Responding to Labour’s Ayesha Verrall on Q+A this morning, ACT’s Public Service spokesperson Todd Stephenson says:

“If the current public service cuts are unprecedented, that’s only because the ballooning of the Wellington bureaucracy under Labour was also unprecedented.

“Ayesha Verrall this morning admitted that the service New Zealanders received from the public sector did not match the growth in the number of people on the government’s payroll between 2017 and 2023.

“Labour is learning that throwing money at problems doesn’t work. If only it had listened to ACT for six years.

“The growing bureaucratic class in Wellington has failed to solve our country’s problems. We need to allow New Zealanders to make a difference in their own lives again.

“ACT’s view is that the reduction in size of the Wellington bureaucracy must go much further.

“Putting things right requires a smaller, more effective government that is much smarter about solving the long-term challenges that have grown under multiple governments.”

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