一、老戏再度重演，我们听到了高调重弹─但是没有实质。

储备银行行长艾伦‧博拉得分，约翰‧基失分。

事实证明艾伦‧博拉是对的─约翰‧基矢言要追上澳洲的承诺仅是空谈─这份演说中没有一点内容代表着逐步改变。

相反，其内容意味着退缩。

里面没有大胆的计划或是任何计划。

总理的团队将这个演说炒作成是他最重要的谈话。

他们说，这是个重大的星期二。我看来更像是蹑手蹑脚的星期二。

他提出调涨GST的议题，这是我所反对的，而他在说到这个问题的时候却在颤抖。

「我们只是在考虑这件事。」

「我们还没有做出决定。」

「我们已要求对这个议题进行更多商讨。」

他们留了一个躲藏处，在民怨太过沸腾时可以快速回避。

他们说他们要的是公平的税负计划，但他们知道那其实是在降低富人的税率。

将最高所得税率降至30%会使总理每周光是他的薪水就多得$509元。他不需要这笔钱。

Telecom总裁保罗‧雷诺每周会多拿$2600元。

领取最低薪资的人继约翰‧基上个月给他们少得可怜的25仙之后，甚么也得不到。

领取平均薪资$48,600的人每周会拿到35仙，收入在$70,000的人也只有$12.69元。

GST会对于必须以所有收入维持生计、特别是有孩子的人们影响最大。

根据审计部的资料，因GST的调涨对人民所做的补贴，只会使额外的GST所收取的$22亿税收剩下$2亿元的盈余。

为何要麻烦做这件事？

难道人们对于他们必须购买的必需品付的钱还不够多吗？中低收入的人会因为通货膨胀而须支付更高的税负额，最后将支付更多的所得税。

总理应该告诉我们谁是赢家、谁是输家，但他没有这么做，因为真正的赢家是他那些高收入的朋友。

如果有补偿的话，大多数的纽西兰人将只会因GST调涨而增高的价格获得补偿。他们将付更多钱在面包、牛奶、电费、孩子的鞋子及学费以及奶酪上。

但这份声明谈的不只是税制。这是有关政府对于推动纽西兰发展的整体计划。

在这一点上，它缺乏实质、没有信念、毫无新意。

它只是一堆我们已经听过、重新加热过的老掉牙声明。

就像深夜电视节目一样，一再重复的放送。

由工党资助并发起的科普桥─已经重新宣布达第11次。国家党唯一的投入只是将它的工程提前6个月而已。

R&D研发方面，国家党废止了$20亿元的Fast Forward基金并取消研发的税负减免，他们突然又发觉这是个重要项目。

但他们说没有多余的钱投入在这个项目。澳大利亚在研发方面增加投入了25%，约翰‧基却假装他有计划要赶上澳大利亚。                                                                                   
约翰‧基说艾伦‧博拉认为我国没有计划要赶上澳大利亚是错的。他的看法是负面而悲观的。

但事实上博拉博士以及其他纽西兰人有理由抱持怀疑态度。

纽西兰以其资源如水、环境、制作出Avatar电影背后数码效果的创意，有潜力可以领先世界。

但国家党的这份发言中没有提到任何行动去释放那项潜力。

以约翰‧基所有的那些空谈，他的政府扩大了差距而不是缩小差距。

纽西兰的失业率一直以来总是低于澳大利亚的失业率，现在却是高出三成。

澳大利亚在技术及教育上进行投资。国家党在这里则撤销了纽西兰技术策略，让工会及雇主同感失望。

每5个年轻人中就有1个没有工作、教育或训练。在澳大利亚，这个数字少于十分之一。

让168,000名失业的国人重新就业的计划如今安在？这些纽西兰人中有超过四分之一的人已经失业超过6个月。

要扭转我们两周前在南奥克兰看到的悲惨景况的决心在哪里？

约翰‧基于去年12月说他对于失业数据相当满意。在他发表谈话的时候，另外又有18,000名纽西兰人加入失业的队伍。

他将失业描述为一个往回看的统计数字。他真正所谈的是那些已经失去生计的人的人权，以及所有由此而生的个人、社会及财务成本。

他于上周宣称，他的政府已经「对失业情况做所有能做的事」。

这根本不是事实。

就业峰会只是空谈─——沦为一个他宣称不会出现的谈话大会。它最多挽救了一些工作机会，同时却有数以万计的人失业。

澳大利亚采取严肃的步骤处理失业并降低了失业率。

我们在这里只有基先生以及班奈特女士的政治空谈，失业率则上升到17年的新高。

这份声明中有哪一点为辛勤工作以抚养家庭的纽西兰人提供希望？

数百个纽西兰家庭在去年由于真实的收入降低，他们难以支付账单。

                                                             （未完待续）

 Once again, we’ve heard the rhetoric – but there’s no substance.

 It’s Alan Bollard one, John Key nil.

 It’s proved Alan Bollard right – John Key’s promise to catch up with Australia is a hollow one – there’s nothing in this speech that represents step change.

Instead, it’s a step back.

There’s no bold plan or any plan at all.

This was hyped by the Prime Minister’s team to be his most important speech.

It was Big Tuesday, they said. More like Tiptoe Tuesday.

He signals a rise in GST, which I oppose, but he trembles as he says it.

“We’re only considering it”.

“No decisions have been made”.

“We’ve asked for more work to be done on it”.

They’ve left a bolt hole they can scamper into when the heat gets too much.

They say they want a fair tax package but they know that it is really about mates’ rates.

Cutting the top income tax rate down to 30% would give the PM, on his salary alone, $509 a week. He doesn’t need it.  

Paul Reynolds would get $2600 a week.

Someone on the minimum wage would get nothing, which comes after the miserable 25 cents John Key gave them last month.

A person on the average wage of $48,600 gets 35 cents a week and on $70,000 just $12.69. 

And GST would hurt most those who have to spend all their income to make ends met and particularly those with children.

Compensating people for the rise would leave just $200 million more in revenue out of the $2.2 billion in tax take from extra GST, according to Treasury.

Why would you bother?

Aren’t people paying enough for the things they have to buy? Low and middle income earners will ultimately pay more income tax as inflation puts them into higher tax brackets.

Mr Key should tell us who are the winners and who are the losers, but he has failed to do so because the real winners will be his well paid mates.

The bulk of New Zealanders at best will just get compensation for increased prices from GST, if that. They will pay more for their bread, milk, power and their kids’ shoes and school fees, and their block of cheese.

But this statement wasn’t just about tax. It was about the Government’s overall programme to advance New Zealand. 

In that, it lacks substance, it lacks conviction, it lacks anything new. 

It is a series of reheated announcements we’ve heard before.

Like late night TV, it’s repeat after repeat.

The Kopu Bridge – funded and initiated by Labour -- has been re-announced for the 11^th time. Even though National’s sole input was to bring it forward by six months.

R&D, where National abolished the $2 billion Fast Forward Fund and repealed the R&D tax credit, has been suddenly found by National to be important. 

But they say there's no extra money to put into it. Australia increased their R&D by 25% and John Key pretends he has a plan to catch up. 

John Key said Alan Bollard was wrong about there being no plan to catch up with Australia. He was negative, pessimistic. 

But in fact Dr Bollard and the rest of New Zealand were right to be cynical. 

New Zealand has the potential to be world beating, with its resources like water, its environment, ingenuity that gave us the digital effects behind Avatar.

But the National Party does nothing in this statement to unleash that potential.

And for all John Key’s rhetoric, his Government has widened the gap not narrowed it.

New Zealand’s unemployment, always lower than Australia’s, is now 30% higher.

Australia has invested in skills and education. National here has dumped the New Zealand Skills Strategy, to the dismay of unions and employers alike.

One in five Kiwi young people are not in work, education or training.

In Australia, it’s less than one in ten.

Where is the plan today to get 168,000 unemployed Kiwis back to work?

Over a quarter of these New Zealanders have bee out of work for more than six months.

Where is the commitment to turn around the sad situation we saw in South Auckland two weeks ago – 3,500 people desperately queuing for 150 low paid supermarket jobs?

John Key last December said he was pretty happy about the unemployment figures. An extra 18,000 extra Kiwis were joining the unemployment queue as he made that statement.

He described unemployment as a backward looking statistic. What he’s actually referring to is human beings who have lost their livelihoods, with all the personal, social and financial costs that entails.  

He claimed last week that his Government has done “as much as we possibly can about unemployment”.

That’s simply untrue.

The job summit was just hot air – the talkfest he claimed it wasn’t going to be. At best it saved a handful of jobs while tens of thousands were losing them.

The Aussie’s took serious steps to deal with unemployment and got it down across the Tasman.

Here we just got political rhetoric from Mr Key and Mrs Bennett and unemployment has risen to the highest level in 17 years.

What in this statement gives hope to hard working Kiwi’s to help their families get ahead?

Hundreds of Kiwi families struggled last year to pay their bills as real incomes fell.

                                                                                           （to be continued）