KEY POINTS:
National Party leader John Key is pledging to make major changes to the tax treatment of donations to charity as he tries to back his talk with policy.
Mr Key unveiled his party's new policy at the Wellington City Mission's youth school yesterday, taking half an hour to
tour the venue and chat with some of its students.
His casual career advice to the students appeared to go down well and charities later also welcomed National's new policy to remove the cap on tax rebates for charitable donations.
But Mr Key's political opponents were less impressed, with Finance Minister Michael Cullen labelling National's policy as "completely lacking in novelty".
Dr Cullen said a discussion document on potential changes to charitable giving was released last year and later announcements would be made "in the context of the Budget".
But the detail of National's policy goes further than what was proposed in that discussion document.
National said that if it was in power it would ensure there was no cap on the amount of money people could claim in rebates from charitable giving.
At the moment, the maximum rebate is $630.
The Government's discussion document released last year floated the options of either raising the rebate cap, increasing the rate of rebate, or a combination of both.
Charities have responded that they want the cap removed altogether.
Mr Key estimated that removing the cap would cost around $60 million to $90 million a year in lost tax.
"The aim of this policy is to bed into New Zealand society a culture of philanthropy and giving," he said.
Mr Key, who has made a high-profile foray into Labour territory with his talk of an underclass and children going to school hungry, donates a "significant amount" of his money and said he would give more under the new policy.
But the multimillionaire's disclosure that he claimed the $630 tax rebate he was eligible for left Dr Cullen bemused.
"I can't believe it - I don't bother asking for a rebate," Dr Cullen said.
Father Des Britten, the Wellington City Missioner, said National's policy would help his organisation.
"We would like more recognition for what we do," he said.
"A step in the right direction is to look at us and say we are doing a good job, we are doing it our way, we don't want to do it the way of some bureaucrats ... support us and we'll get results."
