NZ First leader Winston Peters talks to the media after his speech at the party launch in Auckland today.
Video / Alex Burton
New Zealand First is promising to adjust income tax brackets to inflation, as well as offering tax incentives.
Party leader Winston Peters made the announcement during his speech to about 500 people at the party’s campaign launch, hosted at Mt Smart Stadium.
“We know we can both lower taxation on business and give higher wages for workers, with our policies to rapidly double our Gross National Product and that’s got to be our target,” Peters told the audience.
“And for those experts who say it can’t be done, we point to countries like Singapore to refute their myopic ideological mindset.”
Incentives would be intended to promote IT, productivity and add value before exports, according to Peters.
“How did someone sentenced for choking someone almost to death receive just five months home detention?”
He repeated the party’s existing policy to designate gangs as terrorist entities and confirmed a gang-only prison was built, but if gang members wanted a job, the party would help those efforts.
In health, Peters spoke in support of his party’s position on scrapping Pharmac and doubling the funding of its replacement with $1.3 billion to fund the drugs still on the waitlist.
He would also stop Auckland Light Rail and use the designated funding to support hospital emergency departments and residential care.
Peters hit out at media for recent questions about potential coalitions between NZ First and National or Act, following Peters ruling out working with Labour.
“How many times must we tell them that our record means we will never go with parties that have racist policies,” he asked.
“The last party other political parties want to talk to before election day is New Zealand First, and the first party they want to talk to - the day after.”
He concluded a polished speech by urging his audience; “let’s take back our country” - possibly the party’s campaign slogan.
It comes as the party members voted on policy proposals during the NZ First party convention in Auckland this weekend, where the party also celebrated its 30th birthday.
On Saturday, members voted to scrap the Waitangi Tribunal and build a prison just for gang members.
The proposal on Waitangi Tribunal was raised by Casey Costello, a spokeswoman for Hobson’s Pledge and now a candidate for NZ First running in the Port Waikato electorate.
She initially suggested the removal of the “exclusive authority of the Waitangi Tribunal to determine the meaning and effect” of the Treaty of Waitangi, alongside several removals or reviews of the tribunal’s powers.
“We need to bring back some level of control over the authority because it’s circumventing the legislative process and it does not follow due process,” Costello said in her pitch to members.
Northland candidate Shane Jones, who supercharged the proposal by suggesting it be amended to say the tribunal be abolished from 2025 and replace it with a “modest, residual range of functions.
“Once this remit falls into the hands of the Law Society, falls into the hands of the bureaucracy, our time in politics will be over and they’ll be still buggering around with it.”
The lively discussion set the scene for remit relating to gangs that included finding jobs for gang members, designating gangs as terrorist organisations, and building a prison for “all identified convicted gang members and associates” to “minimise prison recruitment and exposure” to prisoners who weren’t gang-affiliated.
This remit - the first and third points in particular - was immediately opposed by former police officer and current Whangārei councillor Gavin Benney, who also identified himself as the “wannabe Whangārei candidate” for NZ First.
“While I understand the principle, it’s my fear that we will achieve the opposite, putting the gangs altogether in a prison is exactly what they want, it will encourage not discourage them.”
He proposed it be removed from the remit and was supported by Jim Peters, but the amendment ultimately failed after several people rose to speak in favour of the initial proposal.
