It's almost amusing to see the Labour Party now railing against so many initiatives they have previously so proudly trumpeted in the past. They don't want jobs in energy or farming - also known as the productive side of the economy.
Farming is our biggest export earner, oil and gas is the fourth biggest - they pay our way and if we didn't have them we'd be knackered. The energy industry creates 7700 jobs (a huge number of which are in Taranaki), pay comparatively high salaries, which are taxed, and 42 per cent of the profits of these companies comes back to the Government in royalties and taxes. Labour says all the money goes overseas - a lie.
In government, Labour sold 100 per cent of assets, opened mines, opened casinos and granted exploration consents. They still want to float and sell assets in subsidiaries owned by State Owned Enterprises.
In government they brought trains and carriages from overseas companies but in opposition they are dead against getting the best deal for rail transport in New Zealand. They closed the Eastown Railway Workshops in Wanganui and yet strongly opposed the closure of a similar workshop in Dunedin.
They presided over the biggest growth in house prices, where people made huge paper-based gains in housing prices, and the biggest escalation in private rents, all with no change to the tax regime, just as they had before the 1987 crash. They then spent all the profits on buying elections in 2002 and 2005 and trying and failing to buy the 2008 election. Now, in opposition, Labour wants to implement a capital gains tax, which apparently was a horrible idea when they were in government, but sounds much better when they propose it in opposition.
