Reacting to Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s refusal to rule out introducing new taxes at the budget, Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns Manager, Connor Molloy, said:

“Today’s refusal to rule out new taxes suggests the Government is nothing more than Labour lite. After hounding the previous Government for increasing spending by 67% in just six years and criticising them for introducing new taxes as an answer for every problem, the National-led Government appears to be softening voters to do just that.

“We have already seen it with the u-turns on the promise to scrap the app tax, the hiking of the trust tax rate and the delay to reinstating interest deductibility for rental properties. At every turn, the government has opted for more and higher taxes, rather than making the necessary cuts to the bloated bureaucracy and slashing wasteful spending such as the billions splashed out on corporate and middle class welfare each year.

“It is time the Government gets real with New Zealanders. Did they elect a fiscally conservative government who is prepared to cut waste and shrink the size of the state or did they elect a continuation of the tax, spend and hope policies of the past six years?”

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