No two sovereign countries are closer, says 'citizen of Australasia' on prospect of unity with Canberra

The prospect of New Zealand giving up its independence and joining Australia in a trans-Tasman federation has been revived by a senior minister in Wellington.

The idea of the two countries joining forces was first floated during the late 19th-century, during debates over the federation of Australia's separate colonies, but was ruled out due to the distance between the two countries.

But cabinet minister Steve Maharey now says that air travel and better communications, as well as increasingly intertwined economies, have given the idea fresh impetus.

'The speed of travel and communications means that the 1,200 reasons that some saw as constituting the obstacles to New Zealand's participation in the Australian Federation - the distance between Australia and New Zealand - no longer present such an obstacle,' he said in a speech to the Sydney Institute last night.

Describing himself as 'a citizen of Australasia', Mr Maharey said: 'I don't know what particular form the widening and deepening of the relationship between Australia and New Zealand will evolve into - and in the interests of retaining my place in the cabinet, I am not going to volunteer my own preferences - but no two sovereign nations are any closer than Australia and New Zealand.'

Mr Maharey, who is Social Services and Employment Minister in the Government of Prime Minister Helen Clark, said the 'crimson thread of kinship' between the two countries was now complemented by 'a high degree of economic integration and independence'.