Budget 2012 Information Release

The Treasury has released documents relating to Budget 2012 in response to and in anticipation of requests for Budget-related information. The documents released here are among the most frequently requested under the Official Information Act.

See Budget 2012 for access to the core Budget documents such as the Budget Speech, Executive Summary and Fiscal Strategy Report. See also previous Budget information releases back to Budget 2005.

Budget-related information in this release is organised as follows:

• Key Documents - Covering:
o Design of the Budget process
o Budget strategy
o Budget Ministers' briefings
o Budget Package Cabinet paper
o Cabinet minutes related to the Budget strategy and Budget Package Cabinet papers
• Tax Papers
• Other Papers Relating to Specific Votes:
o ACC
o Arts, Culture and Heritage
o Attorney-General
o Canterbury Earthquake Recovery
o Commerce
o Communications
o Community and Voluntary Sector
o Conservation
o Consumer Affairs
o Corrections
o Courts
o Customs
o Defence and Defence Force
o Economic Development
o Education and Education Review Office
o Emergency Management
o Employment
o Energy
o Environment and Climate Change
o Finance
o Food Safety
o Health
o Housing
o Immigration
o Internal Affairs
o Justice
o Labour
o Lands
o Local Government
o Maori Affairs
o Ministerial Services
o National Archives
o National Library
o Office of the Clerk
o Pacific Island Affairs
o Parliamentary Counsel
o Parliamentary Service
o Police
o Primary Industries
o Prime Minister and Cabinet
o Racing
o Revenue
o Science and Innovation
o Senior Citizens
o Serious Fraud
o Social Development
o Sport and Recreation
o State Services
o Statistics
o Tertiary Education
o Tourism
o Transport
o Treaty Negotiations
o Veterans' Affairs - Defence Force
o Veterans' Affairs - Social Developement
o Women's Affairs
o
Note that documents relating to Vote Foreign Affairs and Vote Official Development Assistance are not currently included in this release.

Information Withheld from Documents
Key to sections of the Official Information Act 1982 under which information has been withheld.

Certain information in the attached documents has been withheld under one or more of the following sections of the Official Information Act, as applicable:

• [1] 6(a) - to prevent prejudice to the security or defence of New Zealand or the international relations of the government
• [2] 6(c) - to prevent prejudice to the maintenance of the law, including the prevention, investigation, and detection of offences, and the right to a fair trial
• [3] 9(2)(a) - to protect the privacy of natural persons, including deceased people
• [4] 9(2)(b)(ii) - to protect the commercial position of the person who supplied the information or who is the subject of the information
• [5] 9(2)(d) - to avoid prejudice to the substantial economic interests of New Zealand
• [6] 9(2)(f)(iv) - to maintain the current constitutional conventions protecting the confidentiality of advice tendered by ministers and officials
• [7] 9(2)(g)(i) - to maintain the effective conduct of public affairs through the free and frank expression of opinions
• [8] 9(2)(h) - to maintain legal professional privilege
• [9] 9(2)(i) - to enable the Crown to carry out commercial activities without disadvantage or prejudice
• [10] 9(2)(j) - to enable the Crown to negotiate without disadvantage or prejudice
• [11] 9(2)(k) - to prevent the disclosure of official information for improper gain or improper advantage
• [12] 9(2)(ba)(i) - to prevent prejudice to the supply of similar information, or information from the same source, and it is in the public interest that such information should continue to be supplied.
•
Where information has been withheld, a numbered reference to the applicable section of the Official Information Act has been made, as listed above. For example, a [4] appearing where information has been withheld in a release document refers to section 9(2)(b)(ii).

In preparing this Information Release, the Treasury has considered the public interest considerations in section 9(1) of the Official Information Act.

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Gordon Campbell: On The Government's Assault On Maori

This isn’t news, but the National-led coalition is mounting a sustained assault on Treaty rights and obligations. Audrey Young in the NZ Herald has compiled a useful list of the many ways Christopher Luxon plans to roll back the progress made in race relations over the past forty years. He has described yesterday’s nationwide protests by Maori as “pretty unfair.” Poor thing. More