ACT + National freak out over Greens taxing Billionaires
National Party leader Christopher Luxon has hit out at the Green Party’s latest tax proposal targeting “the super-rich and mega-corporates”, calling the suite of policies “economic lunacy”.
Act leader David Seymour says the Green Party’s newly announced tax policy seeks to take the “dark underbelly of New Zealand’s otherwise happy culture” and make it “official Government policy”.
The speed with which ACT and National rush to defend the ultra rich from paying more tax to fund our public infrastructure is hilarious!
How else will we pay for the climate adaptation?
How else will we pay for the infrastructure upgrade?
How else will we pay for the crucial public services?
The Right will claim that we can pay for all that by rising productivity.
Ok.
You want to talk productivity?
Let’s talk productivity, specifically the myth that dairy is good for the economy…
New Zealand’s economic backbone not so strong
The farming sector is enjoying a boom time at the moment. Beef prices are experiencing a 60 year high, the farm gate milk price is almost $10/kgMS, wool prices have achieved a 10 year high, lamb is getting $2/kg more than last year and fruit prices are also strong. If the sector is the ‘backbone of the economy’, as is often claimed, then why is it that we are struggling to stand upright economically at the moment. Unemployment is sitting at 5.3% (over 11% for Māori and Pasifika) and households are generally struggling to make ends meet.
The problem with agriculture is that most New Zealanders get little value from the sector. While it earns around 85% (dairy is 30%) of our export income it only adds only 5% to our total GDP. It employs just 5% of the workforce and contributes a measly 1-3% of total tax income. The income generated mainly goes to the likes of Fonterra (15 staff earn over $1 million pa), various corporates (many overseas owned) and increasing equity for farm owners who pay minimal tax. Total farm debt was almost $65 billion at the end of 2025 that helped feed the $7.5 billion net profit for our Australian owned banks.
New Zealand exports are mainly raw and semi-processed goods sold in commodity markets and those buying them make even more money from adding further value. Our low level of productivity is partly because we do little manufacturing ourselves. We are rely on quantity over quality.
More and more of our agricultural production is now owned by overseas corporates that funnel profits off shore: 50% of our forestry cutting rights, 40% of wine production and 25% of our food and beverage manufacturing.
…my point is I’m not being lectured to on the Economy by a Right wing who manipulate culture war garbage to gloss over the fact that their entire policy platform is their donors interests.
We are never going to grow the the way the Right pretend we will because their are bent over backwards for enshrined corporate interests.
So let’s tax those corporate interests!
This isn’t envy, this is a righteous reckoning of a rigged capitalism that ACT and National champion!
The only dark under belly of NZ is David Seymour twerking and claims of ‘Economic Lunacy’ from a Prime Minister who is borrowing more than Labour and is promising to upgrade KiwiSaver after slashing it, is a tad projecting isn’t it?
Why shouldn’t this kind of Billionaire arsehole pay a douchebag tax?
Looking more and more like vote brown and green to me .Top are the big movers and will be in the top four of all parties after the election .
The Greens know full well their wishes will count to nothing when they go I to power with Labour . They have made themselves vulnerable because they have said they will only team up with Labour so they have lost the threat of going with the other Party .Thisxwas Winston’s Trump hand
Oh my God. This is good in a gag worthy sort of way.
Kiwi-As urban multi-billionaires, urban multi-millionaires and a cadre of low profile urban riche including an urban gangsta clan of now Australian owned record profit making banksters being anz, asb, bnz and westpac…
How? I know ! Lets ask the national party, a nest of loyal parasites to farmers, urban others and their aforementioned besties since 1936.
Firstly, read then listen to this. Go on you can do it. Put the cat outside, hide sharp objects and see if you can count the number of times some fawning little pro natzo pansy says ” communiddy “. Be warned! Extremely gag worthy pro-national RNZ.
Election 2026 – The disproportionate staying power of the rural vote. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/thedetail/614313/election-2026-the-disproportionate-staying-power-of-the-rural-vote
Look. I know a thing or two about rural AO/NZ ok. I was very nearly literally born on a hay paddock in rural Southland. My lovely old Ma was driving a tractor towing a trailer loaded up with hay when she went into labour with me. No wonder I get hay fever. Then, some time later, we went to 3000 acres in the Mid Canterbury hill country which was emotional to say the least so I can tell you with some cred to support my views that the gibberish espoused by RNZ and the idiocrats they interviewed, the fawning minions to the party national and media celebs was outrageous for their completely bias views in favour of federated farmers who’re merely tea sipping biscuit nibbler company to the national party and the national party’s urban hangers-on. Farmers. Be aware that rnz is merely a mechanism to deliver gibberish to exhausted and ill informed minds. In short, the piece prepared and delivered to you and you by RNZ in the link above was a bias, one sided avalanche of pro-national party giggle-fest bullshit and not that good kind either.
Now, this is where things get fruity. I want you and you to do me a favour and assume I’m correct just for a moment. Then, look around? What do you see? Open your minds and tell yourselves what you see politically, economically and societally as you ride your quad bike through mud in a winters cold. Do you see the truth born of reality? Or do you just see bullshit? Watch this again. And again and again if necessary. Shovel back the bullshit and now, what do you see?
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/thedetail/614313/election-2026-the-disproportionate-staying-power-of-the-rural-vote
Even Chippy won’t have a bar of it, besides Luxon and Seymour…
He might just have to swallow that dead rat along with a few others. Labour are weak and gutless and pathetic. The whole tax structure needs changing so those making the most pay the highest percentage. I see the Greens and Te Pati Maori as a force for good they have always had the poorest in this country at heart. For one person to be a millionaire etc. many people are required to be poor.
agree 100%
Yes hilarious it was…Luxon claiming that ‘Rocket Lab’…who get to use unique and special part of N.Z. at Mahia Peninsula to do all their testing, is suddenly going to upsticks and head off overseas to set up shop somewhere where it would cost 1000 times more to do so…if they could find such a place at all….what planet is he on?
Luxon and Seymour are like watching a Punch and Judy show …but they are not funny…just stupid.
They should tax National and ACT on 90% of the money given to them by the corporates…
Yep rocket lab left years ago .They only launch cheap shit here now .And they more than likely pay bugger all tax here as they can shift money off shore .Get paid US dollars for their services ,pay bugger all to launch from here.
It’s not envy. It’s resentment.
Yes Ada, spot on!
I pay tax on every dollar that I earn, and that’s every dollar that I worked hard for.
I’m happy to pay tax because it’s only fair.
I feel resentment when I think of (very) rich people who, relatively, pay little to no tax.
That has to change.
I think the tax-free thing is about capital growth, and I think that should be taxed as well. Including houses and farms, and art works etc.
That NZ doesn’t is on the political class, not the wealthy and mega rich.
Yes Jk I feel the same about my taxes and some able to avoid paying but even worse is our government selling our resources to those who already pay less taxes and continuing to create the economic conditions for those who pay fuck all taxes to get even more richer.
And who is lining up to buy our resources, the same people.
This from Idiot Savant.
Taxing the rich and limiting their ability to accumulate and weaponise their wealth is a necessary thing for the preservation of our society. And the best bit is that it won’t affect the vast majority of New Zealanders. Only a tiny proportion of people – the Chris Luxons of this world – have more than $10 million. Only a tiny proportion of people inherit or are given more than $1 million. Only a tiny proportion (which includes every MP) “earn” more than $160,000. None of that affects us. Instead, what we get in practice from this policy is a reduction in inequality, a restriction on the power of the rich, better-funded public services, and a tax cut! Because most of us will end up better off, thanks to a shift in the tax burden from the poor to the rich. Which is perfectly sensible the moment you think about it. There’s no point taxing people who don’t have any money. Instead you go after the people who do have it, the bloated accumulators who have sucked all the wealth out of our society into their own pockets.
Sadly, Chris Hipkins – a man paid $305,900 a year plus slush, who rorted his parliamentary superannuation scheme into buying his holiday home and then said “it’s my money” – is saying that none of this will happen if he’s in charge. Voters should take that as a challenge: if we want these policies, we have to vote for them. We need to put the Greens in a position where they can force this policy on Labour. Otherwise, nothing will change, and the rich will just keep on leaching and looting us.
https://norightturn.blogspot.com/2026/06/time-to-tax-rich.html
Luxon and Seymour see Green’s new FAIR tax structure as detrimental to themselves and their wealthy, GREEDY bribers/doners/enablers! Look what it took to get a reaction? When thousands are living on the streets, are taxed unevenly, so they are paying the bulk, and then get kicked down the road again – NO REACTION at all! If it wasn’t so disgusting it would be funny but we’re not laughing. Neither of you will suffer from these new FAIRER taxes, you just won’t have quite as much to splash around or to give to your mates! Kiwis are totally over the greed, corruption, inflated egos and spite! At the very least S & L should have shut up and swallowed their shame but there is no shame – they are unscrupulous scoundrels – who pretend they can’t see it! This CoC stuffed up horribly and viciously and it will come back and bite them. Bring it on, it’s the workers’ turn now!
Billionaires are a big part of the problem of climate change so why shouldn’t they pay for mitigation which benefits us all?
Cluxon threatening us that they might leave and take their few jobs and wealth with them is a red-herring.
If billionaires really wanted to leave, they’d have done it by now. You know, because Grant and Jacinda made it impossible for them to make a buck!
Cluxon is more worried about them leaving and taking their donations and support for him and his mates with them.
He’s been told, we like it here, but tell them we’ll take their jobs, that’ll shut them up.
What is it with right wing parties and their leaders who have either engaged in tax dodging or approve of it …
Luxon spent 18 years with the multinational Unilever ,, https://michaelwest.com.au/unilever-a-multinational-tax-dodger-classic/
Seymour thinks tax havens and other such rorts are funny ,,,, even if his and Keys lame jokes were not –“Seymour: In what century did the wine-box enquiry take place? Rt Hon JOHN KEY : One so far back I can hardly remember it ” ,,,, get it?
One has to ask, is one of Seymours Ministry for (de)Regulation’s objectives to make the use of tax havens easier?
Those two slippery shits are not working in the interests of average New Zealanders / tax payers
The US ‘military’ (zionist terrorists) emit more carbon than our ENTIRE nation.
And yet traitors like Luxon say that those foreigners who are intimately involved in that criminal operation, like Peter Thiel, should pay no tax.
If New Zealand was a free country we would tax all Americans and American lovers at 110%. Take their income, take their properties, strip any fake citizenship they have, send them back to hell.
Feeding AI the 2025 Financial statements of Unilever New Zealand Ltd ( Luxon spent almost two decades working for Unilever before his stint at Air Nz ) ,,,, and then directing AI to summarise Unilever NZ’s accounts but using the information contained in Michael Wests article for help and context in doing so……
AI served up this “The article by Michael West, titled “Unilever: a multinational tax dodger classic” (published in 2017), provides significant context for understanding the nature of the $23,057,000 in royalties and service fees paid by Unilever New Zealand Limited in 2025, even though the article specifically analyzes Unilever’s Australian operations.
Context from the Michael West Article
The article describes a pattern where Unilever uses related-party payments to shift profits offshore, thereby reducing its taxable income in the local jurisdiction (Australia in the article’s case, but the mechanism is identical for New Zealand).
Profit Shifting Mechanism: The article details how Unilever Australia utilized “mysterious cost lines” including massive payments for royalties, service fees, and management charges to related entities in lower-tax jurisdictions (such as the Netherlands). These payments effectively wiped out local profits, reducing the tax bill from $16.3 million to $4.8 million over four years despite generating billions in revenue.
“Related Party Loans” and Fees: It highlights the use of inter-company loans and treasury services where the local subsidiary pays interest and fees to overseas parent companies. This is described as “lending money to yourself” to create a deductible expense locally while moving cash offshore.
Lack of Transparency: The article criticizes Unilever for using “special purpose” financial reporting to conceal the specific details of these transactions, arguing that the complexity is designed to obscure tax avoidance strategies rather than for genuine commercial simplification.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
Application to Unilever New Zealand’s 2025 Figures
The $23,057,000 expense reported by Unilever New Zealand in 2025 aligns with the exact model described in the Michael West investigation:
Nature of the Expense: This line item represents payments made by the New Zealand subsidiary to overseas Unilever entities (likely regional hubs in Singapore, Europe, or global headquarters) for:
Intellectual Property: Royalties for using global brands (e.g., Magnum, Streets, Dove, Surf).
Centralized Services: Management, technical, marketing, and R&D support provided by the global group.
Impact on Profit: By deducting $23 million from its revenue, Unilever New Zealand significantly lowers its taxable profit in New Zealand. Instead of this profit being taxed at the New Zealand corporate rate (28%), the value is transferred offshore where it may be taxed at a lower rate or not at all, depending on the recipient jurisdiction’s tax laws.
Transfer Pricing: While Unilever states these transactions comply with “arm’s length” principles (as noted in global reports), critics and the Michael West article argue that the scale of these fees often exceeds genuine service costs, serving primarily as a vehicle for profit extraction.
Conclusion
The Michael West article suggests that the $23,057,000 in royalties and service fees is not merely a standard operational cost but a strategic financial tool used by the multinational group to minimize local tax liabilities. The “large profit lowering expense” is the mechanism by which value generated by New Zealand operations is transferred to the global parent company, reducing the subsidiary’s reported profit and, consequently, its tax contribution to the New Zealand economy.”
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While you’ll find no argument from me that Billionaires need appropriate taxing ,,,,, The real money is what the top 100 corporations are fleecing us ( and worldwide) year in and year out.
The ‘creative accounting’ / tax vehicles / and other “shewan shuffles”* needs to be dismantled the same way they were created ,,, by amendments and rule changes in our laws / statutes ….
The problem is AO-NZ would be retaliated agains,,,t as countries like the USA and the UK defend and promote this legalised theft b the rich and powerful….
However there is a CRASH coming in the near future ,,,, such emergencies / melt-downs is when we can extricate ourselves from such a rotten, corrupt and failed system….
I hope the Greens and others are drafting plans for when the shit hits the fan ,,,,, because you can bet the Peter Thiels and Elon Musks have theirs.
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*”John Shewan was the senior tax advisor for Westpac in a landmark dispute with the Inland Revenue Department (IRD) over structured finance tax avoidance schemes. While the High Court and subsequent rulings found that major banks, including BNZ, ASB, ANZ, and Westpac, owed over $2 billion in unpaid tax and interest, the legal outcome for Shewan’s specific advice was nuanced.
Bank Liability: The courts ruled the structured finance transactions were illegal tax avoidance, resulting in a record $2.2 billion out-of-court settlement by the four major Australian-owned banks in 2009 to avoid potential penalties.
Shewan’s Role: Shewan advised Westpac that a low effective tax rate was acceptable to satisfy public expectations, a strategy that resulted in Westpac paying only 6.5% tax compared to the 30% corporate rate.
Legal Standing: Although the IRD won the substantive tax cases, Shewan was not personally held liable for the debts; however, his expert evidence was later unanimously rejected by the Supreme Court in a separate case involving Christchurch surgeons, who were found to have used similar avoidance structures.
The rulings effectively overturned the tax positions Shewan helped construct for his clients, confirming that the complex schemes were designed to evade tax obligations rather than comply with legislative intent. ”
If the name John Shewan sounds familiar ( the banks trying to shaft NZ for over $2 billion was largely kept on the low down by ‘Dirty Politics’ media in 2009 and most New Zealanders are unaware of this ‘ bank robbery’) ,,,,, Well anyway Following the 2016 Panama Papers leak, which highlighted New Zealand’s role as a jurisdiction for foreign trusts, Prime Minister John Key appointed tax expert John Shewan to conduct an independent review of the country’s foreign trust disclosure rules….
Thats how right wing Governments roll ,,,, aiding corruption / tax havens at the expense of ordinary people.