Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Showdown today for the leadership of National, climate change commissioner lashes budget failings, and Fonterra picks up earnings amid uncertainty. It’s all going down in the National caucus today, and we’ll see later on who will emerge victorious. The party again suffered a very poor polling … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: A day of concern about police overreach, budget to be announced today, and rules on tangi changed after pressure. Plenty of concerns have been raised about the powers that police will hold under enabling legislation for alert level two. The bill to make level two possible … Read more
Good morning and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Previewing the budget we’ll get tomorrow, tangihanga rules further clarified, and Peters doesn’t believe Taiwan war of words will harm China relationship. We’re increasingly getting a sense of the sort of budget Grant Robertson will deliver tomorrow. The country is facing an economic downturn which could … Read more
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Peters throws New Zealand into the fray over Taiwan’s WHO inclusion, more detail emerges on legality of lockdown, and a potentially major decision for the courier industry. The government wouldn’t frame it in such a way, but they’ve made several recent moves which indicate they’re … Read more
The government’s books are now expected to go into the red this financial year with a forecast deficit of $900 million, down from a budget forecast surplus of $1.3 billion. The government will borrow $12 billion to spend on transport, schools, hospitals and investment in the regions over the next five years, in a bid … Read more
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: Govt gives and takes with first Wellbeing Budget, Treasury Secretary under immense pressure, and dozens of kākāpō sick from fungus. The question was asked in yesterday’s Bulletin – what does this government value enough to put real money towards? In the end, the Budget that was delivered wasn’t … Read more
Good morning, and welcome to The Bulletin. In today’s edition: What to watch for on Budget day, education minister gets brutal heckling from teachers, and Wellington mayor throws support behind trackless trams. “Don’t tell me what you value, show me your budget, and I’ll tell you what you value.” So goes the quote often attributed to former … Read more
There is no evidence of illegality on the part of the National Party, and they have succeeded in shining a light on parts of the Budget the government would prefer you didn’t reflect on, writes Brigitte Morten for RNZ One of the key advantages of being in government is that you get to largely set … Read more
KiwiSavers like you and me are the benefactors New Zealand’s infrastructural development is looking for, says Simplicity’s Sam Stubbs. The government is signalling that New Zealand’s infrastructure build, apart from anything rail related, will go slower than expected. Increases in core funding, let alone mouldy surprises at Middlemore, are draining the national coffers of monies that any … Read more
Budget 2018: If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s probably a tax, says Grant Thornton’s Dan Lowe. Budget day is fast approaching and the predictions are coming thick and fast. Many will be watching with keen interest, not just because it’ll be Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s first budget since being … Read more
If a fuel tax is the best way to fund Auckland’s development, Councillor Efeso Collins asks that the benefits be invested in the people the tax will affect most – those in his Manukau ward. My parents worked on factory floors at NZ Forest Products in Penrose, cleaning operating theatres of Middlemore Hospital, and driving … Read more
Midwives around New Zealand marched today, protesting pay rates and working conditions across the industry. Don Rowe joined the march up Auckland’s main street. New Zealand midwives and their supporters marched in cities around the country today, calling for urgent adjustments to what they say is an outrageously low pay scale, which can in some … Read more
The Budget Responsibility Rules are arbitrary and unhelpful, argues Branko Marcetic. When your house is in decay, a refusal to spend money to fix it is the opposite of prudent Just over a year ago, Labour and the Greens unveiled a set of Budget Responsibility Rules that committed them to keep delivering budget surpluses, paring down debt … Read more
Good morning, and welcome to the Bulletin. In today’s edition: Government prepares ground for a no-treats budget, Waikato DHB pulls out of expensive app failure, and a controversial immigration programme put on hold. The government is preparing the ground for a treat-free Budget by pointing to the situation they inherited. At yesterday’s post-cabinet press conference, PM … Read more
At the end of last year, it was reported that many schools are having to cut teacher aide hours due to tightened budgets. Below, two accounts from Pukerua Bay School, north of Wellington: one from a principal on the importance of teacher aides in the classroom, another from a teacher aide on the impact of … Read more
Yesterday on RNZ’s Morning Report journalist Guyon Espiner brought finance minister Steven Joyce together with Labour’s finance spokesperson Grant Robertson, and asked them both about Joyce’s accusation that Labour has a $11.7 billion hole in its spending plans. Here’s the transcript. In the interview, Guyon Espiner is sitting between the two politicians, with a laptop … Read more
What was Steven Joyce really up to when he said Labour’s budget plan was missing almost $12 billion? Simon Wilson considers the possibilities. On Monday morning the minister of finance said the opposition finance spokesperson was so incompetent, he had produced a fiscal statement that overlooked nearly $12 billion worth of spending they should have … Read more
Prime Minister Bill English made his big pre-Budget speech in Wellington yesterday. He mentioned Auckland exactly zero times. Is this a deliberate election-year strategy, asks Simon Wilson. It’s three weeks till Budget Day. Three weeks until the government sets out the financial framework for the programme it will take into the election in September, now … Read more
Bill English just delivered his eighth budget, and the opposition as ever had pre-cooked epithets to denounce it. Here’s how his budgets have been defined – heroically or hopelessly – by his enemies (and ACT) in the parliamentary budget debate since 2009. 2009 Labour leader Phil Goff said it was the Dishonest Budget Greens co-leader … Read more
The Spinoff asked a bunch of clever people to give us one sentence they’d like to see magically written into the finance minister’s Budget speech. These are the words they’d put in his mouth … “Inequality in New Zealand has increased dramatically in recent years, and we need to urgently address it, particularly in the … Read more