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Hi,
Sometimes politicians complain about the Taxpayers' Union. 90 percent of the time, it means we're right on target in holding them to account...
And this week was no different.
MPs squirm as Taxpayers' Union drop truth bombs to Budget Committee 💣
The Government is currently consulting on this year's "Budget Policy Statement" - in effect, the guard rails determined by Cabinet to inform officials and Ministers as they assess "budget bids" (i.e. proposals for new spending) and prepare May's Government Budget. "Goals", "objectives", "fiscal intentions" and bureaucrat-speak for whether and how we continue to spend beyond our means.
So, as we do every year, your humble Taxpayers' Union gets 10 minutes to lay it out the fiscal issues the Government would rather ignore – and it's not pretty.
After the whole "Nicola's Fudge" and Ruth Richardson debate brouhaha, it's fair to say the team are determined to highlight the laundry list of new taxes and unaffordable spending being proposed by Labour, the Greens, and Te Pari Māori (more on that next week!).
But this week when asked by Government MPs what we make of Nicola Willis's fiscal strategy, we could hardly sugar coat it.
Even adjusting for population growth and inflation, government spending is higher now than when Grant Robertson was in charge. The surplus is further away than when the Government was elected, and the structural deficit is larger!
That's not progress.
But National Party MPs did *not* like hearing about that – and they tried firing back with barbs... 💥
Watch the submission on the Budget Policy Statement here ▶️
I was in the office next door watching the livestream – the tension was coming through the wall. 🫨
Did the team go too far? Do I need to stop Jordan from taking questions from MPs? Or were they right to hold the Government MPs to account for their pre-election promises?
Really keen to hear what you make of it – comment on the video(or email me back).
Labour's fiscal la la land over pay equity 🦄
Lest you think the other side of the aisle is a fiscal panacea, Labour is guilty too of having their heads in the sand on balancing the books.
Earlier this week Chris Hipkins dismissed Treasury’s estimate that restoring Labour’s old pay equity regime could cost up to $12.8 billion over the next four years alone (that's $6,271 per household), saying the numbers “appear to be made up”.
That’ll be news to Treasury, who were the same department Labour relied on for every Budget, fiscal update, and press conference when they were in office.
It's a cheap 'shot the messenger'-style shot from Hipkins who is looking ever more desperate to avoid questions on how to make the numbers work without a massive tax raid on Kiwis.
We know staff in the Labour Party Leader's Office read Taxpayer Update. 👋 Our message to Mr Hipkins is if he really thinks Treasury's numbers are wrong, then show us your workings.
Who wouldn't support pay equity? 💪
Now before you say I'm a right wing anti-woman zealot, let me explain what Labour are actually talking about when they say they want 'pay equity'.
It’s not “equal pay for equal work”. That’s been illegal since the 1970s. No one’s arguing a female teacher should earn less than a male teacher doing the exact same job.
What Labour’s 2020 rules said was that any occupation that was “predominantly female” could launch a claim demanding their wages be topped up to match some “comparable” male-dominated job – even if the jobs had nothing in common except a union organiser with a spreadsheet.
Put another way, Labour had transformed pay equity from a targeted fix for sex discrimination into a broad mechanism for wage hikes across sectors, often without clear evidence of gender-based undervaluation.
And boy, did the comparators get creative!
Social workers (predominantly female, involving emotional support, case management, and community welfare) were lined up against air traffic controllers and detectives (male-dominated, high-stress roles with technical precision, life-or-death decisions, and specialised training).
Librarians were compared to transport engineers. Clerical and admin staff in Health NZ were told they deserved the same as mechanical and civil engineers.
Primary teachers were bundled into mega-claims against builders and tradesmen.
This wasn’t fixing discrimination and, as you'd expect, by the time the current Government came into power, the anticipated costs had totally blown out.
At first glance it sounds lovely: “Women deserve fair pay!” Who could possibly disagree? In simplistic gotcha headlines (only right wing bigots don't support gender pay equity?!) that mask economic reality.
That’s exactly why it was such diabolically effective slogan politics. Hipkins knows the average voter wouldn’t dig into the fine print about 14-factor “mathematical matrices” comparing emotional intelligence to radar screen management. They just hear “pay rise for women” and think it sounds nice.
But nice slogans don’t pay the bills. Treasury’s $12.8 billion ($3.2 billion per year) figure isn’t “made up” — it’s the cold, hard cost of letting 33 separate claims run their course under Labour’s 2020 regime.
To put the figure in perspective, the annual cost of the existing claims alone is two-and-a-half times the entire allowance for new spending!
Saying yes to Hipkins would mean no money for Police, Health, or Education to keep up with inflation or population growth.
Counting Labour's unicorns 🦄
Hipkins cries “made up” and pretends the whole thing was just a harmless feel-good policy.
That’s not leadership. That’s the politics of fiscal unicorns and denial.
Promising the world, ignoring the price tag, then shooting the messenger when Treasury dares to show the receipts reeks of the Ardern-era.
That's why we're here: Because someone has to call it out.
ATTN councils: here's 103 ways to save money 🙌
This week, we launched our latest briefing paper, 103 Ways to Save Money in Local Government – our latest guide for local councils, ready for their next budget meeting.
On average, council rates have increased by 34 percent in just three years. Enough is enough.
So rather than just complain, we're highlighting practical suggestions, and instances of local councils saving ratepayer money.
For example, Porirua City Council is saving $60,000 a year by ending its funding that kept the local Chamber of Commerce on side. Ashburton District Council is saving $10,000 annually simply by switching to electronic agendas. And Christchurch City Council saved more than $163,000 per year by leaving the wasteful Local Government New Zealand lobby group.
 As put by the Whanganui Mayor, Andrew Tripe, in his foreword to the report:
The Taxpayers’ Union’s scrutiny is welcome. It sharpens our focus and keeps public discussion where it belongs: on results for households. I look forward to continuing to work with central and local partners to keep Whanganui moving forward — delivering the basics well, protecting household budgets, and giving permission to dare to dream about the so-called nice to haves which make our communities more liveable.
Read the briefing paper here.
Giving local councils the playbook on where to make savings means there are no excuses for continued rates blowouts.
Over the next few weeks, we'll be sending a copy of the report to every councillor in the country.
Remuneration Authority chair schilling for Western-BOP councillor salary explosion 💥
Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve been in the thick of it with the Remuneration Authority — and what’s happened in Western Bay of Plenty shows exactly why this matters.
The headlines were stark: our Council Pay Increase Dashboardrevealed Western Bay councillors pocketed an average 57 percent pay rise, taking the typical councillor salary to about $80,000.
At a time when ratepayers are being squeezed, that’s quite the uplift.
You can read the full exposé in the Bay of Plenty Times here 📰
But when we called it out, the Remuneration Authority wasn’t thrilled.
How dare the Taxpayers' Union ensure its decisions are being publicly exposed and critiqued?!
As if to prove the point that the Remuneration Authority is totally out of touch, its Chair, Geoff Summers, went on to Newstalk ZB to spin and obfuscate.
Basically Summers tried to suggest that because only the total pool for the Councillors and Mayor had been set (not the individual salary allocation), it wasn't fair to criticise it because "averages" while being correct, aren't (he claims) "accurate". 🙄
Confused? So were we– but Summer assured listeners that it's all too hard to explain on the radio anyway.
Somehow though, it apparently makes the 57 percent bigger average councillor pay packet less bad.
That sort of BS spin sure justifies some high remuneration...
As you'd expect, Heather du Plessis-Allan was having nothing of it. Have a listen here.
The personification of the Wellington self-entitled blob 🧌
Geoff Summers demonstrates why it's time for a taxpayer representative to sit on the Remuneration Authority.
Reflecting his background is as a trade unionist activist, academic, and Pacifica NGOs, we can't find anything that suggests Summers has build or run anything that hasn't relied on taxpayers.
Far from sticking up for the ratepayers footing the bill, he's trying to be clever to avoid transparency and defend his own Authority's decisions.
To see how much more your local mayor and councillors are pocketing, click here to see the Council Pay Rates Dashboard.
Time for a cat among the pigeons? 🐈⬛
Coincidentally, applications closed this week for a vacant spot on the Remuneration Authority.
Keep it to yourself , but never one to shy away, we put Jordan’s name forward and twisted his arm to agree to a last-minute application... 🤫
Now we wait and see whether the Minister responsible, Brooke van Velden, is brave enough to appoint an outsider. After all, she said herself she wants 'great candidates'...
NZ Defence Force: Train to kill, or train to kōrero?
While global tensions are rising and our allies rearm, New Zealand’s Defence Force wants to introduce Māori cosmology to their core training.
As reported by the NZ Herald:
The NZ Army’s new “general orders” to soldiers uses a pantheon of te ao Māori gods as guiding influences for its strategy “to achieve a bicultural status by enabling the recognition of Māori cultural interests as they are guaranteed within Te Tiriti o Waitangi”. [read more]
Call us uncultured, but we reckon the Defence Force's purpose is in the name: defend New Zealand. That means ships that sail, planes that fly, and personnel who are trained and deployable.
Every dollar has an opportunity cost. And at a time when vessels sit idle due to staffing shortages and billions are needed for upgrades, should cultural courses be the priority?
The Māori Battalion were warriors, not woke workshop attendees. They stormed beaches, charged bayonets, and held lines through Greece, Crete, El Alamein and Italy — suffering over 2,600 casualties and earning 99 honours, including a Victoria Cross.
Their mana came from fierce combat skill and courage, not from embedding gods into “general orders” or chasing bicultural status points.
We reckon that if those real toa could see today’s Army mandating Tūmatauenga’s “cosmological traditions” as core strategy, they’d shriek:“We fought for freedom — not to turn barracks into neo-pagan seminars!”
The standing orders purport to honour Māori culture. In reality they dilute military purpose with ideology when we need fighters, not philosophers.
LAST CALL: Join us at Parliament for the 8th Annual Jonesie Government Waste Awards 🐽🏆
For our Wellington based supporters, this is your friendly reminder to RSVP to the most prestigious awards show of the season!
Join us at Parliament as we celebrate the most extravagant, eye-watering, and downright nutty examples of local and central government spending. It’s our annual tongue-firmly-in-cheek awards ceremony where waste gets the red carpet treatment it truly deserves.
📍 Legislative Council Chamber, Parliament
🗓 Thursday 12 March
⏰ 1.00pm–1.30pm
🎩 Black tie optional. Sharp sense of humour essential.
If you’re local to Wellington — or will be in town — come along, meet the team, and experience the best awards show in town live.
Parliamentary security requires a guest list, so RSVP by 12pm Tuesday 10 March to secure your spot.
Good luck to all our nominees!
Thanks for your support, and enjoy the rest of your weekend.
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Tory Relf
Head of Comms
New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union
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