When Simon Nutt invited me to write 900 words for the next issue of Canterbury’s Digest, my problem was knowing which of so many issues to focus on!
The Labour Government has smothered the health sector with money over the last few years, but waiting lists are still appallingly long – despite Pete Hodgson’s directive to district health boards to cull those lists – and the sector is beset with industrial disputes and stoppages.
Civil defence showed itself to be woefully unprepared for a real disaster when a snow storm affecting a few tens of thousands of people in South Canterbury cut power supplies for weeks.
At the same time, power was cut to our largest city for six to eight hours, and we discovered that the economy incurred a loss of between $50 million and $100 million because the transmission system was literally hanging by a thread.
Belatedly, the Government is finally getting serious about building an adequate roading network, but all the indications are that most of the vitally important roads will not be completed in time for the Rugby World Cup in 2011.
When the Government ratified the Kyoto Protocol late in 2002 – against the strong recommendation of the National Party, which argued that we should not ratify ahead of our major trading partners – they claimed that ratifying would enable us to sell surplus carbon credits to a value of hundreds of millions of dollars. Now they have had to admit that there is no surplus of carbon credits – indeed, there is a very substantial deficit – and that will cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. At the same time, owners of forest plantations are rushing to cut down their forests before the so-called first commitment period begins in 2008, with the result that for the first time in many decades we are seeing a net reduction in the total area in plantation forests.
And then there have been all the flagrant breaches of the law, the most egregious of which relates to Labour’s over-spending the legal limit on what it could spend in the election campaign – not a minor over-spend but an over-spend of almost half a million dollars, funded in clear breach of the Parliamentary rules from Helen Clark’s Leader’s budget. The police concluded that there was a prima facie case that Labour broke the law but decided not to prosecute.
Or the investigation into the behaviour of former Minister Taito Philip Field: the Prime Minister appointed a Queens Counsel to investigate the allegations of inappropriate behaviour, and indicated that a report would be forthcoming in nine days. Now, almost nine months later, no report. I don’t know whether Mr Field abused his position as a minister, but the longer we wait for this report the more the rumours grow.
What about the economy? Well, we know that in the nine months to March the economy grew by just 0.8%, and we know that the Treasury is forecasting the economy to grow by just 1% in the 12 months to March next year. We may well escape a recession, but for many people and companies it will certainly seem like a recession.
We know that in the 12 months to March this year, people spent an enormous amount more overseas than we earned overseas – for the largest current account deficit in New Zealand history in dollar terms, and the second largest, since 1975, relative to the size of the economy.
And what about growth in living standards beyond the next slow year? Treasury expects the economy to grow by an average of less than 3% per annum over the years to 2010, which means that Australia will inevitably, and relentlessly, continue to pull ahead of us. Back in 1999, average after-tax incomes in Australia were 20% above those in New Zealand. Last year that gap had widened to 33%. With the Australian Government cutting income tax rates again on 1 July this year, we estimate that the gap is now 37%.
I don’t want anybody to assume that that gap can be closed in a year, or even in one Parliamentary term. It has taken years to develop; it will take years to reverse. But we must start putting in place the measures which will help to close it, by reducing tax rates to give hard-working Kiwis an incentive to get ahead under their own steam, by building the transport systems that we need, by investing in the electricity sector so that we have an assured and stable supply of energy, by amending the Resource Management Act so that getting approval to proceed with an investment can’t be blocked by vexatious or frivolous objectors, by encouraging more research and development, by ensuring that employment law is consistent with the needs of a high employment growth-oriented economy, by reducing the excessive regulation which adds to compliance costs and distorts investment, and in the longer term by improving the literacy and numeracy of our workforce.
The National Party has many other things we are committed to achieving – welfare reform, a safer community, an end to political correctness around the Treaty, a cleaner environment, and a more effective health system.
But without vigorous measures to close the gap in living standards with Australia we will ultimately see many of the bright and innovative New Zealanders on whom our future as a nation depends disappearing across the Tasman. And if that were to happen, voters would rightly hold us responsible.
Copyright © 2024 Don Brash.