National Finance Minister Nicola Willis releases a costings document alleging an $18.2 billion spending gap in Labour's promises, challenging the party to clarify its plans, particularly around pay equity and public sector policies.
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Yeah, and that's where we get to, and and we see calls again. Now, in 2022, Nicola Willis actually wrote for the to then finance minister Grant Robertson, she was opposition finance spokesperson and said to Grant Robertson, we need a parliamentary budget office, Labour agree. In 2023, we saw uh those claims of National's fiscal hole. Again, we've had Greens, Labour, others also would like a parliamentary budget office. In fact, Nicola Willis was asked and replied on Sunday as National's finance spokesperson, not finance minister and saying yes, she would like that idea to be looked at. The problem is is New Zealand First and National disagree with that. Now they say there's enough bureaucracy as it is, it's not needed. Treasury can do that. That's not quite correct because what a parliamentary budget office does, and actually I've looked at um, I've been looking at the Australian version. It is an independent budget and uh provides independent budget and fiscal analysis. It was set up in Australia in 2020 twelve. Basically, it allows senators, MPs, political parties to go to this parliamentary budget office and say, hey, we're gonna release this policy or we've got this report into something. Can you have a look at it and see how much it would cost? Do our numbers stack up? I had a look at some some recent examples in Australia, for instance, the Greens went to the Parliamentary Budget Office around the capital gains tax policy that is in Australia and has been for a long time, and got them to do some numbers on it. The Parliamentary Budget Office then releases those numbers for everyone to see. Um and it is an independent advice, which is crucial, right? Um they also provide reports after every election around for transparency reasons around the fiscal impact of various party policies, uh independence policies. It provides a lot more transparency than we have in New Zealand. The Treasury costs government policies. So if you're in government, Treasury says, hey, this is how much we think it's gonna cost, um, we'll provide some analysis of it. It does not do that for individual political parties. So there is no way for Labour to say to go to a government department of any sort and say, how much do you think this would cost? So for them to get that independent advice, they have to go to an economist or someone and say hey and pay them to do it.
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demand for transparency on unmet fiscal commitments
.jpg%3Fv%3D1748240983&w=828&q=75)\\ \\ **Labour challenged to come clean on $18.2b bill**\\ \\ 14 June, 2026\\ \\ Nicola WillisSocial-media signal on the same topic, drawn from the social lens. Engagement is likes + 2×shares + 3×replies, the same weighting used across the digest cards. View on /social →
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