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National finance spokesman Paul Goldsmith dismissed allegations of a fiscal hole in its alternative budget in a debate at RNZ on Friday morning.
Goldsmith played down allegations that it had twice counted $ 3.9 billion in National’s alternative budget.
That money originally came from a fund called the New Zealand Upgrade Program, but when Stuff alerted National that the fund no longer existed, Goldsmith said it would find the extra money by reallocating spending from another government fund, the National Ground Transportation Fund.
Paul Goldsmith and Grant Robertson squared off in the RNZ financial debate.
He told the debate moderator, Corin Dann, that National had made changes to the way its transportation plan would be funded since it was announced in July.
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Originally, a third of that $ 31 billion plan would come from the Covid-19 fund (contributing $ 7 billion) and the New Zealand Update Fund (contributing $ 3.9 billion).
National has decided that it will instead spend $ 4.7 billion from the Covid-19 fund on tax cuts and instead fund part of the transportation package by increasing government capital allocations.
Goldsmith said the $ 3.9 billion from the New Zealand Upgrade Fund would come by raiding the NZTA’s National Ground Transportation Fund, the amount of money funded by fuel taxes and road user charges.
Goldsmith slightly changed his tone on the financial debate, telling RNZ that the $ 3.9 billion would also come from capital allocations.
STUFF
Paul Goldsmith admits to an error in the National Party’s figures, but says it will make no difference to the promised tax cuts.
“We have also changed, because the Government allocated the additional money from that upgrade fund to capital allocations, we have increased our capital allocations,” Goldsmith said.
But Stuff It was later clarified that the $ 3.9b would still come from the NLTF, meaning that National would look to reallocate roughly $ 10b of the $ 48b NLTF over the next decade.
“It is no different than what has been said in recent days. We’ll take it from the NLTF, “Goldsmith said. Stuff.
Finance spokesmen also grappled with New Zealand’s rising debt levels, with Goldsmith accusing Labor’s Grant Robertson of not having a plan to return to surplus.
“What we don’t hear from Labor is any plans to control the debt,” Goldsmith said.
“There is no plan by this government to return to surplus,” he said.
Robertson replied that National’s plan did not add up.
Robertson said Goldsmith didn’t have a plan to fund increases in basic costs for things like healthcare.
National’s alternative budget, for the next two years, has remaining operating allocations of less than $ 1 billion. That means less than $ 1 billion to fund the rising cost of running basic government services.
Robertson said this was not credible and said it would not even cover projected increases in the cost of healthcare.
He said the average increase in health spending over the past five budgets has been $ 767 million.
“In the last five budgets, the average has been for new health expenditures to keep our hospitals running, the average has been $ 767 million coming from National and Labor,
“Paul has left 800 million dollars for everything, health, education, police, everything,” said Robertson.
“The things that are left in your budget are the extras, you are not funding the basics here,” he said.
The couple also discussed skyrocketing house prices in New Zealand.
Goldsmith said his party tried to deal with housing affordability by introducing the two-year bright line test, which the current government has extended to five years.
He also said his party has vowed to revoke the extension and delay the test to two years.
Neither would put a number on how expensive the houses should be relative to income.
Robertson said that house prices were too high in Auckland relative to income.
“What we want to see is a period of sustained moderation in house prices,” Robertson said.
Goldsmith said: “Housing is expensive in New Zealand.
“We have an absolute focus on reducing the cost of producing new houses.”
