National’s
campaign chair has demanded Labour and the Greens explain
which smaller-party policies would emerge from coalition
negotiations – despite National refusing to do the
same.
Speaking to reporters in Auckland on Wednesday,
Simeon Brown said the situation for a Labour-led coalition
is “completely different” compared to a National-led
one.
“Because we have got very clear fiscal rules. We
took that to the last election, and we have a track record
of sticking to that in government. Labour and the Greens
don’t have a track record, in particular, Labour doesn’t
have a track record even when they’re in government with
themselves – they break all of their fiscal rules and they
break all of their tax promises.
“Labour will tax
more, borrow more, and spend more and New Zealanders have a
right to know what is Chris Hipkins prepared to sign up to
in order to do a deal with the Greens by
Christmas.”
Labour has stood by its fiscal
plan, with leader Chris Hipkins pointing to the last 30
years, saying hourly wages grew faster under Labour than
National, and that Labour has balanced the books 11 times
whereas National had only done so six times.
Brown
pushed back on reporters’ questions about which of New
Zealand First’s promises – which some commentators have
estimated at costing $50 billion to $100b – National would
take up.
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He also denied that David Seymour – who said
in 2023 he would like to be finance minister – could be
named in the role, saying that would be for Nicola Willis.
National has consistently attacked Labour over the risk that
Greens co-leader Chloe Swarbrick could be finance minister,
despite Hipkins ruling that out.
Asked what National
would do if Willis – a list-only MP – failed to return to
Parliament, he simply rejected that
possibility.
“Look, I’m not going into hypotheticals
… we have demonstrated that National-led governments have,
and the work that Nicola Willis has done shows, that we have
a proven track record. She is our finance spokesperson. She
will be our finance minister after the next election, and
she has demonstrated that she keeps to her commitments.
Labour governments don’t, and that is the clear choice at
this year’s election … it will it will be a National Party
Minister of Finance, and it will be Nicola
Willis.”
Some groups have been campaigning for
National supporters to party vote for smaller parties in the
right bloc to engineer an overhang. This would, however,
prevent the party’s list-only MPs from re-entering
Parliament.
Hipkins calls out ‘open racism’ in
current coalition
Labour leader Chris Hipkins took a
swipe back at National, saying he’s not sure how its
coalition partners will reconcile their proposed
policies.
Hipkins said he was surprised Brown didn’t
take the opportunity to set out how they’re going to pay to
renationalise the Bank of New Zealand – a New Zealand First
policy.
“Although now that Shane Jones has announced
he actually wants to buy three of the major trading banks
that are currently based in Australia, I think they might be
having even more difficulty making those numbers add
up.”
Hipkins said New Zealand First had promised
billions in additional spending the National Party had “no
idea how it’s going to pay for.”
“David Seymour, on
the other hand, wants to cut hundreds of billions of dollars
worth of spending.
“Goodness only knows how they would
ever reconcile that around a cabinet table, particularly
with David Seymour as the Minister of Finance, given Nicola
Willis is unlikely to be in the next
Parliament.”
Hipkins said there’s “open racism” in the
coalition, and fighting amongst government
ministers.
“Winston Peters thinks Christopher Luxon is
a fascist. He thinks that he’s out of his
depth.
“We’ve seen what that looks like. New
Zealanders don’t need three more years of it.”
Hipkins
also said he’d welcome the Opportunity Party ruling out New
Zealand First, saying it would put their ability to side
with the coalition on “shaky ground.”
“I’ll always
welcome other political parties taking a principled stance
where they’re standing up for New Zealanders when they’re
being the subject of racism and sexism by other political
leaders.”
On the promises by smaller parties, Hipkins
acknowledged those weren’t new, saying they’d always made
“very, very big promises that have been
unrealistic.”
“That’s not new to this election, it is
up to us as the party that proposes to lead government to
provide a responsible way forward.
“Every promise that
we have made in this election campaign, I know we will be
able to deliver on.”
He maintained Barbara Edmonds
would be finance minister in a government he led, “goodness
only knows who National would put up to be finance minister
should they be part of the next government.”
“It’s not
even clear who they’d be putting up to be prime minister,
given Christopher Luxon’s own team tried to roll them three
times.”
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