The Government’s reduction in consultants and contractors is set to save $800 million, while the public service workforce has shrunk by 4 percent to 62,968 FTEs.

Taxpayers’ Union spokesman Rhys Hurley said:

“Fewer consultants writing pointless reports and sucking up taxpayer dollars is good progress—but let’s not pretend this is some kind of fiscal detox. Back in 2017, the public service was a smaller beast at 47,252 FTEs.”

“That means we’re still paying for nearly 16,000 more mandarins to lap it up at the taxpayer buffet. These aren’t frontline workers like doctors or teachers—these are the back-office bureaucrats pulling the strings and doing the Ministers’ bidding.”

“The Government needs to go full cold turkey and ditch the extra public servants. Trimming a little off the top won’t cut it. Nicola must show she’s serious in Budget 2025 and bring staffing at least back to 2017 levels. New Zealand deserves a healthy fiscal future—not one weighed down by an overstuffed bureaucracy.” 

The Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request that the Ministry for the Environment has handed out $3,839,094 (exc. GST) to environmental NGOs over the 2023/24 and 2024/25 financial years—without a single report measuring its effectiveness.

Amongst the big winners are the Environmental Defence Society ($377,743) and Forest & Bird ($200,000)—groups that have spent the last two years attacking the Government’s policies in court and the media.

Taxpayers’ Union Investigations Coordinator Rhys Hurley said:

“This isn’t environmental protection—it’s a taxpayer-funded activist slush fund.”

“Kiwis don’t fork out their hard-earned money so lobbyists can live off taxpayer handouts. If these groups have real public support, they should stand on their own two feet.”

“The Minister has put a stop to some of this funding—but the real problem is MfE itself. It’s ballooned from 360 staff in 2017 to 939 today. Clearly, they’ve got far too much time and money on their hands.”

“These activist handouts are just the tip of the iceberg. Nicola Willis needs to take an axe to MfE’s funding in the May Budget and slash this bloated bureaucracy back to size.”

The Government’s announcement today of legislation to finally repeal and replace the Resource Management Act (RMA) is a long-overdue, much-needed win for New Zealand’s productivity. Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman, James Ross, said:

“The RMA has long been a bureaucrat’s dream and a developer’s nightmare. It’s been a lead weight around New Zealand’s neck — throttling housing, blocking infrastructure, jacking up costs and stifling growth.”

“This new system puts the right to use your own land back where it belongs — in the hands of the people who want to build and grow, not clipboard-wielding council officials or meddling neighbours from across town.”

“Councils will no longer be able to tie Kiwis up in red tape for wanting to build a deck or a granny flat. It’s a return to common sense, where resource management means managing actual resources — not micromanaging people’s lives.”

“This is the sort of bold, pro-growth reform New Zealand has been crying out for. This is a huge win for anyone who wants to spend less time filling out forms and more time laying down foundations.”

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through a Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act request that Dunedin City Council (DCC) has spent a staggering $1.365 million over just three years on consultation with Aukaha—an iwi-owned consultancy firm—with ratepayers now hit by an average rates hike of 17.5%.

Taxpayers’ Union Investigations Coordinator Rhys Hurley said:

“Ratepayers expect their money to go toward fixing potholes, maintaining pipes, and keeping life affordable—not six-figure bills for cultural interpretations for cycleways. In a cost-of-living crisis, this looks less like cultural engagement and more like virtue-signaling with other people’s money.”

“Among the more eye-watering line items are $100,310 for Harbour City Cycleway cultural interpretation and $94,984 for George Street design work. If that wasn’t enough, the Council is cutting Aukaha a $750,000 cheque for handouts to clubs and groups.”

“The Government has rightly decided to scrap Councils’ focus on social and cultural ‘wellbeings’ and get them back to getting the basics right first, and it’s time Dunedin Council followed suit.”

“Ratepayers deserve roads that aren’t crumbling and bills that don’t break the bank—not more than $40,000 spent on consultancy for a landfill.”

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through a Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act request that Wellington City Council flushed $21,702 (exc. GST) of ratepayer money on portaloos for last November’s Toitū Te Tiriti Hīkoi protest—despite having no policy on funding facilities for protests and never having done so before.

Taxpayers’ Union Investigations Coordinator Rhys Hurley says:

“The portaloos aren’t the only thing that stinks here - councils shouldn’t be playing political favourites with ratepayers’ money.”

"The Council have never funded protest facilities before—why now spend tens of thousands playing politics when organisers have always managed before to pay their own bills?"

“In the same year as an 18.5% rates hike, Wellingtonians overwhelmingly want their Council focussed only on delivering essential services - that doesn’t include subsidies and handouts for political causes staffers happen to agree with.”

“If the Council insists on spending ratepayers’ money on non-Council events, it needs a clear and consistent policy—not inconsistent decisions that reek of bias.”

New figures obtained by the Taxpayers’ Union under the Official Information Act request lay bare an embarrassing trend—ACC claims for injuries involving objects stuck where the sun doesn’t shine are on the rise, with taxpayers left to pick up the tab.

In the 2023/24 financial year alone, ACC shelled out $125,348 for these mishaps—a sharp increase from the previous year’s $50,093. Worse still, claims have already hit $117,799 in 2024/25, putting Kiwis on track for yet another record-breaking year of reckless insertion incidents.

In the last full year, Auckland remained New Zealand’s capital of curiosity gone wrong, while Wellington, Southland, and Otago bring up the rear in joint second place. 

Taxpayers’ Union Investigations Coordinator Rhys Hurley said:

“What Kiwis do in their own time is their business, but when things get stuck, why are taxpayers stuck with the bill?”

“With ACC levies soaring, it’s taxpayers getting hit in the back pocket—making them the real butt of this costly joke.”

“But unfortunately, this is just one example of wasteful ACC spending habits. With ACC under review for performance mismanagement and ballooning costs, New Zealanders deserve a full review of how ACC funds are spent—and where to draw the line on personal responsibility.”

After eight consecutive quarters of decline, New Zealand’s GDP per capita has inched up by 0.4%.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union spokesman James Ross said:

“Kiwis can breathe a small sigh of relief, but it’s far from time to pop the champagne. Even after two years of declining living standards, Kiwis are still much poorer than this time two years ago.”

“The Government’s cautious approach is failing to deliver enough. We need serious reform to break out of this economic slump—starting with Full Capital Expensing.”

“Letting businesses deduct the full cost of investments immediately—rather than dragging the process out over years—put a rocket under the US economy. We need the same medicine here.”

“With Budget 2025 just two months away, Nicola Willis has a choice: settle for stagnation, or deliver a pro-growth Budget with Full Capital Expensing front and centre.”

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is slamming the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) for its token attempt to trim its bloated workforce, with just 64 jobs on the chopping block.

Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman Rhys Hurley said

“In 2017, DIA had 2,159 staff. Fast forward to 2024, that number had exploded to 2,871. Now they have the cheek to demand a pat on the back from the Minister for shaving off a measly 64 roles. Give us a break.”

“The Government promised to rein in the sprawling bureaucracy that has been sucking up taxpayer dollars, and a handful of job cuts won’t do it.”

“DIA’s staffing should return to 2017 levels—at minimum. And the same goes for every other department and agency that ballooned under the last government. Every cent wasted on unnecessary pen pushers is a cent that could be funding frontline services, tax relief, or paying down the growing government debt.”

“Minister van Velden must take accountability and show she is serious about delivering real savings within her Ministry, not just tinkering around the edges.”

Western Bay of Plenty District Council has today voted to leave Local Government New Zealand (LGNZ) with one councillor saying it has swung ‘so far left’ that it no longer represented local views.

“Western Bay of Plenty is the latest council to ditch the increasingly toxic group” said Sam Warren, Local Government Campaigns Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union.

“Councils for years have been under the thumb of hardcore political ideologues not remotely capable of tolerating any views other than their own. LGNZ sold out the day it decided to push Labour’s divisive Three Waters plans, abandoning genuine localism for a radical, centralising agenda.”

“Under the guise of localism, LGNZ is nothing more than an activist group backing bureaucrats instead of the locals paying the enormous yearly membership fees.”

“Bravo to Western Bay of Plenty, the latest to join the ranks of six other councils abandoning the group, including Auckland, Christchurch, Grey, Kaipara, West Coast Regional, and Westland. Who will the next domino be?”

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request that KiwiRail has spent $87,259 on murals—including a “kitty mural” and various cultural artworks—while Wellington commuters continue to endure delays, cancellations, and fare hikes.

Taxpayers’ Union Investigations Coordinator Rhys Hurley said:

“Wellington commuters should be fur-ious that KiwiRail is prioritising feel-good pet projects while services go to the dogs.”

“After clawing a 10% fare hike out of commuters in 2024, followed by another 2.2% increase this year and cuts to off-peak discounts, KiwiRail’s focus clearly isn’t on making life easier for commuters—it’s apparently on painting staff members’ cats all over train stations.”

“KiwiRail claims the murals will ‘bring colour, joy, and beauty’ to commuters and help deter graffiti. But if they really want to bring joy, they should cut the vanity projects and focus on delivering reliable trains at a fair price.”

As part of its Long-term Plan, Wellington City Council wants to apply commercial rates to short-term accommodation providers like Airbnbs. This would see an increase of 3.7 times more than the current rates applied to these properties.

“It’s an excuse to get more out of ratepayers” said Sam Warren, the Local Government Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union.

“They've got this backwards. Instead of working to lower rates, council's M.O. seems to be finding new ways to increase them.”

“Key to this discussion is that short-term accommodation providers are not the same as hotels. Their scale incurs no significant toll on local infrastructure that could justify applying commercial rates, nor are they constantly occupied.”

“Most Airbnbs use only a small portion of their property for guests, and are often sporadic in tenancy. Despite this fact, council really wants to apply commercial rates to the entire property? Get real.”

“The only thing they will achieve is the disappearance of short-term providers like Airbnb, as if it wasn’t hard enough finding affordable accommodation in Wellington.”

“Putting this into context—rates in Wellington over the next 10 years are expected to increase by 175 percent. More rates aren't the solution locals are crying out for."

"Instead the council needs to show that it can cut the waste, stick to the basics, and find ways to reduce the cost of living in the capital.”

Wellington City Council this week expects to confirm its long-term plan that will include a budget of $437 million for social housing upgrades over the next 10-years.

“Many of the houses are in fine shape following recent upgrades by government, and we’re in danger of seeing money spent for the sake of spending it” said Sam Warren, Local Government Campaigns Manager for the Taxpayers' Union.

“Attempts were made last year to push out these upgrades so more work could be done in lowering the cost—but was ultimately voted down.  We implore the council to consider Councillor Ray Chung’s amendment before they go barrelling down another budget sinkhole.”

“By all means, fix what needs to be fixed. But given the enormous price of a quarter million per unit, or roughly $5,400 per Wellington household—far greater thought needs to be given by council in getting this number down and making sure ratepayer money is spent strategically.”

“Over the same 10-year period, Wellington locals are facing rates increases of more than 175%.  We simply cannot afford more reckless spending. If hitting 'pause' for another year ensures this project is carried out in a more cost-effective way—council needs to do it.”

Responding to The Post’s front page article, the New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is demanding the Government take immediate action to overturn a High Court ruling which will grind infrastructure development to a halt by making it next to impossible for NZTA to relocate or inadvertently kill wildlife.Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union spokesman James Ross says:

“This isn’t just a spanner in the works—it’s a wrecking ball that will demolish New Zealand’s infrastructure pipeline. New Zealand’s bang-for-buck on infrastructure spending is already in the bottom ten percent in the developed world, and this ruling will bind taxpayers in a wave of delays and legal challenges.”

“Tieing the country up in green tape is the last thing we need to “Go for Growth”. The only thing getting built will be more courtrooms.”

“This bombshell lands right as the Government is trying to coax foreign investors to invest billions into infrastructure projects that now might never see the light of day. How can investors take New Zealand seriously when we’re putting spiders and slugs ahead of building roads?”

“We’ve just seen NZTA waste $85,000 finding a single lizard in Taranaki, but following this absurd ruling that gold-plated gecko hunt will just be the start. The Government needs to take immediate action, or we may as well slap a ‘closed for business’ sign on the country.”

As part of the Taxpayers' Union-Curia poll, each month our pollsters ask participants "How do you rate the job your local Mayor has done since the last election? Has it been very poor, poor, average, good or very good?". The results below are based on responses to our monthly polls from January to November 2023 and February 2024 to February 2025 totalling 24,000 respondents. As cities and districts vary in size, only where we have 100 or more responses are reported below, as anything less than 100 responses would be a the margin of error (MOE) that is too large for the results to be meaningful. For further information about the methodology click here to download the report by our pollsters.

Metropolitan Mayors - changes over time

Because the sample sizes for the Auckland, Christchurch, and Wellington mayors are larger, we are able to deduce trend data over time. For that analysis, click here.

Revenue Minister Simon Watts is two weeks behind the curve with today’s announcement on Foreign Investment Fund (FIF) rule changes, says Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross.

“The FIF rules are one of the biggest deterrents to foreign investment in New Zealand, and today’s changes barely scratch the surface. The real question is: why should New Zealand tax foreign assets that never even touch our shores?”

“To be competitive, New Zealand needs to scrap the FIF rules for new tax residents altogether. Tweaking them won’t cut it.”

“Any savvy international investor will see right through this. The old FIF rules still apply to overseas investments acquired after moving here, so this change is meaningless for active investors—especially the tech talent the Government claims to want to attract.”

“Two weeks ago, US President Donald Trump unveiled a ‘Gold Card’ visa, exempting foreign income from local tax. Meanwhile, New Zealand’s Government is still fiddling with outdated rules that drive investors away.”

“This is a headline-grab, not a serious attempt to 'Go for Growth'.”

The Taxpayers’ Union is releasing a full briefing paper on how to fix FIF rules in the coming weeks.

The Taxpayers’ Union is reacting to 1News’ footage of unhappy schoolchildren tipping their taxpayer funded lunches into a bin subsequently fed to the school pig at a school in Nuhaka.

Taxpayers’ Union Communications Officer, Alex Emes, called this “a misuse of taxpayer-funded food. It begs the question: If the children were genuinely hungry, would they really be refusing to eat a pasta meal because it was ‘bland’ and provided too often?”

“If flavour truly is the problem, add some salt and pepper. It would be much more affordable for New Zealand taxpayers for the school to invest in some basic condiments than buying all these meals just for unionised teachers to make a show of chucking them to the pigs.”

“Nuhaka school needs to keep a register of those kids throwing away the meals, and reduce their order accordingly. Properly means-testing this programme will ensure those kids in need are still getting the food they need, without taxpayers’ money going straight to the pig trough.”

The Government has today opened consultation on new procurement rules that would prioritise contracts based on “public value”—a concept that includes social, cultural, and environmental benefits, alongside a preference for domestic businesses - rather than cost-effectiveness.

Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross has condemned the move as “irresponsible protectionism at the exact same time the Government claims to be focusing on growth and cutting costs.”

“Favouring more expensive local firms over better-value alternatives will only drive up costs. The Government’s books are already $12 billion in the red.”

“It’s worse than just protectionism. Why are we prioritising social and cultural ‘benefits’ over cost-effective Government services whilst New Zealanders are grappling with a cost-of-living crisis?”

“These new rules will give future governments free rein to mandate their own pet projects. They’re an open invitation to lock in woke, expensive contracts—funded by taxpayers who are already stretched thin.”

“With Budget 2025 two months away, we need to see pro-growth policies like Full Capital Expensing on the table, not bizarre new rules which will make growth harder.”

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through the Local Government Official Information and Meeting Act that Nelson City Council has spent $661,704.35 on a footbridge – with $100,518.95 of the total cost spent on cultural designs.

Local Government Campaigns Manager, Sam Warren, said:

“The bridge works out to be $50,000 per metre, with more than $100,000 spent on making it more visually appealing. This is the opposite of doing away with the nice-to-haves and doing the basics well.”

“There’s nothing wrong with a dash of culture in our infrastructure – but perhaps not during a time when locals struggle with a 8.2% rate rise for 2024-25 and a $300 per household storm recovery levy.”

“Nelson ratepayers are tightening their belts. Would it be so outrageous to expect council to do the same?”

“It doesn’t have to be barebones, but when one-sixth of the cost of a footbridge is simply on flourish, it’s probably time to pull back. The people of Nelson deserve better from their council in terms of spending decisions.”

Here are the headline results for March's Taxpayers’ Union – Curia Poll:

National is up 1.7 points to 33.6% while Labour gain 2.8 points to 34.1%. The Greens are down 3.2 points to 10.0%, while ACT are down to 7.7% (-2.3 points). New Zealand First are down 1.3 points to 5.1% while Te Pāti Māori is up 2.1 points to 6.5%.

For the minor parties, Outdoors and Freedom is on 0.6% (-0.3 points), TOP is on 0.5% (0.0 points), and Vision NZ is on 0.4% (+0.4 points).

More bad news for the Coalition Government following the latest Taxpayers’ Union-Curia poll, as Labour edges ahead of National and the Centre-Left bloc increases its lead.

The poll, conducted between 02 and 04 March, shows National up 1.7 points to 33.6 percent, while Labour gains 2.8 points to 34.1 percent.

The Greens drop 3.2 points to 10.0 percent, while ACT declines 2.3 points to 7.7 percent. New Zealand First is down 1.3 points to 5.1 percent, while Te Pāti Māori rises 2.1 points to 6.5 percent.

The poll results and information about the methodology are available on the Taxpayers' Union website at https://www.taxpayers.org.nz/march25_nztupollsuhg

For the minor parties, Outdoors and Freedom is on 0.6 percent (-0.3 points), TOP remains at 0.5 percent, and Vision NZ is on 0.4 percent (+0.4 points).

This month's results are compared to the last Taxpayers' Union–Curia Poll conducted in February 2025, available at https://www.taxpayers.org.nz/poll_feb_25_basjfgas

Based on these results, the Centre-Right bloc drops 1 seat to 58, while the Centre-Left bloc gains 1 seat to 62. On these numbers, National and ACT could not form a government even with the support of New Zealand First.

National gains 3 seats to 42, while Labour also rises by 3 to 42. The Greens lose 4 seats, bringing them to 12, while ACT drops 2 to 10 seats. New Zealand First falls by 2 seats to 6, and Te Pāti Māori gains 2 to a total of 8 seats.

For the first time since the election, Chris Hipkins has overtaken Christopher Luxon as preferred PM.

Christopher Luxon drops slightly to 20.3 percent (-0.4 points), while Chris Hipkins jumps 3.1 points to 20.7 percent. David Seymour falls to 5.0 percent (-1.4 points), Winston Peters is at 8.6 percent (+0.6 points), and Chlöe Swarbrick falls 4.1 points to 4.8 percent.

Commenting on the results, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross said:

"Kiwis elected this Government to fix the economic mess. Unless the Government starts delivering meaningful growth, the polls are only going to show them slip further."

"Luxon losing his top spot as preferred Prime Minister for the first time has to be a wake-up call. We're neck-deep in the worst economic downturn in three decades, and the country needs to see a plan to rebuild the economy."

"With Budget 2025 in just over two months' time, now's the time for the Government to be laser-focused on delivering economic growth. Kiwis need high bang-for-buck reforms like full capital expensing, because managed decline has lost its appeal."

Going for Growth

What gets us up in the morning is a determination to put a stop to the economic drift - and the low productivity - that New Zealand's had for a generation.

Economic growth isn't the silver bullet to all New Zealand's problems, but it comes close! Only with growth can we afford world-class public services, to protect the environment, and economic opportunities so our kids (and grandkids) can thrive.

And with the Prime Minister now 'talking the talk' on growth, our job is to ensure the Government 'walks the walk'.

That's why, today we are launching the first of a series of Taxpayers' Union Briefing Papers: Going for Growth: Full Expensing of Capital Expenditure.

The best tax policy you've (probably) never heard of: Full Expensing 🚜🖥️

 >> Read the Briefing Paper <<

Simply put, Full Capital Expensing lets businesses write off the cost of new equipment, machinery, and technology immediately, instead of dragging it out over years through depreciation schedules.

In other words, it puts money back into businesses faster, allowing them to invest, expand, and create better jobs and higher wages for hardworking Kiwis.

Here at the Taxpayers' Union, you'll understand that we love tax relief (no kidding). But this is, we think, the best type of tax relief in terms of promoting economic growth, and its driver: productivity.

Politicians often like to dangle personal tax relief (National) and entitlement handouts (Labour) in front of voters as a sweetener to get people to rush down to Harvey Norman for big-screen-TV-fuelled economic sugar hits.

In comparison, Full Capital Expensing promotes the very type of spending that serves to make New Zealand's economy more productive and labour more efficient (which is the key driver of wages).

And the best part: if introduced as part of Budget 2025 (which is less than three months away) it could serve to boost the economy immediately. Unlike most tax changes, it could come into effect straight away...

And this policy has form! As covered in the Briefing Paper, it's proven effective in the UK and the USA. More investment means more productivity, higher wages, and more tax revenue in the long run.

Read the Briefing Paper here.

The 'use it or lose it' approach 😉

We think Full Capital Expensing is such a good idea, it should be done right now, and made permanent. 

But if the Government wanted to really put a rocket under the economy in the short term, Nicola Willis could tell firms that Full Capital Expensing is time-limited (as happened in the UK and USA, originally).

Think about what that would mean. Say you're a business owner looking to upgrade machines or build a factory later this decade. If suddenly you could deduct the cost from taxable income (rather than do the same over a decade or more under IRD's complex depreciation rules) you'd bring the investment forward to take advantage of Full Expensing, right?

That's what makes this tool so powerful in boosting capital spending and productivity.

We set out this option in the Briefing Paper.

War on Waste 🎯 NZTA's $85,000 golden gecko wild goose chase 🦎🪿

From the 'you couldn't make this up file', the team have uncovered that Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has shelled out $85,000 to catch and relocate just one lizard in Taranaki!

Since one skink was found back in 2023, NZTA have been waiting for sign-off to send in the lizard life-savers – and we wonder why infrastructure takes so long and is so expensive...

The $85,000 includes travel and accommodation costs for our gecko guardians - because for a project in Taranaki, a Rotorua-based company was contracted to conduct the gecko hunt in New Plymouth, employing contractors from as far afield as Wellington.

We're all for conservation, but not wild goose gecko chases. But to be fair to NZTA, they've got some catching up to do – remember when we uncovered Otago Regional Council's $2.76 million hunt that nabbed just 18 wallabies?

The Reserve Bank's Orr-deal is over (finally)! 🥳🎉

Reserve Bank Governor Adrian Orr is finally out the door, and his resignation couldn't come soon enough. Think we’re overstating things? Buckle up.

Orr's "Large Scale Asset Purchase (LSAP) programme" (effectively, a fancy name for money-printing) lost taxpayers $11 billion because when interest rates rose after COVID the value of the bonds plummeted. Those losses (underwritten by Grant Robertson the taxpayer) could pay for four Dunedin hospitals. Per household, it's five and a half thousand dollars!).

Then there's the extreme capital rules (applicable to how banks finance themselves) that spiked mortgage costs, putting an extra $3,750 on the annual interest bill for a $1 million home loan.

And being too slow to ease up on interest rates plunged New Zealand into the worst economic downturn in thirty years.

Under Orr, the Bank's staff numbers increased 2.5x between 2018 and 2024, and the cost to taxpayers climbed with it. No wonder Nicola Willis refused Orr's demands for $1 billion of funding for the Reserve Bank over the next five years. 

Good riddance.

We say the next Reserve Bank Governor needs to cut through the distractions and focus on one thing, and one thing only: keeping inflation in check.

SHOCK POLL: Chris Hipkins is now the preferred PM 🛑

The news keeps getting worse for the Government in the latest Taxpayers' Union-Curia Poll, as the Centre-Left bloc increases their lead. Labour, the Greens, and Te Pāti Māori could form a government.

The combined projected seats for the Centre-Right of 58 is down 1 seat from last month. The combined seats for the Centre-Left is up 1 to 62. On these numbers, National and ACT could not form a government even with the support of New Zealand First.

In the Preferred Prime Minister rankings, Christopher Luxon is down from last month at 20.3% (-0.4 points) while Chris Hipkins is up 3.1 points to 20.7%. For the first time since the election, Hipkins has overtaken Luxon as top choice for Prime Minister.

In fact, it is generally highly unusual for Opposition Leaders to top "preferred Prime Minister" polls outside of an election period.

>>See the results on our website here<<

What do voters want? 🏭🤔

In last month's poll, our pollsters dug into voters' views on economic growth and policy reform. They found Kiwis are overwhelmingly in favour of boosting tourism, more international students, and (the important one) cutting taxes to drive growth. 

65 percent want income tax slashed, with just 15 percent opposed.

The country’s less keen currently on asset sales. Although, as a recent report by our friends at the NZ Initiative think tank shows, there is plenty of room to recycle capital and avoid selling the family silver while increasing New Zealand's prosperity by having the Government sell off the clapped-out old car rusting in the driveway underperforming assets.

We say, all options need to be on the table in Nicola Willis’ next budget to get the country growing again, and Mr Luxon "back on track".

NZTA's $1.338 billion ticket to nowhere 🚌🎫

16 years since the Transport Agency agreed to a National Ticketing system (Motu Move), it's still nowhere in sight. An investigation by the Taxpayers' Union has revealed the scheme has already cost taxpayers $146.4 million with nothing to show for it!

All we've had so far is a test run in Christchurch, and a planned rollout in Timaru – which has once again been pushed back. What's worse – the total cost of the project is set to hit $1.338 billion - that's $700 for every New Zealand household!

All of it would be solved if we could just tap on with PayWave like most of the developed world. Nicola Willis needs to find $12 billion of savings in May's Budget to get the books back in the black - scrapping this programme would put a big dent in that target.

Enjoy the rest of your Monday,

James Ross Policy & Public Affairs Manager New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union

Going for Growth: Taxpayers’ Union urges Government to adopt Full Capital Expensing in new briefing paper  

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is today launching the first in a series of briefing papers aimed at tackling the country’s long-standing under-capitalisation and low productivity. Titled Going for Growth: Full Expensing of Capital Expenditure, the paper makes the case for a tax policy with a proven track record of boosting investment, productivity, and wages. 

Full Capital Expensing allows businesses to immediately write off the cost of new equipment, machinery, and technology, rather than spreading the deduction over years under complex depreciation schedules. This policy has been successfully implemented in the United States and the United Kingdom, driving economic growth and increasing tax revenue in the long run. 

The briefing paper can be downloaded here (or read below).

Economic growth is not just a theoretical concept—it’s the key to higher wages, better public services, and greater economic opportunities for future generations. Full Capital Expensing is a no-brainer that would supercharge investment and make New Zealand businesses more productive.

With Finance Minister Nicola Willis set to deliver Budget 2025 in less than three months, the Taxpayers’ Union is urging the Government to seize the opportunity and implement the policy to come into effect on Budget night. 

If Christopher Luxon is serious about growth, Full Capital Expensing should be at the top of his agenda. And if the Government really want to put a rocket under the economy, they could adopt the ‘use it or lose it’ approach used by Donald Trump and Rishi Sunak – making the policy time-limited to encourage businesses to bring forward investment decisions.

The briefing paper highlights the success of Full Capital Expensing in other jurisdictions and details how New Zealand can implement it effectively. 

Politicians love to dangle short-term sweeteners in front of voters, but real economic growth comes from policies that drive productivity. Unlike tax cuts designed to boost consumer spending, Full Capital Expensing supports the kind of investment that lifts the entire economy.

The Taxpayers’ Union is calling on Kiwis who support pro-growth policies to endorse the initiative and send a clear message to the Government. 

Poll after poll shows Kiwis are tired of managed decline, and they want more than fiddling round the edges from Budget 2025. Here’s a cost-effective solution which will go a long way to breaking us out of our economic downward spiral.

The Taxpayers' Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request that spending on a National Ticketing System for buses has so far cost $146.4 million (of a $1.338 billion budget over 14 years). NZTA first agreed to the project in 2009, and funding was approved for a business case in 2018.

Of the costs, $527.8 million is for design and build of the system, and further $800 million for operational costs.

Rhys Hurley, Taxpayers’ Union Investigations Coordinator said:

"16 years after the project was first agreed to, all we have is a Christchurch pilot and a local rollout in Timaru already facing problems. This project is the poster-child for how government bureaucracy bloats projects into expensive, inefficient nightmares."

"The rest of the world manages ticketing systems fine - so why in New Zealand does it take more than a decade and a half, and hundreds of millions of dollars, before we even get to the system rolling out?"

“The Motu Move system seems unable to move out of first gear, stuck in a traffic jam of complexity and disagreement."

"When the budget's $1.338 billion, taxpayers have every right to ask where the sense or urgency has been. Instead of getting value for money, we’re seeing endless delays and inflated costs, leaving commuters, councils and taxpayers to pick up the bill.” 

Dear Supporter,

EXPOSED: New Zealand's best and worst Mayor. How does your local Mayor rank? 🥇

With media thinner and thinner, and community newspapers often reliant on their largest advertisers (i.e. councils) accountability in local government is at an all time low. But your humble Taxpayers' Union is here to help...

To kick-off local body election year, we've published Mayoral rankings – based on the responses of random samples of voters as part of our regular political polling.

The Sunday Star Times splashed the headline results (read the coverage over on Stuff.co.nz)

Jordan, the verdict was not good. Barely half of the country's Mayors have a positive 'net approval' among their voters.

The country's most loved is the Far North Mayor, Moko Tepania with a 39 percent net approval score.

Coincidently... the Far North District Council / Mayor Moko Tepaia, delivered the lowest rates rise of anywhere in the country this year. Perhaps a lesson there for those local body politicians who we know read Taxpayer Update 😉

Incredibly the research suggests that there are Mayors even worse than Wellington's "Night Mayor", Tory Whanau. 😲  

>>> See how your Mayor compares <<<

Good news for Brown, bad news for Whanau 🗳️

Because a higher proportion of New Zealanders live in the three big cities, the larger sample sizes for the mayors of Auckland, Christchurch, and Wellington allow for statistically meaningful trend data. As you might expect, Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown is growing his support, while it seems Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau is turning voters off the more they get to know her. Ouch.

🚨🚨🚨 Disinformation Alert 🚨🚨🚨

Public Sector Union promote myth about 'cuts to health spending'

Imagine if the Taxpayers' Union did a survey that asserted false information in the question, and then took the media results to justify complaining about the false information. We'd never get away with it (and rightly so!).

But the Public Service Commission – the self-interested union for Wellington's back-office bureaucrats – run by a former Labour Party candidate, Fleur Fitzsimons, did just that! And Stuff lapped it up! 🤦

This was splashed on Monday's front page of Wellington's The Post (owned by Stuff):

A couple of problems with that headline and the quote highlighted.

Contrary to what the bureaucrats want you to think, health funding has actually increased under the current government.

In fact, according to the Treasury's most recent fiscal update, even when adjusted for inflation and population changes, the Government is spending more on health than ever before.

They've also committed an extra $16 billion over the next three years, on top of what the previous Government was spending on health.

The only 'cuts' are cuts to back office spending that affect (you guessed it!) the back-office pen-pushers the PSA represent.

We say, the PSA are entitled to their own opinions, but they're not entitled to their own facts. Stuff / The Post should be ashamed.

And one more thing: a 'survey' is not a poll. Polls are based on a random selection of a population. A survey participants are self selected.

If the standards applied to the PSA applied to us, we could just survey Taxpayers' Union members and get front page coverage about how everyone is supporting our campaigns! But we have too much integrity to do a PSA-style campaign to mislead the public.

Yesterday, Jordan was on The Platform to discuss the PSA's false claims.

DANGER: Chris Bishop wants to give Councils a new way to tax your home! 🏠💰

Last week, Housing Minister Chris Bishop unveiled changes to how councils fund infrastructure for new housing, hoping to speed up building homes across the country.

In short, the Government wants to allow councils to 'value capture' from homes that benefit from new public infrastructure. In principle, it makes sense. In fact, value capture levies were how most of the New Zealand's infrastructure (such as rural roads) were funded in the early 20th century (they were commonly termed 'betterment levies').

Say a new road and pipeline opens up the potential for a big new housing development. It's only fair that those houses/properties pay for the infrastructure as their properties (and property values) directly benefit.

But there's a danger. Do you trust your local mayor council to decide what's good for you? 

Say your council wants to build a new cycle lane or bus way to be built near your home or something else where the council may assert there's an increased value. See the problem?

So the devil is in the detail. There needs to be strong legal and economic oversight to ensure that councils don't just use a new ability to tax to continue to grow wasteful or unwanted spending. And, while this new funding mechanism could enable much needed infrastructure to be built, if it locks-in councils as inefficient monopoly providers in the actual building of the infrastructure (where other providers may be able to deliver the same for cheaper) there is also danger.

Make no mistake, this is a 'new tax'. So your humble Taxpayers' Union will be on watch.

FEEDBACK SOUGHT: Do you support a four-year term for Parliament?

Julie Anne Genter's book review for the Taxpayers' Union! 🤣

Last week, the media approached us about an incident at Victoria University's "Clubs Day" involving Green Party MP Julie-Anne Genter.

You can read The Post's summary here.

Ms Genter approached the stall of our University movement, Generation Screwed, and started berating some of our interns and volunteers who were helping out. It was the usual nonsense you'd expect from a far-left activist ("foreign shills", "billionaire funded", "Atlas propaganda" nonsense), not the sort of conversation you'd expect from an MP.

Our Comms Officer, Alex, had the quick wit to get it on tape (unfortunately the sound failed to work), but the screenshots give you an idea of Ms Genter's, errr, animation...

Given Ms Genter's very strong views about the Taxpayers' Union and our book (pictured) we asked Chat GPT to tell us what Ms Genter would say if she were to formally review the book. It was too accurate not to share with you!

The Mission: the Taxpayers' Union at 10 – Book review by Julie-Anne Genter MP

The chapters on government waste nearly made me throw my reusable coffee cup across the room. If you enjoy fiction, conspiracy theories, and being wrong, this is the book for you. Otherwise, compost it immediately. ⭐☆☆☆☆

What a review we can be proud of! Grab yourself a copy before the Green Party snap them all up!

Enjoy the rest of your week,

James Ross Policy & Public Affairs Manager New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union

Reacting to the Minister of Finance’s announcement that RBNZ Governor Adrian Orr has resigned, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross stated “this resignation is not before time.”

“Orr’s work caused the single worst economic downturn in New Zealand in over three decades. He was far too slow to react as inflation increased, and far too slow to lower interest rates as inflation fell.”

“With more than two and a half times as many staff at the Reserve Bank now as in 2018, the Governor spent his time in the top seat empire-building rather than focussing on his core responsibilities.”

“This is the opportunity to take a thorough look at the Reserve Bank’s actions over the last few years, to ensure this never happens again. The replacement Governor needs to be absolutely laser-focused on keeping inflation within the target range, and we can’t see repeats of Orr’s money-printing spree.”

A report released by the Ombudsman has found Hastings District Council failed to properly maintain its streams and damns prior to Cyclone Gabrielle despite concerns raised during 2016 and 2021 reviews.

Local Government Campaigns Manager, Sam Warren, commented:

“Once again they’ve dropped the ball in meeting their most basic obligations towards locals.”

“We're seeing here a council without priorities – focusing on nice-to-haves when really ratepayers just want them to get on with the basics. Roads, pipes, infrastructure, waste.”

“The relevant issues were not addressed in time, and unfortunately, the worst happened.”

“Sure, they’ve said they have accepted the Ombudsman’s findings – but will they learn? There needs to be a drastic return of focus towards core council business. It's time to lead like adults are in charge.”

The Taxpayers’ Union is slamming Wellington City Council for planning yet another punishing rate hike, with homeowners set to face a 12.2 percent increase this year—on top of last year’s staggering 16.9 percent rise and 1.6 percent sludge levy. Ratepayers are being bled dry while the Council continues to burn through money with little to show for it.

Rhys Hurley, Investigations Co-ordinator for the Taxpayers’ Union, said:

“This Council has truly lost the plot if they think a slightly lower rates hike is going to stop the pain to ratepayers.”

“Last year’s hike was meant to fix the books, yet here we are again, with Council considering another double-digit increase. How much more do they think Wellington can take of this shambles?”

“Council should be embarrassed as Wellingtonians are seeing wasteful spending, bloated bureaucracy, and pet projects take priority while essential services continue to crumble.”

“Ratepayers shouldn’t have to bankroll this financial incompetence as they struggle with their own cost-of-living crises.”

“As empty shops sprout up across the city, leaks continue to fester over footpaths, and pensioners struggle to pay the rates, when will councillors wake up and get back to basics? Projects like the Golden Mile and Town Hall revamp must come to an end.”

The Taxpayers’ Union is slamming Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) for wasting taxpayer money after revelations that $85,000 has been spent on a lizard relocation effort that has netted just one Gold-Striped Gecko.

Investigations Co-ordinator for the Taxpayers’ Union, Rhys Hurley, said:

“No-one’s saying conservation isn’t important, but $85,000 to find a single gecko? That’s not just bad value for money - it’s laughable.”

“Instead of these make work schemes, NZTA needs to shed its culture of waste like a gecko sheds its tail. Why is a Rotorua based company paying Wellington contractors for a gold-plated gecko hunt in New Plymouth while also employing local contractors on the side?”

“Taranaki needs its highways upgrade to deliver results at the best value possible. Pouring tens of thousands into finding one gecko will make taxpayers’ blood run colder than the lizard’s.” 

Dunedin City Council argues local water bills doubling ‘inevitable’ over the next 10-years as they seek consultation on a replacement for its Three Waters department.

“What we’re seeing is the result of years of underinvestment in local water infrastructure” said Sam Warren, Local Government Campaigns Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union.

“Paying more than $4,200 a year on water – even after adjusting for 10-years of inflation – doesn’t seem at all acceptable for Dunedin ratepayers.”

“Councils long-ago have taken their eye of their core responsibilities; pipes, roads and rubbish. Doing too many other things and neglecting critical infrastructure is exactly why councils up and down the country are in this position.”

“Now, quite predictably, it’s the ratepayer copping the backlog of poor planning decisions and years of underinvestment. Better asset management and stronger focus are desperately needed in councils to mitigate these absurdly expensive blowouts.”

“Council must stop spending on all ‘nice-to-haves’ and mayoral vanity projects to reduce the impact on ratepayers. Is Council capable of exercising financial discipline?”

The Public Service Association (PSA) is misleading the public with false claims of health cuts—when the facts say otherwise, says Taxpayers’ Union spokesman Jordan Williams.

“The PSA’s outrageous scaremongering is nothing more than a desperate attempt to protect bureaucratic empire-building.”

Contrary to today’s The Post front page, which warns of the “devastating impacts of cuts to health,” the reality is clear: health spending has surged more than 24% since 2020—even after adjusting for inflation. Health NZ is hiring 4,200 frontline staff, and the Government has committed an extra $16 billion over three years.

“If the PSA knows something about the Budget that the public doesn’t, they should front up—rather than peddle disinformation.”

“This isn’t about patient care—it’s about shielding back-office pen-pushers from much-needed reforms. Their so-called ‘survey’ is a politically motivated whinge-fest designed to deceive the public and push a myth of ‘health cuts.’”

“Taxpayers want a health system that delivers results, not one that props up pointless bureaucratic sinecures. The PSA is clutching at straws, pushing fear-mongering to protect the bloated administrative machine. The public won’t be fooled.”

A report circulated this morning to Wellington mayors has made damning revelations over Wellington Water’s poor financial checks and strategic oversight that has resulted in pipework costing three times more than necessary.

“These revelations are nothing short of a scandal” said Local Government Campaigns Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union, Sam Warren.

“Highlighting the period between 2017 and 2022 – concerns have been raised on this for years by officials. Warning signs have been ignored, and heads need to roll.”

“Ratepayers have been completely betrayed – and need to start being put front-and-center in every decision for publicly-funded projects.”

“It has been longly suspected the CCO has taken the public for a ride, and this report has confirmed it.”

“The lack of scrutiny and mechanisms to detect these issues in Wellington Water is appalling. Why has it taken this long to find out, and will someone be held accountable?”

“There needs to be complete reassurance that this won’t happen again. Similar issues could likely be rife throughout local government and CCOs – requiring far greater oversight in areas like procurement.”

The results are based on a series of monthly polls across New Zealand and, because the sample sizes for the Auckland, Christchurch, and Wellington mayors are larger, trends were able to be deduced over time.

Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns Manager for Local Government, Sam Warren, said:

“Of the three mayors from our largest councils, only Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown has actually improved his approval score. Perhaps not so coincidentally, it is also Mayor Wayne Brown who has kept local rates increases the lowest of the three metro mayors.”

“Mayor Wayne Brown’s most recent approval score was +14 percent in February 2025 by his Auckland constituents, which puts him in good stead following his announcement to seek re-election later this year.”

“Christchurch Mayor Phil Mauger’s approval has moved about the place. He had a positive first three quarters, dropped to -7 percent in December 2024, recovered – and now lands just above neutral at +1 percent approval as of February 2025.”

“Wellington City Mayor Tory Whanau had a positive score of +4 percent in her first quarter, followed by a slight decline to -1 percent. A massive drop took to -30 percent took place, and she has stayed in the negatives since.”

“Recovering to -11 percent in June 2024, Whanau took another massive fall as a result of her failure to pass her Long-term Plan that ultimately brought in an observer from Government. As of February 2025, Whanau has a -42 percent approval score and is the lowest placed mayor of the three largest city mayors – and third least approved mayor in the country on average.”

"Of the three cities, Wellington City has the highest rates increase last year on average. Rates are expected to further increase by more than 175% over the next 10 years, as is reflected by the mayor's low approval score.”

“A chart of the three metro mayors’ performance over time can be found at www.taxpayers.org.nz/metro_mayors”.

The New Zealand Taxpayers' Union can reveal through a Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act request that Wellington City Council has wasted $93,819 of ratepayer funds on the 100-metre-long 'realms to the world of light' mural at Ākau Tangi Sports Centre.The expenditure breakdown is as follows:

• $4,000: Design and commission fees
• $5,762: Contract and legal fees
• $25,711: Wall preparation
• $52,945: Mural panels
• $5,401: Installation

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross said:

“Wellingtonians are facing their rates bill nearly tripling over ten years. 87 percent of residents want the Council to get back to focussing on the basics. So why has Council wasted $94k on making the side of a sports centre a bit jazzier?”

“The Council is once again proving how tone deaf it is - spending almost a hundred grand painting whirlpools on buildings whilst real whirlpools aren't far off forming in the CBD thanks to all the leaking pipes.”

“It’s not just artwork up there, the writing’s on the wall too. Wellington’s broke, Wellingtonians are squeezed dry, and we can’t afford these vanity projects whilst core infrastructure like pipes and roads keep crumbling.”

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is calling out the Wellington City Council for its decision to allocate $300,000 of ratepayer money to event organisers so they can pay workers the ‘Living Wage'.

The ‘Living Wage for Events Fund’ allows anyone to apply for ratepayer-funded top-ups, regardless of whether or not the event would turn a profit.

Taxpayers’ Union Local Government Campaigns Manager, Sam Warren, says:

“Ratepayers who earn less than the Living Wage themselves are being forced to subsidise wages for event workers. Pensioners, struggling small business owners, and hard-working families are footing the bill so that an event can pocket higher incomes, without the need to make any profit.”

“It’s another example of councils implementing corporate welfare to make themselves feel better. Not only are they topping up event organisers with ratepayer money, but unprofitable events now have an unfair advantage."

"From the pirate musical about Shakespeare’s ultimate lover "one bedroom still available in super sunny central wellington flat" to ‘Slavfest, the Secret Lives of Extremely Old People and Raw Meat Monday’ – everyone seems to have their hands out to council."

"But if Wellington City Council actually wants to help those struggling, they should focus on reducing rates and cutting wasteful spending – not throwing more cash around.”

Today it was revealed that Arapata Reuben, a representative from Ngāi Tūāhuriri, has not attended two-year’s worth of meetings for the Canterbury Water Zone Committee. Despite this, he was still paid his full $8000 honorarium.

“Reuben’s absence is perfectly in breach of standing orders, but both councils have not bothered to act as they say the future of the committee itself is under review” said Sam Warren, Local Government Campaigns Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union.

“Between 2023-24, Mr Reuben was at zero of the fourteen meetings that he should have attended, not even sending an apology for the last seven of these. Does Council simply does not care if paid representatives show up? What exactly does it take to get fired here?”

“Now on the back foot, both councils are ‘following this up’. Unless an awfully good excuse is found, a refund is well in order for such an appalling display of contempt towards the ratepayers footing the bill.”

Commenting on the Herald’s front-page article about academics criticising the process behind Minister Judith Collin's decision to focus the Marsden Fund on core science, a spokesman for the Taxpayers' Union, Sam Warren, said:

“Anger from academics like Troy Baisden on the decision by Minister Collins to right-size Marsden funding is a storm in a teacup.”

“The process is irrelevant if it leads to taxpayers no longer funding dubious research, such as projects aimed at “amplifying pacific girl gamer voices” or “the desexualisation of te reo Māori domains.”

“It is clear the Minister's decision to cut Marsden funding for humanities and social sciences, along with requiring 50 percent of grants to demonstrate economic benefit, is a win for taxpayers."

“The gravy train for eccentric academic ideas is coming to an end. It’s time to refocus the Marsden Fund on its core purpose: supporting chemistry, maths, engineering, and biomedical sciences for the benefit of all.

The Taxpayers’ Union is calling on the Public Service Association to sack its Acting National Secretary after she publicly suggested women, Māori, & Pasifika people are incapable of high-performance and should therefore have pay increases automatically applied.

“Suggestions that Maori, Pacifika, and woman are incapable of high performance belongs in the 17th century, not the modern public service,” says Taxpayers’ Union Executive Director Jordan Williams.

“We must all call out racism and sexism when it occurs, especially in the trade union movement. We are disgusted that such stereotypes are being used to suggest performance-based pay rises will see women, Māori, and Pasifika people miss out.”

“At the Taxpayers’ Union, we are baffled that in 2025 anyone would suggest that sex or race would make people less capable. Either Fleur Fitzsimons is a bad egg, or there is something deeply wrong with the culture at the PSA.”

“Fleur Fitzsimons’ comments are plainly demeaning and condescending. If the PSA won’t act, the Government should – by refusing to engage with a failed Labour Party candidate with these extreme views.”

“We must say no to hate, even when it is disguised as concern.”

Today it was revealed Health New Zealand is undergoing an urgent overhaul for its data sharing agreements on discovering they had no power to check if sensitive health data had been misused.

“The public service has an appallingly lax attitude towards data privacy” said Sam Warren, a spokesman for the New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union.

“The overhaul follows findings from Sir Brian Roche’s inquiry into the Manurewa Marae, and until now, Health NZ had no idea about its system’s weaknesses.”

“It’s not at all dissimilar to the issues we found with Inland Revenue last year, when they were caught giving sensitive taxpayer information to overseas tech firms like Facebook.”

“Sir Brian Roche is doing excellent work reorienting the public service. It’s a big job with seemingly no end for improvement. We’d strongly encourage him to take a look into Inland Revenue next, an agency that remains steeped with poor data safety protocols and an attitude completely at odds with the protection of Kiwis’ privacy.”

Public Service Commissioner Sir Brian Roche has questioned automatic pay rises for bureaucrats, stripping powers off Chief Executives to further entrench the ‘tenure-based pay scale’ as pay rises become unaffordable.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers Union Spokesman James Ross said: “Roche has cast an unbiased eye on a serious and growing problem – the bloating of bureaucrats’ salary bills.”

“The public service salary burden jumped 72% between 2017 and 2023, and the average bureaucrat’s salary is now over $101k. Automatic pay rises, no matter what, are unsustainable under current economic conditions. ”

“Everyday Kiwis get pay rises when they earn them, and bear the consequences of their own performance. Public servants shouldn’t be entitled to special privileges, especially when everyone else is picking up the bill.”

“Rewarding time-served with automatic pay hikes subsidises mediocrity, and public sector performance pay is long overdue.”

The Reserve Bank has today slashed the Official Cash Rate (OCR) by 50 basis points for the third time in a row, dropping the rate to 3.75%.

Commenting on the rapid drop, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross called this “an admission of failure by the Reserve Bank Governor.”

“The Reserve Bank being too slow off the mark to cut interest rates has driven the country into the worst economic downturn in three decades. With more than two and a half times the staff now than the Bank had in 2018, clearly too many cooks spoiled the broth.”

“To dig ourselves out of recession, we need to see serious growth. That means attracting investment, and the corporate tax reforms to fuel it.”

“With Budget 2025 just around the corner, now’s the time for Nicola Willis to be drafting plans for a pro-growth agenda, including high bang-for-buck policies like full capital expensing.”

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through a Local Government Official Information and Meeting Act request a total cost breakdown of Tauranga City Council $5 million destination playground.

A breakdown of costs shows $1.67 million was spent on play equipment, $1.1 million on hard landscaping, nearly $640,000 on consulting, engineering, and management costs, $361,000 on safety surfacing, and $150,000 on council staff costs.

Taxpayers’ Union Communications Officer, Alex Emes, said:

“Building a park for $5 million is one thing, but spending nearly $800,000 before a single cent is spent on actual materials, is disgraceful.

"When the fact the floor alone cost more than 1.4million it makes you wonder if its made of shredded ratepayer cash.

“Not only did Tauranga council blunder millions on this project, including exorbitant council fees but they had the gall to jack rates 13.1% this year alone. It's time for Tauranga council to understand they can't have their cake and eat it to.

“This is yet another example of local councils treating ratepayers as a bottomless ATM. Tauranga residents deserve full transparency on where their money is going and why this playground climbed so much higher than it should have.”

The Taxpayers’ Union says that the Stats NZ Chief Executive, Mark Sowden, should be sacked, not allowed to quietly leave at the end of his term following the findings of an inquiry into data breaches released by the Public Service Commission today.

“The findings are damning - if public accountability is to mean anything, the Government should be telling Mr Sowden not to bother coming to work tomorrow - not serve out another six weeks fully paid to save face,” said Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross.

“Let’s put this in perspective, the Stats boss allowed census and Covid vaccine data to be leaked and allegedly misused to favour a political party. It doesn’t get much more serious than that. Heads should be rolling, but yet-again these public sector bosses are quietly moved on to save face.”

“We saw the same with the Police Commissioner – a cushy job elsewhere in the public sector found for someone Ministers had lost confidence in. Instead of a revolving door, Sir Brian Roche needs to be making examples.”

“The situation with Stats NZ does create an awkward situation for the IRD’s bosses though. Last year, an IRD data leak saw over a quarter of a million taxpayers’ data handed to third parties completely unencrypted. The very criticisms of Stats NZ about lack of processes and systems are applicable to IRD. But the IRD breach was on a much larger scale and it appears laws were broken.”

“The Public Service Commissioner should turn his attention to Inland Revenue. The Department’s culture of burying its head in the sand won’t end unless the IRD Commissioner’s job is also on the line.”

Hi 

You won't top these Golden Hogs 💫🐷

Thanks to those who joined us at Parliament last week where we hosted the 2025 Jonesie Awards for Government Waste.

In case you missed it, you can watch a replay of the red carpet, golden-glitzed (and, tongue firmly in cheek) awards ceremony here.

This year's Jonesies winners were up there with the best of them.

Spoiler alert: The who's who of government waste 🥇

This year’s winners did not disappoint. In the Local Government Category, the Hastings District Council took the bacon for its disastrous fiscal management and putting unelected kids members of its "youth council" onto its council committees and giving them voting rights.

To our delight, a Hastings District [Youth] Councillor flew all the way to Wellington to accept the award on the Mayor's behalf. Congratulations Councillor Zoe!

The Central Government Winner was Dr Ayesha Verrall for her time as Minister of Science and Innovation in approving the "research" of Whale Song to cure Kauri trees costing taxpayers four million bucks. 

And as for the 2025 Lifetime Achievement Award – click here to watch the ceremony to see which very lucky Mayor took home her very own golden bicycle.

"Will do my utmost to never be a nominee for these awards" - says Minister 🎉

The purpose of Jonesies-style name-and-shame efforts is to discourage officials and politicians from making wasteful spending decisions in the first place.

So we know we're right over the target when a Minister (in this case the Hon Andrew Hoggard) publicly comments that he "Will do [his] utmost to never be a nominee for these awards." 

We hope so Mr Hoggard! 😉

Why are polls looking for gloomy for the Government? ⤵️ 

Off the back of last week's Taxpayers' Union-Curia Poll and another poll which also showed a potential change of government, Jordan was on RNZ's Morning Report to discuss what our research says Mr Luxon needs to do. Click here to listen.

Eh?! New Zealand's closing up shop? 👀

The economy might be in bad shape, but even for the Taxpayers' Union, the latest government announcement might be slightly overselling the gravity of the situation. On Sunday, the Government announced a new tourism campaign with the slogan "Everyone Must Go".

In a sign that the Beehive's political antenna remains on the fritz, many were quick to point out the blindingly obvious: is this a closing down sale or a snazzy catchphrase to draw in Australians?

But here's the kicker. The $500,000 ad campaign was funded out of the International Visitor and Tourism Levy – a tax on [checks notes] all non-Australian tourists. So officials are using the money to attract the only type of tourism that is exempt.

Look, we're not against a little tourism promotion, but is this really the serious economic reform Luxon's been promising?

To save us from the next campaign (pictured below) surely the Government can do better, right?

Government accountability: Sir Saint Brian Roche's music to our ears 🎶🙌

Glory glory, Hallelujah! The new Public Service Commissioner is certainly singing from our hymn sheet.

At last week's New Zealand Economics Forum, Sir Brian Roche didn't waste any time sugarcoating - it was truth-bomb after truth-bomb:

• The public service has exploded by more than 30 percent in six years – accounting for 63,537 public servants 'workers'.
• Over the same timeframe, total salary costs grew a staggering 72 percent, to $6.1 billion ($3,043 per household) per year. And that doesn't include the wider public sector such as defence personnel, police, teachers, public healthcare workers.
• In terms of the public service structure (his words) "to say it's complex is an understatement". There are 46 chief executives in the core public service (again, that excludes police, teachers, frontline departments, etc).
• “The system is inefficient”  “not fit for purpose” and "We’ve got too many small, overlapping agencies, eating up resources, duplicating work, and driving up fixed costs."

We've been waiting for a long time for a Public Service Commissioner who knows our government's become a money-sink. But he's only in the role until June 2027 - so there's no time to waste.

How bad's the problem? 💣

{{recipient.first_name_or_friend}}, it wasn't in Sir Brian's speech, but to illustrate the points the Commission was making, here are two factoids to bank.

The first is this comparison produced last year by our friends at the NZ Initiative (a Wellington-based think tank).

Here is New Zealand's "Public Policy Responsibility Flowchart" drawing the lines of responsibility between Ministers, departments, and major sectors of the economy.

And here is a country of roughly the same size, Norway. Notice any difference?

In the humble opinion of the Taxpayers' Union, the report should be compulsory reading for every MP: especially the former Minister for the Public Service who shepherded through Parliament the Public Sector Act 2020 and got us into this mess, one [double checks notes] Rt Hon Chris Hipkins...

The full research note is online here.

Judge for yourself: MBIE accountable to all or accountable to no one? 🥸

Here's today's second factoid for you to pull out when some left-wing media claims that reform in Wellington isn't necessary.

The screen shot below is taken directly from the Ministry of Business, Innovation, and Employment website. Just look how many Ministers MBIE officials are "accountable" to (click for larger version):

Double check my maths, but I think that's 21 Ministers across 29 portfolios. When something goes wrong, or officials go rogue, just who is responsible? Clear as mud then.

Sir Brian, you know what to do.

$12,700 worth of bad news: the cost of just two years under performance 📉🚮

Ever wondered how poor New Zealand's growth is? Nicola Willis, take heed.

GDP per capita is $5,300 lower than Treasury forecast just two years ago. And stunted growth means another $7,400 can be shaved off where Treasury forecast we'd be in two years' time.

As the NZ Herald's Thomas Coughlan put it: $12,700 for every New Zealander - the cost of no growth. 

Nicola Willis' speech at the NZ Economics Forum was significantly less inspiring than Sir Brian Roche's. Trite lines about prioritising economic growth, but still no real meat to back it up.

Budget 2025 is just 93 sleeps away. If we want growth, we need ambitious policies.

But your humble Taxpayers' Union is here to help. Keep an eye on your inbox later this week for the "best tax policy you've [probably] never heard of" ...

EXPOSED: grifting as an Art Foundation art form 🎨💰

The Arts Foundation was set up to raise private money for the arts – you know, helping young, starving artists get their shot at the big time and giving humble arts organisations a boost. Fair enough.

You’d think their funding would go toward paintbrushes, canvases, and theatre productions, right? Wrong. Instead, they’ve raked in $1,180,300 from Creative NZ (i.e. taxpayers) since 2021/22 — but not for art, not for artists, but, drumroll please… lobbying! 

That’s right, instead of funding tortured geniuses, the Arts Foundation is now being funded by the taxpayer to practicing the art of schmoozing politicians.

Picasso once said, “Art is a lie that makes us realise truth.” Well, here’s the truth: Creative NZ is funnelling millions to a private charity, which then turns around and lobbies the very government that funds it. Talk about a taxpayer-funded money-go-round.

Why paint the system when you can game it? You can read what our research team have uncovered over on our website.

Enjoy the rest of your week.

James Ross Policy & Public Affairs Manager New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request that Health New Zealand (Te Whatu Ora) has confirmed the continued funding of the Te Kurahuna Programme, despite the disestablishment of the Māori Health Authority.

The programme, which cost taxpayers $4 million, will see 11,000 staff access the programme until at least 30 June 2025.

This revelation follows concerns raised by the Taxpayers’ Union about Te Kurahuna’s links to the Department of Internal Affairs which previously spent $375k (on top of $575,000 staff costs) to promote using indigenous knowledge to create ‘change agents’.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross, said:

“Taxpayers expect professional development that actually makes a difference, not just another example of taxpayer money being funnelled into initiatives with little accountability or measurable outcomes.”

“Despite the Government’s promise to root out waste like this, groups like Te Kurahuna are still receiving millions. It raises serious concerns about whether all Ministers are ensuring reforms that deliver the efficiencies and savings that were promised.”

“Health NZ should only be spending taxpayers money on what we know saves lives. Before training begins to understand traditional healing practices we need some evidence of its effectiveness over proven healthcare methods.”

“The Taxpayers’ Union is calling for Ministers to end funding for Te Kurahuna programmes and workshop grifters that have received millions in taxpayer funding, despite the Government’s supposed focus on cutting costs.”

“Minister Brooke van Velden has already shown its possible to cut spending in DIA. It’s time for the new Health Minister to also step up and do the same.”

Minister of Finance and Economic Growth Nicola Willis has today celebrated a 63 percent decrease in the amount spent annually on Big Four consultants by the Ministry of Business, Innovation, and Employment.

“The multi-million-dollar gravy train has left the station – hopefully never to return” said Sam Warren, a spokesman for the Taxpayers’ Union.

“Excessive and costly dependence on external consultants to provide ministries with advice has been allowed to go off the rails.”

“Peaking under the last government, MBIE spent more than $7.1 million on the Big Four in a single financial year. We’re pleased to see Minister Willis reining in a 63 percent reduction, or about $4.5 million in savings to the taxpayer."

“It’s great work, with much more to be done. Relying on the Big Four only accounts for some of the costs incurred by ministries and other agencies. Described by the Minister as a ‘consultant gravy train’, Willis says she will make sure this number tracks down – and just as importantly, stays down. More of this please, Minister.”

Responding to news that Wellington City Council is considering selling off the 26 unused electric vehicle chargers which have been sat in storage unused since they were purchased five years ago, Taxpayers’ Union Communications Officer, Alex Emes, said “it’s about time for the council to front up and admit guilt.”

“While it is in the interests of Wellington ratepayers to sell off this subsidy for the rich, it is unfortunate that it has come to this point. The council should have never spent a penny on this programme, and the $3.4 million spent is a flagrant abuse of taxpayer money.

“Wellington City Council has long known of the underutilisation of chargers. Hardworking Wellingtonians shouldn’t be on the hook for a programme that only benefits wealthy Tesla Owners. 

“While the Taxpayers’ Union has already been beating this drum by breaking stories of EV charger waste left and right, it is nice to finally see a Wellington city councillor have some common sense and call out this outrageous handout for the rich.”

Recent analysis has shown every New Zealander is likely to be $12,700 worse off, on average, than forecast by Treasury only two years ago.

“These figures show the depth of the situation we’re in” said Sam Warren, a spokesman for the Taxpayers’ Union.

“The reality is we’re getting poorer. The government this year is leaning heavy on chasing economic growth, which is absolutely the right thing to do.”

“But what should have been done last year might be too little too late.”

“The Minister has shamelessly decreed she ‘will not be a slave to surplus’ but that only leaves us with one alternative – continuing as a slave to debt."

“From day one Willis has had every lever at her disposal to generate growth and pull us out of recession. Instead, her softly-softly approach has only played around the edges – and Kiwis are worse off for it.”

“Let’s be really clear, the government was elected with a mandate to make bold decisions, yet Willis has been reluctant to do so – and I think is reflected in the polls. We can only hope ‘going for growth’ is more than a bumper sticker and actually has some meat to it.”

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request that The Arts Foundation Te Tumo Toi has received $1,180,300 of funding from Creative NZ since 2021/22.

This includes funding for lobbying/advocacy purposes, although The Arts Foundation was set up in order to raise private funds for the arts.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman, James Ross, said:

“Taxpayer-funded lobbying is rife with examples across the public sector. But it especially stings when taxpayers’ money is being given to a charity set up to seek private funding, just for it then to use the cash to lobby other bits of government."

“Time and again Creative NZ have been shown to be wasting taxpayers’ money on nonsense projects including – to name a few – Indigenised Hypno-Soundscapes, a ballet called the Sl*tcracker, and Covid dance videos. This is just the latest in a long string of questionable uses of taxpayers’ money.”

“Creative NZ should’ve been for the chop long ago, and the huge ecosystem of taxpayer-funded lobbyists needs to go with them.”

The Taxpayers' Union's annual Jonesie Awards (the Jonesies) today have once again shone a light on the 'best of the worst' of Government waste. Hosted in Parliament's Legislative Council Chamber, there were laughs, there were tears, and there was more competition than ever for our coveted Golden Hogs.

You can watch the ceremony here.

Since 2018, the Jonesies - modelled on the Canadian Taxpayers' Federation's 'Teddies' hosted at the Canadian Parliament in Ottawa - have awarded councils, departments, and politicians for the most weird and wacky waste throughout the year. 

Commenting on the event, Taxpayers' Union Spokesman, Jordan Williams, said:

"From whalesong to training wheels, officials boozing up and lessons in sitting down - this year's Jonesies had it all."

"$4 million Whalesong FM for sick kauri trees was music to the ears of the awards committee, and Ayesha Verrall takes the prize for central government waste in approving the spend as the former Minister of Science and Innovation."

"Another shiny plaything will be adorning the trophy shelf in Hastings District Council. Congratulations to the kids running the show."

"Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau was miles ahead of the competition for the Lifetime Achievement Award – and with her shiny new golden bicycle, she'll be a tough one to catch."

"Congratulations to all our winners this year, but we've barely scratched the surface of Government waste, so look forward to seeing our contestants again next year."
 
Local Government Nominees:

1. Auckland Transport (taking ratepayers for a ride): Auckland Transport has found another way to take ratepayers for a ride. In order to convince people to start using their empty cycleways. Auckland Transport spent more than $450,000 on 'free' bike riding lessons...for adults.

2. Hastings Council (Where the kids are in charge): After Hastings Council purchased a $1 million earthquake-prone building only to sell it off 3 months later for only $150k, the Council needed a rebrand. Unfortunately, this new campaign rebrand cost ratepayers more than $70,000. With their new save-face campaign falling flat on its face, the council tried a new strategy: paying to put the kids in charge.

3. Auckland Unlimited (For helping Auckland find its happiness): In a misguided attempt to make Aucklanders happier about their city, Auckland Unlimited decided to spend $737,000 of ratepayer money on a video of a half-naked guy from Finland.

4. Auckland Council ($263,000 for a few (mis)(steps)): A $263,000 price tag has Auckland ratepayers asking if the council was building a stairway to heaven. With an average cost of $8,200 per step, the build is sure to "make you wonder".

5. Metlink ($1.3 million for seven luxurious loos): Instead of shoring up their shortage of bus drivers, Metlink decided to build seven toilets - exclusively for the use of bus drivers - with each one coming with an average pricetag of $185,000. Take a look at these diamond-encrusted dunnies.


The 2025 Winner for Local Government Waste - Hastings District Council!

 
Central Government Nominees:

1. Ayesha Verrall (Healing trees with whale sounds): Former Minister of Science, Innovation and Technology Ayesha Verrall handed millions of taxpayer dollars to practice new, ground-breaking, revolutionary science - healing kauri trees with whale sounds. The Taxpayers' Union is anxiously waiting to find out exactly how many trees have been saved.

2. NZ Film Commission (For parties and propaganda): From funding Ardern and Swarbrick's propaganda documentaries, to having four back-to-back parties within a fortnight. Add on their yearly Hollywood booze-ups at the Cannes Film Festival, and the Film Commission have really been rolling out the red carpet this year.

3. NZTA (A giant cone-spiracy): The Transport Agency has cone-spired to spend more than $786 million on road cones and lollipop signs. Are they trying to build roads, or just trying to block them?

4. MBIE (For wasteful workshops): MBIE has commissioned more than a million dollars' worth of exclusive workshops for staffers. Whether it's white privilege, learning how to sit, or studying the algorithms of whiteness...the war against work never stops at this government ministry.

5. Creative NZ (for having fun "dancing"): Now we all know art is subjective. But subjecting taxpayers to pay $75k for a video that received only 60 views seems a little much. So the Taxpayers' Union has decided to help out by bringing this masterpiece to a wider audience.


The 2025 Winner for Central Government Waste - Dr Ayesha Verrall
 

2025 Lifetime Achievement in Waste Award: Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau

This year’s winner has experience with wasting money not only in her current position but also during her three years at the eye-wateringly wasteful Film Commission. This was followed with a position in the Green Party. This year’s winner of the Lifetime Achievement Award is Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau!

And she hasn’t slowed down. Since she was elected Mayor in 2022, Whanau has wasted more of ratepayers' money. Whether it was the Town Hall tab coming to a tremendous $4,000 per household, a planned $30 million dollar fence along Wellington’s idyllic waterfront, Ms. Whanau has shown time and time again why she is a deserving recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award.

But no matter her $189,000 salary or her famous 2003 lotto win, Ms. Whanau consistently reminds us how not only is she wasteful of others' money, but how she is wasteful of her own as well.

In an interview earlier this year, the mayor said that due to the tough times brought on presumably from her continually rising rates, she had to ‘sell her car’. After her car-selling sob story, the Taxpayers' Union uncovered a more than half a million-dollar taxpayer-funded bike rack installed just outside the mayor’s office, but there was one problem: despite the cost, no one was using it!

So, on the recommendation of Porky the Waste Hater, the waste-watching academy at the Taxpayers’ Union has decided to award a gift fitting of both the waste and grift Tory Whanau has imposed on the ratepayers of Wellington.

More bad news for the Coalition Government following the results of the latest Taxpayers’ Union-Curia poll, as they fall behind the Centre-Left bloc. 

The poll, conducted between 02 and 04 February, shows National up 2.3 points to 31.9 percent, while Labour has risen 0.4 points from last month to 31.3 percent. 

The Greens are up 3.7 points to 13.2 percent, while ACT is down 0.8 points to 10.0 percent. New Zealand First is down 1.7 points to 6.4 percent, while Te Pāti Māori is down 0.9% to 4.4%.
 

The headline poll results and information about the methodology can be found on the Taxpayers' Union's website at https://www.taxpayers.org.nz/poll_feb_25_basjfgas

For the minor parties, Outdoors and Freedom is down 0.8 points to 0.9%, TOP is down 1.6 points to 0.5% and New Conservatives are up 0.2 points to 0.2%. 

This month's results are compared to the last Taxpayers' Union–Curia Poll conducted in January 2025, available at https://www.taxpayers.org.nz/25jan_tuc_poll

Based on these results, National is up 1 seat to 39, whilst Labour remain on 39. 

Despite this, the Centre-Right bloc has dropped 3 seats to 59, compared to the Centre-Left bloc’s 61 (+3 seats). 

The Greens gain 4 seats to 16, while ACT drop 2 to 12 seats. New Zealand First is down 2 to 8 seats, while Te Pāti Māori drops 1 to 6 seats. 

Commenting on the results, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross said: 

“As long as the Government keeps failing to fix the current economic bonfire, they'll keep getting battered at the polls. It's no coincidence the proportion of people who think New Zealand is heading in the right direction keeps plummeting."

"If a poll showing they'd lose power if there was an election held today isn't a wake-up call, nothing will be. By burying the heads, the Government's playing a dangerous game of chicken with the electorate.

"Managed decline has lost its appeal. With Budget 2025 around the corner, now's the time to start laser-focusing on economic growth."

Here are the headline results for February's Taxpayers’ Union – Curia Poll:

National is up 2.3 points to 31.9% from January while Labour is up 0.4 points to 31.3%. The Greens are up 3.7 points to 13.2%, while ACT is down 0.8 points to 10.0%. New Zealand First is down 1.7 points to 6.4%, while Te Pāti Māori is down 0.9 points to 4.4%.

For the minor parties, Outdoors and Freedom is at 0.9% (-0.8 points), TOP is on 0.5% (-1.6 points), and New Conservatives is on 0.2% (+0.2 points).

The second Taxpayers' Union-Curia Poll for the year is out, and it's not good news for the Government.

SHOCK POLL: Labour, Te Pāti Māori and the Greens would have enough seats to form Government 📊

Under these numbers, Labour, with te Pāti Māori and the Greens would be able to form a Government – that's the first time since March 2022, when the Taxpayers' Union-Curia Poll last shows the left ahead.

Although National is up 2.3 points to 31.9 percent from last month, it's not enough to fend off the left block.

Labour is up 0.4 points to 31.3 percent, the Greens are up 3.7 points to 13.2 percent, and Te Pāti Māori are down 0.9 points to 4.4 percent.

Meanwhile, ACT are down 0.8 points to 10.0 percent, New Zealand First are down 1.7 points to 6.4 percent. 

That means the centre-right bloc are projected to hold 59 seats, not enough to command a majority in the 120-seat Parliament. Compared to last month, the centre-left bloc has gained three seats, bringing their total to 61 seats.

Head over to our website for the 'top voting issue', preferred Prime Minister, and other data.

Watt went wrong with Paris emissions target? 🫷

As you know, the Taxpayers' Union has always supported sensible climate mitigation policy, and New Zealand's world-beating emissions trading scheme. But Climate Change Minister Simon Watts' decision to sign New Zealand up for even more aggressive climate targets than Jacinda Ardern and James Shaw is economic madness. 

How can you credibly say you want to "grow the economy" when you sign up to extreme targets to cut emissions that Treasury estimate could cost taxpayers up to $24 billion – or $12,000 per New Zealand household?

Perhaps the reason this was so misjudged was because Simon Watts was talking to the wrong people (or just the side with a particular viewpoint).

Last week, we exposed the Minister for having refused to meet with the Federated Farmers for more than a year – despite agricultural emissions making up one half of New Zealand's emissions profile. According to publicly available Ministerial diaries, the Minister has instead been meeting with anti-agricultural groups such as Greenpeace!

This is consistent with what we've faced with Minister Watts's office. In fact, Minister Watts is the only Minister in the current Government to have refused to meet with your humble Taxpayers' Union!

Despite being Minister of Revenue (i.e. responsible for the tax system) the Minister wouldn't even talk to New Zealand's largest taxpayer group.

We tried to reach out again last year when the IRD was found to have leaked taxpayer information of hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders in a data breach to social media companies. No response.

Then a few weeks back, when Simon Watts was given the Local Government Portfolio. After all, Simeon Brown would bounce ideas off the Taxpayers' Union and, well, ensure he was engaged with ratepayers. But with Watts' office, again, radio silence. In fact, we understand Watts is instead meeting with the lefties Nanaia Mahuta's friends at Local Government New Zealand – the very organisation trying to undermine Simeon Brown's efforts to put a cap on rates!

So, last week, given the climate target announcement, we asked him onto our podcast. I'm not holding my breath.

Simon Watts was quite happy to hitch his cart to our 'Stop Three Waters' roadshow events, but as soon as he got the Ministerial limo, the phone went off the hook. With the Feds also being locked out, it really makes you wonder...

Watt was that?! The Climate Change Minister's train crash interview 💥

In what can only be described as a train wreck interview, judge for yourself whether the Minister is over the details of his portfolio.

As a farmer said to me over the weekend - at least James Shaw was over the detail.

There is still time for Mr Luxon to overrule this wayward Minister: use our email tool to email the Coalition's Party-leaders and ask them to stop this economic self-sabotage and set emissions targets that are actually achievable. 

Adrian Orr spends $1k a night on a hotel room and laundry. Time to bring back Don Brash? 🌟

Before entering politics, former Governor of the Reserve Bank, Don Brash established himself as a taxpayer-hero when, in 1999, the Reserve Bank released details of his travel spending. The original press release (recently purged from the RBNZ's eyewateringly expensive website) concluded with:

"Unlike many central bank chiefs, Dr Brash travels without an entourage. On all of his overseas trips and most of his New Zealand ones, he travels entirely without the aid of staff. Furthermore, as a matter of policy he flies economy class within New Zealand and Australia and business class internationally.

"In line with a Bank policy he instigated, he routinely washes his own clothes when travelling to avoid incurring the expense of using laundry services. Dr Brash is always very mindful of his accountability to the New Zealand taxpayer."

How times have changed... 

The Taxpayers' Union can reveal that current Reserve Bank Governor Adrian Orr and a lucky colleague spent $32k on a flash foreign getaway to Washington DC, courtesy of you, the taxpayer. 

Or maybe not so lucky. While Mr Orr lived it up at the front of the plane in Business Class, Premium Economy was just fine for the bag carrier.

Now here's the kicker. Both of their rooms cost a few dollars shy of $1,000 a night each!

Reading the receipts, it seems Orr's room stay ended up about $700 more expensive than his workmate's thanks to extra meals, as well as exorbitant laundry services.

Seems like the Governor was about as successful at keeping food off his clothes as he was at keeping the lid on inflation (or his expenses under control). 

Adrian Orr's not the only one who's bloated... 🐖🏦

Speaking of appetites, seems like the Reserve Bank's got one to match its head honcho.

What was once a lean, mean inflation-wrecking machine even a few years ago is now the poster child for Wellington bloat. Since 2018, RBNZ has ballooned in size by more than two and a half times.

The Strategy, Governance, and Sustainability team has grown from 29 to 63, and the Transformation, Innovation, People and Culture more than tripled from 11 to 38. And even the Governor's personal retinue has gone from three to five.

The worst bit is RBNZ's got worse at its job. When it sat at around 200 staff it was the envy of the world. At two and a half times that size, the Reserve Bank's failures to properly manage inflation have seen it take all the heat out of the economy. We've suffered a longer per-capita recession than after the Global Financial Crisis and we're currently knee-deep in the middle of the worst economic downturn in more than thirty years.

Too many cooks spoil the broth?

TAXPAYER VICTORY: The stopping the workshop gravy train 🙌

Department of Internal Affairs have been caught wasting almost a million dollars sending bureaucrats to yet more workshops - this time, using "indigenous knowledge" to become "change agents."

92 staff spent 80 hours each prepping for the course, five straight days getting grilled at the marae, and then eight hours of debriefing over the next month.

Running the maths quickly, that's just shy of 12,000 staff hours at an average Public Sector salary of $48.89 an hour. Yeesh

Slap another $375k of course costs on top of those $575,000 staff costs and what do you have? A big waste of time and money.

Every rock we look under, we find more of these workshops raking in hundreds of thousands from the taxpayer. Te Kurahuna, Pakeha Project, Courageous Conversations, sitting lessons, bravery training...

Minutes after we went to the media with this one, we had a call from Minister Brooke van Velden's office. The Minister's office told us that they've now stopped all future training with Te Kurahuna Ltd. 

And - get this - the Minister's already managed to save $1,316,000 through her programme scrapping just some of DIA's workshops. Other Ministers, take note. Cheers to a Taxpayer Victory!

Have a good week.

James Ross Policy & Public Affairs Manager New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union

Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau has today dismissed a Better Wellington–Curia pollshowing 53 percent of locals supported any future rates rises to be capped with inflation, while only 29 percent opposed.   

“It’s really quite sad that Mayor Whanau is so dismissive of her constituents” said Sam Warren, Local Government Campaigns Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union.

“Under Whanau, rates increased by 18.5 percent, on average, last year alone.  Successive rates increases are still on the table to fund Whanau’s poor policy decisions.”

“Instead of listening to locals, Mayor Whanau has brushed off the poll as fake news. She instead remains committed to driving the city into the ground – literally rating people out of their own homes in the process.”

“Former Local Government Minister, Simeon Brown, was actively exploring rates capping as instrument to keep future rates increases reasonable – which the Taxpayers’ Union has long championed. We continue to push this as a key topic with local elections looming.”

“Our message to Mayor Whanau: Read the room, or locals will find someone who will.”

The National-led coalition was elected on the promise of growth and responsible spending, and “Delivering on their election promises would be better late than never” said Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross.

“New Zealand has one of the highest corporate tax rates in the developed world. It also has next to no foreign investment, and negative growth. The connection is clear.”

“Nicola Willis’ plans for corporate tax reform needs to have more meat than the paltry income ‘tax relief’ delivered last year, which failed to even account for bracket creep.”

“If we want growth, that means a slash to the corporate tax rate in combination with high bang-for-buck policies like full capital expensing, and the spending cuts to make that possible.”

“Now’s the time to, in Willis’ words, ‘be bold.’ Kiwis have had enough of managed decline.” 

The National Party was once seen as the party for farmers, but it seems that’s no longer the case. The Taxpayers’ Union can confirm that Climate Change Minister Simon Watts refused multiple requests by New Zealand’s largest farming group to meet ahead of his decision to ramp up the country’s already $24 billion Paris Agreement contributions.

Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman, James Ross, said “What is Simon Watts’ job? Because if it’s taking a balanced approach to stakeholders, he’s not doing it.”

“Publicly disclosed Ministerial diaries show Minister Watts is happy to get cosy with anti-agriculture activist groups like Greenpeace, the World Wildlife Fund, and the Aotearoa Circle, but his staff wouldn’t even reply to emails from Federated Farmers. Nor did Watts meet with Beef + Lamb, or even a Chamber of Commerce in formulating his Paris target.”

“Agriculture accounts for half our emissions. Forget just bad policy, not meeting with the major stakeholders in the industry the Minister has announced he plans to decimate is either extreme arrogance or severe incompetence.”

“National MPs were more than happy to join protest marches against James Shaw and Jacinda Ardern’s climate policy. It’s one thing to get into government and adopt the same policies, it’s quite another to ghost the stakeholders who got you there.”

“When are we getting a Minister who takes climate change – and the bill for tens of thousands every Kiwi household is getting stuck with – seriously? This isn’t a game, Minister.”

“More than 9,000 New Zealanders have emailed the Prime Minister, and leaders of ACT and NZ First asking them to overrule Watts’ extreme and costly 2035 target.”

Ashburton District Council has paid social media influencers $7,000 in an attempt to promote tourism in the area.

Commenting on this, Local Government Campaign Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union, Sam Warren, said:

“Rates in Ashburton increased by 17.90 percent on average last year alone. You’d think council would be more interested in working out how to keep this number down.”

“Businesses aren’t struggling due to a lack of influencers, but they are struggling with crippling rate rises, year-on year."

“There’s no shortage of areas to focus on, but ratepayer-funded holidays for social media influencers isn’t one of them. Instead, why not focus on the obscene cost overruns from the new $62.1 million library?"

"What we have is another Council trying to do too much. Stick to the basics – roads, waste and pipes."

At 8pm last night – timed, presumably, to avoid pick up on the morning news shows – Climate Change Minister Simon Watts released New Zealand’s 2035 Nationally Determined Contribution to combatting climate change under the Paris Agreement.

The target, which locks unavoidable agricultural emissions into New Zealand’s international targets, are even more ‘ambitious’ than the 2030 targets made when Jacinda Ardern/James Shaw flew to Glasgow. They will cost future taxpayers literally tens of billions of dollars in penalties.

Taxpayers’ Union Executive Director, Jordan Williams, said “Ardern’s 50% emissions reduction by 2030 target was ludicrous. Treasury estimates that in just five years taxpayers will be on the hook for up to $24 billion - that’s $12,000 per New Zealand household. The Government has now signed us up for another bill for five years later.”

“To not only lock this cost in, but go even harder for 2035 is economic sabotage. Watts and his Cabinet colleagues are not going to be around in a decade to have to pay the bill, but are doubling down on Paris at the very time our trading partners are pulling back.”

“Half of New Zealand’s emissions are agricultural. To achieve the 51-55% reduction Simon Watts has put NZ on the hook for would mean we either must shut down parts of our agricultural sector, or just about everything else. To say this is fantasy does Mickey Mouse a disservice.”

“The only way New Zealand avoids paying tens of billions in international carbon credits is if every square inch of Otago and Southland is planted in pine.  But even the Government’s own experts advise that pathway is not credible.”

“So this decision will see New Zealanders having to stump up billions more to buy international credits in a decade’s time.”

“The Taxpayers’ Union has long supported sensible emissions reductions using our world leading Emissions Trading Scheme. But such a scheme can only operate with realistic targets and collective international action. Sacrificing our economic prosperity at the altar of good intentions when other countries are pulling back is nothing short of economic sabotage.”

“Minister Todd McClay was on radio this morning talking about how the Government want to ‘power up’ agricultural exports. He’s sure in for a shock.”

“Meanwhile, Simon Watts has just harpooned the Prime Minister’s ‘Going for Growth’ plan. Mr Luxon, Mr Peters, and Mr Seymour need to step in and overrule this decision.”

Dunedin City Council has agreed to open consultation on a $4.4 million boost in funding towards local events and festivals – described by one promotor as a ‘a drop in the ocean’.

“It’s an unfortunate lesson in corporate welfare” said Sam Warren, Local Government Campaigns Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union.

“If there was a business case for these events, pumping endless cash into them wouldn’t be required.”

“Promoters are concerned about competing with Christchurch’s events, which receives even more public funding. Christchurch will then compete with Dunedin – Dunedin with Christchurch, and so on. It’s a race to the bottom, funded by ratepayers.”

“One promotor said $4.4 million was not enough, a ‘drop in the ocean’. It’s a slippery slope that quickly becomes a money hose.”

“Last year Dunedin locals suffered a 17.5 percent average increase to their rates. Council should be looking harder at finding savings, not funding nice-to-haves.”  

The Taxpayers’ Union can reveal, through an Official Information Act request, that Reserve Bank Governor Adrian Orr and a staff member spent $32,048.39 on a six-day trip to Washington DC to meet with central bankers from around the world.

Costs included business-class flights (for Orr), accommodation, meals and laundry.

Commenting on the high costs, Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager, James Ross, said:

“Given New Zealand is still suffering through its worst economic downturn in over three decades thanks to the work of the Reserve Bank, an ‘all hands on deck’ approach wouldn’t go amiss. Not least from the man running the show.”

“Hopefully the Governor’s $14,025 business-class flights left him well-rested. If not, spending $972 per night on his hotel surely did.”

“Seeing as RBNZ now has more than two and a half times more staff than it did in June 2018, let’s hope the rest of the bank’s employees show a bit more spending restraint than their head honcho.”

“Clearly the international jaunts and hiring sprees haven’t helped the Reserve Bank do its job. It’s time for the Governor to put his head down and focus on undoing some of the economic damage that’s set to be his lasting legacy.”

After initially declining Official Information requests made by the New Zealand Herald, KiwiRail has finally released its board members’ letters of resignation following interventions made by the Ombudsman.

“State-owned enterprises are now too comfortable burying the lead when they should be held accountable to its shareholders – the New Zealand taxpayer” said Sam Warren, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman.

“We’re seeing a growing reluctance from a number of agencies to comply with requests from Official Information, despite a clear legislative requirement to do so.”

“Hiding behind veils of bureaucracy and baseless excuses of ‘commercial sensitivity’ has allowed SOEs to game the OIA process designed to improve transparency.”

“It’s well and good the Ombudsman acted on this, but discouraging to know that this was even required. So much more needs to be done in this space to improve accountability.”

Tomorrow’s expected announcement on what the Luxon Government has signed New Zealand taxpayers up for in terms of Paris Agreement emission targets for 2030-2035 are a first real test of whether the Government’s claimed focus on economic growth is genuine, says the Taxpayers’ Union.

“This is where the rubber hits the road,” says James Ross, Policy Manager at the Taxpayers’ Union.

“In the context of the US having pulled the plug on the Paris Agreement, and with the UK’s ‘net zero’ intentions in question, no responsible New Zealand government would sign up for a second round of ‘ambitious’ and impossible targets if they are serious about growing the economy.”

“Treasury estimate that the Ardern/Shaw-era 2030 targets will cost Kiwi taxpayers up to $24 billion - that’s twelve Dunedin hospitals or $12,000 for every New Zealand household.”

“If the Government does a rinse and repeat, or sets targets that apply to agricultural emissions, that would be close to economic sabotage, and make a joke of Mr Luxon’s comments about ‘going for growth’.”

“The Taxpayers’ Union has long supported sensible emissions reductions using our world leading Emissions Trading Scheme. But such a scheme can only operate with realistic targets and collective international action. Sacrificing our economic prosperity at the altar of good intentions when other countries are pulling back would be an economic and political stink bomb.”

Responding to news that this Government has been breaking records with its heavy use of urgency, Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager, James Ross, said:

“Urgency can’t just become the short-cut when Governments want to skip over the hassle of consulting the public. Rushed laws undermine transparency and lead to bad outcomes.”

“Repeal Bills going through under urgency is one thing. But between the last Government and this one, we’ve seen RMA reforms passed under urgency, then repealed under urgency, and now being replaced in the short-term under urgency – this legislative yo-yo needs to be a lesson about what rushed reforms lead to.”

“We can’t allow the dangerous precedent to be bedded in that tough issues are rushed through Parliament to side-step scrutiny. There’s a place for urgency, but it should be “break glass in case of emergency”, not just the default “go faster” button.”

“National were rightly quick to criticise the last Government’s overuse of urgency. Now they need to walk the talk.”

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has floated the possibility of selling assets which fail to return value after the next election, putting TVNZ firmly in the firing line. Taxpayers’ Union Communications Officer, Alex Emes, responded to the reports by saying, “better late than never”.

“Finally, the PM has hinted at the writing on the wall. Owning failing companies like TVNZ who are deep in debt while continuing to lose money by the day is a losing strategy for the taxpayers that own them, and a losing strategy for New Zealand. It's time to cut the cord and save taxpayers from the subsidies or bailouts they will inevitably be on the hook for.”

“However, for the taxpayers who own TVNZ, the government has to do a little less talk and a lot more action. Waiting to sell TVNZ until after the next election means taxpayers will see a much lower return on investment while the dying media monster continues to post additional millions of dollars in losses.”

“While it is good that the government has begun to have this desperately needed conversation, they need to realise now is the time to sell TVNZ, not years down the line.”

Today it has been revealed the budget for Dunedin’s new landfill has almost doubled to $92 million following recommendations made by council staff.

“How on earth did they get it so wrong with their initial $52 million proposal only four years ago?” said Sam Warren, Local Government Campaigns Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union.

“Councillors voted not to pursue a partnership with private operator who could harbour the cost and better manage the project – citing this would be too complex and expensive to establish”.

“Now it’s ratepayers on the hook for an additional $40 million, which we all know will likely grow even higher when construction begins in 2027, as things often do in council.

"Remember, last year alone the city faced an average rates increase of 17.5 percent.”

“Also in the background, officials recommended against exporting waste to other areas by truck, which would be odds with their zero-carbon policy and relationship with mana whenua.”

“It seems in an effort to maintain autonomy and not share profits with a more capable provider – Dunedin City Council has chosen the least efficient and most expensive option. Time will tell if this project can be done, even at the escalated cost.”

Responding to the Government’s plans to disband Callaghan Innovation, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman James Ross said “corporate welfare has no place in New Zealand.”

“Callaghan Innovation has shown itself to be a toxic organisation, with a culture that leads to waste on a wallet-shattering scale. The Taxpayers’ Union has worked for years exposing the agency’s waste, and this is a major win for Kiwi taxpayers.”

“This should mark the end of corporate welfare across the board, with a shift to fostering growth through healthy competition.”

“The agency’s role as corporate-handout-granter-in chief can’t simply be reshuffled to another agency as part of this shake-up of the Crown Research Institutes.”

“Given that one Crown Research Institute – Landcare Research– had chucked $4m at a project playing whalesong to trees, clearly getting science funding back to basics has been in order for a long time.”

The Taxpayers’ Union says Christopher Luxon’s State of the Nation speech on the economy strikes, but misses the mark, with no announcements that will increase New Zealand’s productivity or unshackle the private sector that drives growth.

Taxpayers' Union Spokesman, Jordan Williams, said “the speech was more about feels and repeating old announcements than concrete policy changes to improve New Zealand’s prosperity.”

“The only exception is, bizarrely, another government agency, apparently to attract foreign investors.”

“The speech represents shifting deck chairs, not the sort of economic reform the times call for.”

“People don’t invest in a country because a government agency tells them to. Claims that this model is seen in Ireland or Singapore are fantasy. Investors in those countries don’t have among the highest corporate tax rates in the developed world. Today’s speech would have meant something had it tackled our tax settings or securities law which make investing here so unattractive.”

“New Zealand’s lack of foreign investment isn’t because of a lack of bureaucrats. It’s because we don’t offer competitive investments. Today’s speech lacks the seriousness or urgency in ‘going for growth’.”

Trigger warning: this email is likely to upset you

This email is longer than usual, but important. It will likely see kickback from those who like to attack anyone who dares to criticise spending when it relates to indigenous matters.

The media won't touch it. But, frankly, unless we take on these sorts of rorts, New Zealand's reputation for accountable government won't last long.

I'm also emailing to ask for your support so the Taxpayers' Union can continue to name and shame Wellington's rorts and demand the Government actually rein in wasteful spending.

Remember when we told you about the whale music being played to trees to 'cure' Kauri dieback? 🐋🎶🌳

A few months ago the Taxpayers' Union went public exposing the taxpayer-funded "science" project our researchers uncovered to (and this is no joke) record whales, mixing those sounds with recordings from healthy Kauri forests, to take into unhealthy Kauri forests, play back the audio recordings and assess whether the whale music could be effective in 'soothing' Kauri trees and beating myrtle rust and Kauri dieback. 

You really couldn't make it up.

To recap, it was part of the "National Science Challenges" which are to bring together "the country's top scientists" and use "the best science to address the Challenge[s]".

One of the challenges relates to protecting New Zealand's biodiversity, including our iconic trees.

Recall that MBIE officials insisted that as part of the project, "matauranga Māori" (i.e. traditional Māori knowledge) must be on the same footing as "colonial science" (their description, not mine!).

MBIE's justification for this project is that according to Māori legend knowledge, sperm whales and kauri trees are brothers. 

The hypthosis taxpayers are forking out to test, is whether the whales have a "calming" effect on the trees, and therefore help the trees resist disease. (We're not making this up, it's literally on the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment website!)

They spent HOW MUCH?! 🤯

After we blew the whistle on the project, officials spent months playing games and refusing to answer our basic questions on the "Oranga (wellbeing) project".

It's all rather murky complex (the project is managed by MBIE, but the actual payments are from Landcare Research) and after much determination (i.e. staff time! 😠 ), James and the research team have finally got to the bottom of how much was spent on the Ngā Rakau Taketake project.

Officials are still refusing a line-by-line breakdown (I wonder why...) but, in total, this matauranga Māori-based "research" cost taxpayers $4,027,020.

FOUR MILLION DOLLARS to mix music for trees 🎧

That's right, four million (plus GST) was paid to investigate whether recording whale sounds, mixing them with recordings from healthy Kauri forests, and playing them to unhealthy Kauri forests and other nonsense such as "The language of the domain of Tāne" – all in the name of “healing” them and "science".

Here's what the four million paid for:

The whale song feeds into the first two points of the project, and the project was carried out by an organisation Te Tira Whakamātaki Limited (which received the funds).

So who is Te Tira Whakamātaki Limited? 🧐

As part of this investigation, we've uncovered that the "research" was outsourced to a private "not for profit" company: Te Tira Whakamātaki Limited.

And that's when we came to a stunning realisation – which now explains why the departments have been so cagey about giving us information on the project...

According to Te Tira Whakamātaki Ltd's website, its "Co-funder and Trustee" is Melanie Mark-Shadbolt.

And here's the startling thing: Ms Mark-Shadbolt is also the Co-Director of the very same BioHeritage Science Challenge Science – i.e. the Government initiative funding the project!

I had the team work through the finances and Charities Commission records of Ms Mark-Shadbolt's company. The company's costs are almost entirely salaries (surprise, surprise!), and its charitable purpose is merely "Provides advice, information, and advocacy".  

Nice work if you can get it.

Why aren't the media asking questions? 🚨

It's bad enough that this taxpayer money was spent in the first place to "research" what we all know is nothing more than a myth (whales being brothers of the Kauri, and that they're able to communicate with each other). 

But when the provider of these nonsense projects (playing music to trees) is also one of the two Co-directors of the overall "science challenge" what hope is there the taxpayer will get value for money or scientific knowledge will be advanced?

And here's the kicker: The project leaders openly admit that this isn’t even real research. They describe it as a way to give Māori knowledge equal footing with science, claiming it doesn’t need to meet scientific standards because it’s about “restoring mauri (life force)” rather than achieving measurable, effective results.

And yet, MBIE continues to call it “top science quality” while burning through millions of taxpayer dollars.

So, instead of putting resources toward actual science and solutions, this project uses public money to fund what can only be described as mystical performances in the forest.

Only the Taxpayers' Union are willing to call out this grift 📣 

In the ideal world, the media (and Opposition political parties) would be all over this. But no one likes calling-out government waste if it relates to indigenous projects. We will no doubt be labelled things even for sending this email.

Because it is Māori related wasteful spending, newsrooms fall over themselves not to cover it. We even get individual journalists contact us about some of our stories saying they'd love to pick them up, but their colleagues and editors would go berserk. 

We cannot buy into making apologies. If anything shows that the Taxpayers' Union continues to be needed to find, expose, and fight wasteful spending it's this. Will you support our work so we can continue to fight the War on Waste?

Will you back taxpayers in 2025? ✊

The Government has no money. Families are struggling. New Zealand is literally getting poorer. The Taxpayers' Union must continue to shine sunlight onto wasteful spending, no matter what the PC-brigade would rather we not talk about.

This is why we need your support: to use 2025 to take on these (at best) “feel-good” projects.

On this particular spend, we want to go to the Auditor General and ask him to investigate the process and prudence of paying millions to Te Tira Whakamātaki to play music to trees. But we need your support to dig deeper and uncover and prove exactly who approved what, and when.

>> Support the 2025 War on Waste <<

We are counting on your support to make Government waste a national issue this year and demand accountability for every dollar spent. Will you stand with us to get the job done?

Thank you for your support.

Jordan Williams Executive Director New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union.

p.s. The Taxpayers' Union doesn't waste money playing whale music to trees. But to expose and embarrass Wellington to cut the waste, there is no polite way to put it: we can't do the work, if we can't keep the lights on.

Updated March 2025:

Ms Mark-Shadbolt has recently advised that she perceived there would be a conflict of interest if she was to be involved with the decision to appoint Te Tira Whakamataki Limited to its role, and therefore recused herself from that decision-making process.

The Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request that Landcare Research gave $4,027,020 on the Oranga (Wellbeing) Project - including treating Kauri dieback with potions made from Whale-oil and music from whale song (yes, seriously) as part of the MBIE-administered National Science Challenges.

Research methods in this project included healing Kauri trees through using "sonic samples of healthy whales to construct a tapestry of rejuvenation and wellbeing.”

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union spokesman Jordan Williams said “when did science become a laughing stock?”

“Kauri dieback is a natural disaster. I’m no biologist, but I can confidently say a whale-song mix-tape isn’t going to stop it. Nor are pagan potions made from whale-oil on the basis, apparently, that whales once walked the Earth and are the brothers of Kauri trees.”

“At the same time the Government’s plugging economic growth through science and innovation, we find out that the Strategic Science Investment Fund has been used to play nautical noises at trees.”

“The Taxpayers’ Union are all for blue-sky thinking. But if the Government’s chucking millions at any ‘research’ project which comes begging, a common-sense check might be needed if even this one’s made it past the keeper.”

“At $4 million, the very least taxpayers could at least expect is a copy of the CD.”

Statistics New Zealand has today released the latest Consumer Price Index (CPI) figures, with inflation remaining at 2.2%. However, domestic inflation in particular is still stubbornly high at 4.5%. 

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager, James Ross, said: 

“Punishingly high interest rates have driven us into the worst economic downturn in over three decades. With domestic inflation still sitting high at 4.5%, the crisis is far from over.” 

“Treasury opened the books last month, and they were on fire. With spending, debt, and deficits out of control, this Government isn’t going anywhere near far enough to tackle domestic inflation.” 

“We need to see aggressive cuts to interest rates now, in the hope this can undo some of the lasting damage that will be the Reserve Bank Governor’s legacy. But that can’t happen unless Nicola Willis gets the Government’s runaway spending back in line.” 

The New Zealand Taxpayers' Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request that Dame Cindy Kiro, Governor-General of New Zealand, has spent $23,082.11 on London Heathrow Airport VIP facilitation charges since 2022.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman, James Ross, said:

“The Governor-General is already taking home $447,900 a year, plus an allowance of $40,551. Totalling almost seven times the median wage, no one can accuse Dame Cindy Kiro of being underpaid.”

“If the Governor-General needs the red carpet rolled out through airports on the far side of the world, is it too much to ask for her to pay for the VIP fast-tracking herself?”

“Most of us manage to carry our own bags through the airport every time we go abroad. An on-demand valet service isn't what many taxpayers would call an essential cost of travel.”

“Overseas travel is too often treated as a way of milking taxpayers for a splash of luxury. But that stings a little bit more when the person doing it already lives in a taxpayer-funded mansion.”

The Taxpayers’ Union is welcoming the Government's new focus on economic growth and the re-energised Economic Development Portfolio as Economic Growth held by one of the most senior Ministers.

Taxpayers’ Union Co-founder, Jordan Williams, said “Economic growth isn’t everything, but it is almost everything. Our ability to afford a world-class health, education, and social safety system depends on having a first-world economy. Nothing is more important."

"For a generation New Zealand has coasted off the back of economic reforms from the 1980s and 90s. If that continues, we will continue to wave goodbye to our best and brightest at Auckland Airport. Willis is the logical choice to do the necessary heavy lifting.”

“With Simeon Brown taking the health portfolio, ratepayers will be relieved to see the Local Government portfolio going to the National party’s former local government spokesperson, Simon Watts."

"With a substantial reform agenda set by Simeon Brown in the coming months, Watts will need to hit the ground running and deliver before this year's council elections. Watts was instrumental in helping 'Stop Three Waters' and we look forward to reviving our partnership with Minister Watts in the local government portfolio."

The National Party will have little reason to celebrate following the results of the first Taxpayers-Union Curia Poll for 2025.

 

The poll, conducted between 9-13 January, shows National down 4.6 points to 29.6%, while Labour have risen 4.0 points from last month, overtaking them with 30.9%.

 

This is the first time the Labour Party has led National since April 2023, when Labour enjoyed the leadership bounce following Chris Hipkins replacing Jacinda Ardern.

The Greens are up 1.2 points to 9.5%, while ACT is down 2.2 points to 10.8%. New Zealand First is up 2.7 points to 8.1%, while Te Pāti Māori is down 0.2% to 5.3%.


The headline poll results and information about the methodology can be found on the Taxpayers' Union's website at http://www.taxpayers.org.nz/25jan_tuc_poll 

For the minor parties, Outdoors and Freedom is on 1.7% (down 0.3 points), TOP is on 2.1% (+1.0 points), and Vision NZ is on 0.6 (+0.4 points). New Conservatives are up 0.5 points to 0.5%. 

This month's results are compared to the last Taxpayers' Union–Curia Poll conducted in December 2024, available at https://www.taxpayers.org.nz/final_poll_dec2024

Based on these results, National is down 6 seats to 38, whilst Labour is up 5 seats to 39.

The Greens gain one seat to 12, whilst ACT is down 3 to 14 seats. New Zealand First is up 3 seats to 10, whilst Te Pati Maori remains on 7.

The combined seats for the centre-right are down 6 to 62, whilst the combined seats for the centre-left are up 6 to 58.

This month, the Taxpayers' Union is also releasing the Country Right Direction/Wrong Direction data, showing the full context of voter sentiment.

Commenting on the results, Taxpayers' Union spokesman, Jordan Williams, said:

"Tough news about the dire state of the economy hit the headlines in December, so it's not a coincidence the Government's taken a big hit in the polls."

"Just one year into this Government, a two-to-one ratio of voters say New Zealand is headed in the 'wrong direction'. That is anything but an endorsement of National's softly-softly approach to economic and fiscal matters."

"For many families, Christmas provides a real economic mirror. The data shows people are doing it tough. Nicola Willis' lack of boldness in the economic sphere appears to be hurting National's electoral prospects."

Hi,

Next week the Labour and National Parties have their respective caucus 'retreats' before Parliament resumes the week of the 27th. And it's all bad news for Christopher Luxon, according to the latest Taxpayers' Union-Curia Poll.

NEW POLL: 📊 Nats fall behind Labour for the first time since April 2023 ⏰

Summer BBQ season is a time for reflection, including on the Government. It seems the economic headwinds, and December's series of bad economic/fiscal news, is doing the Government no favours.

The poll sees National tumble 4.6 points to 29.6 percent and Labour up 4.0 points to 30.9 percent.

The ACT Party are down 2.2 points to 10.8 percent, whilst the Greens are up 1.2 points to 9.5 percent. New Zealand First is up 2.7 points to 8.1 percent, while Te Pāti Māori is down 0.2 points to 5.3 percent.

Converting the results to seats in Parliament, National and ACT would need NZ First to form a Government. The total number of seats for the Centre-right is 62 (-6), while the left has has 58 seats (+6).

Majority now say country headed in 'wrong direction' 👎

More concerning for the Beehive than the party vote numbers will be the sharp rise in the proportion of voters saying the country is headed in the "wrong direction".

Country direction (sometimes referred to as "right track/wrong track" polling) is a barometer of the national mood and tends to be a leading (as opposed to lagging) indicator of a Government's prospects of re-election.

The net country direction is down a whopping 17 points to negative 14 percent. 39 percent of New Zealanders think the country is headed in the right direction (down seven points), while 53 percent say the wrong direction (up 11 points) and 12 percent unsure.

The clear message from voters on what's concerning them 📣

Each month our pollsters ask the 1,000 respondents for their most important issue that would influence their vote.

The results are loud and clear: cost-of-living and the economy are on voters' minds, with the poll suggesting that New Zealanders are not backing Nicola Willis' softly-softly approach to tackling the country's economic woes or the Government's overspending.

Despite the media's attention on Māori / Treaty issues, just eight percent of respondents cited it as their major voting issue (compared to a combined 40 percent who said the economy or cost of living). Note too that the December poll (which these results are compared to) was just a few weeks after the high profile hīkoi.

For many families, Christmas has been a painful economic mirror, and this poll appears to reflect it – or as Bill Clinton's campaign strategist, James Carville, famously said: "It's the economy, stupid".

More information about the poll and how to get your hands on the full results can be found here.

Willis out-Mao-ing Mao? 😳 More mandarins than Communist China 🇨🇳🍊

Thanks to the supporter who flagged this Spectator UK  "Steerpike" piece (requires sub) which outlines how, incredibly, on a per capita basis the UK has more civil servants than communist China. 

Here at the Taxpayers' Union, we wanted to see how New Zealand compared to both Britain and our buddies in Beijing. 👀

To clarify: we're only counting actual mandarins (i.e. bureaucrats) not front-line personnel like doctors, nurses, and teachers – or those working for government-owned businesses.

China’s 8 million bureaucrats work out to about 0.56 percent of the population. Far too many if you ask me. 😉

Incredibly, the UK has more. Some 0.8 percent of the UK population are bureaucrats.

So how do we compare? Well, with nearly 63,000 taxpayer funded bureaucrats (even after Nicola Willis’ so-called ‘cuts’) that's some 1.18 percent of the population.

That's right, on a per-person basis, New Zealand employs twice as many bureaucrats as Communist China.

It's not often the Taxpayers' Union holds [checks notes] Communist China as the better model of government efficiency, but here we are! Time for some reining in, Comrade Nicola?

More seriously though, no one could accuse the UK Government of being lean. The short point is, Wellington needs a proper clear out if the Government is to get on top of its fiscal mess.

New Public Service Commissioner talking truth about the bloat 📈

Nicola Willis might not be taking matters seriously, but good news from the Public Service Commission, with its new head Sir Brian Roche now publicly questioning the state of Wellington's bloated bureaucracy.

In a letter to public sector CEOs, he called out endless meetings, too many management layers, and bureaucrats’ obsession with internal paperwork over actual outcomes.

Roche says he wants fewer excuses and more action. Cutting to the heart of the issue, Roche reminded chief executives “[w]e are funded by one source of money — and that is the taxpayer — and…we need to try to simplify and streamline, not fragment and complicate.”

Could Roche be the taxpayer champion we’ve been waiting for? 🦸🏻‍♂️

Not since the valour of Sir Roderick Deane (in the mid-1980s) has New Zealand seen a State Services/Public Services Commissioner show real leadership and slim the size of the public service while improving performance.

So if Sir Brian means what he says, and can survive its toughest challenge yet (the bureaucracy itself!) he's worth every penny.

Your humble Taxpayers' Union has approached Sir Brian's office to ask him onto our Taxpayer Talk podcast. If he agrees, it'll be a good sign that the new public-service-Sheriff is indeed the champion for taxpayers we've been hoping for. On the other hand, if he's just another insider whose actions won't reflect the talking points, we doubt he'll accept.

We'll keep you posted...

Are the lights out? Revenue Minister won't intervene despite new tax laws costing Crown revenue 🤦💰

Despite popular belief, in most international comparisons, New Zealand's tax system is one of the best in the world in terms of efficiency and cost of compliance.

This is why we so often rank very well in 'ease of doing business' and other international league tables.

And the costs to the Crown are cheap too. Inland Revenue reports that it costs just 4.5 cents to collect a dollar in tax (although, their measure does not include the administrative cost to the taxpayer in compliance).

So it's pretty disappointing to see that the Revenue Minister, Simon Watts, is ploughing ahead with an ideological and out-of-date OECD-led "minimum corporate tax rate" framework targeting large companies that's so complex, nearly all of the additional revenue will be gobbled up by the costs of administration.

On 1 January changes to New Zealand’s company tax regime came into effect that will see New Zealand resident multinational companies (think Fonterra and Mainfreight) and foreign-based multinationals with operations here face enormous disclosure and compliance costs for almost nothing.

With New Zealand's company tax rate being one of the highest in the developed world, the idea that any multinationals are using New Zealand as a tax haven is a ridiculous.

Inland Revenue estimates this new law will generate just $24 million in revenue, affect no more than 25 companies, but will cost $11 million for IRD to build systems to monitor and administer the tax, and an annual $3m to operate them!

And here's the thing, the OECD was driven on this by the Biden administration – and given the change in situation over in the US (the Trump administration is expected to pull out of the scheme) the key sponsor of the initiative won't even be applying the rules!

But instead of rejecting these changes brought in by the last government, Revenue Minister Simon Watts' is missing in action.

Say, Waaaaaatt? 👀

We'd love to give you some answers on why the Minister isn't putting the kibosh on this backward step (and answers to other questions – such as what Ministers are doing to rein in IRD leaking taxpayers' data) but this Minister's phone is off the hook.

Last year, your humble taxpayer advocates asked to meet with Minister Watts (as we have with loads of other Ministers). But, this Minister said no. The only one to date who has refused to meet with our friendly team.

Not a good sign, is it? Even Nicola Willis will take a meeting (and credit to her).

$35k of taxpayer money propping up race-based ticket pricing event 🤯 🎶

A music event down in Christchurch has been charging racially-tiered ticket pricing. And here's the kicker - your money is footing the bill.

The event charged three tiers of tickets: $15 for early birds, $20 for Māori and Pasifika attendees, and $30 for everyone else.

"Browntown" received a $35,000 grant from Creative NZ last year, supposedly to promote wider community involvement in the arts. But should your hard-earned taxpayer money be supporting events that charge more or less depending on the attendee's race?

The real issue here is that taxpayers are still being lumbered with the costs of Creative New Zealand bureaucrats supporting their pet projects (even if they breach anti-discrimination laws).

As long time readers of Taxpayer Update know full well, it's long past time some Creative New Zealand's ridiculous funding handouts were scrapped.

That's all for this week, have a great weekend.

James Ross Policy and Public Affairs Manager New Zealand Taxpayers' Union

Here are the headline results for January's Taxpayers’ Union – Curia Poll:

National is down 4.6 points to 29.6% from December while Labour is up 4.0 points to 30.9%. The Greens are up 1.2 points to 9.5%, while ACT is down 2.2 points to 10.8%. New Zealand First is up 2.7 points to 8.1%, while Te Pāti Māori is down 0.2 points to 5.3%.

For the minor parties, Outdoors and Freedom is at 1.7% (-0.3 points), TOP is at 2.1% (+1 points), and Vision NZ is at 0.6 (+0.4 points).

I am delighted to be able to share with you the Taxpayers’ Union's 2024/25 Annual Review and Campaign Plan for 2025. 

If you have trouble viewing, click here to download the report.

Flicking through it, I’m sure you will agree that we can be incredibly proud of what Jordan, James, Michelle, Amber and the team are achieving, despite our relatively small size. After all, without you, the Taxpayers' Union would not be possible.

2024 in review

With so many of the voices you see in the media (and those paid to lobby politicians) entirely taxpayer funded, the Taxpayers' Union provides the balance. Everything you read in the Annual Review was made possible by the goodwill of the tens of thousands of New Zealanders who have chipped-in with a membership or donation.

And I think the report demonstrates that it's been put to good use! From the huge win on the Te Mana O Te Wai issue (which would have imposed co-governance of water management/environmental policies across all councils) to the successful campaign for referendum safeguards on Māori wards (ensuring that the rules of local elections are ultimately in the hands of voters not the politicians) the Taxpayers' Union has bravely fought for democratic accountability in the areas where the media often do not tread.

And again it was the Taxpayers' Union who held the IRD to account after it was revealed that tax officials had shared unencrypted taxpayer data with overseas tech companies. Thanks to the pressure applied, the full extent of this breach was forced to be uncovered: IRD now admit that 268,000 New Zealanders had their privacy breached. This is precisely why a voice for taxpayers is so important!

Meanwhile, the Union's exposé on the Health Research Council and the Marsden Fund's wasteful spending forced the Government to respond and narrow the scope of the fund criteria to ensure taxpayer dollars are spent where they’re truly needed.

These successes remind us why the Taxpayers' Union is so vital.

The achievements you’ll see in the report are the fruits of tireless work and bucket loads of passion. When I speak to the Board members, or pay a visit into the office, it is clear that every member of the team – and our volunteers – really loves what they do.

The year ahead

But let's not kid ourselves that a prosperous future of New Zealand is yet secured. As was laid bare with the opening of the Government's books the week before Christmas, 2025 is make-or-break. The country is in the longest per-capita recession since records began, our productivity has flatlined, and local government is still an absolute mess.

Sadly, there's just so much more to be done.

Jordan, even the Taxpayers' Union can't save the world if they can’t keep the lights on. To keep the momentum going, will you chip-in with a donation so the good work can continue?

Thank you for making the work of the Taxpayers' Union possible.

David Farrar Co-founder New Zealand Taxpayers' Union

Hi,

The politicians might still be sitting under their Pohutukawa trees eating ice creams, but like rust, government waste never takes a day off.

It's only week two of 2025, but here's what we've found so far...

MBIE's New Year's Resolution: The Ministry of Silly Walks Sitting up Straight 🪑

Some say that bureaucrats spend too long on their backsides. Well, hold on to your seats for this one, because we can reveal that the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment have spent $500,012 to learn how to sit at their desks correctly. 

MBIE has spent half a million dollars on coaching staff on how to sit up straight! 💸

That's right – half a million dollars over the last two-and-a-half years teaching bureaucrats how to sit.

As I put it to my comments to the media:

"The public service can posture all it likes about their being no fat to be trimmed, but when MBIE’s happy to chuck hundreds of thousands away on posture training it’s taxpayers who are left bent out of shape."

Sacking back-office consultants is one thing, but how about the Government sack these back-alignment consultants too?

You can read more (including MBIE's official advice about setting up a workstation) by heading over to our website.

Speaking of sitting at a desk... officials caught accessing p*rn  from work machines 👀

Turns out, sitting incorrectly isn't the biggest blunder public servants have made recently.

In just six months, the Ministry of Māori Development has recorded 217 instances of explicit content being accessed on the clock. 

Just to hammer home that these aren't just some flukey Google accidents, over the same period the Ministry of Women recorded only one incident. 

Time is money, so when bureaucrats sit watching *ahem* entertainment in the office maybe they lack enough to do?

But is it racist to call out bureaucrats watching p*rn at work?

Ccalling out public officials for using taxpayer computers to access adult material is far from our most important or valued work. We asked a number of government agencies mostly because wanted to know whether the Government is implementing the sorts of internet filters and security that are standard in the private sector.

Other than some anecdotal feedback giggles from our friends in the media, the story wasn't covered by any of the mainstream outlets.

But then, we got an out of the blue request from Māori Television. They wanted to know whether we had targeted the Ministry of Māori Development and whether we'd asked other departments about their computer use...

Of course when it comes to snuffing out government waste we take an equal opportunities approach – but it raises the question about fourth estate priorities when an agency is embarrassed, the media are more interested in 'why are you asking this', or even seeming to imply a racial motive, rather than holding a taxpayer funded agency to account...

As the media become so agenda-driving, is it any wonder so many New Zealanders support the Taxpayers' Union?

Police dogs chasing criminals, but biting taxpayers 🐕👮

Call us old fashioned, but if you get yourself injured whilst breaking the law we don't think taxpayers should be on the hook for patching you up again. 

The Taxpayers' Union can reveal that ACC has paid out $217,674 for 255 claims for police dog bites over the last four years.

And even they recognise that the figures are likely be an under-estimate! It only includes claims where "Police Dog" was voluntarily mentioned – so the real bill is likely to be even higher.

This is at the same time as those of us with (non-criminal) jobs are facing 16 percent hikes in our ACC levies over the next three years, and drivers have another 24 percent tax hike coming over the same period.

We say, that if you put yourself in harm's way, and are caught breaking the law, 'accident compensation' costs should be on you not the taxpayer. If you can't do the time, don't do the crime. 

Unelected Iwi council reps 'call out' elected councillors (for daring to disagree) 🙅‍♂️🗳️

Unelected reps sitting on the Taranaki Regional Council got themselves into a tizz last week when the elected councillors rejected spending ratepayers' money on taking an Official Council Position and submitting on ACT's Treaty Principles Bill.

Here at the Taxpayers' Union, we say that council should stick to their knitting. Spending ratepayer money on lobbying (especially on matters not directly related to core services) is compelled speech. Why should Joe-and-Jill-ratepayer be forced to pay rates money to lobby for things they may not agree with.

Well, you'd think the sky had caved in. After the Council decided to remain impartial, the six (yes, six) unelected appointees formally lodged complaints and declared "no confidence" in the elected council members being an 'impartial governing body'. 

Someone needs to sit these reps down and explain to them how democracy works. The Council specifically rejected taking a view on a contentious piece of national legislation. Sounds pretty 'impartial' to us! 

Here at the Taxpayers' Union, we say that unelected, undemocratic appointees have no business trying to ram through political campaigns unrelated to the council's core job. Whether it's Iwi reps or the kids with voting powers in Hastings, they also need to learn democracy comes first. 

Like what we do? Why not join the team? 🫵🥸

If you like bureaucrats buying you drinks, we don't suggest becoming an intern or researcher at the Taxpayers' Union. But if you're looking for a role that mixes public policy, economics, politics, communications and advocacy, we have a deal for you! We are looking for talented additions to our team.

So if you've got a passion for keeping more money in taxpayers' pockets, and fighting for more transparency and accountability within government, drop us a line.

Have a great week.

James Ross Policy and Public Affairs Manager New Zealand Taxpayers' Union

REVEALED: Ministry of Regulation senior managers’ $260k golden payslips

The New Zealand Taxpayers Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request (see below) that the new Ministry of Regulation paid their Establishment Unit senior managers up to $257,941 each. This follows earlier reporting that the average salary at the organisation was $54,834 more than the average across the Public Service.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager James Ross commented:

“When the Government’s bureaucracy-slashing department starts turning into a bloated bureaucracy itself, questions have to be asked about this Government’s commitment to cost-saving.”

“The three Establishment Unit Senior Managers are taking home up to $258k each - well over three times the median wage. At a time when Kiwis’ standards of living are plummeting in real terms at a rate of knots, the irony of these new cost-saving positions being paid somewhere between a fifth and a quarter of a million dollars a year each won’t be lost.”

“Every story about the Ministry of Regulation seems to be about staffing cost blow-outs. The red tape slashing Ministry needs teeth, sure, but all we seem to hear about are teething problems.”

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request (see below) that the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment has sent $500,012 on consultants for posture training and workstation assessments in the last three years.

Commenting on this, regular desk user (self-trained) and Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager, James Ross, said:

“Here’s one to make taxpayers sit up straight and listen: over half a million dollars has been wasted by one government department alone teaching bureaucrats how to use a desk and chair.”

“The public service can posture all it likes claiming there’s no more fat to be trimmed, but when MBIE’s happy to chuck hundreds of thousands away on posture training it’s taxpayers who are left bent out of shape.”

“MBIE could do with getting their values back in alignment with cash-strapped taxpayers. They can start by sacking the back-alignment consultants, when a few printed-off diagrams stuck around the office would do the same job for a fraction of the cost.”

More than 100 local businesses and major property owners have called on the Gore District Council to put its new district plan on hold, saying it is inconsistent with a directive from Central Government to do away with nice-to-haves.

“The district plan is well overdue for an update – but it would be entirely irresponsible to release a plan if it is already at odds with Central Government” said Local Government Campaigns Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union, Sam Warren.

“In December, Minister Simeon Brown announced a raft of change for the New Year. While pausing for another nine months would have cost implications for Gore District Council, it would allow time for the new, more sensible direction to be made clear.”

“Considerable resources have gone into the plan so far, but if the plan is already outdated on its release and doesn’t follow the more sensible approach towards council spending set out by the Minister, it will only end up costing Gore residents more in the long run.”

“Gore District Council has already stung its residents with an average rates increase of 21.4 percent this last year alone – one of the highest in the country. It’s clear more thought needs to be given on how it can make better spending decisions. If the new Government directive can better guide Council in this space, it’s certainly worth waiting just a little bit longer for.”

The New Zealand Taxpayers Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request that ACC has paid out $217,674 for 255 claims into police dog bites over the last four years.

This information includes 595 bites with 68 to the arm and 59 to the lower leg.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager, James Ross, said:

“ACC is funded by levies. Taxpayers shouldn’t be picking up the bill for hardened criminals who get themselves hurt whilst out committing crimes."

“ACC’s finances are already in the doghouse, with a $7.2 billion deficit this year and Kiwis facing down massive ACC levy hikes. It’s going to take a lot more than $220k of savings to fix that, but there’s a principle involved - criminals should not be the tail that wags the dog.”

“That’s also just the costs we know about. Given declaring cause of injury is voluntary, and not every criminal who injures themselves getting collared is bitten by a police dog, just how much are we paying so people can avoid the consequences of their own actions?”

“If everyone else is getting stung by the unfortunately much-needed cost-savings, those who have actively chosen to put themselves in harms’ way shouldn’t be able to take the taxpayer for a ride.”

The New Zealand Taxpayers' Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request (see below) that over the last six months, the Ministry of Māori Development has recorded 217 instances of staff accessing explicit material blocked by their web-filters.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager, James Ross, said:

“Taxpayers don’t pay bureaucrats to sit watching adult videos, so why does it keep happening?”

“When bureaucrats in your department keep being disciplined for wasting taxpayers’ time getting distracted at the office, something’s gone wrong.”

“Our investigations so far reveal this is an embarrassingly common problem government-wide, but when one department has recorded this happening a couple of hundred times there’s only so often this can be called an accident.”

“After the agency’s significant staffing increases over the last six years, is it just that staff have too much time on their hands? Maybe it’s time to roll back the bloat and start scrapping those departments who seem not to have enough work to do.”

Today's the last day at the office for the year, and this email is to sign-off for the year and recap on what has (unfortunately, for taxpayers!) been a busy 10 days.

'Twas the week before Christmas: The economic bad news continues... 🚨🎄

Last week's quarterly GDP stats were worse than anyone was expecting. 

In the space of three months, the economy shrank 1.0 percent. In the three months prior to that, it shrank 1.1 percent.

While the headline "growth" (or in this case "shrink") number is one thing, what determines what a country can afford is GDP per capita, or 'per person GDP' – the amount the whole economy produces divided by the population.

And on that measure, it's even worse:

Sorry to spoil your Christmas, but these new figures show that the average Kiwi is $1,711 poorer compared to what was produced last year.

When we talk about wasteful government spending and overtaxation, this is those chickens coming home to roost. But where's the plan to fix it?

As laid bare in the opening-of-the-books last week, Nicola Willis is spending more than Grant Robertson.

And before you say the deficit is because of 'tax cuts', the Treasury figures show that Nicola Willis' tax-take as a share of the economy is bigger than at any point under Ardern/Hipkins.

And debt's still spiralling! Interest payments are set to reach $7,000 per household by 2028/29. There isn't a recipe for growth on the menu.

Merry Christmas 👀

Stats NZ struggling with numbers? 20,000 job losses in Wellington out by [checks notes] 18,000 🤔📊

It's a real shame that Stats NZ are, well, struggling with statistics given the political overdrive the media and opposition parties went into after Stats NZ published employment figures that 20,000 had lost their jobs in Wellington.

This was, apparently, evidence to show 'nasty cuts' since the new Government came in.

It turns out, Stats NZ got it wrong. Really wrong. So how much were they out by? A thousand? Five thousand? Surely not more?

They were off by 90 percent! Last week Stats NZ corrected their figures and there has only been about 2,000 job losses in the capital (and that's during our worst recession since 1991, don't forget).

And most job-losses weren't within government! 

Sir Humphrey reported safe 🤵‍♂️

At its peak, there were more than 65,000 "core public servants" – an 18,000 increase from six years prior.

And of those 2,000 job losses, Nicola Willis revealed this month that only 865 bureaucrats had actually been made redundant (and about half of those were voluntary)!

It might be the New Year soon, but the team at the Taxpayers' Union all have the same resolution. Pump those numbers up, because last week's HYEFU opening-of-the-books showed one thing - if we're going to get New Zealand growing again the public service needs to do some shrinking.

Taxpayer-funded Waipareira Trust to lose charitable status over political donations 🎯

The Te Whanau o Waipareira Trust's latest annual report has certainly raised a few eyebrows. In just four years, the net assets for the taxpayer-funded charity have more than doubled - to $103.8million.

The report showed a net annual surplus of $20.6 million - a 24 percent return on revenue. Most commercial enterprises could only dream of those sort of numbers, with a higher profit than 93 of the top 100 companies in New Zealand!

This is the same trust paid $385,307 in no-interest, related-party loans to fund Chief Exec John Tamihere's 2019 Auckland Mayoral campaign. As well as Tamihere's 2020 general election campaign where he stood as a Te Pati Maori candidate-slash-co-leader, and of course further donations to Te Pati Maori's 2023 election campaign.

Entities associated with the Trust have also been facing down investigations over alleged misuse of census data for use in Te Pati Maori's 2023 election campaign.

The Democracy Project's Bryce Edwards took a deep dive into the Trust back in July.

Well, turns out you can't keep that up forever. After a four-year-long investigation, Tamihere's outfit is set to lose its charitable status.

Four years too long, if you ask us. Taxpayer-funded 'charities' should not enjoy tax-free charitable status.

Driving home for Christmas will cost more next year 🚗🚧

Now from groups that don't pay enough tax to one who are paying far too much: you. 

Road tolling to pay back the cost of making a road makes sense – people in Ashburton and New Plymouth shouldn't be made to stump up for highways in Tauranga they'll never use. But here's where it gets tricky. Transport Minister Simeon Brown's announced tolling on three roads (including Auckland's Penlink, Tauranga's Northlink, and the road from Otaki to north of Levin) to pay for ongoing maintenance.

This is a change from previous toll regimes where tolls are used to fund/finance the building costs of new roads. 

But it's permanent, it's a tax. Plain and simple. And let's be frank, we already have taxes that are meant to pay for road maintenance (i.e. fuel taxes and the road user charge). 

And wasn't this supposed to be the government of 'no new taxes'? 🤔

And last but not least... Merry Christmas from the Taxpayers' Union 🥳🎄

This is the time of year to be thankful, and we know that our work wouldn't be possible without you. We've had some huge wins this year, but not kidding ourselves that there is a big job ahead to force Wellington to make the tough but necessary decisions in the New Year.

So from the whole team, wishing you and your family a very Merry Christmas.

James Ross Policy and Public Affairs Manager New Zealand Taxpayers' Union

Responding to today’s release of the third quarter GDP figures by Statistics New Zealand, Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager, James Ross said that “New Zealand’s back in recession after a second quarter of negative growth, but with the economy shrinking by 1% in just a single quarter the scale of the damage is shocking.

“Reserve Bank Governor Orr has almost throttled the life out of the economy with his earlier far too aggressive monetary tightening. He has now been forced into an aggressive loosening of monetary conditions, but it looks too little too late.”

“Tuesday’s release of Treasury’s Half-Year Economic and Fiscal Update should’ve been the wake-up call that the country’s in real trouble. The forecasts show the Government has lost control of it’s spending, spending growth is well outpacing revenue growth making a balanced budget impossible.  Finance Minister Willis’ claim of a surplus in 2028/29 is a mirage conjured up by deleting those pesky ACC deficits.”

“The Government needs to take its spending problem seriously to balance the books. Sir Bill English made the hard choices to get back to surplus after the Global Financial Crisis and this Government needs to do the same. Continuing to fiddle whilst the books burn is not a fiscal strategy - Willis missing her targets has the country on course for disaster.”

“Can someone please wake the Government up?”

On 24 October the New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union published a statement about Toni Grace, partner of Rt. Hon. Chris Hipkins. The statement said that Ms Grace travelled to the UK and Europe at the taxpayers’ expense. This statement was untrue.

On 17 December 2024 the New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union published a tweet stating that Ms Grace had been given a tax-payer funded car for her personal use. This statement was also untrue.

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union unreservedly apologises to Ms Grace for the distress caused by these publications

As predicted by your humble Taxpayers' Union last week, the Government is well and truly 'taking out the trash' with bad news – and Nicola Willis is hoping that with the festive season in full swing, you don't notice!

But before we get to the depressing fiscal news bundled into the half-year opening of the books, we need to tell you about another set of policy wins in local government.

So let's start this Taxpayer Update with the good!

Yet More Policy Victories: Simeon Brown gives ratepayers an early Christmas Present 🎁🎉

Yesterday's final Cabinet Meeting of 2024 delivered much Christmas joy here at the Taxpayers' Union  (we watch the weekly livestream – so you don't have to 🤓 ).

The Prime Minister and Local Government Minister announced a new reform package for local councils to get local government "back to basics".

The announcements go even further than the PM's speech back in August to the Local Government NZ conference. The package is a huge win for our Local Government Campaigns Manager, Sam Warren.

Just a few weeks ago, Sam and Jordan (pictured) went to see Local Government Minister Simeon Brown with the Taxpayers' Union wish list of local government reform, including: 

• Adopting a UK or Australian-style rates cap connected to inflation, population growth (or both). This is a no brainer. While households have struggled with the cost of living crisis, town halls haven't cut back at all. This year, the average rates bill is being hiked by 14% and most of the extra money isn't even going on infrastructure, but rather unaffordable nice-to-haves.
  
  
• Scrapping the "four well-beings" in the Local Government Act. These have lead to an explosion in the scope of what councils have been doing (you can fit almost any boondoggle within the excuses, sorry, well-beings of social, economic, environmental, and cultural.
  
  
• Changes to council financial disclosure requirements to enable better accountability and enabling better benchmarking and financial comparisons between councils. Since 2014, the Taxpayers' Union has published league tables of councils financial and democracy data.
  
  While some councils use the Taxpayers' Union data to benchmark, unfortunately many others do their darnedest to obfuscate and undermine the process. For example, the Minister did not know that there is not a uniform expenses classification or general ledger accounts across different councils. Nor are the councils even applying the same accounting policies (such as how assets are valued in their annual accounts) which makes it far, far harder to do meaningful comparisons.
  
  We think a lot of that is not by accident, and needs central government to come in over-the-top and set a uniform set of accounting, classification, and asset valuation policies across the sector.
  
  
• Giving elected officials the ability to require information from council CEOs and officials. It is difficult to expect good governance when, unlike company directors, local councillors do not currently have statutory rights to demand information from the organisations they are supposed to be governing.

The very policies announced yesterday are the same policies your humble Taxpayers' Union have been championing for ratepayers!

And not only has the Government listened, officials have even been instructed to work with the Taxpayers' Union to develop some of the finer details of new information disclosure and benchmarking requirements given our staff's experience in local government freedom of information and league table benchmarking.

I call that a nice Christmas win! 

If you're facing rates bills that are eye watering, you may want to watch the full Post-Cabinet press conference available here.

Journalists question whether local government is actually wasteful 🤣🤣🤣

You can imagine the astonishment in our office when the PM struggled to give examples of local government 'white elephants' and waste. 

Yes, seriously, Wellington's journalists were really questioning whether local government is 'wasteful'. Wellington, of all places...

Rest assured Sam is printing out just the first [million?] examples to rush down to the Beehive – and we'll be sure to invite Mr Luxon to our Jonesie Government-Waste Awards scheduled for early in the New Year...

Simeon Brown's media release summarising the reforms is here.

Also, we are reliably informed from a very senior source in the Minister's office – which may or may not be the Minister himself – that further Cabinet decisions regarding the disclosures are to be made in February. Sam and the team will be working over the summer for a good cause then! 😉

Now for the bad news:

Nicola Willis gets petty: tells Treasury to ban CTU economist she doesn't like from Treasury briefing lock-ups 🤪

This morning a small group of media (and a few analysts from the Australian banks) were at Treasury's half year "lock-up" to work through the latest Treasury forecasts in the Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update (HYEFU).

We would normally be in the room, and asking questions of the Minister and senior Treasury Officials.  But, having been invited to submit names, last week we learned that having 'consulted' with the Minister, Treasury had decided to ban all of those who might criticise the Government's fiscal management pressure groups, unions, universities, NGOs, major corporates (except the banks), and think tanks.

Reliable sources in the Treasury tell us that the Minister specifically wanted the Council of Trade Unions' Economist Craig Rennie (who used to work in Grant Robertson's office under the last Government) from being in the room and able to easily give commentary to media.

But the only way Treasury could justify that was to ban every one of the groups who provide expert analysis to the media: including Business NZ, Federated Farmers, the NZ Initiative, and us!

Basically, the Minister's thrown us (and others) under the bus to avoid a critic having early access to the information designed to ensure the Government's fiscals are transparent!

It's not often we agree with the Council of Trade Unions, but here we are...

Earlier today, we wrote a joint letter with the NZ Initiative think tank, echoing the CTU's own letter sent yesterday.

Seriously Nicola, New Zealand deserves better. 

The Minister is, at best, employing a cheap PR ploy to attempt to control today's media narrative. At worst, it’s a petty and vindictive move to exclude a Labour Party-aligned economist the Minister has taken umbrage with.

It doesn't come easy to say this, but we need Nicola Willis to get over herself and stop being so, well, political.

Instead, New Zealand needs a Minister of Finance to get on with the job: cut wasteful spending to balance the books.

In an interview last week, Nicola Willis said that she does not want to be "slave to getting back to surplus". That's a cute line, but unless she cuts spending, all New Zealanders will soon be a "slave to debt".  I know which one I'd rather...

Even before today's new figures, for every New Zealand household the Government, sorry, taxpayers, are paying more than $5,000 in interest this year alone.

And it's getting worse. Nicola Willis is borrowing at an even faster rate than [yes, that's right] Grant Robertson.

We know the Minister of Finance reads these Taxpayer Updates, so we have a message for her: Minister, banning critics is not a path back to surplus.

What Willis was hiding: a worse fiscal strategy than Grant Robertson 🤫💸

Because of Nicola Willis's pettiness we don't have our usual comprehensive report to cut through the spin and highlight what the Minister's press releases are deliberately not mentioning. But that's the way Nicola Willis wanted it today.

So with the very limited time, here are the immediate take aways:

❌ The surplus has been pushed back, yet again. It's now at the very end of the forecast period (2028/2029).

❌ Total government spending has gone up - and Nicola Willis is choosing to continue to increase it each and every year in cash terms. Total government spending is 43.6% of GDP this year (compared to 'just' 41.0% last year and 35.9% in 2017).

❌ Net Core-Crown Debt has exploded. It is now forecast to peak at at at least $115,000 for every NZ household by 2028/2029.

❌ Interest costs will be just shy of $7k per household by 2028/2029.

❌ All of this is despite revenue being a higher proportion of the economy than in at any point under the six years of the last Labour Government. It now sits at 40.5% of GDP. Under Ardern/Hipkins, it never topped 39% of GDP.

❌ There are no signs of meaningful reform that would boost New Zealand's lagging productivity in both the government and private sectors.

And the ugly:

Cooking the books: Willis changes how surplus is calculated 🧑‍🍳📚

But the real news is that Nicola Willis has instructed Treasury to change the way surplus/deficits are measured using what's called "OBEGAL" (the Operating Balance Excluding Gains and Losses). 

Despite the union "lock-out" a concerned source within Treasury gave us the heads up that Nicola Willis was working with the Treasury Secretary to change the calculation so it all doesn't look quite so bad. Basically, because ACC's books are in dire straits, instead of confronting the problem, Nicola Willis is pulling a sleight of hand and excluding it.

Make no mistake, this is the Public Finance equivalent of cooking the books.

When Grant Robertson manipulated the fiscal indicators back in 2022 (changing how Net Core-Crown Debt was calculated to make the debt numbers look better), the then Opposition Finance Spokesperson jumped up-and-down.

And to give Grant Robertson some credit, at least he had the excuse of coming into line with international precedent.

But who was that Opposition Finance Spokesperson? One Nicola Willis. 😱

The fact is, despite the Government being elected on a platform of cutting spending, they continue to spend even more than Grant Robertson, and kick the fiscal can down the road.

In the coming days, our economic team will work through the material and give you a more thorough analysis.

Another Minister takes out the trash: announcing a tax hike just in time for Christmas 🎅💵👆

Speaking of ACC, ACC Minister Doocey is set to get coal in his stocking this Christmas, after a massive ACC levy hike was announced this week effective from 1 April.

So if you get a crisp $20 in any Christmas cards, hold on to it, because next year's looking like it's going to be a tight one, and the hikes keep coming until at least 2027.

By 2027, ACC's jobs tax will be another $140 a year per employee.

As ever, small businesses are going to get hammered because a ACC can't keep costs down.

So much for 'no new taxes'...

At least Judith Collins makes Santa's good list...🎅🏻🛷

Marsden Fund grants have long been a woke slush fund. You know it, I know it, and thanks to our taxpayer-hero of the week Judith Collins, everyone knows it.

Incredibly, the Government's decision to take up the Taxpayers' Union's call and narrow the remit of the Marsden Fund – returning it to focus solely on science rather than the social science nonsense of (to pick just one example) $360,000 study of “big things” such as large vegetable sculptures placed next to state highways – hasn't been supported by all.

The media ran with the usual complaints from self-entitled academics and their proxies. But, sadly, the Opposition followed suit.

In Parliament, the Science Minister was able to easily knock it back – using the example above, Judith Collins appeared to have been forwarded this and other grants highlighted by the Taxpayers’ Union to supporters calling for the very change in policy Labour was criticising.

Check out the video of Judith Collins using our examples of waste here.

Enjoy the rest of your week.

James Ross Policy and Public Affairs Manager New Zealand Taxpayers' Union

Now we know why Nicola Willis’s office seem to have worked with Treasury to change the criteria of experts able to attend the HYEFU lock up: it seems she didn’t want the CTU,  the Taxpayers’ Union, or other experts who would normally attend these things holding her to account for a Grant Robertson-style sleight-of-hand in how OBEGAL is calculated.

“This is the Finance Minister equivalent of cooking the books,” says James Ross, Policy and Public Affairs Manager at the Taxpayers’ Union.

“Nicola Willis is guilty of manipulating the fiscal indicators in the same way then Opposition Finance Spokesperson Nicola Willis jumped up-and-down about when Grant Robertson changed the way Net Core-Crown Debt was calculated to make the numbers look better in 2022.  But at least Grant Robertson had the excuse of coming into line with international precedent.”

“The fact is, despite the Government being elected on a platform of cutting spending, Nicola Willis continues to spend even more than Grant Robertson, and kick the fiscal can down the road.  Changing measures, or banning those pointing out the elephants in the room, doesn’t avoid the fact Nicola Willis is not doing what she was elected to do.”

In an unusual move, the Taxpayers’ Union is standing with comrades at the Council of Trade Unions following Finance Minister Nicola Willis’ petty decision to have Treasury officials ensure CTU Economist Craig Rennie could not attend today’s Half Year Fiscal and Economic Update.
 
Taxpayers’ Union Executive Director Jordan Williams said, “We don’t agree with the CTU on much, but it’s outrageous that the Minister has had Treasury impose a ban on peak bodies, think tanks, unions, universities and large corporates to justify the uninviting of a single left-wing economist the Minister does not like.”
 
“The worst kept secret in Wellington is that today’s opening of the books will show that Nicola Willis has not done her job in getting Government spending under control.  She makes the claim that she does ‘not want to be a slave to surplus’ but as a result will soon have the whole country slave to her debt.”
 
“Banning the CTU, the Taxpayers’ Union, and groups like Business NZ and the Federated Farmers is not a strategy to get back to surplus. At best, it’s a cheap PR ploy to attempt to control the media narrative. At worst, it’s a petty and vindictive move to exclude a left-wing economist the Minister has taken umbrage at.”
 
“We think the media should make the point of going to talk to Craig Rennie and the CTU this afternoon after the lock-up to ensure the Minister’s ploy to suppress commentary she does not like does not work.”

Yesterday, the CTU wrote to the Secretary of the Treasury which is available on its website. In a joint letter with The New Zealand Initiative, the Taxpayers’ Union has backed up the CTU, making the same points (available here).
Groups affected by the new guidelines regularly provide their analysis of budget figures to their own readers, who number in the hundreds of thousands, and provide expert analysis to journalists attending the restricted briefings. Both functions assist in transparency and accountability to the public, which are purposes of the restricted briefings.
 
Mr Williams asks, “How does it promote the interests of ‘transparency and accountability to the public’ or assist public understanding when Bloomberg will be able to tell foreign investors what’s in the Government books, and provide considered analysis, faster than organisations representing New Zealand workers, business, and taxpayers?”
 
The joint letter points out that substantial errors in previous Budget Economic and Fiscal Updates have been uncovered by the very analysts that will now be prevented from attending future budget lock-ups.
 
“Make no mistake, the move to ban the likes of Business NZ and the CTU’s expert economists from budget and financial briefings does nothing to enhance public understanding in public finance. It is a cynical and unbecoming move by a Minister who, clearly, needs a summer holiday,” concludes Mr Williams.
 
Notes to editors: The Taxpayers’ Union will also have spokespeople available in Wellington including Ray Deacon (Economist) and Jordan Williams any time after the public release of the HYEFU information at 1pm.

Minister for Local Government Simeon Brown has today announced in the final post-Cabinet Press conference for 2024 a raft of changes designed to refocus local government and keep rates down.

“At long last sanity will be returned to councils” said Sam Warren, Local Government Campaigns Manager for the Taxpayers’ Union.

“Local rates have increased an average of 14 percent this year alone, the highest increase seen in 20 years. Returning councils’ focus is long overdue.”

“For years now the Taxpayers’ Union has been lobbying for the changes announced today – it’s certainly a massive win for us, and a massive win for all ratepayers”, Warren continues.

“Removing the four well-beings that have dragged council’s attention away from core services is a huge step in the right direction. The message is clear; stop blowing money on nice-to-haves and focus on the basics like roads and pipes.”

“The Minister has also announced a yearly benchmarking tool to improve transparency on council performance. Suspiciously similar to the Taxpayers’ Union’s own benchmarking tool - Ratepayersreport.nz - we’ll forgive the Minister for what I’m sure is very sincere form of flattery.”

“Ratepayers will have greater ability to compare council performance on issues such as council debt, unit ratings and forecasts, and a number of other important KPIs that put pressure on councils to remain accountable.”

“Perhaps most importantly, Minister Brown has expressed interest in exploring rates pegging similar to those used overseas to stop the endless bloat at councils. If the Minister plays his cards right, the days of councils ramming through double-digit rates hikes year after year could be coming to an end.”

The Taxpayers’ Union is calling the recent taxpayer-supported $5m loan given to a private corporation for the purchase of a big Ruapehu skifield “an abuse of taxpayer money”.

Commenting on the latest of nine multi-million corporate welfare cheques, Taxpayers’ Union Communications Officer, Alex Emes, said:

“This can no longer be seen as a mistake of government judgement. Once is a waste, twice is incompetence, but nine times is a scandal. How much longer is this grift going to continue?

“If Shane Jones really meant it when he said the eighth payment was “the last chance saloon”, why are we now talking about a ninth payment? Since 2018, more than $50 million of government-backed support has been handed over to this failed project.

“The Ruapehu skifield keeps failing to stay afloat in no small part because Government departments are tying it up in consent restrictions and red tape. Taxpayers keep getting stuck with the tab for cleaning up the Government’s mess.

“It’s time for the abuse of taxpayer money to stop, and start investing in things that will actually benefit hardworking Kiwis.”

The Taxpayers’ Union is commenting on the Government’s “job cuts” released during scrutiny week. Only 865 redundancies were announced across the public sector, with spending going up 0.7 percent.

Commenting on the relatively small cuts, Taxpayers’ Union Communications Officer, Alex Emes, said:

“If the Government is serious about cutting waste and returning taxpayers’ money, they need to start spending less instead of spending more on an already bloated bureaucracy.

“With half of the reported redundancies being voluntary, the cuts made are an absolute drop in the bucket when considering the size of the Public Service is now more than 63,000 full-time equivalent staff.

“For all the bashing of the last Government, it is clear this Coalition has failed to get New Zealand’s books ‘back on track’. If they are true to their word, it’s time to start spending less - instead of spending more - on bureaucrats.”

The Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request that the Inland Revenue Department has spent $54,990 on remote worker travel to the Wellington office, including flights, meals, taxis and accommodation.

The revelations, which predate recent changes to public service working-from-home policies, highlight how lax oversight has allowed such wasteful spending to flourish.

Commenting on the findings, Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager, James Ross, said:

“While tradies, farmers, and hospitality workers don’t get anything close to the luxury of working on the sofa in their dressing gowns, on the rare occasion these bureaucrats show up for work they’re flown in to the office on the taxpayer’s dollar."

“Taxpayers have also footed the bill for one IRD employee’s $1,182 in meals and accommodation and another’s $368 in taxis. The same ‘public servants’ who are supposed to set an example of accountability and fiscal prudence are living it large at our expense.”

“Other large agencies like the Department of Internal Affairs and Ministry for the Environment couldn’t even answer how much they’d spent because they “don’t hold a register of remote employees who travel to work”. How can they expect to control costs when they don’t even know what they’re spending?”

“The Public Service Commissioner needs to ensure these new return-to-office guidelines are enforced and that past excesses like these are never repeated.”

The Taxpayers' Union is slamming Tauranga Mayor Mahé Drysdale and his Council's decision to appoint unelected, unaccountable, iwi representatives onto every one of the Council's powerful standing committees, with full voting rights.

Responding to today's vote, Taxpayers' Union Executive Director, Jordan Williams, said:

"This is a fundamentally undemocratic move. By shifting so much power to the Committee, Drysdale is screwing the scrum so that he has extra votes in the pocket."

"But it's also undemocratic in that appointments are not accountable to voters. In the same way the Taxpayers' Union ridiculed the Hastings District Council's decision to appoint teenagers from their 'youth council' to Council committees, Iwi appointments are inherently unaccountable to voters."

"The people of Tauranga only recently got their local democracy back. Now, without even putting it out for public feedback, Mayor Drysdale is driving it into a ditch. He's clearly out of his depth."

It's silly season in Wellington, with Christmas joy (i.e. taxpayer funded) knees up well underway.

There's also the usual December "take out the trash" silliness where exceedingly well paid government spin doctors dump the bad news at the very time the media and public aren't looking... 

But here at the Taxpayers' Union, we're still at it and will be at right up until the fat man in the red suit arrives in a few weeks.

Merry Christmas (to the Debt Monster) 🎄

This week we're expecting the Government's solution to the Interislander debacle (quite why Kiwirail isn't expected to fund its own asset purchases, just like the privately-owned Cook Straight ferry operator does has never been clear), and next week, on the Eve of Christmas comes Nicola Willis' Budget Policy Statement, and Half Year Fiscal and Economic Update. There, we're expecting the inevitable announcement that budget surplus is being pushed back, yet again. 

So the Government Debt Clock won't be stopped for Christmas, in fact it's ticking at a faster rate than when Grant Robertson was in-charge. The only one who's happy is the Debt Monster.

Meanwhile, Labour thinking about how to make New Zealand more prosperous tax you more 🤦

The Labour Party was hammered at last year's election, and last week Party members gathered in Christchurch for their annual conference to discuss the rebuild.

You'd think that they'd learn some lessons and take the message, right? After all, Labour's increase in Government spending (gross core Crown spending by 83 percent in just seven years ! ) resulted in high inflation and, arguably, worse public services. 

But it seems Christopher Hipkins missed the memo. 

Instead of debating the challenges the New Zealand economy faces, our structural overspending, and lack of productivity growth in both the private and public sectors, the Labour Party's main agenda item was to debate [re-checks notes] which new tax they should introduce!

➡️➡️➡️ Walk this way to higher taxes ➡️➡️➡️

To help Labour Party delegates find their way to the venue, your humble Taxpayers' Union were on hand to help. 😉

Even Stuff liked the gag! Young Alex (who came to work for us from our sister group, the Canadian Taxpayers' Federation) got his first interview on the 6 o'clock TV news to give the taxpayer perspective.

Despite our best intentions to be helpful, Labour's delegates weren't so keen on our helpful sign posting (video here). Weird.

NEW POLL: ACT & Te Pāti Māori gain in final Taxpayers-Union Curia Poll for 2024 📊

There will be sighs of relief in the Beehive with the centre-right commanding a comfortable majority in our final poll for 2024, despite a hard month and media attention on the hīkoi.

The poll, conducted 1 to 3 December, has both National and Labour down 4.6 points from last month, National at 34.2% and Labour at 26.9%.

Despite some progress on the "Preferred PM" results (see below), it's not much progress for Chris Hipkins, 26.9% is the exact result Labour got at last year's general election.

The Greens are down 1 point to 8.3%, while ACT are up 4.5 points to 13%. That puts ACT ahead of the Greens for the first time since February 2024.

New Zealand First is down 1.1 points to 5.4% while Te Pāti Māori is up 3 points to 5.5%.
For the minor parties, Outdoors and Freedom is on 2% (+0.7 points), TOP is on 1.1% (+0.2 points), and Vision NZ is on 0.2% (-0.2 points).

Converting that to seats in Parliament, these results would mean National and ACT would not need NZ First to form a Government. The total number of seats for the Centre-right is 68, while the left has only 52 seats in the 120 Parliament.

In terms of Preferred Prime Minister, Christopher Luxon is up slightly from last month to 27.1% (+0.6 points) while Chris Hipkins is up to 19.9% (+4.4 points). David Seymour is at 5.8% (-1.6 points) matched by Winston Peters (-0.5 points) at 5.8% and Chlöe Swarbrick at 4.5% (-0.7 points).

This month we're also publicly releasing what participants said was their "most important issue" that would influence how they would vote. 

Although it is getting much media attention, just 8.4% of voters listed the Treaty as their top voting issue. That could suggest that media attention does not necessarily correlate to importance in the minds of most voters. 

You can read more results over on our website.

EXPOSED: New Zealand's infrastructure benchmark - more traffic cones than sheep? 👀 🚧 🐑

The Taxpayers' Union has exposed that the New Zealand Transport Agency's spending on 'temporary traffic management' has been a massive $786 million in just three years.

That's more than $390 per household on road cones and lollypop signs.

And it gets worse. The $786 million is 'only' what comes from central government. It doesn't include what your council is spending on cones (those higher rates have to be going somewhere!).

Politicians and talking heads in the media complain about New Zealand's "infrastructure deficit" and argue that we must spend more. But according to the OECD (a think tank funded by the governments of most developed countries) New Zealand spends at higher levels than Australia and the median OECD country on infrastructure.

So why aren't we enjoying world class infrastructure? Like so many areas of spending coming from Wellington, it's not how much we're spending, it's what we're getting (or not getting) due to New Zealand's very poor productivity.

And it's no state secret. As our friends over at the NZ Initiative think tank have pointed out:

Despite this comparatively high spending, New Zealand reaps a relatively poor return from its infrastructure investment. Alarmingly, we rank near the bottom 10 per cent of high-income countries for the efficiency of our infrastructure spending.

A cone-spiracy? 🤷

Your humble Taxpayers' Union suggests that when you're spending so much on traffic management there are (so we are told) more cones than there are sheep, overly zealous traffic management would be a good place to start to get more bang for our buck from NZTA.

No one is saying 'end all road cones' (well, maybe a few of us in the office), but when Alex and the team stumbled upon a single Wellington intersection with more than 200 road cones, surely something has to change?!

A tree-mendous waste of $1.2 million 🎄🎅🏻

Christmas is a time for family, and our Auckland ratepayer campaign has been digging deep.

On behalf of the Auckland Ratepayers' Alliance I found myself playing the Grinch when I broke the news that Auckland's new Christmas Tree cost up to $1.2 million. Ouch!

It seems no expense was spared on this 18-metre ornament, with Council committing $800,000 of rates money.

We can only assume the baubles are made of solid gold (we asked, but Auckland Council refused to provide a breakdown of the $1.3million – so it's anyone's guess).

Christchurch on the other hand erected their 10 metre Christmas tree for just four percent of the cost.

Wellington also managed three Christmas trees for about the same cost as Christchurch's one. You read that right: Wellington City Council actially kept costs down for something – it's a Christmas miracle!

Your household's $57 SolarZero charge: time for some sunlight ☀️🔥

Politicians love to give old fashioned corporate welfare new labels such as 'green investments'. But in the case of the $115 million taxpayer dollars basked onto SolarZero, a private company, through the so-called "Green Investment Finance Investment Bank" even an Orwellion name and $155million wasn't enough to stop the collapse.

According to the NZ Herald, Finance Minister Nicola Willis is "seeking advice" on the investment and why it went wrong.

Here's what the advice should say: Big gambles mean big losses, and taxpayers shouldn't have to front up with (in this company's case) $57 for every Kiwi household to subsides (via cheap capital) because a business or industry is green fashionable.

The Government was elected to cut wasteful spending. Corporate welfare funds like the Green Investment Finance Investment Bank would be a good place to start. After all, if you're a half decent investment banker, are you really likely to be working for the New Zealand Government...

More money muscled musseled out of Shane Jones 🦪💪

Speaking of corporate welfare, the hapless mussel farm in Opotiki has received yet another $16.5 million of taxpayer cash courtesy of Shane Jones.

Most Kiwis love a good seafood feast. But for those counting, this latest handout takes the total corporate welfare handouts to $52 million, for just one mussel farm!

We hope you like mussels because every NZ household has now stumped up $26 subsidising this one company.

Shane Jones says he wants to create a sustainable industry out of mussel farming in the area. But the company he's showering has never turned a profit. Not even once.

Speaking of creative accounting...

Official Dis-information? South Wairarapa District Council's audited accounts show wrong CEO pay numbers  🫢

They won't tell anyone what the extra money was for, except that it was in relation to "contractual obligations". Sounds like a golden goodbye to me...

Forcing every single one of the 7,400 households in the small district to chip in $10 as a goodbye a bit rich. But to then not disclose the payout (as required by law) is a bit poor, to say the least.

Have a great week,

Sam Warren    Local Government Campaigns Manager    New Zealand Taxpayers' Union

The Minister of Finance's spat with left-wing economist Craig Rennie for, apparently, making up a quote during a previous Budget lock-up should not affect the decision on whether to allow the Taxpayers' Union to attend (and report on) the Half-Year Fiscal and Economic Update to be released next week.

Speaking in response to the Minister of Finance's comments at the Post-Cab, Taxpayers' Union spokesman, Jordan Williams said:

"With one-in-14 voters receiving our Taxpayer Updates, more people receive news from the Taxpayers' Union about the Government fiscal situation than most of the 'media' organisations that attend Budget lock-ups."

"It appears the Taxpayers' Union is being singled out to try and 'balance' the decision to bar Craig Rennie from attending. But his bad behaviour is totally irrelevant in terms of whether our economist and staffers should be allowed to attend."

"Grant Robertson once tried this trick and attempted to bar the Taxpayers' Union from attending a Budget lock-up. Wiser heads eventually prevailed. Indeed, we can recall an Opposition Finance Spokesperson commenting that Robertson should ensure we can attend and report on these very matters."

Radio New Zealand reported yesterday that Finance Minister, Nicola Willis, stated that tax changes for charities, and closing of loopholes, will be announced at next year’s budget in May.

Taxpayers’ Union Acting Head of Campaigns, James Ross, said “this looks like a move in the right direction.”

“Businesses should be treated in exactly the same way by the tax system. Exempting a business’ profits from taxation because it is set up to fund charitable or religious activities is not the correct approach.”

“It’s inconceivable that all of the profits are used for these activities. Most businesses fund capital replacements and expansions entirely, or at least partly, from retained profits. These expenditures are not charitable activities and, in the normal course of business, are funded from after-tax profits.”

“The correct approach is to tax the profits made by all businesses in the same way and then to provide the appropriate tax rebates to any profits distributed for qualifying charitable activities.”

“This is how the system works for all other businesses and individual taxpayers. It should be no different just because a business operates to fund charitable activities.”

“The current arrangements provide an unfair competitive advantage to businesses that have a broad charitable purposes tax exemption, because profits reinvested in the business are not taxed, unlike all other businesses. The Government is correct to fix this anomaly in the tax system.”

The Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through Local Government Official Information and Meeting Act that Environment Southland has spent $32,871.17 to hunt one phantom wallaby that was ultimately never found.

The month long hunt involved Otago Regional Council, the Ministry of Primary Industries, thermal drones, biosecurity, dogs – and a team of management and comms staff.

“This result makes the National Wallaby Eradication Programme look more like a taxpayer funded social club than a crack team committed to stomping out pests” said Local Government Campaigns Manager, Sam Warren.

“One week alone saw $19,249.89 spent, with a staggering $13,000 towards staff and a further $6,000 on contractors – and that is without Council and MPI related costs on top."

“It’s hard not to wonder if the local hunting community would have done the job for less and actually manage to turn the phantom into a ghost."

“Review is urgently needed of this programme before the pest problem gets any worse, and ratepayers are left paying the bill.”

Waitaki District Council is defending its new logo following complaints from the public it more closely resembles certain aspects of the human anatomy.

“$100,000 of ratepayers' money has already been put towards this logo – which should probably come with an R-rating” said Local Government Campaigns Manager, Sam Warren.

“The Council used no less than two professional design firms for an outrageously expensive ‘W’ that doesn’t leave much to the imagination."

“Once the final design is confirmed, a further $200,000 – $300,000 will be spent on the changeover to replace existing signs. Meanwhile, rates in Waitaki have increased a whopping 13.73% on average this year alone. I’m not convinced a new anatomically-inspired logo is a priority at the moment."

“Other questions have been raised over the design’s shared similarities with a sustainable wool company. It’s crazy this amount of money has been wasted on a logo that, arguably, already exists."

“My advice is for council to ditch the expensive brand refresh and work on getting rates down for Waitaki locals.”

Waitaki District Council is defending its new logo following complaints from the public it more closely resembles certain aspects of the human anatomy.

“$100,000 of ratepayers' money has already been put towards this logo – which should probably come with an R-rating” said Local Government Campaigns Manager, Sam Warren.

“The Council used no less than two professional design firms for an outrageously expensive ‘W’ that doesn’t leave much to the imagination."

“Once the final design is confirmed, a further $200,000 – $300,000 will be spent on the changeover to replace existing signs. Meanwhile, rates in Waitaki have increased a whopping 13.73% on average this year alone. I’m not convinced a new anatomically-inspired logo is a priority at the moment."

“Other questions have been raised over the design’s shared similarities with a sustainable wool company. It’s crazy this amount of money has been wasted on a logo that, arguably, already exists."

“My advice is for council to ditch the expensive brand refresh and work on getting rates down for Waitaki locals.”