Mike's Minute: This was a classic centre-right budget

It's likely, and indeed forecasted, that if this Government is re-elected next year it will end its second term in 2029 having never run a surplus.

Now, that either means they spent too much, or they inherited a gargantuan mess.

The latter we know to be a fact. But the former is a bit debatable.

Depending on how you measure things, the forecast surplus in 2029 is so thin it might be less than nothing, and that’s the optimistic way of measuring things, which the Government now favours.

I wonder why?

The traditional way of measuring things still has a $3 billion hole by 2029.

The pay equity money turns out to be about $2.5 billion a year, which shows you how hopelessly loose pay equity became.

Primary teaching is not a pay equity issue, the same way nursing isn't. It’s a union pay grab. The opposition will still try and convince you otherwise, but they're wrong.

What we do know is the Government found $5 billion a year from savings and equity, which is a lot of money, but money that still allegedly needs spending, hence the ongoing deficits.

The dept-to-GDP keeps going up. It's too high. But under my way of doing things, the little there was handed out, or redistributed, yesterday wouldn’t have even been there.

But I suspect the politics of an approach that austere was too much to stomach.

But here is their issue; a conservative Government can only run things in the red for so long before the public quite rightly asks whether they actually know what they're doing.

Getting rid of KiwiSaver freebies for the so-called wealthy is a good move. Getting rid of Best Start freebies for wealthy families is also a good move.

Means testing wealthy families on jobless teenagers is common sense. It's already done on student allowance.

Depreciation for business assets is a good move. It encourages people to spend and take a punt - more of that please.

In the end it was a simple document because the Government has limited room to move and Governments should not be the home of all good ideas, bum wiping and problem solving.

They should set the mood and clear the run way.

It’s a classic centre-right Budget written in tough times.

What they need politically is people to understand just how tough it is and to give them leeway and some patience to ride this out.

As for those who dug us this hole in the first place - the less we hear from them the better.

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