The target of returning to surplus this year was always a tough one.
A variety of factors outside the government’s control have made it much tougher.
The government could take a slash and burn approach to get to surplus this year.
Or it could continue for focus on what matters and take a little longer.
The Opposition would criticise it whatever it did but most people will recognise that other things matter more than the relatively insignificant difference between a small forecast surplus and a small forecast deficit.
Bill E should have told Lisa Owen if she wanted to call what the Key Government have achieved around the budget deficit that was so dire 7 years ago and plunged NZ into recession a year ahead of the rest of the world and is lauded so widely across the western democracies, a failure, then with her second attempt to get English to call his close miss a failure then the simple screeching fingernails on a blackboard might have been rendered silent.
Had my TV had its Mic on, the stupid woman could have perhaps taken my suggestion in a slightly raised voice, and merely stated she considered the small possible deficit a failure in her estimation and just moved on.
It could have saved some wasted minutes of my life that are now gone for all time.
LikeLike