Stand by for the Budget magic show
National defending its reputation for sound economic management.
‘‘Billiondollar holes’’ are popping up like meerkats as fast as the Government can uncover them.
You are not dreaming, we have not entered a parallel universe.
National is not advocating for a wild spend-up and Labour is not fixing for austerity. Although one might be forgiven for thinking the political messaging in the leadup to the Labour-led Government’s first Budget represented something of an aboutface.
As fast as Labour announces more essential infrastructure that’s sprouting mushrooms or oozing toxic sludge, National (abandoning its pre-election ‘‘$11 billion hole’’ accusations) reminds voters that the Government is flush with cash and has promised to spend it.
Meanwhile, ‘‘billion-dollar holes’’ are popping up like meerkats as fast as the Government can uncover them and sheet them back to the last lot in charge.
The latest is Friday’s can of worms that school buildings across the country face a collective $1.1 billion bill to cater for both roll growth and maintenance.
It was actually an ace that was foreshadowed by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in one of her first speeches to Parliament, and it was clearly saved for the pre-Budget gameplan.
And National has a job ahead of it to keep hold of its legacy as a ‘‘steadfast economic manager’’ responsible for the ‘‘rockstar economy’’.
This is nothing National didn’t subject the last Labour Government to upon taking office under former Prime Minister Sir John Key in 2008.
‘‘Decades of deficits’’ was the well-established catchcry which, also due to a number of outside events, was both effective and devastating for Labour.
Arguably, if it wasn’t so effective then, the Government wouldn’t be bound by its Budget responsibility rules now.
But in tearing down National’s legacy, the Government has to get the balance just right. In the case of health, for example, Labour in Opposition gained serious traction in claiming $1.7b in underfunding of the health system.
If it wants to avoid headlines accusing it of exactly the same, then its vote health and DHB numbers have to be significantly bigger than the funding track National would have put them on.
But pushing it too high for DHBs leaves less room for individual centrepiece packages now, and in the future.
DHB funding goes to the core of the running of the health system – that is what pays for cancer treatment, surgeries and all of those things people demand of a free health system, so very little of it can be ringfenced for flashy headline promises.
Equally, as this is a battle for the higher ground, National has to get the balance in its messaging just right.
Talk up the Government’s bulging wallet too much and it risks looking like the big-spend party – especially when the Government is making a very real play for centre and centre-right voters by talking down its position so it can under-promise, overdeliver, but not deliver too much and risk looking irresponsible.
National leader Simon Bridges will need to counter by making this about priorities, more than simply trying to hold Labour to its promises.
His party will ram home the $2.8b Labour has already spent on providing free tertiary education, whilst not attracting any discernible increase in enrolments, and other policies it deems wasteful, which have taken precedent over ones such as lower GP fees.
But there’ll no doubt be some rabbits to pull out. As National says, Labour is ‘‘flush with cash’’.