New Zealand had agreed to work with other OECD countries on a comprehensive tax strategy addressing the ''new world without business borders''.
''The bigger object is to try and get our main trading partner countries to solve this problem collectively. New Zealand, as a net exporter, runs the risk of being a net loser if every export destination decides to tax our companies.''
Labour leader Andrew Little announced yesterday a Labour government would crack down on multinational companies dodging paying their fair share of tax.
New Zealanders were missing out by hundreds of millions of dollars, according to Inland Revenue, because multinational companies could hide their profits in complicated international schemes.
Mr Little had written to the largest multinational companies, outlining Labour's intention to make every company pay its fair share of tax like everybody else.
If multinationals were not prepared to pay their fair share, Labour would introduce a diverted profits tax to enable New Zealand tax authorities to impose tax at a penalty rate if they believed tax had been deliberately avoided, he said.
The experience in the United Kingdom had been positive, as companies such as Amazon were now booking their profits in the UK rather than in the tax haven Luxembourg.
''A diverted profits tax is an important tool to encourage multinationals to behave appropriately and pay their fair share of tax like every New Zealander who works for a living.''
Kiwis did not have tricky accountants to help them dodge their obligations, Mr Little said.
Labour was budgeting to collect an additional $600 million over three years. Labour would allow $30 million a year to help pay for Inland Revenue's investigation unit to do its job.
Mr Mason said, generally speaking, countries that had gone for a diverted profits tax had done so only at the very large end of town.
''One can see the attraction to Andrew Little, as words are much easier than implementation. It strikes the chord of 'fairness' and doesn't affect the average voter until prices potentially go up to recoup the extra tax paid.''
Mr Mason's view was New Zealand should continue to pursue a comprehensive solution through the OECD base erosion, profit shifting (Beps) programme.
Finance Minister and National Party campaign manager Steven Joyce said the Government announced two months ago it would collect an initial $100million a year in additional multinational tax.
''The Labour Party turns up today and announces they plan to collect an additional $200million a year without any plan as to how to get there.''
The Government was wrapping up consultation on three areas of work to ensure multinationals paid their share of tax for their activities in New Zealand.
Those areas covered companies using artificially high interest payments to shift profits offshore, artificially avoiding having a taxable presence in New Zealand, and exploiting hybrid mismatches between different countries' tax rules, he said.
Also, New Zealand had joined the OECD multilateral convention to prevent base erosion and profit shifting by multinational companies. The convention updated several thousand tax treaties in one go, Mr Joyce said.
