Labour Party cost breakdown

• Labour has released its fiscal plan this week, which we cost at $33.17 billion above the Government's current spending track, or $16,007 per household.
• Labour has softened on its plans to spend 33 percent of GDP, or more than $50 billion extra, at least until its CGT is fully up and running. We will continue to pay attention to Labour's position on this, which has been changeable over the last few weeks.
• Excluding health cost pressures, which track the Government's forecasts, Labour claim their plan outlines 'just' $11.12 billion of operating spending between 2028 and 2031, plus $4.13 billion of capital commitments. This totals $15.25 billion. In other words, Labour has committed to $17.9 billion in spending which does not appear in their fiscal plan.
• This unaccounted-for spending is equivalent to $8,649 per household.
• Labour's plan also books the cost of reversing the Government's income-related rent subsidy and accommodation supplement reforms incorrectly. We have pointed out this $146.8 million maths error to Labour, who have agreed to fix their plan.

The Labour Party has announced $33.2 billion in new spending over the next four years. This is equivalent to $16,007 per household. The single largest commitment is Labour's pledge to reinstate the Pay Equity regime, which Treasury cost at $10.97 billion over four years.

Government services and administration

Treasury projects the cost of reinstating pay equity at $10.97 billion ($5,295 per household). Labour's plan funds only the $4-an-hour pay rise for care and support workers, about a quarter of that, and says future settlements will be paid for in future Budgets. We have taken Treasury's word, without counting the $4 pay rise separately.

Labour would reverse part of National's planned public service savings: half of the first tranche and all of the second. The plan costs this at $1.96 billion, down from the previous $2.75 billion cost of their plans to reverse all of National's savings. The plan also holds $968 million for policy not yet released, and funds a Parliamentary Budget Office at $10.5 million. We have also included their public sector living wage pledge ($100 million), an Office of AI and AI online safety regulator ($29.2 million) and an independent review of FENZ ($3.9 million), none of which the plan itemises.

Labour has pledged to progressively lift foreign aid towards 0.7 percent of Gross National Income, but has put no cost or date on it. We assume the increase reaches 0.7 percent by the fourth year, which would cost $5.5 billion, or $2,662 per household. We would welcome Labour sharing its own costing.

Labour's lobbyist code, public register and ministerial stand-down, together with restrictions on political donations, have no Labour costing. We have costed them at $48 million, the same as Opportunity's clean up politics package minus their proposed anti-corruption body.

Social spending

On health, Labour's plan costs its three free GP visits and the related Medicard package at $2.0 billion over four years, $44 million less than their previous costing. It also itemises free prescriptions ($296 million), free maternity scans ($86 million), prevention ($44 million), GP loans ($32 million) and hospital repairs ($200 million, capital). Free cervical screening is costed at $82 million and the graduate nurse job guarantee at $525 million. We have removed the separate $1.2 billion we had included for health spending funded by the Capital Gains Tax, because these plan lines now cover it.

Labour has also committed to an independent redress system for survivors of abuse in care, but has not published its scope or cost. Without any idea of scale and scope, putting a costing to this is next to impossible.

On education, wiping 10 percent of some student loans is costed at $583 million, taken from their fiscal plan. We have funded Labour's school lunch programme at $740 million. Their plan assumed school lunches would not be funded in 2031, but as this is at odds with their claims otherwise we have taken this to be a fiscal cliff for the purposes of book-keeping, and extended 2030 funding to 2031. School improvements add $400 million of capital.

On welfare, reversing the income-related rent (IRRS) and Accommodation Supplement (AS) changes costs $73.4 million, corrected from the plan's mistaken inclusion of this as a saving. By reversing the AS changes as well as the IRRS changes, this has reduced the cost of this policy from $542 million to $73.4 million. The KiwiSaver parental leave top-up is $89.2 million for the three years from July 2028. Lifting the Crown's KiwiSaver cost as an employer is another $443.3 million, using the fiscal plan's own figure.

A Rainbow health strategy ($5.4 million) and ACC reforms for firefighters ($26.7 million) are unchanged.

Economic development

Labour would forgo dividends to the Future Fund, costed at $2.78 billion over four years from forecast dividend income. This is uncertain, since it depends on Future Fund performance rather than an announced Labour costing. The plan separately adds a $200 million capital injection.

Labour's "Start Work Now" package of 6,000 state homes costs $3.7 billion on the housing side ($2.9 billion Kāinga Ora build, the rest rent subsidies and running costs), with the school and hospital improvements shown in the education and health sections above. They've also promised an Apprenticeship Boost at $226 million, up from the $57 million we used last week, Māori trades training at $84 million, SolarSaver at $160 million and an AI fund for SMEs at $36 million.

We continue to dispute Labour's $260 million costing for capping public transport fares and estimate $648 million. Banning price gouging is $80 million, grocery regulation $8.6 million, and enforcement of a new Fair Go Law is $8.1 million, which Labour has not costed. Labour's replacement for Investment Boost, a low-value asset write-off, is a tax measure and sits on the revenue side, so it is excluded.

Environment & arts
Labour has not announced any costed policies for the environment, arts or heritage this election.

(t) policies where we’ve taken parties’ costings at face value.
(o) uncosted policies that we have had to cost ourselves.
(d) policies where we have disputed parties’ own costings.

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