A Labour Government with billion dollar surpluses is like a billionaire socialist – not to be respected or trusted

1. Id say. A government isn’t a fucken warehouse for cash.

2. They have stopped spending on roads because of the Greens. Pandering to NZF they have spent large on defence which benefits few in NZ. Where are the state houses they promised as rents still climb and more and more are needed . Health spending is still poor . Prisons still overcrowded while gangs are growing in power . This lot are hopeless and helpless

   • Are you saying that because they haven’t “fixed” the huge number of deep seated issues left behind by the corporate raiding party, who had nine years to gleefully hollow out nearly every public service/infrastrucure for the sole reason of profit skimming, which then flowed largely out of the country, inside two years, so they’re useless? Are you a masochist?

     • No, I’m not saying that at all Stefan.

       What I’m saying is that this Government had no idea they would win, had zero plan when they took over, never focused on reforming the public service so that their policy could actually be implemented, and that the budget responsibility gag they signed up to has made transformative change almost impossible.

       We have a $4b surplus, I’ll make it easy for you – please explain to us all why that shouldn’t be used to clear all the DHB debt?

3. Would it be fair to say there’s nothing remotely Socialist or for that matter left wing about this government? Could it be they are in fact centre right and have more in common with National than they do with Labour governments as they were back in the 70’s and prior?

   Suffice to say sitting on public money when there is so much urgent need from any government is in my opinion utterly disgraceful. As I said and keep saying I refuse to vote for more of this and if that means staying home on election day so be it.

   • exactly

   • Agree 100% SEAN.

4. Hyperbole, and side issues aside.. Not you Martin… When is the next election? And is that a “war chest” being readied? As cynical as it is, I wonder if this isn’t as much an acceptance of the short attention span of rather too many “citizens”…

5. “Surplus” again
   This from No Right Turn.
   Another year, and the government has announced another enormous government “surplus”. And just like last year, its nothing of the sort. When we have people homeless and sick and hungry, when we have schools and hospitals still falling down, when we have underpaid public servants and infrastucture unmaintained or unbuilt, its not a “surplus”. Instead, its a crime, a theft from the public of the services and infrastructure the government should have provided with it. It’s also a real reminder that every time the government cried “but we don’t have the money” in the last year – to striking teachers, to those demanding beneficiaries be allowed to live in dignity, to those wanting their medical needs met – they were outright lying. They did have the money – and in fact they had billions and billions more, just sitting there, doing nothing useful whatsoever.

   But its not just a lie – it is also a mistake. The government runs these massive surpluses because they feel that as a nominally-left wing party, they need to “prove themselves” to business. But business will never be satisfied, no matter how “fiscally responsible” the government is: they never voted Labour, and never will. Meanwhile running a surplus lets the opposition run a narrative of the government stealing from “hard working” millionaires and promise to “give the money back” – something the government has made painless, because there’s a pile of cash there, which frees the opposition from the political cost of having to be honest about its priorities and what it would cut. At least when you spend money, you get something for it. All piling it up like this does is waste it.

   Meanwhile, I’m thinking of all the things this could have done. How much would it cost to restore benefits to pre-Richardson levels and let the sick and the unemployed live in dignity? How many state houses could be built with it? How many wind turbines and solar panels? How many trees? Except I know the answers to those questions: a couple of billion, ~15,000, ~7,500 MW, and ~7.5 billion (storing 6 billion tons of carbon when grown, or the next hundred years gross emissions). Those answers should make you very, very angry at the opportunities the government has squandered in the name of chasing the unachievable and pointless approval of the rich.

6. The New Zealand Labour Party died a slow death. Incrementally it was replaced with younglings who were trained in the current orthodoxy – neo-liberalism. Who better to train them in the dark art than the war criminal tony blair, and the wraith H. Clark.

   They younglings dare not use a surplus for good. Neo-liberals are hard wired to ensure wealth trickles upwards. It is an insult that they trade on the name Labour and the emotional content that carries for some. Neo-Labour would be more accurate for the current nasty pack.

7. Her teeth are more like a gate. Hearing Stephen Mills on today’s right v. left prog on RNZ nine to noon, lets never present a target. Which is a good lesson from the last Australian election, except there is right. If you can’t talk for that …

   • Let’s never give a target hence Phil Goff’s harsh imprisonment policy in the early 2000s. People who ‘acted’ for the wrong. 7.5 billion surplus and a Labour Govt can’t find enough of the NZ idea to present the PR for the restoration of Jenny Shitley’s benefit cuts. Never voted for them and glad of it.

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