21 May 2002

Recent Government press releases announcing a number of good news initiatives such as the Design Task Force, and a new Hollywood movie for Taranaki are typical election year flag-waving as government tries to take credit for the success of the private enterprise. Enterprises that have succeeded in overcoming the obstacles of living under a high tax government that increases tax compliance costs by continually tampering with the employment and taxation rules.

The real credit for these successes must go to the low value of the dollar and entrepreneurial efforts that succeed despite the smothering blanket of government administration.

An important fact ignored by most commentators on New Zealand business is that we now need ten times more accountancy graduates than we did in 1975. That is largely due to a massive increase in compliance costs for the 90% of businesses that have under ten employees, businesses which in our view are the ones most likely to launch new initiatives for the “Knowledge Economy”. During this same period registered apprentices have declined from around 25,000 to just a few thousand and our ability to respond to manufacturing opportunities has suffered.

Christian Heritage is more interested in knowing what this government is going to do to release the bureaucratic shackles on apprenticeship training for small businesses than hear about their flag waving presence at the launch of a successful business enterprise.

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