Budget thoughts

"Sensible".

That's the at-first-glance description of today's budget. Another would be "uninspiring" - and in an election year, the government should have been looking to do something a little more impressive. Instead, we have a few moderate rises for some programmes, coupled with expanded eligibility for others, all with a good couple of years lead-time to give people time to adapt (or alternatively, the government time to cancel or defer). Plus an utterly insignificant change in tax brackets. Woo hoo.

The tax change (adjusting tax brackets for inflation every three years from 2008) represents a lost opportunity - not to cripple the budget with huge tax cuts, but to undermine tax as an election issue. Bracket changes are relatively cheap compared to cuts in tax rates and are widely (and correctly, IMHO) seen as being fair; implementing them ASAP would have been a cheap and easy way of robbing National and ACT of a talking point without significantly undermining Labour's key contention that large-scale tax cuts are unaffordable without cuts in services. Instead, by delaying them, the government has provided yet another rod for their own back.

The "KiwiSaver" savings scheme is designed to help people save for retirement or home ownership, and is pretty much borrowed wholesale from the New Zealand Institute. The plan I think though is to start encouraging employers to match employee contributions - though this will probably be done through the market (by having government departments do it and relying on competition for employees to get other employers to follow suit) rather than legislation. The home-deposit scheme - basically a free $5000 if you save for five years - is a solid, social democratic programme, aimed at promoting greater equality and helping people achieve the kiwi dream of owning their own home. Unlike the suggested tertiary savings scheme, the government contribution is not linked to the amount saved, so it does not advantage the wealthy more than the poor (except insofar as the former can afford to save 4% of their income while the latter cannot). It is however means-tested, rather than being universal - though probably more accessible than assistance from the Working for Families package. Overall, its good - though hardly anything to stir the blood.

Most of the media coverage has focussed on the above two policies, giving the impression of a fiscally conservative, sensible, boring budget. Overlooked has been a far more impressive package: a billion dollars a year extra for health. Now that's inspiring.