John Armstrong: Figures let Key turn tables

With yet another poll leaving Labour feeling sick in the stomach, the last thing it needed was to be tripped up over the cost of the flashest of its flash new pledge-card promises just three days out from the election.

Chief Ombudsman John Belgrave's instruction to Michael Cullen to release Treasury reports giving preliminary costings of Labour's interest-free student loan policy has left the ruling party looking somewhat red-faced.

When the policy was unveiled in late July, Labour said the annual cost "will grow through time through to a maximum of around $300 million".

Labour appears to have happily used part of the Treasury papers to back up that claim. However, the background material accompanying the policy release neglected to include the Treasury figures showing the cost ballooning beyond $300 million to around $500 million in 15 years' time.

That was the sort of blow-out National's John Key and Bill English were predicting. They sought the reports under the Official Information Act, drawing the Ombudsman's Office into the wrangle after Labour resisted release.

The reports will not do one iota of damage to Labour's promise of interest-free loans, the popularity of which the Prime Minister is trying to reinforce this week with whistle-stops through university campuses.

But the Chief Ombudsman's decision has allowed National to turn the tables on Labour on the question of the affordability of National's tax cuts. It has allowed Mr Key, National's finance spokesman, to question Dr Cullen's credibility on a key Labour policy at the very moment a volatile electorate is starting to think seriously about the choices.

Dr Belgrave's instruction to the Government is a rare example of a public watchdog's bite matching his bark.

Noting that the public interest was best served by the reports being released before the election, he flexed his limited muscle to compress the traditional 21-day period within which the Government had to respond to his recommendation to a matter of hours.

The Finance Minister had no option but to release the reports.

Not to have done so would have exposed Labour to the charge that it was hiding something until after election day.

The story would have turned into one of "who can you trust?" - the very line of attack Labour has been hammering in its attempt to undermine National leader Don Brash.

As it is, Labour has been caught out by the reports' release. It appears the party used the Treasury costings when it suited.

They were cut and pasted into background material as four-year forecasts to back up the claim that the policy would cost no more than $300 million a year, although, to be fair, there were accompanying cautions about the costings not being definitive.

Now, the costings are being dismissed by Dr Cullen as "fragile" and "back-of-the-envelope stuff".

But the real issue for Labour here is political management. In hindsight, it must be ruing that Dr Cullen did not dump them into the public domain at some point when they would have been submerged by other events.

Instead, the Finance Minister has been forced to release them on one of the few days Dr Brash's campaign has not stumbled over something or other.