The Treasury has released its briefings to incoming ministers, but they contained very little information about fiscal and economic challenges or priorities.
While some other agencies included specific advice and contextual information, Treasury’s briefings were mostly about the responsibilities of the minister and structure of the agency.
A separate presentation on “Treasury’s view on the overall economic and fiscal context” was given to Finance Minister Nicola Willis, but was not released with the main document.
The 2017 and 2020 briefings to Grant Robertson both included a set of slides outlining the agency's strategic assessment and possible policy direction for 20 to 30 key issues.
Interest.co.nz has asked for the presentation to be released.
Revenue, infrastructure, and earthquakes
Briefings prepared by the agency for other ministers included a little more detail, although were still fairly sparse.
Revenue Minister Simon Watts was told he would receive a separate briefing on “on a number of current issues in the tax system”.
These issues included the sustainability of the tax system, emissions leakage and other environmental tax and pricing issues, and international tax issues such as “the OECD two-pillar solution”.
Minister for Infrastructure, Chris Bishop was told Treasury would discuss the need to reprioritise and re-sequence the investment pipeline which was overwhelming capacity.
“Significant levels of capital funding have been allocated in recent years and this has led to an investment pipeline larger than agencies and the market can deliver, leading to cost increases and project delays,” it said.
The delivery of large-scale investments were dependent on large Tier 1 firms which were already “at capacity”.
The Treasury also advised the Minister Responsible for the Earthquake Commission that insurance costs were climbing due to the various crises in the past few years.
“In future, the increasingly granular risk-based pricing of flood insurance, in combination with climate change exacerbating underlying flood risks, will challenge the insurability of some assets”.
In 2022, the Cabinet asked the Treasury to consult on these issues and to examine options for intervention in the insurance market.
The Commission, also called Toka Tū Ake, could become “a vehicle for a Government policy response in the flood insurance market”.
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