IRD spends $20 million on consultants

The National Party’s released figures showing the Inland Revenue Department has spent more than $20 million on consultants in the past three years.

“Twenty million is a lot of hip operations, it could go a long way in the health sector and even our defence forces would welcome an injection of that magnitude,” says National’s Rangitikei MP Simon Power.

National obtained the figures in written questions to the Minister of Finance, who’s attached 10 pages of documents listing the consultants used since 2000.

“The list of consultants was so long that those who had less than $5,000 spent on them weren’t included,” says Mr Power.

“This sort of spending makes a mockery of Helen Clark’s claim that she would crack down on the culture of extravagance.”

Millions of dollars has been spent on computer consultants and one contract measuring customer satisfaction cost more than half a million.

“For some strange reason nearly $1.7 million has been spent on Colmar Brunton, when a simple phone call to any taxpayer in New Zealand would have given the IRD a clear idea of how it was performing,” Mr Power says.

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