Are Australians Smarter or Braver than New Zealanders?

It has been interesting following the political events in Australia this week with Julia Gillard pushing ahead with the carbon tax she promised the Australian electorate she wouldn't implement and polls indicating the Australian public are overwhelmingly against the proposal and ready to dump the Australian Labor Party for breaking its election promises.

The reaction to this political intransigence contrasts with our experience in New Zealand where the National Government last year pushed ahead with its Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) against earlier promises, a betrayal that New Zealanders accepted with barely a whimper.

Australians have figured out that a carbon tax is a hugely expensive exercise in futility. They know that any carbon emissions savings that result from the significant increases in energy prices (and the cost of pretty much every other product and service in the economy) will be offset 100-fold by China's increase in emissions over the same period. Unlike Australians, New Zealanders seem to be too stupid to make the connection between the direct impact of the ETS on energy prices and the consequential price increases of almost everything in the economy.

Australians are smart enough to know that the science is far from settled and that actually global temperatures are not consistently tracking upwards with atmospheric carbon dioxide levels but rather have been static for the last ten years.

They are smart enough or brave enough to respond to Gillard's carbon tax proposals with, "Piss off, Mate, we're not having a bar of it!" (or words to that effect).

Australians are smart enough to know that if they don't dig minerals out of ground and sell those minerals to anyone who wants them, the only people who will suffer are Australians - unlike New Zealanders. And they are smart enough to know they need to reduce taxes to generate economic growth and create jobs - unlike New Zealanders.

The New Zealand National Government has given up on its goal of catching Australia in wages and living standards. Perhaps they have conceded that we're not smart enough or brave enough to get there.

2009 - the year NZ decided to join the Third World

As 2009 draws to a close, it is time to reflect on the year in retrospect. It was a year that opened with hope for those of us who believe there is a better alternative to the ever-waxing tide of government regulation and expenditure that we have seen under successive New Zealand governments for the last 15 years. The new National government was elected on a platform of economic growth and prosperity.

Alas, after one year of National, the signs are that this is a conservative (with a small 'c') government that is not prepared to change anything that the previous Labour government put in place and that is prepared to increase the burden of regulation and government interference in the economy through initiatives such as the new emissions trading scheme and increases in accident compensation levies.

The truly alarming news out of this government came late in the year when the Minister of Finance announced that the goal of the 2025 Task Force, to match Australia's GDP per capita by 2025, was "aspirational" and unrealistic. The effect of this is that, for the first time ever in my observation of politics in this country, the government has conceded that New Zealand's future is as a Third World, not a First World, country. This alarming news is made worse by the widespread acceptance of the Finance Minister's view in the mainstream media. Personally, I find this situation very depressing and for the first time in many years I find myself reassessing whether New Zealand will continue to be my home.

I am fortunate in that my family and I have dual citizenship and can live and work anywhere in the European Community as well as in New Zealand. My children are still at school but they are already citizens of the world, having travelled to a number of countries at a young age and having already become fluent in other languages. It is apparent that they will be highly productive citizens of whichever country they eventually settle in and I don't think I am being overly boastful when I say that they are exactly the type of young people that New Zealand needs to retain. But it is difficult to remain loyal to a country that seems intent on squandering its future.

Hopefully 2010 will see the National Government come to its senses and follow through on the platform of economic growth and prosperity on which it was elected. If it does not, it will be betraying not only the electors who put it in power but the future electors of New Zealand like my children.

NZ - a future nation of domestic servants?

It was interesting to hear Bill English's reaction to the 2025 Taskforce's recommendations on policies New Zealand should follow to catch Australia in GDP per capita by 2025. The taskforce was set up by the National Party-led Government as a condition of its 2008 election coalition agreement with ACT. English didn't disagree with the taskforce's recommendations so much because he thought they were likely to fail to meet the objective, rather he dismissed the objective itself. It other words, he said it was unrealistic for NZ to try and catch Australia.

Let us think about what this means for a moment. Australia's economic growth hasn't been spectacular in recent years, in fact, it has been quite modest in comparison with China and some other Asian nations. Australia itself will have its work cut out trying to keep up with its Asian neighbours over the next 15 years. If NZ doesn't even keep pace with Australia, where does that leave us?

I think the answer to this question is obvious. It will leave New Zealand as an increasingly poor country in an increasingly prosperous region. We are already starting to take on the characteristics of a third world nation with low wages and poor infrastructure, and an economy based on commodity exports and low-cost tourism. If the trend continues, New Zealanders in the future will work for Chinese and Malaysian companies as low-cost labour, manufacturing consumer goods or pharmaceuticals; or as domestic servants making the beds, cleaning the toilets and tending the gardens in wealthy Asian homes. We will become a remittance economy with New Zealanders working offshore sending money home to enable unemployed relatives here to survive, just like many Pacific Island economies today.

Is this what we aspire to? According to Bill English it is. Essentially he is saying New Zealand should not try to compete with its neighbours in the region. We should lie down and allow ourselves to be rogered by those who have the fortitude to compete on the world stage.

I have never before heard such a pathetic, defeatist vision for this country. If this is all English and his cronies think the people of this country are capable of, they should all resign immediately.