Context - Few political one-liners are as enduring in New Zealand folklore as Sir Robert Muldoon's crack about the brain drain. Asked about Kiwis moving to Australia in the late 1970s, Muldoon famously replied that the migrants "raised the IQ of both countries". Trans-Tasman migration was surging at the time, with 103,000 New Zealanders moving permanently to Australia between 1976 and 1982.
The joke has been repeated in speeches, pub banter, and the occasional barbecue argument for decades. But here's the punchline: Muldoon didn't write it - he pinched it from political cartoonist and columnist Tom Scott.
However, Scott says he wasn't bothered. "I'd already stolen it," he admitted. "I couldn't get too pious".
Sir Robert Muldoon served as the 31st prime minister of New Zealand. Photo: Stuff
Speaking to Corin Dann in RNZ's new podcast Context, which looks at the history behind today's headlines, Tom Scott said he took the gag from Irish writer Brendan Behan. In his play The Quare Fellow Behan wrote the same thing about Irish people migrating to America. "I modified it without attribution," Scott explained. "I didn't give Brendan the credit. I took it for myself. I said, 'When Kiwis go to Australia, it raises the IQ of both countries.' And I put it in The Listener column."
It was the perfect joke for the moment. The Trans-Tasman Travel Arrangement, introduced in 1973, had made it easy for Kiwis to live and work in Australia without visas. When Australia's economy surged while New Zealand's sputtered, thousands left for greener pastures.
RNZ's new podcast Context looks at the history behind today's headlines. Photo: RNZ / Marika Khabazi (photo), Robert Whitaker (design)
Ten days after Scott's column ran, Muldoon dropped the line as if it were his own.
Scott said he was only too pleased to see Muldoon borrowing from his (and Brendan Behan's) work given that, at the time, he was banned from Muldoon's press conferences. "It was doubly rewarding," Scott said, "to be a banned person and a quoted person. It was quite nice."
Follow and listen to Context on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
David Lange served as the 32nd prime minister of New Zealand. Photo: Merv Griffiths. Dominion Post (Newspaper): Photographic negatives and prints of the Evening Post and Dominion newspapers. Ref: EP/1986/3948/17-F. Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, New Zealand.
Muldoon wasn't the only prime minister to steal Tom Scott's lines. "[David] Lange stole a lot of mine as well," Scott recalled. "In his farewell valedictory to Parliament, he said, 'Winston Peters can't be here tonight, he's been unavoidably detained by a full-length mirror.' And that was my line too. So, you know, I've had Muldoon and Lange both stealing my lines. It's quite flattering, really."
Over the years, the "IQ" remark has taken on a life of its own. Many quote it without knowing its real author, assuming it sprang fully formed from the PM's famously sharp tongue.
For more on the fascinating historical story of the 'Brain Drain' - including fears of farm workers fleeing for the goldfields, and anxieties over scientific migration in the 1960s - check out RNZ's new podcast Context, hosted by Corin Dann and Guyon Espiner, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
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