Bernard Hickey: He had a chance to follow up all the talk of real reform to create a ’step change’. He had all the experts under the sun from inside and outside of government telling him he needed to do something. He commissioned reports. He talked a good game. Today he did nothing. He did worse than nothing. He shut down the debate.
He is accepting the poverty and the hopelessness that is often attached to the working poor in rental accommodation. He is saying tough. My backers own property. We won. You lost. Eat that.
He has finally shown his colours. He is a mediocre leader without the vision or the ability to change New Zealand. He is a seat-warmer who is too scared to scare the masses. He is saying he wants to get re-elected. How uninspiring. How pedestrian.
He is saying he is a not a real leader. He is saying he will follow his followers.
Bill Rosenberg: National has missed an opportunity to make significant changes in our tax structure and create jobs. “The Prime Minister glosses over the steep rise in unemployment revealed just last week, and his statement does precious little for those out of a job or whose jobs are at risk,”
Russel Norman: ”The honeymoon is over for John Key’s Government but sadly most New Zealanders won’t be able to afford a divorce lawyer.” He says National is intent on digging New Zealand into an economic and environmental black hole, and raising GST will only hurt low and middle income Kiwis.
John Armstrong: John Key’s promised quick march towards economic nirvana still looks like progressing at little more than a crawl. On a measure of boldness, John Key’s 23-page statement to Parliament scores about four out of ten.
Brian Fallow: Tax, the prime minister proclaims, is a powerful lever for the Government to boost the economy’s performance. It’s a pity then that instead of grasping that lever he is proposing to just crook his little finger around it. Business is unlikely to be blown away by the boldness of the vision outlined in today’s agenda-setting speech. Indeed the average thistledown would not be blown away.
I’ve just finished reading Key’s full statement. The National MPs seems very impressed with the fact is is 9,000 words long. Well, who said you can’t waffle for 9,000 words? There is very very little in the statement of any detail. Certainly nothing that would begin to close the gap with Australia. According to Labour, it includes over 50 re-announcements of existing spending and policies, including many that Labour put in place. Still waiting for the great leap forward.






While here we have Jackie Blue’s office on Dominion Rd…

On a related note, National Party pollster David Farrar has played the ‘blame the minimum wage’ card to try to excuse the shocking level of unemployment. He claims that the abolishment of the lower youth minimum wage in 2008 is somehow responsible for higher unemployment. His ‘evidence’ is that gap between 15-19 year olds unemployment and 20-24 year olds has grown. Of course, the real reason it has grown is that 15-19 year olds always have a higher unemployment rate and, so, as general unemployment increases you would expect there’s to increase faster. If you look at the ratio of 15-19 unemployment to 20-24 unemployment, it’s pretty steady.
We don’t need to blame the minimum wage to explain the growing rate of 15-19 year old unemployment. Groups with normally higher unemployment always get hit the hardest by recession. Is Farrar going to blame the abolishment of youth rates for the greater gap between Maori unemployment and Pakeha unemployment too? Because you could using exactly the same argument he made for 15-19 year old unemployment.

Nearly a year ago, John Key, shaken by the first whispers of disquiet over his government’s month-long holiday at the height of an economic crisis (whispers that would later grow into cries of ‘Do Nothing’ Key), decided to hold the Prime Minister’s Jobs Summit.
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