Robertson Grant: Oral Questions — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeRobertson Grant: Oral Questions — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 17 February 2015. Volume:703;Page:1592. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]4.GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central) to the Minister of Finance: How many operating surpluses if any using the Total Crown OBEGAL measure has the Government posted in its six years in office?Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): The Government has not posted any operating surpluses in its 6 years of office starting with the one we inherited in 2008-09 which was a deficit of $3.9 billion left behind by the previous Government and that was when the economy was growing fairly significantly. Since then we have moved steadily as I pointed out before to repair the fiscal damage left by the previous Government but also to deal with recession and earthquakes and we have not made bad progress.Grant Robertson: In light of that answer what is Treasury’s forecast for surplus or deficit in this current financial year the year that he and John Key promised New Zealanders we would finally see a surplus?Hon BILL ENGLISH: Treasury’s forecast for the 2014-15 year I think currently stands at around minus $500 million. That is a small deficit. That is after a number of forecasts of surplus. But it could be that they have taken too much notice of that member who of course has been opposed to every aspect of fiscal restraint exercised by this Government in the last 6 years.Grant Robertson: Is it correct that his Government rejected officials’ advice that would have seen ACC levies cut by $658 million given that the worker and earners account is more than fully funded?Hon BILL ENGLISH: I think we did reject that advice as we reject a lot of officials’ advice because often officials’ advice is unbalanced and does not take into account all the objectives of the Government. There is no particular item that makes surplus achievable or not achievable. Budgets are put together in the whole counting expenditure on health education corrections innovation science and research and that will continue to be the case in this Budget as well.Grant Robertson: Given that answer is it correct that officials have advised the Government that ACC levies will be $60 a year more for the average household and for businesses with more than 10 staff $1500 more simply to help him manufacture a surplus in his Budget in May?Hon BILL ENGLISH: The member may not be aware of this but all these issues were canvassed in detail I think at the time of the last Budget. I would expect the member to go and do a bit of homework on that Budget. As I said before the Government has made decisions about ACC in the same way as it decides for instance to give schools an increase in their operational budget or allocate $400 million or $500 million to health. It is just part of putting a whole Budget together and ACC is one of many decisions that add up to whether there is a surplus or not a surplus.Grant Robertson: Will he guarantee to New Zealand workers and businesses that they will not be paying more than they need to in ACC levies simply to help him manufacture a Budget surplus?Hon BILL ENGLISH: Of course I can say that. Of course you have got to remember that any decisions about ACC levies are based on forecasts and the forecasts almost always turn out to be wrong. They are either too high or too low and in retrospect you can see that. So this Government has taken a conservative view of both increasing and decreasing ACC levies and along the way has ignored officials’ advice to increase them too far. And we have not always taken notice of officials’ advice to decrease them too far.Joanne Hayes: What was Treasury’s forecast for Crown debt levels when the National-led Government was first elected in 2008?Hon BILL ENGLISH: I have seen a number of such reports because all sorts of people make it more challenging for the Government to return its finances to surplus. One such report is a photo of a picket-waving protester calling for more Government spending outside the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment offices here in Wellington. Another involves a photo of the same protester calling for more Government spending outside Statistics New Zealand here in central Wellington. A third involves the same individual complaining about efficiencies in the public sector. The individual in the photos is Grant Robertson the current finance spokesman for the Labour Party who says we should have made bigger surpluses sooner somehow by spending more Government money.Joanne Hayes: What reports has he seen on policies that would make it even more challenging for the Government to return its finances to surplus?Hon BILL ENGLISH: There has been a range of other reports from Opposition spokespeople not just the Labour Party—Grant Robertson: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The Minister of Finance has no responsibility for Opposition spokespeople which is what he is now going in to describe the words of.Mr SPEAKER: I do not see how the member knows that at this stage. I did not hear that from the Minister. If the Minister is about to attack the Opposition or the Opposition spokesperson then that is not in order. [Interruption] I will allow the Minister to finish his answer.Hon BILL ENGLISH: It is not uncommon to find individuals or groups in our community who advocate that the Government should get to surplus sooner and at the same time that it should increase spending against a given amount of revenue. These things cannot both happen at the same time but those are clearly the individual and groups whom Grant Robertson Labour Opposition finance spokesperson is listening to.