Polling for the television channels appears to confirm the Govt will see its support base shrink rapidly when it increases GST in the May budget. The TVNZ Colmar Brunton poll, for example, recorded 69% of respondents didn’t think raising GST is a “good idea” and 63% didn’t believe they would be better off after the tax changes, including personal tax cuts. Labour leader Phil Goff, who sees the prospect of an increase in GST as reinforcing his message John Key is delivering tax cuts for the rich at the expense of the poor, is leading his MPs on a bus tour campaigning against the increase. He may find he is preaching only to the converted since Labour is not making any commitment to repeal it, requiring an increase in personal tax rates.

The PM says he is not surprised the polls show “some concerns” but he believes most people are “open-minded,” and waiting until they see the detail in the budget. He is almost certainly reassured by responses in focus groups where more detailed probing reveals rather different answers than those posed in the simplistic questions of the public polls. Far from suggesting the Govt’s political capital is running out, the more intellectual analysis points to a tectonic shift in political attitudes. Left-wing pundit Chris Trotter, noting the “most startling fact” about the Key Govt is its enduring popularity, attributes it in part to National’s superior ability to make out a case for much-needed change, while the Left is stuck defending the status quo.

- - - NOT A SUBSCRIBER? - - — - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

UNDERSTAND GOVERNMENT WITH NEW ZEALAND’S NO.1 POLITICAL LETTER

THE TRANS TASMAN POLITICAL LETTER

Published since 1968. Hot On The Spot from Wellington and Canberra. An indispensable guide to what’s happening and why it’s happening…in Politics, the Economy, Legislation and Regulations. Analysis and Forecasts which are impartial, accurate, reliable and timely. Published each Thursday 46 times per year.

To subscribe http://transtasman.co.nz/home/special-introductory-offer

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Another view comes from Colin James who sees Key as experimenting with changes to the way policy is made, to fit with the more differentiated way of doing things the rising generation expects. Tax, science, capital markets, petroleum and mining development, water, “green growth”: these are areas where taskforces of non-party experts are analysing the issues, conditioning the public for political action. This is how in the environment an MMP electoral system creates, a Govt can achieve a series of “step-changes,” without collapsing in a heap.

 Copyright © Trans Tasman Media Ltd