National predicts $10b surplus

The Government's books are "healthy", says Prime Minister Helen Clark, but National says Labour has gone too far, and will today announce it has stockpiled a record $10 billion surplus.

The Crown accounts are to be revealed today and Helen Clark has said she expected them to contain a "pretty healthy" result.

As Parliament returned yesterday after a three-week recess, National finance spokesman John Key asked Finance Minister Michael Cullen if the Crown accounts would reveal a record $10 billion surplus.

"Having now produced surpluses of over $20 billion in the past three years alone, can he understand why the public of New Zealand are getting fed up with his excuses for not delivering tax cuts?"

Dr Cullen would only point to National's own change in tax policy. Leader Don Brash last week said the party was looking at incremental changes, rather than the immediate personal tax cuts it had promised during the 2005 election.

Treasury's latest estimates show the Government running an operating surplus of close to $9 billion.

The question came in the context of business tax, with Dr Cullen saying the total cost of business tax cuts brought into effect on April 1 this year was $1.1 billion over four years. "This represents the largest cut to business taxes since the late 1980s."

- NZPA