John Key’s tax swindle

John Key’s Government today delivered a tax swindle Budget and a Budget of broken promises, Labour Leader Phil Goff said today.

“The real winners in John Key’s Budget are the very highest earners because most New Zealanders’ tax cuts will be wiped out by inflation before they even get to the check out – and this is based on the government’s own numbers,” Phil Goff said.

“Inflation of nearly 6 per cent will destroy most of the tax cuts and Kiwis won’t be compensated for the GST rise.

“To fund this National has massively increased borrowing for these tax cuts.

“The Government will have to borrow an extra $1 billion over the next three years. It seems John Key has called on the pixies at the bottom of his garden to pay for his tax cut package.

“Today the National led Government had the opportunity to deliver a Budget that was fair to all New Zealanders. A Budget for the many not the few. But they didn’t,” Phil Goff said.

“John Key called his increase in GST and tax cut package a ‘tax switch’, but for middle and low income earners it’s a tax swindle.

“Today, National had the chance to produce a Budget that invested in the future. A Budget that promoted a modern, smart economy with better jobs and higher wages. They didn’t.

“National has no idea how to create jobs and the future we need. They have increased tax on everything Kiwis buy and have added a raft of other taxes. This won’t help close the gap with Australia.

“That’s not a plan for growth. It is a short term plan that is designed to take money from the many and give it to the few.

“This Budget of broken promises, borrow and hope and rampaging inflation also contains service cuts which will hit families hard.

“A huge cut to early childhood education funding means parents with young children will have to find extra each week, and the $1.2 billion hole in health spending over four years will hit the elderly and the sick hard,” Phil Goff said.