Can’t afford these three-yearly lolly scrambles

 Clive Bibby

Opinion

I guess it is no surprise to see in the Budget where this Government’s spending priorities are!

It’s just a pity that the Labour Party is so disingenuous with its “self-centred“ interpretation of a commitment to “serve” all of its citizens — if in fact that commitment was ever intended to be fulfilled.

In this latest process of allocating funds to those who one would assume are in most need, one of the largest deposits is in the form of billions put aside in anticipation of public servant wage increases. It is as if this allocation was the grease that would, as much as anything else, ensure the economic wheels keep turning.

Unfortunately, the truth is that many government departments are already hugely overstaffed and some would only marginally affect the outcome of our annual balance sheet if they disappeared off the face of the Earth.

In saying that, some core public services always seem understaffed and underpaid even though they are critical to the nation’s survival as a sovereign state — teachers, health professionals and police being top of that list.

As a farmer, helping to produce the revenue that keeps the country from going bankrupt, l reckon it is only fair that we are able to air our concerns about these spending priorities — particularly when, during the latest climate disaster, through no fault of our own, we ceased to be able to operate in a way that enables the government to allocate those hard-earned funds to the people most likely to vote for them.

Cynical, perhaps, but unfortunately true.

As one living and working at the epicentre of the latest storm, and all the others that have devastated this region at different times over the past 40 years, l know what happens to the local economy and, as a direct result, to the national economy when disasters of this type occur.

Every day that goes by when we can’t produce goods for sale in the markets that will keep our economy in a viable state is one more day that our national debt increases, until we get to a point that it is unsustainable.

Some experts are suggesting we are getting as close to that point as we have ever been and it is time for governments (of whatever persuasion) to rein in the spending — particularly the stuff that is clearly politically motivated.

It is all very well to say that all governments do it — it is the nature of politics.

Well, given that there must come a time when we simply can’t afford to allow this “three yearly lolly scramble” to continue, perhaps we can expect our political masters to start behaving as if they had the nation’s best interests at heart.

Pigs can fly!