Cunliffe David: Taxation (Annual Rates Trans-Tasman Savings Portability KiwiSaver and Remedial Matters) Bill — In Committee 
Cunliffe David: Taxation (Annual Rates Trans-Tasman Savings Portability KiwiSaver and Remedial Matters) Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:666;Page:13469] 
Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Labour—New Lynn) 
: 
 I rise to correct some factual inaccuracies that have been conveyed by members of the Government—no one will be surprised about that. There are two in particular I would like to turn the Committee’s attention to. The first is the spurious claim that National has magicked an 8.7 percent wage growth since it came to office. I will just look into those numbers for the benefit of the Committee. 
Craig Foss 
: Real. 
Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE 
: That is far off the mark. The other is that Kiwis are somehow $25 a week better off through paying more GST. Let us look at the first one. I was interested that the National Government seems to be repeating the claim that somehow Kiwis are 8.7 percent better off in real terms since it was elected but that does not feel right does it? Everybody knows that the recovery is not happening everybody knows that the Government has no plan and nobody is feeling better off. Where did that number come from? Well we had the research unit have a bit of a look at it and this is what it has told us so far: the 8.7 percent includes Labour’s tax cuts in Budget 2008. So the National Government has counted the policies of the previous Labour Government as part of the credit for its administration. Well that is the best way I know for National to say that Labour did a really good job that National is sorry it got elected and Labour did not get a chance to keep doing it and that National is going to count Labour’s policies as its gain. 
Interestingly of course it follows that it is not wage growth at all in the context that an ordinary New Zealander would understand it; it is net wages after tax. So if we correct those anomalies and put Labour’s policies into Labour’s total and National’s policies in National’s total where do the numbers go? It is very instructive. 
Chris Tremain 
: This is what matters: if people can buy more next year or the year after. 
Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE 
: The National senior whip might care to listen to this because it will be big in the Hawke’s Bay. When we correct the total National can claim at most only about 4 percent net wage growth but even that seems a huge stretch of the imagination. Labour had at least 6.3 percent. We know there was at least 6.3 percent real growth under Labour and this National Government is nowhere near it. We can talk about slipperiness. My youngest child was just given a book by a friend called  
The 
Wonky Donkey 
. It is a lovely book but every time I see it I see the “Shonky John-Key”. The “Shonky John-Key” is the leader of a party that would take Labour’s tax cuts and count them into National’s wage growth—ridiculous! 
How about the second claim that somehow New Zealanders are $25 a week better off after the Budget? I ask members how that could be true because GST takes $2.1 billion from them and there are about $1.95 billion of tax cuts back of which a third go to the top 5 percent. So what do average Kiwis have? They will be worse off until 2014. We think that they will be from $20 to $50 a week worse off. Why? Because according to the Government’s own Budget forecasts there will be 5.9 percent inflation next year. That means that with 2 percent wage growth and 6 percent inflation people will go backwards. It is not difficult to work it out. In fact on our numbers people will be going backwards until after the 2014 election. 
National is saying that it will put up GST now and that people will pay more but have less to put towards the grocery bill every year until two elections away—two elections away. What are New Zealanders supposed to do in the meantime if they cannot pay the rent the power bill and the rates and buy food? That is why at the very least our amendment gives people relief from the increase in GST on their rates for this year by saying that the increase will not apply until the next financial year. It would reduce the compliance costs of doing funny money changeovers in the middle of the year. They would be funny money changeovers like the other funny money changeovers in the 28-page tidy-up Supplementary Order Papers that the Minister of Revenue has had to bring to the Committee with his tail between his legs in order to beg for mercy today because the legislation is a mess. It was a bad idea it has been badly implemented and it is a shocker.