Latest news with #Renney
Scoop
30-05-2025
- Business
- Scoop
NZCTU Release Detailed Budget 2025 Analysis
Press Release – NZCTU This Budget is funded above all by the gutting of the pay equity system, the halving of the governments contribution to peoples Kiwisaver accounts, and other cuts that will disproportionality impact women, welfare recipients, and working households, … The New Zealand Council of Trade Unions Te Kauae Kaimahi has today released a report with detailed analysis of Budget 2025. It covers the major decisions made at this Budget, and how they might affect workers. 'This Budget is funded above all by the gutting of the pay equity system, the halving of the government's contribution to people's Kiwisaver accounts, and other cuts that will disproportionality impact women, welfare recipients, and working households,' said NZCTU Economist Craig Renney. 'None of the choices the government has made were inevitable. The government could have funded its spending initiatives by raising new taxes on the wealthiest New Zealanders. It could have not decided to give billions away to those who already have much, while cutting services for those with real and pressing needs. 'Budget 2025 also leaves New Zealand's most significant structural challenges unaddressed. There is no meaningful movement on closing the infrastructure deficit; no solution to our health workforce shortage; no willingness to reduce child poverty or to address the housing crisis; and absolutely zero investment made in decarbonisation and climate adaptation. 'The coalition government continues to kick the can down the road on the most pressing challenges we face, all while making life steadily more difficult for New Zealanders who have the least,' said Renney.
Scoop
30-05-2025
- Business
- Scoop
NZCTU Release Detailed Budget 2025 Analysis
Press Release – NZCTU This Budget is funded above all by the gutting of the pay equity system, the halving of the governments contribution to peoples Kiwisaver accounts, and other cuts that will disproportionality impact women, welfare recipients, and working households, … The New Zealand Council of Trade Unions Te Kauae Kaimahi has today released a report with detailed analysis of Budget 2025. It covers the major decisions made at this Budget, and how they might affect workers. 'This Budget is funded above all by the gutting of the pay equity system, the halving of the government's contribution to people's Kiwisaver accounts, and other cuts that will disproportionality impact women, welfare recipients, and working households,' said NZCTU Economist Craig Renney. 'None of the choices the government has made were inevitable. The government could have funded its spending initiatives by raising new taxes on the wealthiest New Zealanders. It could have not decided to give billions away to those who already have much, while cutting services for those with real and pressing needs. 'Budget 2025 also leaves New Zealand's most significant structural challenges unaddressed. There is no meaningful movement on closing the infrastructure deficit; no solution to our health workforce shortage; no willingness to reduce child poverty or to address the housing crisis; and absolutely zero investment made in decarbonisation and climate adaptation. 'The coalition government continues to kick the can down the road on the most pressing challenges we face, all while making life steadily more difficult for New Zealanders who have the least,' said Renney.
Scoop
30-05-2025
- Business
- Scoop
NZCTU Release Detailed Budget 2025 Analysis
The New Zealand Council of Trade Unions Te Kauae Kaimahi has today released a report with detailed analysis of Budget 2025. It covers the major decisions made at this Budget, and how they might affect workers. 'This Budget is funded above all by the gutting of the pay equity system, the halving of the government's contribution to people's Kiwisaver accounts, and other cuts that will disproportionality impact women, welfare recipients, and working households,' said NZCTU Economist Craig Renney. 'None of the choices the government has made were inevitable. The government could have funded its spending initiatives by raising new taxes on the wealthiest New Zealanders. It could have not decided to give billions away to those who already have much, while cutting services for those with real and pressing needs. 'Budget 2025 also leaves New Zealand's most significant structural challenges unaddressed. There is no meaningful movement on closing the infrastructure deficit; no solution to our health workforce shortage; no willingness to reduce child poverty or to address the housing crisis; and absolutely zero investment made in decarbonisation and climate adaptation. 'The coalition government continues to kick the can down the road on the most pressing challenges we face, all while making life steadily more difficult for New Zealanders who have the least,' said Renney.
Scoop
22-05-2025
- Business
- Scoop
Reverse Robin Hood Budget Steals From Working People
Budget 2025 takes $12.8bn from low-income, female dominated workforces to prop up the Government's failed economic policies, said NZCTU Te Kauae Kaimahi Economist Craig Renney. 'The Government has promised this would be a growth budget, yet it has effectively cut the wages of low-income women workers. We know that one of the best ways to stimulate economic growth is by lifting wages – the Government is doing the opposite,' said Renney. 'The figures released today also showed that the number of people on Jobseekers Support is rising, and higher than forecast just last year. Real wage growth is lower than forecast last year – the Treasury itself says the Budget 'lowers wage growth'. This is a Budget that is taking working people backwards. 'The Budget delivers more cuts to investment, including real terms cuts to early childhood education funding. New funding for learning support is largely being delivered by cutting funding from other programmes in education. Māori Development programmes have been cut significantly, as has funding from our media, culture, and heritage institutions. 'Promises made in health aren't provided with new funding and the destruction of the pay equity process will mean we will continue to lose health workers to Australia, putting further stress on the system. 'Forecasts show we will continue to miss our child poverty targets over the next four years, and we will see thousands of families loose essential income due to cuts to Best Start and Working for Families. The Government is taking money from unemployed 18- and 19-year-olds, while investing nothing in action on climate change. 'Overall, this is a Budget that works by taking away from some of the poorest people in New Zealand, to fund tax cuts for multinationals, increased investment in corrections, the failed charter schools project, and more spending on defence. 'This is a Budget with its priorities all wrong – and working people will be paying the price,' said Renney.
Scoop
20-05-2025
- Health
- Scoop
Billions Missing From Health Budget
New analysis from the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions Te Kauae Kaimahi shows that the health service is likely to be underfunded by between $1.2bn to $2bn at the Budget. 'We have examined the spending decisions and announcements of the Minister of Health over the past few months. These demonstrate a pattern of making a new service promise but not providing any new funding for that new service,' said NZCTU Economist Craig Renney. 'That means the commitments have to be paid out of the existing budget, which is already under huge pressure. These sneaky cuts add up to $1.2bn across 4 years. 'At Budget 2024 the government provided $1.370bn for cost pressures. This has been calculated by the Treasury as simply covering the cost of existing services. The $1.2bn of new spending are all new services on top. If they come from the 'cost pressure' payment above, that acts as a direct cut to existing health services. 'Assuming the Treasury cost pressure costs are right, health needs $1.713bn just to stand still at Budget 2025 in direct new funding – and likely a figure closer to $2bn once the unknown costs are added. 'If this money is coming from pay equity funding, it would be the equivalent of those low-income health workers paying for the new service themselves. 'In opposition, National said that it would 'prioritise increases in funding for health and education to account for inflation.' The government now appears to be robbing the very funding set aside for inflation in health to pay for its new priorities, breaking their pre-election promise,' said Renney. New Announcements Commitment Annual Amount ($m) 4-year total ($m) After Hours Care 41 Cancer Medicines 151 Hawkes Bay Endoscopy 0.4 GP Practices 95 Private Sector Support [1] 50 Practice Nurses 6 343.4 1,223.80 Advertisement - scroll to continue reading The government has also made the following announcements and has not provided any costing information with those announcements. These costs are likely in the hundreds of millions, but we simply have no current idea about if the government will provide any further resources for them. [1] The private sector surgery support is only for one year and so has only been accounted once.
