By Alex Tarrant
Labour Party leader Phil Goff has criticised Prime Minister John Key's management of the economy over the last three years in the latest of blows traded between the two as the November 26 election approaches.
Speaking to unionists in Porirua this morning, Goff outlined 10 points which he said showed Key and the governing National Party had failed to deliver on the economy.
Goff said he would not accept excuses from Key such as the Christchurch earthquakes, global recession, or that National had inherited a fiscal mess from the previous government.
Key hit back later on Tuesday, saying Goff seemed to be in a state of denial that any of those events had happened.
"Just in the same way he's in denial in the fact that he won't admit his books won't add up," Key said.
"So I think he'd be better to focus on the real world which is, these are very difficult times for New Zealand but I think as a Government we are doing the best we can," he said.
Goff's comments appeared to be an attempt by Labour to attack the brand of Key - Goff said many New Zealanders continued to support Key personally rather than National, "because they believe he has made a personal fortune for himself; maybe he can do it for New Zealand".
However, Goff said the attack was not on John Key 'the person', but on his record as Prime Minister.
"A lot of people voted for him on the basis of his promise of a brighter future and his claim he was ambitious for New Zealand. But the simple fact is he has failed to deliver," Goff said.
Here's Goff's ten Key criticisms:
- Unemployment has increased by 50 per cent, leaving 157,000 New Zealanders out of work.
(Source: Statistics New Zealand, Household Labour Force Survey)- 100,000 New Zealanders have left for Australia after he promised he would stop the brain drain. (Source: Statistics New Zealand, International Travel and Migration)
- Prices have gone up nearly four times faster than incomes over the past 3 years. John Key increased prices by hiking GST after promising not to.
(Source: Statistics New Zealand, New Zealand Income Survey and Consumer Price Index)
- The first credit rating downgrade in 13 years and a double downgrade at that.
(Source: Westpac, Weekly Commentary: Sign of the times, 3 October 2011)
- There are 60,000 more people on benefits costing an extra $1 billion a year.
(Sources: MSD, National Benefit Factsheet and Monthly Benefit Data; and Treasury, Pre-election Economic and Fiscal Update 2011)
- The wage gap with Australia has increased by $32 a week.
(Sources: Statistics New Zealand, Quarterly Employment Survey and Australian Bureau of Statistics, Average Weekly Earnings, PPP adjusted)
- There are 55,200 15 to 24 year olds not in education, employment or training and the number of young people on the unemployment benefit long term has increased by over 700 per cent.
(Sources: Statistics New Zealand, Household Labour Force Survey, NEETs and Hon Paula Bennett, Question for Written Answer 6058 )
- The economy has grown by just 0.4 per cent since John Key took office.
(Source: Statistics New Zealand, Gross Domestic Product)
- National’s tax cuts for the most well off were supposed to be paid for with the GST increase. They actually cost an extra $1.1 billion in their first nine months.
(Source: Treasury, Financial Statements of the Government of New Zealand for the year ended 30 June 2011)- The underclass has grown with the number of children living in benefit dependent households increasing by over 32,000 in the past 3 years. (Source: New Zealand Council of Christian Social Services, Vulnerability Report, Sept 2009 and Sept 2011)
'No excuses'
Goff said it was hard for Key to be smug about the points he provided. Key responded by saying he didn't "really care what Phil Goff thinks".
"I work 19 hours a day, seven days a week to try and make New Zealand a better country," Key said.
Goff said Key would use excuses when confronted with the figures Labour had presented, "because he’s really good at describing the problem but not so good at fixing it".
He’ll say, “well, actually there’s been a global recession”; Or “We’ve had the earthquakes to deal with”; Or “We’ve tried to take the rough edges off the recession”; Or “We inherited a mess from the last government”," Goff said.
"Sure, there’s been a global financial crisis – but that actually started before John Key became Prime Minister. He knew well before he arrived at the Beehive the world was in turmoil and things had to change. Yes, we have had the Canterbury earthquakes. These were tragic events that claimed lives, ripped up a city and set the economy back, but:
- Unemployment had already increased 50 per cent
- economic growth was already crawling
- people were already leaving for Australia in their droves
- the deficit was already climbing – yes, the earthquake accounts for half of the deficit but is John Key telling New Zealanders he’s happy with a $9 billion deficit?"
"The earthquakes simply made a really bad situation worse," Goff said.
"Do you really think he’s taken the hard edges off the recession when unemployment has increased 50 per cent and family budgets are squeezed because prices outstripped wage growth? When the number of young people who are long-term unemployed has increased 700 per cent?" Goff asked.
"The claim that the last Labour Government left the books in a mess and we were spendthrifts is one of the biggest myths John Key and National have peddled this term. The fact is Labour ran surpluses and paid back the debt while government spending as a percentage of GDP only rose once National took office," he said.
Bill English actually summed up the healthy state of the books left by Labour before the spin doctors got to him. In December 2008 – at the height of the Global Financial Crisis – he said this was the rainy day we had been saving for. Labour was the party that put money away in the good times despite John Key calling for tax cuts," he said.
"We have only weathered the storm as well we have because of the actions of the last Labour Government. When you look at what he has actually done, he has cut taxes for the rich and borrowed to pay for them, put up GST and hacked twice at KiwiSaver."
(Updates with comments from PM Key, link to policy section, video of Goff)
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