Well as far election bribes go, I’ll have this one, thank you!
Good move from Chris Hipkins extending the fuel tax discount through to June. To be fair, he had no choice.
He could hardly start adding tax back onto fuel in the middle of cost of living crisis, could he?
Honestly, I’m a little surprised by the conversation this afternoon, to hear how many people are ungrateful and are calling it a stupid idea.
I mean, be cynical, sure. This is an election bribe, no doubt about it. But being ungrateful and calling it stupid seems weird.
What would you rather have? The Government adding this tax back on and bringing in more money for them to spend? That’s not a good call.
I have no confidence that any money I give them ends up making this country better right now.
They’ll happily spend $9000 a week on consultants for a media merger that’s not going to happen, and are still to this day leasing office space for a bike bridge they’ve already canned at a cost of $600K.
Meanwhile, we have a growing number of potholes on our roads, our nurses have to beg for pay rises, and our wait-lists for specialist appointments just keep growing.
They’ll happily fund endless cycleways from the Land Transport fund, meanwhile, have you ever seen so many potholes?
And this is not even to mention the families right now, who clearly really need the money.
There’s data out today showing more than 400K people ended last year behind on their bills- power bills, credit bills, home loans. This money’s going to make a difference to them.
I’d rather they have it, than Labour have it. This is the party that plans to spend $660,000 on an IT system for Nanaia Mahuta’s Three Waters.
This is what I predict: This tax is never coming back under this Labour Government.
They’ve extended the discount out to June. But the tax isn’t coming back in June.
They’re just doing this to give Chris Hipkins another chance in June to hold a big media conference and extend it again, and get some of us feeling grateful to him again four months out from an election.
Fine by me. As I say, this is one election bribe I will happily pocket because it is better in my pocket than theirs.
Heather du Plessis-Allan is a journalist and commentator who hosts Newstalk ZB's Drive show.
2 comments:
Fair commentary Heather. Most of us have no say in these manoeuverings anyhow, but at least we can see them for what they are.
It still amuses me that we have a socialist government which is happy to spend taxpayer money to subsidise the wealthier segment of society into shiny new Teslas, and other models of e-car. Most working and middle class citizens can't even dream of these smart new vehicles, so with the cost of everything heading north yes let's just accept some relief in the cost of the fuels that the majority of us use.
It's a no-brainer but why June?
He honestly isn't going to put the tax back on then, just 4 months out from the election, is he.
Is it so he can look good again by telling us in June he will be postponing it one more.
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