Coming to a Town Near You
Labour is bringing the fight against John Key’s plans to hike GST to 15% to a community near you.
I will be kicking off Labour’s “Axe the Tax” bus tour in Auckland this Sunday.
No one voted for an increase in GST. John Key’s plan will have a destructive impact on the lives of all low to middle-income Kiwis who have borne the brunt of the recession, and who are already struggling to make ends meet without a GST hike on top of everything else.
Check out whether Labour’s “Axe the Tax” bus stops in your part of New Zealand here.
Labour’s MPs will be on the road for two weeks from Auckland to Dunedin, and if we don’t stop in your town, we’re making plans to make sure we can get to you ASAP.
We’ll be touching base with community groups such as budgeting services, Grey Power, and Citizens’ Advice Bureaus to gauge the impact of the planned hike.
This week in Parliament John Key labelled his plan National’s “tax switch”.
It’s a strange term but probably quite accurate because as it implies it’s about giving with one hand and taking with the other.
It’s just shuffling money around.
You pay more for just about everything you buy because of the increase in GST – that’s the only certainty in the package.
You can keep up to date with the bus via twitter and you can also join the “Axe the Tax” Facebook group here.
It would be great to see you when we hit town. Check out where and when, here.
Keep in touch with Phil online
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National's Standards
John Key came into office and promised a high standard from his Ministers.
Well after 15 months in office we’ve seen a second Senior Minister resign under a cloud of shame.
It’s pretty simple really. You don’t pay for wine for your National Party mates on a Ministerial credit card or rack $1200 of bills on the public account to pay for a holiday in the South Island.
There has been a constant chain of National Ministers feathering their nests - Bill English, Rodney Hide, Gerry Brownlee and Phil Heatley - instead of focusing on hardworking New Zealanders who are trying to make ends meet.
National's ACC Rip Off
The passing of legislation cutting compensation this week means every New Zealand worker will now have less ACC cover for workplace injuries.
The changes include lower weekly compensation for part-timers and seasonal workers, as well as rules allowing ACC earnings related compensation and rehabilitation to be cut off earlier for all workers.
ACC was set up to provide all New Zealanders with fair no fault compensation and rehabilitation should they be injured.
National’s changes even removes mention of rehabilitation and prevention of injury from its title, further signalling the path being taken towards of privatisation and lower cover for New Zealand workers.
At Home and Helpless
Tony Ryall is at it again.
Five DHBs are in the process of reviewing home help which has seen thousands of people in the Kapiti, Canterbury, Southland and Otago have the support they receive cut.
The cost of providing home support is just $21 per hour. That means cutting the one and a half hours of home help per week that thousands of elderly are reliant on and saves the DHB and the Government just $30 a week per person – meanwhile the Prime Minister is telling New Zealanders he deserves a tax cut of $393 a week – that’s just not fair.
DHBs are now writing to elderly Kiwis telling them to pay for home help themselves! While $30 might not be a lot to some people it represents nearly 10 percent of an elderly person’s weekly pension (the living alone rate is $310 per week).
That is not fair – and Labour says that is not OK.
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