Ryan Bridge: the treasury's told us what we knew all along

The $66-billion question hanging over Labour's head has been answered.

This new Treasury report tells us what we all already knew about Labour's Covid response. 

They went too far. Spent like a drunken sailor. Made it rain dollar bills. 

When Treasury advised them to pull back, they didn't they kept going. 

Covid was the most expensive economic to this country. The government spent $66-billion - which is 20% of our GDP.

Of that, just 18% was spent on specific pandemic healthcare costs.  

Then they just kept spending. 

Forget the Nigerian prince, this is the biggest scam to hit kiwi shores. 

They also spent the Covid fund on things like school lunches and art therapy programmes. 

The report tip toes around it but the clear inference of this report is Labour went too far pulling the fiscal leaver. The Reserve Bank should be using monetary policy to bulk of the heaving lifting in future events. 

At the same time this report landed on Labour's lap like a tonne of bricks, Chris Hipkins was in Queenstown chatting about the policies they don't have but will probably have going into the election. 

Guess what's on the menu? A capital gains tax. More government spending. And talk that the Treasury-imposed safe debt cap could be increased. 

So debt, Tax. And spend. 

People may not like Luxon's delivery of this message, it grates, but you can't hide from the fact those guys screwed the pooch.

And the pooch, if they were to get back into power, best be preparing for more screwing. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The sixty six billion dollar question hanging over Labour's head
has been answered. This new Treasury report tells us pretty
much what we already knew about Labour's COVID response. They
went too far. They spent like drunken sailors. They made
it rain dollar bills, and then Treasury said, hey, hey,
heyy pullback, pullback, And what did they do. They didn't

(00:22):
listen and they kept on spending. COVID was the most
expensive economic event this country. Seeing the government splashed out
sixty six billion, which is twenty percent of our GDP.
And guess how much of that went on specific pandemic
healthcare costs eighteen percent, one eight The rest of it, well,

(00:44):
they just kept spending. Forget the Nigerian prince. This is
the biggest scammed hit Kiwi Shaws in a very long time.
They spent money the COVID fund money on things like
school lunches and art therapy programs. The report tiptoes around it,
but the clear inference is Labour went too far pulling
the fiscal lever. The Reserve Bank should be using monetary

(01:05):
policy to do the bulk of the heavy lifting in
future events. And at the same time, this report lands
on our lapse like a thud, like a ton of bricks.
Chrishipkins was in Queenstown yesterday chatting about the policies they
don't have but will probably have going into the election.
Guess what's on the menu. A capital gains tax, probably

(01:26):
more government spending definitely, and talk that the Treasury imposed
safe debt cap could be increased, so debt, tax and spend.
People may not like Christopher Luxen's delivery of this message.
It greats people at the moment, you can sense it,
but you can't hide from the fact that those guys

(01:48):
as in labor screwed the pooch, and the pooch if
they were to get back into power best be preparing
for more screwing. For more from early edition with Ryan Bridge,
listen live News Talks it'd be from five am weekdays,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.