tech sector by changing tax settings and creating a Minister of Technology.
It would also offer up to 1000 new visas - the centrepiece of the pitch - for top talent and digital nomads. However, Labour has said the visas could mean another tax hole for National.
"These three visas are just about trying something new, about being a bit innovative with the immigration system which we haven't seen over the last six years," National immigration spokesperson Erica Stanford said.
One is a work visa for highly-educated young people from one of the top universities in the world of which there'd be 500; another is a 12-month digital nomad work visa for people who earn more than $20,000 a month with 250 spots; and the third is a residency visa for people who earn more than $400,000 and have worked at a top 200 tech firm - there'd be 250 visas for them.
But rolling out the red residency carpet could impact National's foreign luxury home buyers' tax.
On average, National needs 1700 people a year to buy luxury homes worth more than $2 million. But all the 250 super-wealthy foreigners who come to New Zealand on the top talent residency visa would bypass the tax, as would anyone who spends more than six months of the year in New Zealand.
"It certainly creates another hole in their foreign buyers' tax but that's ultimately one of many holes they've got there," Labour leader Chris Hipkins said.
Newshub repeatedly asked National leader Christopher Luxon on Friday whether the party had factored that into their modelling.
"We have capped these numbers at quite low levels," he said.
"It's important for us to understand the multiplier effect that when you can bring someone from one of the top 100 universities in the world, come from one of the top tech firms and we attract them and make it easy to come to New Zealand.
"That's why I think the ideas that we've got are really innovative but they're about driving more prosperity to the New Zealand economy."
Newshub's Amelia Wade again asked if National factored the foreign buyers' tax into their tech plan, to which Luxon said, "Thank you, Amelia" and moved to the next question.
That sounds like a no.
