Liberty International: Sir Roger Douglas Selected as Freedom Torch Awardee 2026

Liberty International is proud to announce that Sir Roger Douglas will receive the Freedom Torch Award 2026, in recognition of his enduring contributions to individual liberty, economic freedom, and public policy reform.

Sir Roger Douglas, Freedom Torch Awardee 2026

Professor Robert MacCulloch and Sir Roger Douglas: The Superannuation Debate

PRESS RELEASE

Professor Robert MacCulloch
Matthew S. Abel Chair of Macroeconomics
University of Auckland

Sir Roger Douglas
NZ Finance Minister 1984-88

The NZ Initiative, which is funded by our largest corporates, has attacked super savings for all. One of its former staffers is Prime Minister Luxon's Chief Policy Adviser.

NZCPR Newsletter: Good Policy Requires Courage

When the Coalition became Government in 2023, their priority was to reverse the devastating social and economic impact of the former Ardern-Hipkins Government. Their failings were universal, but particularly evident in the economy.

As a result of Labour’s six years in office, Core Crown expenditure escalated from 27 percent of GDP in 2017, to almost 35 percent, and net core Crown debt more than doubled from below 20 percent, to over 42 percent.

Labour’s profligate spending and excessive borrowing had plunged the country into hyperinflation followed by a double-dip recession.

NZCPR Newsletter: Transforming Our Future

When Labour launched their failed Three Waters scheme in 2021, which aimed to confiscate council water services and amalgamate them into mega-authorities controlled by Maori, one of the major concerns raised was over the financing of the scheme.

The quantum of the proposed debt was eye-watering - some $180 billion was to be borrowed. Their figures were made more attractive because the repayment of that debt fell outside of their 30-year cash flow projections!

This controversial funding arrangement was likened to a Ponzi scheme – one day the chickens would come home to roost and the money would have to be paid back.

NZCPR Newsletter: In Search of Solutions

According to the American economist and social philosopher Thomas Sowell, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute, “The most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work. Therefore we should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.”

Recent experience in New Zealand can testify to the truth of that quote.

After six years in office inflicting their flawed ideology onto the country, Labour failed in virtually everything they touched.

Michael Reddell: Not on the “brink of bankruptcy”

This coming Sunday will be the 40th anniversary of the 1984 election, which ushered in a decade of radical economic reform in New Zealand. The Listener magazine has a cover story (or set of them) on “Rogernomics and how it continues to shape our lives”. The first article is by Danyl McLauchlan (and isn’t bad in itself, even if it could have done with some economic policy fact-checking in a few places), which the contents page introduced with the description that the accelerated reform programme was a “momentous shift in direction for a country on the brink of bankruptcy”. The only problem with that story is that it simply wasn’t so.

Heather du Plessis Allan: Roger Douglas is right - we have too much debt

Today is 40 years to the day since Rob Muldoon called the snap election.  

Which then, of course, led to his defeat. Which then, of course, led to the incoming Labour Government, realised we were nearly broke as a country. Which then led to them embarking on the most amazing set of reforms which they do not get enough credit for to this day - and get way too much grief for.  

It is a really interesting anniversary for us to mark right now - as we find ourselves in a recession that feels like the worst that many of us have ever experienced. As we watch old names in New Zealand, like Smith and Caughey give up. As we see projections that the country's debt will just keep growing. 

Dr Bryce Wilkinson: A response to Sir Roger Douglas on Budget 2024 challenges

Eminent New Zealander, Sir Roger Douglas has renewed his case for radical changes to fiscal policy in the last three weeks. The issues are relevant to Budget 2024.

His voice should be heard. As minister of finance in 1984, he faced a major financial and economic mess. It took him and the next four ministers of finance to deal with that mess, but he set the path. His party took many tough decisions. They worked.

Richard Prebble: An 86-year-old has better budget policies

A “pakeha budget” would not cut the NZ Symphony Orchestra funding and maintain funding to Te Māngai Pāho. The agency’s CEO in a press release said the budget “signaled good news for the te reo sector…continuity of funding” for Maori media.

A “pakeha budget” would not fail to fund the election promised new cancer treatments while lowering the bowel screening age for Māori and Pasifika from 60 to 50 years old.

In a multi-racial country it is dangerous for politicians to claim, as Labour’s Willie Jackson did in his Herald article, that this was “the most anti-Māori Budget in a generation”.

NZCPR Newsletter: Time for Reform

When Treasury prepared its four-yearly Long-Term Fiscal Position report in 2021, the forecasts showed that the rising cost of funding the healthcare and pensions of retirees would bankrupt New Zealand by 2061 if policies remained the same.

The problem is demography. While retirees currently number around 800,000, between 2060 and 2070 they are expected to approach 2 million. At that time, the number of workers per pensioner, will fall from around four to one today, to just two to one.

NZCPR Newsletter: Budget Challenges

As the new Government puts the finishing touches to this month’s Budget, they will undoubtedly have had their hands full dealing with the economic mess that Labour created.

Not only was Labour a grossly incompetent manager of the economy, but they also set out to sabotage the new administration’s ability to balance the budget and deliver on their election promises.

Liam Dann: Money Talks - Roger Douglas on losing faith in all the parties including Act

Extract from the Herald:

Roger Douglas, former Labour Finance Minister and co-founder of the Act Party, is plainly unimpressed with modern politics.

“Look at the last 20 years, you tell me anyone, any Government that’s done anything,” he says.

Douglas, now 86, probably has more right than most to make that claim, having been the key driver of an economic revolution in his four years as Finance Minister, from 1984 to 1988.

To many Kiwis it was a revolution that saved the country from bankruptcy, pulling it out of a spiral of debt and depression.

NZCPR Newsletter: Aspirational Reform

The last six years of inept management by the Hipkins-Ardern Labour Government has exposed a multitude of problems facing the country that need to be addressed.

Since poor public sector performance has become the norm in most policy areas, the lack of resilience of many New Zealand families to cope with the resulting adversity, is now a growing concern.

Nowhere is this more evident than in health, where the contrast between being forced onto a public hospital waiting list for specialist treatment, and having the resources to pay for private care, could mean the difference between life and death.

NZCPR Podcast: A Big Idea

The government is the answer to our problems, at least that’s what the politicians would like us to believe. 

Since Labour took office in 2017 there has been a seismic shift towards greater state intervention and socialist control. But it is also true that all of the major parties have moved to the left. 

NZCPR Newsletter: A Big Idea

“The bedrock of any successful democracy is that it delivers government of the people, by the people, for the people. In the case of our current government, and too many other western democracies, this once abiding principle has been subverted. We now have government of the people, by the government, for the government.”
– Sir Roger Douglas 2023

How on earth has a fiercely independent nation like New Zealand, with its number eight fencing wire heritage and strong pioneering spirit, reached a point where The Government is doing almost everything for us – including feeding our children?

Sir Roger Douglas: Timeless Wisdom – The Politics of Successful Structural Reform

It’s a well-known pattern in public policy – profligate politicians damaging their economies with out-of-control spending, massive borrowing and higher taxes – inevitably leading to fiscal crisis, sharp declines to growth and ultimately rapidly falling currency value and living standards. 

How do countries recover from such negative downward policy spirals?  The answer is bold and quality “structural reform” to right size government, eliminate special interest privilege and create an environment for strong private sector growth. 

The following article was written in 1990 by Sir Roger Douglas, who was the finance minister in the Lange Labour Government between 1984 and 1988. He was the driving force in rescuing his country from financial collapse with bold structural policy reforms which became known as “Rogernomics”.   Sir Roger was voted as one of the most influential New Zealanders of the past century.

Peter Holle: A Canadian Perspective - Rogernomics in 2020

Many Winnipeggers are disappointed that Exchange District restaurant Hermano’s is closing. It is just one of thousands of businesses which will not survive the government’s drastically overwrought and badly informed decision to shut down the economy in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

History will show how wildly inaccurate computer models grossly exaggerated fatality projections. Unfortunately, too many folks still think holding the economy underwater will end the virus’s progression. Sadly, it is just delaying the virus; we can expect Covid to return after the summer.

But hold the panic. A May 21 National Post commentary by 4 infectious disease doctors discussed their study which showed that in Canada, the individual rate of death from COVID-19 for people under 65 years of age is just six per million people, or 0.0006 percent. This is roughly equivalent to the risk of dying from a motor vehicle accident within the same time period.

NZCPR Weekly: New Zealand at a Crossroads

Dear NZCPR Reader,   

This week, in considering the economic crisis created by the Government’s over-reaction to the pandemic, we question whether our future will embrace freedom and liberty or increasing State control, our NZCPR Guest Commentator Sir Roger Douglas shares his plan for ensuring New Zealand emerges from this crisis as a stronger and richer society, and our poll asks whether you want the Government to be more or less active in the long term management of the economy.

*To read the newsletter click HERE.
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NZCPR Weekly: Ideas for a Better Future

Dear NZCPR Reader,   

This week we share some innovative policy ideas to create an opportunity society, our NZCPR Guest Commentator Sir Roger Douglas outlines a plan to eliminate dependency and transform New Zealand’s future – and we ask readers whether we have your backing to continue bringing you our newsletters in 2020 HERE.

*To read the newsletter click HERE.
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