Prime Minister Christopher Luxon is blaming New Zealand going into another recession on the previous Government’s “six years of economic vandalism”.
It was revealed on Thursday that New Zealand is back in a technical recession after the economy shrank two quarters in a row.
Gross domestic product (GDP) fell by 0.1 percent in the December 2023 quarter, official data found. This is the fourth quarter in the past five where the economy has contracted.
Let’s be very clear here!
The ‘economic vandalism’ Luxon is claiming here is the extra money the last Government borrowed to combat Covid!
Policies that saved 20 000 lives!
New Zealand Covid response saved 20,000 lives, study says
So the ‘economic vandalism’ was saving 20 000 lives!
I’m sick of having our Covid sacrifice denigrated by a Right wing who want to re-write the narrative!
Labour borrowed to prevent a health catastrophe during a once in a century pandemic, the true economic vandalism is taking from children’s hungry mouths, the disabled, workers, renters and the environment to afford a $2.9billion tax break for the richest landlords!
We now have this situation where ACT are mocking Public Servants getting sacked…
Deputy leader Brooke van Velden is unrepentant about an Act Party tweet which said “good” in response to news hundreds of public sector workers were set to lose their jobs.
Act tweeted that in response to news that the Ministry for Primary Industries was planning to slash 384 roles. The Ministry of Health has also confirmed that a quarter of the jobs at the ministry could be scrapped in its proposed restructure – up to 200 jobs – after a consultation period.
The cuts are part of the coalition Government’s drive to cut public sector spending by requiring government departments to find 6.5 per cent to 7.5 per cent of savings – but to restrict staff cuts to back-office roles.
Act’s post said: “Good. The number of bureaucrats at MPI increased by 52 per cent – or 1,277 – between 2017-23. The average salary at MPI is about $102,000.”
…ACT and National are promising to gut MBIE because MBIE employs the people who regulate New Zealand’s poorly policed and under regulated capitalism!
27 000 Bosses were given the power to import migrant workers and exploit them, of that number only 2 have had their exploitation scams ended and that’s because there is no State policing the current regulations we have!
We see this time and time and time again, State regulators who are supposedly policing the under regulated markets with barely enough staff to look into anything at all!
Max Rashbrooke highlighted the horror of NZs under regulated market…
The bad news is that, to investigate 200,000-300,000 terrible rentals, the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) has employed a frontline inspectorate numbering … 37. Each inspector will have to check somewhere between 5000 and 8000 rentals.
…there is only 37 inspectors of rental properties for 300 000 terrible rentals?
Similar poorly funded regulation is apparent in the 82 labour inspectorates who are supposed to police hundreds of thousands of migrant worker exploitations!
ACT and National’s bullshit dismantling of Capitalism’s police tells you all you need to know about the deregulated hellscape a National/ACT monstrosity would birth into this world!
Destroying the Ministry tasked with policing NZs poorly regulated capitalism is a recipe for disaster.
This is the malice we is now.
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NACTNZ are reaping what they sowed .While the economy was growing by 7% they were saying it was a dead dog .Well now they have killed it completely .The CEO and CFO just thought it would be all good as soon as they were elected .Well I have news for them as it has gone down hill steeply since october .Instead of brown and benny bashing for the last 3 months they should have been waving the magic wand and fixed the disaster they wanted .I bet they wish they were not in charge now .
Yes….and that pathetic line that Luxon keeps spinning that he… “is not about to be lectured to by Grant Robertson or the Labour Party about how to run the finances of the country” …when he has had zero experience at the complex juggling act required, let alone throwing in a one -in -100 -year worldwide pandemic and multiple catastrophic climate disasters into the mix.
His trite lines, clear ignorance, and buffoonery, just makes him sound like it is actually, ‘he’, who is one, who doesn’t have a clue.
I am surprised that none of the media have picked him up and challenged him on it, as he is reciting the same stupid false unproven lines almost every day!!
You are right of course.
But they could probably get rid of all civil servants now because all the decisions are going to be made by Benson and Hedges Bishop, Pork Barrel Jones and Simian Browne.
The redundant workers could be issued shovels and picks to build all the houses and roads and to dig the new oil and gas wells. Some could be given boats to catch all the fish and dig the offshore wells while building the Wind farms in the Taranaki night. Thats if Nicorette Willis will fund the purchase of picks and shovels.
Billions of dollars were printed and pumped through the economy during lockdown to prevent small business, big business, landlords, banks and workers going bankrupt. The final stopping point of that money was the ultra rich and landlords who made billions on inflated assets. Now is the time for that money to be rebalanced by tax on the very wealthy and landlords. Their government is going to increase reducing services for the poorest and middle class and provide rentier welfare to themselves and their rich mates.
I agree with your comment although as Luxon shows they all think that they are “entitled” to whatever their greedy hearts desire & have the money to pay for the government they want. Tough times ahead
Yes and not to mention the COVID subsidies that were granted to keep businesses going, and rightly so, but what happened on numerous occasions was wealthy businesses claiming the subsidies without any justification and in many cases, without paying their employees or keeping the subsidies for employees who had in fact been made redundant.
They always seem to regard the people who are losing their jobs as something like “stock units”, rather than people. It’s unfortunate they say, but you never actually hear much about the effects on people’s families of redundancy. I know them first hand – fuck act.
guerilla surgeon. Yes. There are people who won’t just lose their jobs and livelihood, but their family life, mortgages, and homes. Nicola Willis’s flip comment suggesting they’ll have no trouble finding new employment opportunities was the usual Nat disregard for consequences and the broader impact. ACT’s “good” comment was vicious and strangely personal. They are haters, and enjoying it.
It’s just utter bullshit. Don’t give tax cuts if the books are so bad. They are supposed to be the responsible economic managers (which again is utter rubbish). The fact is their numbers didn’t add up pre election and after forming a coalition and trading off certain policies the numbers look worse.
Hit the nail on the head Wheel. Simply cancel tax cuts, we don’t need them, then no jobs will be lost. Fuck,even Willis could that equation up and she’s dumber than dumb.
She promised to resign if tax cuts were not…delivered.
Here’s hoping…she resigns.
We don’t need the tax cuts, but we probably need to rinse the inefficiencies from the public service too. We don’t need to keep pumping money into the Wellington bureaucrat elite when we need to spend it on the underpaid Police, Teachers, Nurses… If we cut 20,000 managers and give that money to the workers then more power to them.
Wheel 100%. Of course they should cancel the tax cuts. And raise them for the rich, and chase the off-shore evaders and dodgy trusts, if they know how. Today an affluent older man from a fairly affluent suburb, told me that he thought cancelling children’s school lunches is wicked. Correct.
In the meantime Amanda luxon is holding a hundred dollar luncheon to tell people what it’s like to be a PMs wife, talk about out of touch. A hundred dollar lunch when her husband is cutting school lunches and many NZers can’t afford food or pay rising bill cost. These people disgust me.
Ultimately, tax cuts are a stimulus measure. Which might make some sense given the parlous state of the economy. But they are also the least effective stimulus measure, and economists know that perfectly well. Only a joke government would propose them.
But they were promising tax cuts to buy votes, not to stimulate the economy.
Well, a serious government doesn’t just corruptly disburse public funds to their mates, they act in the public interest. Not that we’ve seen much of that in my lifetime.
They may come to regret being anti-police too.
Tax cuts are not a stimulus measure because if you cut taxes. The over all income of the nation falls. And oh look, it fell. Amazing. Someone like John Key could fudge the numbers which taxes years of practice and great timing to get the execution right.
Expect nothing less from this fascist government – folk might say this is an overstatement – just wait and see as we have Police focusing on ensuring property rights over human rights in the next couple of years. I am sure it will be this long because know there is no way they will call an early election unless they are certain of victory. This certainty is ebbing by the day as more NZers realise what we have elected … watch this space.
I wonder how many of those being made redundant voted for National or ACT?
Events now show people really do get the kind of government they deserve and we are now a nation full of silly bastards.
The best money managers are those on low incomes who have to account for every dollar and spend wisely. They know they can’t go making extravagant promises to anyone.
We have the two groups here who live by buying favour. The wealthy, donating crazy amounts to a political party then to claim they do it out of the goodness of their hearts and the political party which knows it has to offer money (tax cuts) to win the favour of gullible voters. They are all fools and the gullible voters who believed it, were even more stupid.
No-one wanted Luxon as PM. We still don’t. But we’re stuck with him now for a few months.
Make better choices next time people. We’re always being told the situation we’re in is because of our choices. That advice applies to everyone, not just those at the poor end. The wealthy need to make more compassionate choices, not hard-nosed, me first choices. Many people are too selfish to think straight.
“The best money managers are those on low incomes who have to account for every dollar and spend wisely.”
Some would say the best money managers are those who can increase their income. This foolish government is going out of their way to reduce their income by giving to the rich.
Increasing your income is good but it’s a long-term plan and won’t happen over-night. This govt. reduces the possibility of low-income earners doing that in future through education etc. by making every day a matter of just surviving.
Therefore, more proof if we needed it, that this govt. are poor money managers themselves. They don’t look into the future potential earning power of people when they would also be able to pay more tax.
Always short-term, quick buck thinking from the right.
This government is one for the greedy, not the needy.
But TDB warned you of that before the election.
Next time – in less than three years, I reckon – heed the warning!
Winston uses the Nazi line, unfortunately he is akin to Hitler alongside the worst government in history, the 2023 National Government…
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/police-cuts-rural-cops-could-lose-super-cheap-22-a-week-rentals/2RYF4JLNCFF5VB3S6ALTTGO5MY/
So Cockwomble Dave thinks we should be more like Switzerland. Not the worst idea. Economic growth fueled by innovation not immigration. A wealth tax. The ability for homeowners to write off mortgage interest against their taxable income. Subsidised public transport. Pretty much all things the Cockwomble rails against.
Luxon blames the previous Labour Government for “economic vandalism” in his address to Labour hating farmers but what he conveniently overlooks is that it was the Reserve Bank, Adrian Orr, which deliberately created the recession:
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/130568638/adrian-orr-admits-reserve-bank-is-deliberately-engineering-recession#:~:text=Reserve%20Bank%20governor%20Adrian%20Orr,a%20select%20committee%20on%20Thursday.
In his now typically boring finger pointing blaming exercise, Luxon does not give any real detail to justify his claim. Anyway, it is not just New Zealand that is suffering under the current economic recession. Many, many countries are also struggling.
This is just a rinse and repeat of the failed economics of the 80s, 90s, 00s & 10s. Most of us subscribing to this blog know this. We also know the solutions to giving ALL NZ a fair go. They’ve been listed and infinitum. Unfortunately the lies, manipulation and marginalisation have seduced sufficient of the electorate to inflict a further 36 months of pain. Maybe they’ll learn, but I forgot one, won’t hold my breath.
Totalitarian, wake up.
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