PM on knife edge finding the cash to pay for changes
By TRACY WATKINS - The Dominion Post
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OPINION: John Key looked like a man who did not have a care in the world when he poked his head in the doorway of the press gallery.
No-one was fooled.
His big Tuesday speech is a huge risk. Mr Key is calculating that a hike in GST will not do to his leadership what healthcare reform has done to Barack Obama and the emissions trading scheme has done to Kevin Rudd.
On the surface, Mr Key has given himself some wriggle room on GST by insisting it is not yet set in stone. In reality, he has left himself few other options for funding meaningful changes to the tax system. By increasing GST and hitting the property investment sector for some $1.7 billion in taxes, Mr Key expects to give himself around $4b to play with.
Having ruled out options including a capital gains tax and a land tax (political suicide is the 9th floor response), refusing to go back on his promise not to touch sacred cows such as Working for Families (except to tidy up some rorts at the top end) and interest free student loans, there are few kitties left to raid.
By the time he wandered down to the press gallery, Mr Key would have known that the instant reaction to his speech had been less than generous.
Critics were already lambasting him for failing to deliver on the promised economic "step change".
His answer is wait and see.
His speech hints at more sweeping changes in welfare, education and state housing, while clearly signalling a big step-up in mining – another area where Mr Key looks ready to take a risk.
But it may not be till the May Budget that we see for sure just how many risks he is prepared to take.
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Thought you were electing someone better!??. In your dreams. A modest look at the election campaign should tell you that Little Johnny and his merry men(and women), were elected on a promise not to rock too many boats.Or not the ones a materialistic and largely apathetic electorate could be made to care too much about. And that's just what they've done. Change? Um no, - they're still nats you know.
What wide-eyed, sycophantic waffle from you Tracy. The Dom Post is really starting to sound like its in cahoots with the Beehive's scriptwriters. Is this really the best that you all can do? "Huge risk", "step-up in mining", "wait and see"... please pull your heads out of the Oriental Bay sand. John Key got elected on a platform of change. What precisely has he delivered, now well into his second year of government? Very little other than taskforce reports that have been dismissed outright because the tough decisions required threaten the populist objectives of his Cabinet. It is long overdue for the Dom Post to being casting a ruler over this Government's performance. Where is your critical assessment of its actual achievements to date? Instead all you serve up is muted, hopeful "wait and see" lines that you are fed by the PM's spindoctors. New Zealand does not have time to "wait and see". It needs this Government to face up to the harsh reality of NZ as an increasingly isolated economic loner hemorrhaging talent, money and investment offshore. If Key's solution to our future economic prosperity is simply to send Gerry off poking around the Coromandel and West Coast with a torch and spade then any fool could be running this country. We thought we were electing someone better.
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Number 1 is correct. The Dom Post and the media in general are revealing their pro National stance. Anyone noted how the huge number of talent flight to Aussie media scare articles and TV programs has stopped since the election in 2008? Yes, some stringent analysis of this Govt's actions, or lack of them, is now required by a media with an objective stance. The honeymoon is long over.