Aspirational Commitments

The coalition’s broken promises - they hope we’ll fall for them again.

There's nothing in the street
Looks any different to me
And the slogans are effaced, by-the-bye
And the parting on the left
Is now parting on the right
And the beards have all grown longer overnight

Songwriter: Peter Townshend.

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It brings me no joy to say, and probably comes as little surprise to you, that NZ Inc is not doing very well; in fact, it is starkly apparent that things are far from on track. Promises have been broken, and the coalition’s optimistic words belie our reality.

The war in Iran seems to be back on, with attacks from both sides, and the straits of Hormuz are closed despite the unseemly haste with which the government and some economists declared that things were returning to normal.

Employment and wages.

Unemployment remains high, and the government’s goal of reducing the number of people on the Job Seeker benefit by 50,000, to 140,000 by 2030, looks dubious at best, given that 215,200 people were on the benefit as of March 2026.

Then, after all the funding cuts to the public sector that spill over into private businesses, leaving many struggling, the government’s response is to tell us about all the high-paying jobs they’re going to create, even though real wages in NZ have fallen and are the lowest in the OECD.

The OECD reported last week that “New Zealand's wages were 6.4 percent below 2021's in real terms.” No wonder there is a cost-of-living crisis. We were also among 11 countries where the minimum wage fell last year, making it even further from a living wage.

The first report I mentioned, on government targets, also indicated that “shorter emergency department stays and shorter wait times for elective treatment were labelled as ‘feasible’”.

Emergency Department waiting times.

So that doesn’t sound good, does it? “Feasible,” to me, suggests it is still possible but less likely than the more concrete commitment National made at the last election of: “95% of patients to be admitted, discharged or transferred from an emergency department within six hours.”

As of last month, 74.4% of patients met this goal, a marginal annual improvement of 0.2% from 74.2%. At that rate, it would take 100 years to meet National’s 2023 goal, and in the meantime, as we saw recently at Waikato Hospital, patients are left far longer than is reasonable or safe.

The Indian FTA.

It was great to see the Indian community derive so much joy from PM Modi’s visit this weekend, but it was the Indian PM’s comments afterwards that made me question whether Christopher Luxon had been fully transparent about the cost to NZ of the deal.

I posted:

The Indian PM didn’t seem to think there was anything vague about our commitment to invest US$20b (NZ$34.7b) in India. Has Luxon committed us to spending billions on an FTA that excludes dairy, just to make himself look successful?

Modi said that NZ had committed to invest NZ$34.7b in India over the next 15 years, and he didn’t sound like he expected us to just give it a go, whereas Luxon said it was more “aspirational”.

I wondered if his commitments at the last election were also “aspirational”, the best of the best cases.

Margot suggested that Luxon had sold us down the road…

Reo said, “This deal is for Luxon to try and make himself look good. The Indians know this, and that is why this deal is very one-sided. Luxon is so desperate to get this across the line that he will agree to anything, regardless of whether it is good for NZ.”

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon. Original photo: BRUCE MACKAY / The Post

Luxon has previously demonstrated weak negotiation skills in securing what he wants. In the coalition discussions, he was played like a fiddle and made far too many concessions to ACT and NZ First to secure the win and become PM.

Has Christopher given away the farm to secure an FTA that excludes dairy, just to be seen to have achieved something, with ample opportunity for handshakes and gushing about how good a friend he is with Modi, as the Indian PM looks on as if at a country bumpkin he had bettered without breaking a sweat?

Labour leader Chris Hipkins said, “India sees that as a firm commitment on New Zealand’s behalf to invest NZ$34.7b in India over the next 15 years, whereas the New Zealand government simply views that as a commitment to promote investment in India; that is a real discrepancy.”

NZ First leader Winston Peters, who was conveniently overseas, said, “You can’t have a disagreement where one party thinks that US$20b is coming to their economy and the other party says it’s not. You can’t have that, so it’s very concerning.”

Roads of National Significance

The government has listed 17 projects under the title Roads of National Significance, up from the 13 it promised at the 2023 election. These are estimated to cost between $50b and $56b over the next twenty years.

These are projects that deliver important infrastructure and are of particular interest to the electorates affected by long-awaited interchanges or highway improvements. The problem is that the coalition didn’t actually budget for these roads and has recently had to deprioritise quite a number of them, placing them in what it calls the “Slow Lane”.

Despite the government’s fast-tracking approach, many projects are on a go-slow, essentially stalled and broken down on the side of the road, with no expectation of being restarted any time soon. These are the projects in the lowest-priority category:

• Hope Bypass Stage 2 (near Nelson)

• Northland Expressway Sections 2 and 3 — Te Hana to Whangārei (excluding the Brynderwyns section)

• East-West Link (Auckland)

• Mill Road (Alfriston to Drury section) (South Auckland)

• Petone to Grenada (Wellington)

So thanks very much for your votes if you were swayed by the promise of these projects, but you’ll just have to wait indefinitely.

Don’t get fooled again.

People vote for National because they believe the party is good at handling the economy, but in troubled times, its response has been akin to applying leeches to the sick.

The economy needed to be stimulated, not sedated, and their prescription has failed. It is little wonder that they spend so much time attacking the opposition rather than highlighting their achievements. Whether or not those who put him in power are willing to admit that the Emperor is bereft of clothing.

Nobody likes it when politicians make promises they don’t keep, but it is a bit rich of National to constantly point fingers at Labour’s past achievements and question its future plans, given its own record of overpromising and underdelivering, while unemployment rises and the cost of living increases.

If you prefer the policies of one of the coalition parties, then fair play to you, but do keep in mind their track record, our worsening unemployment, and their failure to address the cost of living.

Christopher Luxon might smile and act as if everything is alright, but you know it’s not, from our health system to our roading infrastructure to commitments that may haunt us for years to come.

Have a good Monday, folks, and take care on this cold morning.

Ngā mihi,
Nick.

To end today, here’s Won’t Get Fooled Again by The Who.