The election has heated up considerably in the last few days and I’ve no doubt it will be hot enough to melt the ‘surplus’ away by the time we get a change of Government.

But back to the subject of Tax, or as a good friend of mine calls it; theft.

Currently the Nats who we have already seen, can’t add up, have been lambasting the Labour Party over its reluctance to divulge what it intends to do about taxes.

To those used to the way politics has been in New Zealand over the last 50 years or so, it might seem like a fair call. However that is because most of the voters have been used to pork barrel politics all of their lives.

In most of the elections I can recall, one of the most trumpeted policies of the main protagonists has been the rate of taxation. The party in power has invariably offered a sweetener a few months out from the election which they have timed to come into effect several months after the election. The wannabes have always tried to counter that with a bid of their own and once all the dust has settled, one or the other then implements their promise, right?

Well, actually that isn’t always right; especially when there is a change of Government because what most voters probably don’t realise is that the wannabes don’t usually get to see the entire financial picture prior to the election. They have to make their bids based upon what meagre information is provided to them by the lot that’s in power.

We have had quite a few instances where the party of change has discovered upon taking office that the picture they were given was in fact a mirage (or a complete lie, if you like). This has then left them in the sticky position of either having to go ahead with measures that would spell disaster for the country or risk the venomous backlash that comes from not carrying out an election promise.

Jacinda Ardern is somebody who has ridden into the leadership of the Labour Party on the back of a change movement within that party. The new blood appear to have learned some of the lessons of the past. She and her shadow ministers have realised that they need to know exactly what state the books are in after 9 years in which flag referenda and poncy hideously overpriced trade stands in Dubai and five figure signs to decorate the outside of MBIE have taken priority over putting money into our super fund or properly funding health and education.

Thus they have taken the eminently sensible approach of saying they will set up a working body as soon as they are elected to consider the question of taxation and then be guided by the advice that brings.

A good analogy for this which just might be understood by even some of those whose vote will be in the blue box is this: Would you buy a business without seeing the books and make promises to staff regarding their wages?

I’ll grant you, that it is unconventional to do what Labour has done and highly likely to be misunderstood by many, but given our fucked up political system, their only other choice would have been to make a load of wild promises which they could not be sure they could carry out.

I‘ve said for many years that we need a proper constitution in New Zealand. That document could remove most of the idiosyncracies that bedevil our electoral system such as the party in power being able to choose the date of the election and whether they wish to open the books.

Don’t be blinded by the steaming great pile oozing out of the Nats at the moment. They are rats that have been cornered and they will lie about anything and everything to try and cling to power.

And in any case, why would you want a Minister of Finance who can’t even read a simple spreadsheet?