Who really pays for election promises?

0:00Kia ora, I'm Nadine Higgins and welcome to the Prosperity Project. Politicians are always promising to make us financially better off. They all just have wildly different ideas about how to actually make that happen. Cut taxes, tax the rich, promise freebies, grow the economy. And as November's election draws nearer, the different policies and promises are coming in second fast to help make sense of who is offering what, why and how it could affect your wallet. I'm joined by Harold Senior Correspondent and former long-time political journal, Katie Bradford. Hi Katie, thank you so much for taking the time to do this. Thank you. The policies are coming second fast, right? And one of the really interesting ones I thought was national putting this line in the sand saying no new taxes. Which sounds great if

1:00you feel like you pay too much tax, but are there some consequences of a call like that? Yeah, this is an election that's all about the money, right? And national clearly decided that the easiest tag line this election was going to be the no new taxes line. The problem is if they get back in government, what does that mean for any extra levies and charges that they may have wanted to increase? We already see obviously, they've had say that they won't increase the fuel tax all road user charges. But at the same time, we've got a bill that's just passed through parliament for time of use charging, for congestion charging in Aucklanders in a couple of years time might be paying to come into the city. You pay for a toll road if you if you head out north, we've got more toll roads coming on the way. Those are fees, levies, charges, taxes, whatever you want to call them. And I think there is a difference between a tax and a levie. And it's just it feels a bit like it's a political stick for national to hit label with without potentially thinking it entirely through.

2:02And at the same time, angering a lot of people around, for instance, the bed, levie. Well, that's a really interesting one because at the same time, they're saying we'll introduce a rates cap and anyone who's seen their rates go up and up and up might well say, well, that's really good for my finances. However, how do the councils raise more revenue, which they need if both of those things are true? And we could we could list off any issue, but but let's look at Wellington right now. We just saw the more point report came out. Well, Antonians are facing huge increasing water bills that have now been separated out from their rates. So for the first time, they're facing those water bills to Akiwai is in the gun over that because of years of under investment in infrastructure that people haven't wanted to pay for because they haven't wanted their rates to go out. Now, that's a very simplified version of that problem, but that is one of the issues for councils around the country. Councils are strugging with their infrastructure and all sorts of issues. And at the same time, having essentially their needs kept off by being told by the government, okay, you can't have a bed, levie. Okay, we're going to cap your rates. The you're not going to get

3:07a share of GST actors proposing that, for instance, councils get a share of the GST from accommodation providers. So where do they get the money from to pay for these things that are desperately needed? Fast track, which I'm doing a lot of a lot of stories on, fast track is going to put more pressure on councils again. They don't have the money coming in to deal with these problems. So central government is lumping all these problems on them at the same time, but saying, hey, you're not allowed to introduce any new levies or charges or cost people any more money. Of course, you can understand, I always think this when reporters go out and do voxies right and they go out and they say to people on the street, do you think rates should be kept? Everyone's going to say yes. I don't want to pay more. Of course, if the next question was, do you think rates should be kept? And that means you're going to see another mile point disaster or you're not going to, you're not going to get your rubbish picked up weekly. We're going to move to your rubbish being picked up fortnightly. Any of those issues or you're not, or the light your library is going to close on, you're only going to be able to go the library for two hours on a Saturday. They might think differently. Is there also an alternative scenario where the councils simply have to start charging us for

4:11every additional thing that they do out of the very few things that they can afford? And they will, right? I mean, that comes back to the user pays, that comes back to tools or congestion charging and again, that money goes back largely to central government. Do you want to pay to go to the library? Do you want to pay to use the toilets in the parks? Do you want to pay for your rubbish and recycling to be picked up? There are, that's a privatisation of council services and some would say, well, why not? If you want your rubbish picked up weekly, pay for it. So that's, I guess, a debate that's where that debate leads. Maybe that's where some of nationals coalition partners would like it to lead. And it comes back to an ideological debate, almost about who should pay for what user pays. And the government says it around developments, right? Growth should pay for growth. So if you want to make to build a fast track with additional development, wherever it is around the country, or any kind of development, you should pay for it. So that you should pay for the services for the infrastructure that's provided to the argument from councils on the other hand,

5:15is that that isn't growth paying for growth because they're not paying the same development levees as you do if you go through the usual consenting process. So councils aren't getting as much money through to them on fast track developments as they would on other developments. The government is working to fix that. But it's another example of where costs are being through our non-councils, while the government saying no new taxes, no new levees, no new charges. You mentioned, though, that it's a great stick to beat the opposition with and say, well, we're saying no new taxes and they've said something like, you know, you would introduce 11. Where did they get that number from? Or is that just them lumping all their coalition partners and saying, well, if it's you lot, all of those things are coming in. Yes. And this is what the Greens are saying in party, Māori and opportunities party. And again, some of those levees and charges, I think we almost need to do an explainer on what the difference is between a tax and a levee and a charge and where you draw the line on those. But that's another dangerous argument because if you're saying

6:15that Labour is going to bring in 11 taxes because the Greens want wealth tax and the opportunity party want land tax, then you can also say, well, New Zealand First, a national government is going to buy back BNZ at a cost of a couple of billion dollars because that's what New Zealand First wants to happen. You get into an 8, it's at the top tax rate of 20 out of 6, which is what? Expect, what? Yeah, on earth, what do you call that? And so, so that you get into territory that it's all very hypothetical right, no one knows. And in fact, the politicians themselves are the first ones to say, no one actually knows what policies are going to go ahead until they sit down around that coalition negotiation table on November the 8th. Which is a key point because lots of people have been looking at, for example, the opportunity parties, land tax, which would fund their universal basic income, I think is at 1.5% of the value of residential land and a small percentage of rural land. But it is at all a moot point because

7:16are either of their potential coalition partners ever going to swallow a land tax? Well, you could never say never because if you're desperate to get into government, you might, you know, we saw a national matter clear, they didn't support the Treaty Principles Bill at got that in the coalition agreement. We saw what happened with that. But national and labour have both said they won't support a land tax and I can't see a labour government sitting there and going and taking that from a negotiation for the opportunity party. They will have to give opportunity party something. They'll be looking at where, if it was to happen, you'd be looking at where you had common areas of interest and what you can actually get through. And if your opportunity party right now, you know that both major parties have said a land tax is not on the table. So you would be thinking about, okay, here is what we want to have instead as part of our deal to agree to let you become the government. Yeah, don't back down before you get there. You can at least say, okay, we won't do the land tax in favour of something else as one of your bargaining chips. Talk to me about the capital gains tax because, gosh, we've spent a long time

8:19talking about whether or not New Zealand should or shouldn't have one. There have been leaders that have ruled them out. But this labour party is going to the election with a capital gains tax. But it's quite limited in scope, Brian. It feels like they've already spent it. Yes, and you also might say right policy wrong time. Because prices aren't going anywhere. So you're not making any, not many people are making capital gains, huge capital gains on their properties now anyway. I mean, maybe maybe in some parts of the country, but certainly not in Auckland or Wellington. And certainly not for people who bought and say November 2021, and you and I have both talked to people who are in that position, right? So, so labour policy one might not bring in an anywhere near as much money as they would be hoping for. And it is a very, very limited capital gains tax as far as they go because of the debate. You know, we've seen this debate for however many years, how many capital gains tax has labour looked at and dismissed or tried to push through. And it's never, they've always said it wouldn't be a broad capital gains tax. It's not, I think

9:22there's like a leaven, maybe there's seven, no businesses, no, it's not the family home, not shares, not in here. Not in here. It's not in here. It's just, there's a whole other personal items, I guess like maybe art. So I think even though the government would say they're coming for your Kiwi saver, they're basically ruling that out, right? So not doing a capital gains tax on every asset. It's pretty much just the family home. Sorry. It's pretty much just, if you have been deciding, the investment not family home. Yes. And so, and we all know that people, there are people who are in New Zealand who are quite good at getting away, we're not paying tax on all things. We would have a bright line tax as well. So, which is a capital gains. And so, and national hasn't got rid of that bright line test. The other issue with labour's capital gains tax is going to really be how much money would it bring in and what it's being paid for. Now, I think it's a good strategy, the one they've taken, which is here's what we will use the money for. The problem is,

10:23it makes more people understand it right. They're, okay, I'm going to get this out of it and I think it's the maternity screening and the three free GPs visits. Controversial because not everyone necessarily needs three free GP visits. And we look at the side of the health system right now, is that really the best place for that to be sent to, you know, these all kinds of areas, health money could go. But they've clearly made the strategy, I think, they've taken there is, they can see a health system in crisis. And they're saying, okay, we know we are telling the country we're going to introduce a new tax. The money needs to go on an area that's really under pressure in the country right now. And that is the health system. So that smart politics, it's just the areas they've ring fenced it for, perhaps are not necessarily the best way. I'm also starting to wonder if we need someone faster than me to look at the numbers and let these out. But whether it's almost over subscribed now because they've made quite a few promises for it and they really might not get the amount of money they were hoping for. Depending what happens with the housing market, and you and I know it's not that it's not going

11:25anywhere fast. No, at the moment it's going up anywhere fast anyway. Yeah, and a lot of people saying the next property cycle will be quite different to what we're used to. I think they said they've modelled it on three or four percent. But who knows if it's even going to do that. Hey, we need to take a quick break. But after that, I want to talk about Kiwi Saver, but also some of the freebies and the subsidies and the stuff that they're promising and how that might affect your wallet. So we'll be right back after this. Welcome back to the prosperity project. We're talking about the election promises and policies and how they will affect your finances with Katie Bradford. Katie, we need to talk about Kiwi Saver because Nationals gone all in on Kiwi Saver. And that is great for our retirement savings, but it's going to have a short term impact on your take home pay, isn't it? Yeah, well, you're going to put more in from your pay, which is great if you can afford it. Not great if you can't. Which is an issue with that. And this all comes back to, we are very

12:28behind in our time and savings compared to other countries, particularly Australia. It's great that we're doing it now. The country needs that money behind us to help invest in things. But at the same time, yes, right now in a cost-delivering crisis, being told you're having however much more money coming out of your pocket is not necessarily an ideal situation for everyone. But national, and I think we're seeing this assertionally becoming a key topic, this election is Kiwi Saver, and I think the retirement age is going to come into that too. Well, I was going to ask you that next. Is that the next thing you'd expect to hear from national before the election is great. Here's all these wonderful incentives to save. But by the way, if you're under the age of X, don't expect to get it until you're 67. And they've been hinting at that that it is likely to come. Some have questioned whether that will then see, for instance, super means tested as well. So you know, with the aim that in 20 years time you'll have more money and your Kiwi Saver and therefore you can have your super

13:28means tested as well, which Labour and others would be very opposed to. Of course, the key problem for national is that New Zealand First is what's the name? It's Winston Peters. And he has made it very clear. He's not going to support the retirement age. Doesn't mean national shouldn't propose it and the country shouldn't have a conversation about it because super is costing us more and more money and is a huge burden on the taxpayer essentially. But it is a very difficult one and Labour's never going to support raising it either. And so you get into a position where political parties become stuck and we're really good at this country and the city to be coming in a rut. No one wants to make a hard political decision like this. If you were going to do it, you know, all the experts say you've got to raise it gradually and it's going to be in 20 years time. So it's something I always think of when we see Winston Peters in a hall somewhere with large crowds of people aged over 65 telling them, you know, your super is not going to be touched. Well, it's not yours. It's you and me. It's

14:29our super that's going to be touched. It's peaking still be the white night of the elderly because actually what we need is younger people is a white night. Yes. And so we're the ones with the animal of falling house prices and who are likely to be in a position that we won't put, you know, people in their late 30s, you know, mid 30s, the mid 40s are probably the people, the first generation that we'll see that raise to 67, 70 gradually and it would be gradual right. So you'll see it go up every three years, over a period of time. There's some common ground right. New Zealand first wants to see Kiwi say the compulsory. I think they were talking about some sort of tax relief as to offset the incremental increases in contributions. The opportunities party in favor of compulsion. However, have we heard anything from Labour as to what other than we don't want to touch superannuation? Have they told us what they would or wouldn't do to Kiwi say? I think there'll be something coming. They're wanting to look closer to the election, not that far off now. So I think about 60 days before the election now. And so

15:33not that I'm counting. So it's one of those policies they want to bring out. They'll be working out very carefully. I think probably National got in a bit ahead of, got in on them a bit of time, stole their thunder on that one as they have with a couple of policies, solar being one of them. And so I think there will definitely be some moves. I mean, Labour would argue they are the party of Kiwi saver rights. So they will come in. They're going to, the issue is they're not going to want to be seen to be doing exactly what National NewsLin first did. New Zealand first accused National of copying them. Labour's going to come in the next day of the trial. You looked over my shoulder and stole my homework. It actually doesn't matter because if it's something that's good for the whole country, it shouldn't actually matter whose idea it was. And by partisanship, honestly, is what we could all do with, especially if it's something that you're not going to get to access for 20, 30, 40 years. Be great if they could stop tinkering with it. Yeah. And you hear this from industry all the time. As do I, you know, we go to these conferences and they say, wish we could have bipartisanship on this. I wish we could have bipartisanship on this. And Kiwi saver in super and super rage is actually something that we really should have bipartisanship on because it is

16:36about our future. And more money going into those Kiwi saver schemes means more money for the country. As I said to invest in more money in people's pockets when they retire, more pop money in hard times, or for you, for your first time deposit, whatever it might be, right? But also, it does affect everyone. And therefore a proper adult growing up conversation about it is it would be a good thing and trying to get consensus. I do think if you were going to do something like race, the super rage to have cross party consensus on it would be the best way to try and convince the public and get it through because it's going to be a tricky one. Yeah, maybe not until Winston Peters concludes his political career. Who knows? You mentioned solar and there are two policies, national labour, along the same lines about cheap long-term funding borrowing so that people can install it. But I suppose there's the key difference that labour is actually saying we will also give you a bit of a subsidy to get you over the line. Yes, which is sort of a typical labour policy, right? We'll give you a bit of cash. Is that coming out of the cap for going to do? Yeah, one of my questions with that was,

17:40do we have enough solar panels? Do we have enough solar panel and solar and solar are we going to be able to get them? China's got a solar boom going on at the moment and that was spread on a bit by the fuel crisis this year. But are we going to be able to get them? We know what happens here in New Zealand, all of a sudden everyone wants to do it and we have a shorter job and we have to get into the country and the price goes up, right? So what are we going to have some sort of short to medium to long-term planning gone and to making sure we've got are we training up solar panel installers to actually have those people there. When I, when Labour announced their policy and I was out doing the story with, you know, suddenly it was discovered that these sold the battery packs that they suggested that renters have that you can plug in essentially for plug in solar. They're actually illegal in New Zealand. And so I was, I stand at this press conference with Labour and they're talking about the fact that the these the portable battery solar panels are illegal and I was saying what? And so the the components of them haven't been allowed, the government's changing that law now recently quickly so that we can start bringing those into the country or having them actually be legally

18:43installed. But there's always, we've always got these quirky little things in New Zealand right that you discover, hey, here's something that sounds like a really good idea. Actually, we can't do it. In that case, it was a really sensible thing that the government realised it was a problem, went to EMB and said can you let this out please. Yeah. And it was sorted and both Labour and National were standing there saying we want more of these plug in solar. It's interesting though, isn't it? Because a lot of people before an election go, we're not going to do anything because we don't know what's going to happen in the election. And I often feel like that's not justified. You know, nothing's going to change immediately. And is it really going to affect your back pocket even if it does? But maybe solar is one exception because if I was thinking about installing solar, I wouldn't do it now. I'd wait for you to get a picture. It's like a first-time grant, right? If you know in six months time, you might get a first-time grant of five or ten grant that we used to have, I don't think they have them anymore. They don't. No. And you're going to, well of course, I want to get a grant to buy my house. So I'll wait and see if that party comes in. Solar is the same, right? Yeah. And now, and we're so close to election now, but again, we don't know what the government's

19:46going to look like. So yes, but I guess it falls into, you know, those freebies and subsidies. We've got the doctors visits, we've got the prescriptions, we've got the public transport, public transport which did seem to go down really well. And if you are a commuter, that would save your money, wouldn't I think, yeah, I think an all-conner of peat and Wellington people saving 30 or 40 bucks a week. And if you're a student and others, of course, that's, you know, if you're a nurse trying to get to the hospital or whatever, you know, that is a policy that will be popular. Again, it has to be paid for. And one thing I think is key with all of these freebies as such or whatever you want to call them, Lollis Gramble, they, where the money is coming from for them, parties need to be very transparent about. And that's where we see every election, there's claims for fiscal whole. These numbers don't add up and these numbers don't add up. A few months ago, we were talking a lot about that independent parliamentary, dependent budget office. Labour has now said they want that independent

20:46costings, you know, again, that's something that makes sense, right? Let's actually have someone independent look at the numbers and say, do these add up. I will never forget hearing Nicola Willis was it in the house saying to Grant Robertson, sometimes we go, what is the size of your whole? When everyone's like, oh, I suppose we haven't had some lovishes yet. Yeah, yeah, I'm sure it's to come. There'll be some good one-liners, I'm sure. You mentioned students and national is taking a kind of carrot stick approach with student loans, right? So if you're going to stick around, you don't have to pay it back quite so quickly, interest free, whereas if you go offshore, we're going to sting you. Yes, and again, that's going to be a popular one, right? Like especially graduating, I remember when I graduated a few years ago, and I think I was like 20 bucks a week or something I had to pay, there was a lot of money when you're earning two, okay? You know, like it felt like a lot of money. And so I remember when I paid my student loan off, being like, wow, the same rise. So it felt like a huge pay rise. It is a, you start your life with essentially

21:50an extra tax on you, right? An extra charge on you that your paying that's coming out every week. So yes, that little bit extra would help, particularly if you're on a graduate salary or whatever it might be, struggling to find a job as many people are right now. But also if you're struggling to find a job, can you really blame someone for that going overseas? So that comes back to the argument of you need to make sure there are jobs for the grads when they leave as well. And that's a far bigger problem we have in New Zealand right now. That and given that those offshore, so many of them are in default anyway, charging them more. I mean, is that going to solve the fact that they're not paying their student loan? I mentioned you're getting those bills, so that compounding interest on those going at rapidly, I imagine a lot of them don't see that letter coming from my ID into their emails and you have one unread letter, you've ten unread letters, I'm sure they ignore that. And so I mean, they should be paying it back, right? That is money you borrowed from the government, from the taxpayer, you should be paying it back. And IID has put more money into compliance. We've seen those stories about people who've been stopped at the border or have been

22:52charged with this. So I think that seems a very clear message to people, you better pay it back. Maybe at the same time, at the same time, they need to be teaching people about compounding interest. And how much more that's actually going to be costing them the longer they leave it and the longer they stay overseas. That's right. It's the cohort that didn't get financial literacy training at school that is now being hit with the compounding interest and going, oh, and more was that again? Hey, we need to take a quick break, but when we come back, not all of the freebies and benefits and subsidies are specifically directive and consumer. Some of them are via business, so we'll talk through some of those in just a moment. Welcome back to the prosperity project. Katie, we've talked about a lot of the freebies and subsidies, although I think we did miss talking about the maternity policy of national, but anyway, lots of things. The vehicle screenings and other cervical screening, yes, being handed out directly to us as your everyday people, but some of it is going to business, which is arguably where it needs to go to create these jobs for those grads

23:53to stay in the country. What are the two main parties offering in terms of getting businesses investing? The small business policies are an interesting one because again, in some ways, they're quite similar. It's labour increasing, the GST threshold is an important one. My understanding is both parties work quite closely with small businesses on those to try and get them right, which I think is really important in a smart move, particularly if your labour in your scene is not re-business friendly, getting it right, they have said they will scrap the investment boost, though, which national has rightly jumped on as saying this is something that's really important for businesses to be able to claim back some of those purchases. The question is, investment boost has been used to pay for some of labour's other promises. I had some business aside of me, well, why not keep investment boost as well and do these other things. That's labour's obviously, again, looking at how much money they've got and how they can afford to do this. Yeah, because national's policy doesn't matter the size of the business you are right,

24:56in terms of depreciating those assets, whereas labour's specifically going after the small business. This is insane that they need them the most. I think they use the argument that the boss of a big company doesn't need a new yut, which might be slightly defamatory to someone who feels like they do need the... Well, and it might not be a yut. If you're investing in maybe it's actually some machinery to operate the machinery. Labour also has the future investment fund, which I don't know, Katie, if I fully understand how that works and I don't know if they've explained to us fully how it works, can you feel it? Well, they released this quite early on, a year or so ago now, I think, about using that as a way to invest in New Zealand assets, it would be run by the super fund. So, politicians have their hands offered, which is quite a good thing when you're looking at investment and where money's going to be spent. Essentially saying, I think they're going to kickstart it with $200 million and say, go and invest, go invest,

25:58and we're using deemed suitable to help build capital, build some cash. Having the super fund, do it or a similar organisation is a good way. I think the question of that is when you're looking at, if you're going to look at, say, recycling some of our assets or asset sales on some things that hasn't ever become as much of a topic in the select chain campaign as I thought it might be, about, you know, we know we have a huge infrastructure deficit, for instance, in this country, and we need to find more money to pay for it. We've seen, for instance, how nationals had to back away from all the promises around the roads of national significance, because there's something to not have the cash. We haven't seen much talk of asset sales and saying, you know, national did talk a bit about it a year or so ago again, and that conversation has died away. They're doing some polling. Maybe they're just polling. I haven't seen anyone's got that problem. Maybe just behind the scene. Yeah, so whether that's about, whether that conversation

26:59will start up again about, we're here, what are some assets that we could sell off, that we could then reinvest that money into infrastructure? Again, I've always thought if you were going to have that debate again in this country, because we saw it over the energy companies and someones would argue, look at the state of energy companies. And what we're paying, like, so far. And so, so if you were going to do that, I think if you're going to say, hey, we're going to sell this company and I don't want to pick anyone out on this one. But that money needs to be directed back into say building infrastructure. That isn't going into a high-pothecated fund to ensure that money is going for something that is for the benefit of the whole country and will grow the economy and create jobs and increase productivity and all of those things that we need. But we haven't seen, we haven't seen much of that discussion around that. And whether the future fund would look at that of saying, here are some assets we should be divesting and using that money to put in elsewhere. Really interesting to be taking that decision making away from the politicians which often blow

28:03whichever way public money is. Wow, look at this. What he rusted about today, right? Putting it in the hands of somebody else. What businesses told you about these decisions to either suspend or delay increases in fuel exercise taxes? Because that's what pays for the maintenance of the roads that they use to get goods from point A to point B. Great if you don't want to pay more in fuel, but is it meaning you'll actually pay more later? You've got to imagine this was a really difficult one for Chris Bishop because he did not want to have to, I'm pretty sure he didn't want to have to delay that the increase in roadies are charged as he knows how expensive that needs that money. And now they're saying they're going to essentially have to borrow to put money into that land transport fund. And Lame is saying they'll just suspend the end of time and don't. And again, it's just kicking the can down the road right. It's the same thing around the super fund or not making just not making firm decisions on these issues. Unfortunately, it has to

29:04be paid for some way and it just means you see more tolls or other charges in some other way as it was on the back of back on all you pay more in the long term, right? And so whatever, you know, the city railings are opening and just under a week and hour and that's cost $5.5 billion. That money has to come from somewhere. And so you've got to look at all different ways you can pay for it. And just because the tech, the money's not coming out of your taxes, it's going to come out some other way, some other way. And there might be that you're project you're hoping to have one of the roads of national significance or a cycle way. Whatever it is, you might have been hoping for your town, your city, your neighborhood won't be happening now because there is not enough money to pay for it. And so if you're Christmas ship and you're standing there, you know that you can't go into an election saying, hey, by the way, in January, we're going to hit you with another ten cents a liter at the pump when petrol's nearly $3.00 a liter and look at those oil prices, potentially going up again now. And so that's a really tough

30:06call to make. Yeah, really tough. But as you point out, there are no freebies, right? If we're not collecting it over here, we've got to collect it somewhere else or we have to not do that thing that we really need to do because there ain't no money for it. Or we face more potholes. Yes, you run loves to talk about the potholes. But guess what happens if you don't have money in a road maintenance fund? The road doesn't get maintained. Yes. If we can possibly talk about this briefly, it's a big topic. Two other big business changes being suggested. National hinting at more to come to try and bring more competition to the grocery market. New Zealand first saying, I guess they're hearing people complaining about power prices and saying, all right, let's break up some of these gen tailors, the ones that generate and retail electricity within one entity. Do you think we're likely to see much more meat on those bones before the election? Wow, and this is interesting there is one where the opportunity party said they would like to work with with national and

31:11New Zealand first and act on around both supermarkets and energy companies. Supermarkets, I don't know how many stories I've done over the past, I'd want to say decade with reports after report and politician standing there and saying, we're coming for you. We're coming for you supermarkets, we're coming for you banks, we're coming for you petrol stations, we're coming for you energy companies. Have we seen much of a difference? And are they listening? And again, I don't know how many times I've said to whichever ministers in charge, are they listening to you? Are they listening? When you're standing here saying, we're going to stop these you price gouging. Nothing seems to change. And so supermarkets is a difficult one, I think, again, the politicians talk big, until you come to a point and actually say, we're going to break up, supermarkets, break off the retail and wholesale arms of supermarkets. There's not that much else that can be done there. They've taken the covenants off land to allow more supermarkets to be built. We've got a grocery commissioner, the commerce commission is getting a lot of power,

32:13which I always wonder about the resourcing on the number of things they're now having to regulate and look after. But supermarkets, they've tried, they've done those covenants, they've said to international supermarkets, come on in. What we want you in here, right? Costco, come on, bring on more Costco's, do what you can. And we didn't see that much interest from international players because it's too hard and there are so many, there's the regulations and the way we hear this government talk a lot about regulations and frame that out. We haven't seen really, those are the players come in, there's pockets of them around the country. So there hasn't been much change in that sense. And the same New Zealand First is obviously vowing to take on the gentlers over this as well. They say that's their first thing they want to do back in government. It's tricky isn't it because we own half of them. So I remember looking at the government's books last year and saying they had an increased GST take because of the dividends coming in from

33:17the energy company. So they increased take coming in there because they've been paying more for the power bills, the energy companies are paying bigger dividends and the government's getting the GST from that. So it's actually worked in the government's favour for them to be making bigger profits. Just not politically but like you say it just comes back to that. There is no free lunch right? Someone has to pay somewhere along the line. And those energy companies, there is now the investment in, and we're seeing you know surge in investment in generate and some of these generation projects and in theory that should start kicking in soon and bills should start flattening out. Again you've got to say are they going to pass on any of that to the customers and that's what everyone will be waiting to see. You've covered a lot of elections. It's looking tight at the moment depending on which configuration you know could possibly form a coalition. Do you have any productions as to which way this is going to go? No and I think 60 days out anything can change as well. In fact I think in the 2017 election it was about this time that just

34:18under our doing became Labour leader and flipped everything on its head really. So you I would dare make predictions about what would happen. I think it's going to be tight as the biggest prediction and I think we could very well be in a position where on the night we don't really know where it's going to go. Last election it was pretty obvious. It was nationals turned to see what they could do. But a lot can change as people hit the campaign and these policies come out and we see a number of gaps that will be one prediction I make that they will be. There will be scandals and gaps and candidates standing down and many of those sorts of things. And hopefully some good policies at the same time. Yeah well I guess it then it remains to be saying which of these policies will either boost or hit our pockets post-November really appreciate your time Katie. Thank you Nadine. Thanks for joining us on the Prosperity project for more personal finance coverage visit NZherald.co.nz and just a reminder. This podcast is for informational

35:24purposes only and doesn't constitute personal financial advice. Always do your research or talk to a qualified advisor before making decisions about your finances.