Poll Dancer returns from holiday-mode to look at the Extra-Special Secret Surprise that Labour is preparing for the National Party conference this weekend. And is Cullen trying to throw this election or what? The tax debate, conspiracy theories and fiscal hanky-panky, all in this week's Poll Dancer.
Word from the Labour Party is that there will be an Extra-Special Secret Surprise this weekend (substantively different from the Deep Dark kind of secret surprises, I've been assured). I love surprises. Hey, the National Party conference is on at the same time - what a coincidence!
So what will this Extra-Special Secret Surprise be? It has to be big, for starters. The only reason why they would release something to clash with the conference is because they expect it to eclipse the conference and/or sow discontent or outright panic while the Nats are clustered together.
Possibilities:
1) Personally damaging revelation: Labour has been sitting on some nasty dirt for sometime. They say that they're holding it back because they want a clean game. Maybe. But, it's tabloid-grade stuff - not the sort of thing Helen can just get up and announce. If they're going to leak it, they wouldn't want it traced back to them, so why be so open about it now?
2) Professionally damaging revelation: Again, Labour has been sitting on some very damaging, tennis-ball-grade dirt. Last I heard, the only thing holding this information back was a thin membrane of very expensive lawyers. Again, it seems like the sort of thing that's best left for leaking quietly to Sunday Star-Times or for some elaborate ambush in the House.
3) Election date!: That would be lame as an Extra-Special Secret Surprise, especially at *somebody else's* conference.
4) Policy-related: Maybe it'll be a Treasury costing showing National's policies to be... ah, who am I kidding?
So really, I don't know. Whatever it is, and however well it goes down, I think the battle will be joined good and proper. You know, like "on my signal, unleash hell", that sort of thing. Until then, I think all this hoo-har around the recent polls (er... "poll dancing", if you will) is a bit premature.
A piece in Ian Templeton's Trans Tasman newsletter opens up the possibility for a tantalising theory number 5, though - that Labour's about to concede the election!
(Hat tip: Conor Roberts)
Okay, it's about 90% joke, but the idea is that a) Winston, Tariana, Winston, Jennette/Rod and Winston will make any coalition untenable, unbearable or, at least, really crap, b) the economy is projected to run out of pixie dust anytime now, and c) health and education are just... broken somehow. So, why not throw this election, and let the other poor schmuck win the poison chalice?
Despite it's obvious shortfalls, this theory has the advantage of being the only one capable of explaining the Government's handling of the Budget and the tax debate - and I'm not just talking about the Deep Dark Secret thing, either.
One of the disadvantages of being a young'un is that I haven't covered any Budgets before this year. It came as a surprise to me that the whole idea of the government needing to save up big before the bulk of the population became old and decrepit is not a new idea. In fact, it was there right from the beginning of the present government, in the 2000 Budget:
The Government has not yet finalised details of its policy approach towards prefunding. But the implications at a general level are clear. In the medium term, prefunding will require the Government to generate cash flows sufficient to meet our debt commitments and to make the necessary payments to the proposed New Zealand Superannuation Fund.
This means the Government must increase structural fiscal surpluses from current estimated levels, which means in turn, forgoing opportunities we would otherwise have had to increase spending or reduce taxes. But while it may appear attractive to increase spending or reduce taxes now, it is not responsible in view of future fiscal pressures.
The risk is in delays. If we do not act soon, and act decisively, a core element in our support structure will become unsustainable. At that point, future governments will have only three equally unpalatable options: large tax hikes, big cuts in the level of New Zealand Superannuation or tough age, work, income or asset tests to limit eligibility.
The reasoning is sound. The plan is solid. The alternative is scary.
What I don't get is why, after 5 years of playing the holier-than-thou fiscal monk, piously resisting the temptation to give those voluptuous surpluses a good squeeze and a thorough ravishing, Cullen has suddenly become so damn modest. He seems to have decided that it's not a good idea to extol himself as a saint for accumulating a large nest-egg for the country's impending rainy-day, and has instead been fighting a two-front battle with Key, arguing that a) the cash surplus is the real surplus, not that silly old "operating surplus" thing, and therefore b) any tax-cuts beyond the cash surplus would have to involve an immediate reduction in services.
Bollocks.
Now, I'm no Minister of Finance, but I thought that the OBERAC (Operating Balance Excluding Revaluation and Accounting Changes) was the measure of the underlying surplus. At least that's what I gathered from Minister of Finance Michael Cullen's 2001 budget speech, when he said that "the OBERAC, which may be regarded as the measure of the underlying surplus...".
In fact, having just gone through every single one of Cullen's budget speeches, he doesn't even mention cash surpluses before 2005. Not in 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 or 2004. And he expects people to believe him when he tells us that we're inept for not knowing the difference between cash and operating surplus?
(National Party Research and Media Units: Come on, this material must be worth a beer, at least?)
It's baffling. Not only is it just a load of shit, it's an load of shit that politically negates the work he's done over the past five years. It obscures his true, reasonable, honestly impressive objectives and replaces it with an unbelievable and unbelieved lie that would serve little purpose even if it was believed.
Cullen's heart must still be in it - otherwise he would just have blown his surplus like any red-blooded Minister of Finance. My guess is that the Government has decided that New Zealanders would never understand the idea of demographic change or the need to save; that if they did, they wouldn't have the discipline to save; that if they did, they would still resent the Government doing it for them. So, rather than showing any leadership, they decided that they'll just hide the entire project round the back.
It's not a tough message, really. New Zealand has an aging population. The government needs to save money to pay for governmenty services in the future. That's why the government is putting billions (in the form of the big-as surplus, which clearly needs to exist) away every year. If they don't, there won't be enough money to support you in the future, when you get old.
It's not "will $5 less tax a week mean a noticeable decline in health and education services next year?"; it's "will $5 less tax a week mean that I'll have to pay for my own hip surgery in 20, 30 years' time?". This is where the real debate is, and I don't understand why Labour isn't taking it there.
Are they seriously trying to throw this election?