A surplus of cash and a deficit of concern for people

Memo to: Bill English, Finance Minister. Minister, we know you’re a former Treasury wonk, but after eight years in power you really need to start thinking about a better legacy than balancing the books and being a safe, boring pair of hands.

Now that you have a $1.8 billion surplus no doubt you’re tempted to dish out tax cuts to help buy a fourth term in office next year.

But teachers and doctors are striking, we’re short of police, we’re losing the war on the drug P, mental health is in crisis and suicide numbers are as high as they’ve ever been.

You told everyone to tighten their belts and they did. Maybe it’s time to use your role to help make people’s lives a bit better. So we your humble advisers recommend NO pointless bribes (tax cuts) till the following gets sorted:

More police: How did you let this one slip? National is meant to be the party of law and order but on this your Government has failed miserably. Outgoing mouthpiece Greg O’Connor says we need 500 cops immediately. All the other parties have stolen the march on you Minister. Recommendation: Prime Minister to announce more police shortly. Takes it away from Judith Collins, who we know you don’t like or really respect.

More Pharmac funding: It’s been an embarrassing year, Minister. We pride ourselves on being some modern first-world nation but it takes petitions and media campaigns to get the terminally ill access to the right drugs.

Let’s at least look like we have the same drugs as our Australian and British counterparts. Recommendation: Prime Minister to announce increased funding for Pharmac in New Year.

More houses for the workers: After eight years of running Housing NZ into the ground it’s time to start building again, Minister. We have sold houses, boarded them up, moved them, but we have built very few, as you know.

The market didn’t quite respond as we thought it might. There’s a crisis, Minister. We’re not sure you’ve noticed but people live in cars now. Indeed, cars are more comfy these days, but cramming a family of four into a Holden Commodore is still uncomfortable after a few days.

It’s time we bit the bullet and started building again. I note your kayaking mate, Nick Smith, is starting to announce new building projects again, we suggest this is upgraded to a prime ministerial announcement. Recommendation: Shameless U-turn in time for the election. Prime Minister should front this.

More junior doctors: The secret is out of the bag Minister, we don’t have enough of these young slaves on the books.

We pay them just $28 an hour (plumbers get more) and expect them to work almost a fortnightlong stretch at a time. We don’t allow that for truck and taxi drivers, but no-one has really picked up on this, so fingers crossed, it doesn’t get out.

So, we recommend a big hiring strategy and a minor pay rise in line with all public servants at 0.77 per cent. Let’s dress it up somehow with a joint announcement using Health Minister Dr Jonathan Coleman. Let’s say JC worked under similar conditions, but just don’t mention that was under Bill Birch - who was the last Bill to be totally uninspiring and in charge of the purse strings. Recommendation: Joint announcement with Dr JC and the PM. JC to take all technical questions, PM there to take the credit.

Mental health: Our suicide numbers remain stubbornly high and the mental health sector is totally stretched.

There were 579 Kiwis who took their own lives last year. That’s a new record that we can’t claim to be proud of. We need more services and more people – especially in the regions.

Young people and young Maori are still over-represented in these numbers. Minister, not sure how we do this but we recommend the Prime Minister is NOT included in any announcement as it only draws attention to our failure. We suggest we leave this one to Dr JC alone to take the heat.

Apprenticeships: It’s well past time to target the 70,000 young New Zealanders who aren’t in school, work or any form of training.

Again this is a stubborn problem and a ticking time-bomb and the Salvation Army is right when they claim immigrants have taken some of the jobs normally reserved for young Kiwis, but we can still look good on this.

Let’s pinch Labour’s old policy of paying the dole directly to an employer to take a young kid on as an apprentice. Labour has so many policies they may forget this one is theirs. Recommendation: PM to make the announcement in his State of the Nation Speech, end of January. Make it look like his work.

Save for a rainy day: Your Government hasn’t yet put one cent into the long-term NZ superannuation fund to pay for the future cost of pensions.

Let’s start small and at least look like we’re saving again. It makes us look responsible. Recommendation: Because this is largely technical and boring, we suggest you announce this with a press release only. Keep the Prime Minister out of it. He has ruled himself out of any debate on retirement age and savings.

Finally, Minister, we reiterate that tax cuts shouldn’t be the priority at this stage given the pain a number of sectors have been through.

However, should you wish to consider these, we are currently just outside the Prime Minister’s office on our iPads with a plan for tax cuts given his history on this subject.

Our recommendation is the Prime Minister deliver a slow taxcut strip tease through 2017 to get him a fourth term. Yours sincerely, No Treasury staff member ever.