In order to try and put some teeth into its flagging and ultimately floored campaign, Labour has decided to give free dental care to everyone under thirty. Eventually. It is a bit like pulling teeth because 18 to 23-year-olds have to wait until 2025 and 24 to 30-year-olds don’t get their free trip to the ‘murder house’ until 2026. So there’s a fair bit of ‘chewing the fat’ to be done before it becomes reality. Hipkins says the long term plan is to have free dentistry for all. We oldies won’t be holding our breath then, but we might as well because we will have most likely carked it by that time anyway.
I went to Stuff, a dependably lefty outlet, to read all the plaudits from the left side of town for this policy. Much to my surprise, and may I add delight, it was going down like the odour of bad breath. The bribe was being seen for what it was; nothing more than drilling for votes. According to Hipkins, they’d been working on the plan for some time. Really? Pull the other tooth, it’s a false one. If the reaction from Stuff readers was anything to go by this policy might come back to bite them.
Don’t forget, when you are given money to do with teeth it normally comes from the Tooth Fairy. In this case, it’s the government’s Tooth Fairy in the form of Grant Robertson. The Tooth Fairy normally leaves the money under your pillow at night. The thoughts related to that visit could be more scary than the visit to the dentist.
Without wishing to insinuate that Grant is a fairy, one could be forgiven for thinking he’s had access to fairy dust over the last six years. Bruce Cotterill, writing in the Weekend Herald, seems to think so. He’s dusted off some of the numbers Grant has racked up using his magic wand and they’re not pretty.
Bruce says when Labour took office total crown expenditure was $99 billion. Over the preceding five years it had risen from $92b, an increase of $7b or 7.6%, equating to 1.5% a year. In Labour’s five years 2017–2022, total government expenditure has gone from $99b to $151b. That is an increase of $52b or almost 9% a year. Bruce says as a result the government is going to have to borrow another $15b over and above what was budgeted to see it through the shortfall.
Bruce points out that this government, which has taken our borrowing from $60b to $160b in just six years, and our total government spending from $99b in 2017 to over $151b today, plans another $92.5b over the next four years. He says given this government’s reckless spending we don’t need to save $4b in four years, we need to save $40b in a hurry. Does anyone recall somebody talking about voodoo economics recently? I think that somebody needs to find a mirror.
Bruce says even the most strident Labour supporter must be coming to the conclusion that when it comes to running the economy the least trusted option is the incumbents. The problem is the most strident Labour supporter, to put it nicely, doesn’t understand or doesn’t care. Bruce notes a new government is unlikely to be worse. I cannot but agree. He talks about the bike bridge, light rail and the media merger. Millions were spent and there is nothing to show for it. How right he is.
This country has had enough of fairies at the bottom of the garden watching money supposedly grow on trees. It’s time to return to the economics of the real world. That time, fortunately, is only about six weeks away.
Oh, and I can hear dentists singing ABBA’s song, “Money, Money, Money, it’s always sunny, in a rich man’s world.” Excellent work if you can get it.
