And Chris Luxon then shooting back that Winston's view is not surprising, because he's been there for 50 years, for goodness' sake, he's got a lot of entrenched views.
I'm actually surprised that Luxon and National are prepared to take this to the election, because you can already see it, right? You know how it's gone in the past, this is going to get heated.
And National is not really known at the moment for having the stomach for potentially unpopular ideas, so good on them for doing it - cause this has got to be done, if only to inject some private sector work ethic into these places.
I don't even know if I need to lay this argument out for you, but I will:
We know that the public sector is slower to get things done than the private sector, we know it's more likely to waste money, we know it's less likely to make money.
We got the figures last week, just on sick leave. Public sector workers take more sick days than private sector workers.
The partial sale of the power companies that happened under John Key's watch has already proved what can happen if you get some private discipline in there.
I mean those four power companies are now worth twice what they were when we sold half of them, so we haven't lost any value. And they pay more dividends, and we got to put money in our pockets.
And they've proven that we can do things differently to the way that it was done in the 80s and 90s, which freaked out Winston with the 100 percent sale of things like BNZ, 100 percent of BNZ, 100 percent of New Zealand Rail, 100 percent of Petrocorp.
We can sell 49%, less than half and we can still control the business. We get the money out of it though, we get some discipline into it and we make even more money from it.
Now, of course, I think the power company sales are an example of it going well. Others will blame those same sales for a drop-off in investment in renewable energy generation or an increase in power prices - which is exactly why this will be a contentious debate, because we all see it differently.
So good on the Nats for having the courage, by the looks of things, to go there next election.
Heather du Plessis-Allan is a journalist and commentator who hosts Newstalk ZB's Drive show HERE - where this article was sourced.
9 comments:
They could start by firing 40% of the public sector workers. After that saving, let’s see about selling some assets hmm?
The public sector attracts retards and malingerers. They can hide in plain sight because their bosses are also retards and malingerers. Add to the mix their majority progressive political views and you have a recipe for complete and very expensive disaster.
Government surrounded by piles of welfare recipients, the sick and fat, superannuates, public sector employees, working groups, consultants and other assorted assholes asking themselves what assets they can sell?
Do politicians think we are as stupid as they are. Promising change in the next election cycle while doing next to nothing whilst in power.
except the companies or enterprises they are looming to sell are not all govt depts, they are SOEs or the like.. think AirNZ, NzPost, NzFail, 50% in Power companies and so on.
If the asset entities could be run better, why not just run them better? While you're about it, why not run the public service better? This level of thinking - like 'I don't know what to do with these things so might as well just sell them' is far below what is required to turn NZ around. Luxon leading this looks nothing more than a 'game of mates exercise' fostering corporate cronyism. Like the US Democrats right now, that guy seems to have a knack only for consistently ending up on the wrong side of 80/20 issues (or 83/17 in NZ case).
National don't learn from history.
You're just writing nonsense about a topic that you know nothing about, Heather. Its a red herring; don't you get that? The scale of asset sales or recycling that Lux suckered you into thinking is a big issue is inconsequential to the scale of the fiscal blow-outs hitting health and pensions which are exploding our public debt. Lux and Willis have no plan whatsover to deal with them, pretending that asset sales somehow hold the key. They hold the key to nothing. Most significant assets that could be sold or recycled in NZ have already been. There's little more to talk of. Study one hour of finance or economics before you get suckered by Lux and Willis' PR and marketing clap-trap again, and again, and again.
It angers me when they sell off an asset.such as TVNZ for a nominal $100M, they hand it out a specious $50M to a kapahska group.
If Luxon would stop giving away large amounts of tax payer funds on a racist basis, the books will balance easily.
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