A new Ilam poll shows The Opportunities Party leader Raf Manji fighting the Labour candidate for second place, while National’s Hamish Campbell takes the lead.
With TOP well below the 5% threshold in national polls, Manji’s bid to win an electoral seat in Christchurch’s Ilam is likely the party’s only path to Parliament.
That path looks to be an uphill climb according to a Taxpayers’ Union – Curia poll released on Tuesday evening. It showed Manji with just 18% of the vote, putting him in third place.
National’s Campbell was comfortably ahead with the support of 43% of decided voters, while Labour’s Sarah Pallett - the incumbent MP - was picking up another 20%.
However, almost a fifth of all voters were still undecided and the gap between Pallett and Manji was well within the 4.5% margin of error, meaning the two are effectively tied for second.
Only 33% of all voters had committed to voting for Campbell, compared to 15% for Pallett and 14% for Manji. This means the TOP leader may have to take votes off both parties to win.
This could be a difficult task, as most of Manji’s support has come from voters who supported the Labour candidate in the 2020 election.
Only 6% of people who voted for Gerry Brownlee that year have switched to supporting Manji, compared to 22% of Pallett’s supporters.
Less than half of those who voted for the Labour candidate in 2020 said they would do so again, with another 13% switching to support Campbell and 12% still undecided.
Poll respondents gave Pallett a net performance rating of -15%, although the plurality (32%) said they didn’t have a view on whether she had done a good job or not.
Almost half of respondents said New Zealand was headed in the wrong direction, with a small majority split between ‘right direction’ and ‘unsure’.
The most important issues to voters were ‘unsure’ and ‘other’, but the top three named issues were housing, the cost of living, and law & order — with roughly 10% each.
Despite being behind the other candidates, Manji is polling better than the TOP party vote in Ilam which was at just 4% — although that’s double its 2% average nationwide.
The TOP leader also has decent name recognition, with 30% of poll respondents able to recall his name when asked. That compares to Campbell at 32% and Pallett at 38%.
The poll was conducted by Curia Market Research and included responses from 400 adults in the Ilam electorate, weighted by age and gender. The margin of error was 4.5%.
Billion-dollar promise
Manji has been campaigning on a proposed billion dollar investment package for Christchurch, based on needs he identified while serving as a city councillor.
These investments would include new medical facilities, an electric bus fleet, extra cash for road and footpath repairs, a South Island police training college, a new school, and $40 million to repair the Christchurch Cathedral.
Other key policies include free public transport for young people, a tax-free threshold funded by a 0.75% land value tax and a higher top rate, and a tighter Emissions Trading Scheme.
Without a clear path to Parliament, neither National nor Labour have taken a position on whether they would form a coalition with TOP — which pitches itself as a centrist party.
The three leading Ilam candidates, and the Green Party’s Mike Davidson, will take part in a debate in Christchurch at 7pm on Tuesday.
Almost 10% of poll respondents said they would vote for the local Act or Māori Party candidate, despite neither party fielding one in the 2023 race.
119 Comments
If anything his support is going to drop from here on in. TOP have been campaigning for the last 10 years. The national and Labour campaigns only really started this month. I wouldn't mind seeing TOP in parliament, but unless Hamish Campbell and Sarah Pallett are exposed running a human traffiking ring in the next four weeks, its not going to happen.
An improvement on Goldsmith surely? As a spokesperson on finance his grasp on basic arithmetic was illustrated by his contention, halfway through the last election, that because WP & NZF then had about 2.5% of the party vote, that would double and see them back in government. Blimey!
TOP is very woke, not to mention the fact that they want the State to charge people rent to live in their own houses, even grannies earning no income. They won’t win an electorate, this poll indicates he has not a snowballs chance. All votes cast for TOP, most of which would otherwise have gone to the Greens, will be wasted. Please go ahead.
Does TOP pay interest.co.nz for advertising? Campaign finance issue IMHO. Prove me wrong by giving ACT even a quarter of the publicity.
Ask Manji who owns NZ’s water. The answer he’d give is political suicide, so they choose to stay quiet on their more extreme policies.
Will they be applying their annual land tax to Maori land? Nope.
How does this help the grannie being charged annual rent by the government despite the fact that she is earning no income with which to pay it?
Georgism (land communism) is dead for good reason. The logic is fundamentally flawed on so many levels. If you want the state to charge me rent for my land, why not for my boat or my bicycle? And don’t tell me that it is because land is fixed in supply. We have a surplus of land in NZ. We have a shortage of infrastructure-ready developable land, which is not at all fixed in supply. NZ is not Singapore.
The policy is structured similar to rates where payment can be deferred until the property is sold or ownership is transferred.
Ideally I think the policy would be better received if it was phased in so the market has time to react and price the changes in e.g start at 0.10% then creep it up from there.
Almost as unpalatable as telling her to get a reverse mortgage. There is even a better case for a poll tax (notoriously unjust) than a land tax. In both cases, taxing non-existent or imputed (imaginary) income is a fundamentally flawed and unjust proposition.
First charge nana income tax on the money she earns, then charge her again in perpetuity every year (even in the grave in the case of TOP’s policy) for the asset that she purchases with that money. Not an approach that will resonate with many kiwis.
We pay rates currently the principle is similar. Every tax is bad and has negative effects. I get taxed on my income and then taxed again when I spend that income through GST. Income tax is 39% in the top bracket how is taxing people's labour any more just than taxing land?
I view rates as fundamentally different - a service charge. Simply an annual fee for water supply, wastewater, roads, reserves etc. LVT is an imputed rent tax, not a fee for a service rendered.
At least taxing the income earned from labour or income-generating assets is taxing actual income. Makes more sense than taxing assets themselves, which introduces a disconnect between requirement to pay and ability to pay
Is that not what tax is though? To pay for services and benefits such as superannuation, medical, roading, education, etc. They are fundamentally the same, at least a land value tax doesn't discourage development like property tax (rates) does.
The big issue New Zealand is facing is that we are going to have a shrinking workforce, a workforce that is currently shouldering basically all of the tax burden through unindexed income taxes whilst those who have finished working collect superannuation checks and pay nothing towards these services themselves. The system as it is, is inherently unsustainable and at a certain point we will have too many people collecting super vs working and actually paying taxes, taxes that also need to fund other services such as healthcare and infrastructure. Hence the need to diversify the tax base away from incomes and look into other revenue streams, e.g CGT, LVT or a wealth tax. In my opinion, of these the one with the least negative effects and deadweight losses is an LVT.
Not sure what your point is here? It also doesn't prove that a LVT doesn't have any merit. I don't like tax as much as the next guy but ultimately we do need to pay tax at some point and I don't see why a LVT is fundamentally any worse than taxing income, GST or anything else really.
LVT is a bad idea and I disagree with it. Simply because it disconnects tax from income.
In the current climate no such tax will get any support. Look at the drama of the Auckland rates increases and muliply that by 10.
Anyone who supports this hasnt thought it through. Keyboard warriors just like the idea of a punative tax to get 'them'.
Be rational.
Which it would under TOP's tax switch policy via the 15k tax free threshold.
Unfortunately (my view, not the party view), some of their other policies have muddied the water with PAYE tax rate increases at the high end so the proposition as a whole isn't tax neutral which makes it harder to sell/understand.
LVT encourages productive use of a scarce resource (land) - see my other posts on this thread for examples. Do you disagree? Or do you just not want to incentivise productive use of land?
It doesn't receive support because people don't understand the benefits.
Disconnecting tax from income - this is only true if you use your land to do nothing (including live on it). Just because society of tenure for example isn't taxed, doesn't' mean there isn't a benefit. Define taxable 'income' as 'economic income' and all of a sudden there is no disconnect. Also, plenty of taxes such as GST are paid regardless of any connection to income. Even rates, if you consider them a tax for local services, are requested regardless of income. The connection you speak of just doesn't exist elsewhere in the system, so why does it need to all of a sudden for an LVT?
party admit it has plans to raise it to 1.5%
Great, the LVT incentive for bare land holders to build and empty house owners to rent will be twice as effective at that rate compared to 0.75%.
Seriously though, raising the LVT to 1.5% will not double the total LVT paid/collected due to the land prices falling from its introduction in the same way we're seeing land prices fall from higher interest rates currently (interest being an annual charge too or an opportunity cost if buying with cash). For this reason, LVT would have the additional benefit of making existing houses more affordable all else being held even.
The other half of TOP's tax switch policy is the 15,000 tax-free threshold. That means the majority of people would be better off (pay less tax overall) under TOP's policy - it's not a new tax grab as some like to make it out to be.
+100%. It also divorces itself from the reality that two people earning the same actual useable income (and not a made-up economic income to justify further tax out-reach) should pay the same tax.
A universal land levy like TOP proposes would see most home owners in Auckland significantly worse off, while those in the regions on the same incomes, or even higher ones, would be able to reap the benefits from their lower value land, despite it having no bearing on their relative wealth or ability to actually live directly off it.
The more I have thought about it, the more I feel a land tax is the only thing broad enough (other than GST) to make a real impact in our tax system - but a universal rating across the whole country will produce fundamentally unjust outcomes.
I'm on a postage size stamp section with a townhouse. That's pretty efficient, but because of land strangulation in Auckland by local authorities and the refusal of inner city residents to intensify, that 200sqm section is worth about 80% of my GV.
Guess who is going to get handed the bill for that? I'll give you a hint: not the people who created that outcome in the first place.
Meanwhile, someone in a small town on a quarter acre section will pay far less and get the benefit of the decrease in personal tax - even though they may earn significantly more.
How to end land strangulation in Auckland?
Make people pay for actual land values based on proximity and size. GV again you look at what the policy would do instantly, but refuse to see the secondary effects of forcing land efficiency. It would be a shock for those with big sections living right next to the city and the further out you got, the less of a shock it would be. Land would likely be revalued quite significantly as a second order effect. Its not perfect policy, but policy never is.
But you know, keep voting for the same things and get the same results, poor planning, tax base concentrated on incomes and consumption, lowering overall productivity and kids that can never afford to buy houses.
The problem is it would be a huge shock to those living quite a way from the city who already have efficient uses of extremely small parcels of land.
And sorry "not a perfect policy" isn't good enough when it means I pay more in taxes for a house using land more efficiently than one in another region, despite me earning possibly less income than someone else. That's a flawed policy. You can't bring a land tax to drive land efficiency and then slug people who are actually using land efficiently.
To start with it might slug some people to start with, correct. It will, however, start to force land price adjustment over time and should end up with a much better land use policies and much more productive land.
You are obviously only focussed on your own circumstances though which is based on a system that doesn't include a land tax and is full of the poor policies driven by a system that is fine with unproductive land use. Thinking that your existing circumstances won't change after such a big change in the tax system is, well, stupid. Every piece of land in the country would be re-evaluated over time, if such a policy was introduced and that re-evaluation would mean efficiently used land would benefit while in-efficiently used land would suffer.
But you don't see this, cos you think short term "what would happen to me tomorrow". Short term thinking is what has caused most of the issues we see today in housing, re-electing people with more short term thinking who will rinse and repeat the same poor policy is not going to fix anything. If anything, it will make the situation only more dire.
Quite correct and not directed at GV specifically but I do think there is a pretty high level of entitlement going around to keep what they have and not change anything while ignoring the breakdown of society (and the reasons for things like rising crime).
I moved from one end of the country to the other for a job. Why couldn't others move from Auckland to wherever the great deal is on LVT? Don't want to? Fine, then pay the LVT for the benefits living in Auckland bestows. Or, sell and pay no LVT and rent like half of Aucklanders do. If renting isn't for you then I guess there is a benefit to owning that might make the paying an LVT more palatable.
Why couldn't others move from Auckland to wherever the great deal is on LVT?
Because if your land tax policy makes it unaffordable for people to live in a city then your land tax policy is the problem, not where people live.
But sure, let's drive people from the places they were born, away from families, support networks and other things that they could otherwise afford to live near if it wasn't for an immensely flawed tax policy. At what point do you accept that maybe your policy is completely unworkable?
But sure, let's drive people from the places they were born, away from families, support networks and other things that they could otherwise afford to live near if it wasn't for an immensely flawed tax policy.
That's what's happening right now through really poor policy developed over decades of governments encouraging unproductive land use. At what point do we accept that current policies are completely unworkable and accept that something needs to change?
There are plenty of places in the world that have an LVT and use their land much more productively than us. But lets ignore the evidence and play games of chicken little where we exclaim loudly that if anything changes it will destroy the world.
if your land tax policy makes it unaffordable for people to live in a city then your land tax policy is the problem
It's not the land tax policy that made land unaffordable. We currently don't have an LVT and have some of the most unaffordable land in the world relative to incomes. An LVT would lower land prices (make them more affordable). In my view it is simple supply and demand, we have constrained supply of housing (council rules) while increased demand from external sources such as immigration (residence for sale) and internal sources such as investors with tax settings.
let's drive people from the places they were born
Already been there and done that and agree it's not ideal, but you cannot go from 3 mil to over 5 mil population and expect the same amenity. You're correct to be angry, you're incorrect to blame LVT.
At what point do you accept that maybe your policy is completely unworkable?
Some point after the population/credit creation ponzi has ended and someone has explained how LVT causes any of those things you mention (and I agree are undesirable). Rising rental prices and slowing of the fall in house prices (green shoots according to some). What changed, not LVT, but the flood gates opened after covid, also 160,000 odd new residents that became eligible to purchase and did just like my neighbours did. I don't ignore the demand side of the equation like the current politicians do for short term gain.
Agree. Small town centrally located quarter acre section here. Land Value $250k. I work remote with the odd commute into Wellington so I have a decent salary.
While the LVT arrangement would benefit me, it's certainly not an equitable set up. I think an undeveloped LVT based on land value and then an "LVT" for the occupier based on some uniform metric on a per SQM basis would be the way to go. Each occupier in a 5 story apartment block for example has a 1/5th share of the LVT or whatever we call it.
Keep the LVT simple NZDan.
And why shouldn't you be rewarded for living further out and reducing demand for housing closer to the city?
You did pay a price - the long commutes if I recall correctly even if you WFH a bit more now. An LVT would be an incentive for others to follow suit and leave the central Wellington houses for those that need them (and at a lower rental or purchase price to boot). LVT helps regardless of the other stupid constraints councils etc have in place. It's not going to fix everything, but it helps all else held constant.
Why couldn't others move from Auckland to wherever the great deal is on LVT?
A tax shouldn't drive people from their homes.
Alternatively, why don't we increase the taxes on rural areas that cost more to provide with services when they could be provided far cheaper in an urban setting? That's a choice people are making too.
A tax shouldn't drive people from their homes.
Every tax, at the margin, will drive someone from their home - this is not a valid criticism of LVT (i.e. whether GST or PAYE, if you lose your house by being a dollar short then the last dollar you paid in tax could be blamed). That's why you go for the 'least bad tax' which LVT is. My suggestion of moving was a way to reduce LVT in response to those that protest paying in an 'expensive' (but with other benefits) location. If you're going to grow the population (we have) then you also have to accept you will have less land to share per capita or you're going to pay more for the same amount due to increased demand.
Alternatively, why don't we increase the taxes on rural areas that cost more to provide with services when they could be provided far cheaper in an urban setting? That's a choice people are making too.
Rural rates, and those of small towns, are already (and have been for decades (my living knowledge), much higher than those in Auckland. Indeed, I was astounded that rates in Gore were more than Auckland when I moved. So yes, that's a thing and already exists. Will they have to pay even more going forward? Quite likely and the rationalisation has been happening for decades eg less schools etc. I think you're shifting the debate but yes I'm happy rural pay more but then they might deserve some credit for the export earning they create too.
I moved further out because the acquisition costs were a lot lower among other things. While I don't live in Carterton, they have the highest average rates bills in the country, and I think Masterton's are probably not too far off either. Is that a disincentive?
So I get to enjoy a lower LVT because I can work remote, yet a nurse in Auckland must pay double the LVT I do? I disagree, an LVT shouldn't be a mechanism to encourage people to live further from where they work. It should be there to encourage investment in unused land (dollar based) and then a fair means to shift some tax burden away from wages.
Is that a disincentive?
Yes, of course, all else being equal. But it's just one part of the overall cost/benefit equation which will likely be different for everyone due to different situations and job requirements.
So I get to enjoy a lower LVT because I can work remote, yet a nurse in Auckland must pay double the LVT I do?
Yes, if you choose to live somewhere with a lower LVT (land value). Does every job have the ability to work remote? No, but my point was more that you've helped ease demand in WLG by choosing not to live there - you aren't in bidding up house or rental prices in WLG for those that need to be closer to the city/hospital. I do not believe in equality across all types of work (including location considerations - you choose the job and the job usually dictates the location), but I do think housing should be affordable for those in work, wherever that is.
I disagree, an LVT shouldn't be a mechanism to encourage people to live further from where they work.
I'm not advocating that as a reason for an LVT. It is however a side effect since generally the further from the city centre you go the land is cheaper (due to commute times and costs) so it bestows a small benefit on those that do live more remote (likely nothing compared to the additional commute time and costs of petrol living further out would impose). In short, it would be pretty ineffective even if that was a stated reason for an LVT. I mentioned it as a counter to the argument that it wasn't fair for LVT to be less in remote areas - it is a small insignificant win for those living away from civilistation that already paying higher rates, commutes and fuel costs.
It should be there to encourage investment in unused land (dollar based) and then a fair means to shift some tax burden away from wages.
And it does that very well which is why I advocate for it in conjunction with the tax-free threshold of 15k per TOP policy, a UBI would do much the same as the tax-free threshold if they went that way too.
....Because making government revenues contingent on something definitely makes it cheaper, right?
But let's ignore GST, not adjusting income taxes for inflation, Council rates... this will definitely be different. And if it doesn't work, people can just uproot their lives and move somewhere else. Where to? Who cares! It's not TOP's problem.
"TOP: Overly-complex solutions that are more about making people who vote for us feel smart than actually solving problems" doesn't quite roll off the tongue, does it?
disconnect between ability to pay and requirement to pay
If you don't want to pay or cannot pay then just sell all your land. If renting isn't comparable to owning, then what have landlords been complaining about when asked to raise the standards of rentals via healthy homes etc? Perhaps they believe they should be able to have their cake and eat it too.
The idea that land tax is the “least bad tax” is simply not true.
100% disagree. Income tax acts as a disincentive to work and be productive. As your own comment stated, a land tax is levied regardless of ability to pay, hence it acts as an incentive to utilise your land (generate an income from it) to pay. If you're unable to then you could always just sell. Elderly, as has been pointed out by others, may defer it in order to stay where they are, they could also choose to increase utilisation by taking in a boarder (no, I'm not saying they have to, but this is a simple example of how a land tax encourages making more use of the same land/house).
(no, I'm not saying they have to, but this is a simple example of how a land tax encourages making more use of the same land/house).
No you aren't, because you're saying if my 200sqm postage stamp-sized section in Auckland is made unaffordable by a land-tax then I should have to uproot my family's lives and move somewhere else. This isn't about land-use efficiency at all.
That's not a fair representation of what I've said. I've given multiple options to paying the LVT such as selling and renting in the same location, renting a room out - no need to move if your cost benefit analysis comes out otherwise.
Also, I've consistently said I expect land values to fall with the introduction of and LVT. That's more affordable, not less.
Please also note, I advocate for the land tax to be off set with the 15k tax free threshold per TOP policy. So, if employed then you'd have to be on a very high income to be living on a 200sqm section and end up with less cash in the hand and forced to sell (but someone likely will be in that situation, unfortunately a fairer future doesn't come free). Those hit hardest will be those with empty houses and empty sections - neither being lived in and taking up a scarce resource that could be put to better use if they sold/rented it.
Does GV's mortgage drop in value with the corresponding fall in land values?
I doubt it unless their agreement with the lender allows for that (seems unlikely a lender would want to take that risk on without an additional interest rate margin). If the prices rise, I wouldn't expect the mortgage to 'grow' either.
Or is he locked into a high mortgage, with presumably higher mortgage servicing costs, and then an LVT that exceeds any income tax cuts?
Would need to know numbers to comment specifically, however, mortgage amount and cost will be whatever they are and not changed due to LVT or no LVT. LVT may or may not be more than TOP's tax cuts in an individual's case, that doesn't mean LVT is 'bad'. If an LVT had been in place prior to GV buying then the mortgage and associated servicing costs would have been smaller due to land values (purchase price) being lower. I am disgusted that NZ has held FHB to ransom like they have just to get shelter and security of tenure in the country they were born. There will be winners and losers with any change, but a long-term view not being taken for decades is where the anger should be directed.
Sounds appealing!
TOP should have learned from Winston - to get 5% you just need to pick an enemy (in this case property speculators, who are the issue, not nana wanting to see out her days in the house she raised her family in) and go to war with them.
They've already half done it with wanting to outlaw the use of equity to purchase additional property - I'd personally say allow it but tax it enormously so at least some revenue can be raised - but this is overshadowed by the not unreasonable opposition to paying out of your already taxed income for an LVT because some quango reckons your land is worth $X at any given point in time.
Should have gone for a big tax on equity release plus a capital gains tax (which is at least fair in the sense you're only paying it when you actually sell the property, perhaps even a higher rate for investment properties) and beat that drum until it burst.
Incoherent nonsense. Scream as much as you want about how we aren't Singapore, the reality is that there is *more* land left that can be made available for development in Singapore than there is around Auckland or Wellington, the two main places people want to live and work here. The laws of economics apply to those two cities just like they do in Singapore. Land supply *is* fixed in any given location and even without an absolute shortage of land nationwide, there will always be a relative shortage in the places where land is most useful. At that point the economics functions suspiciously similarly to a case of absolute shortage.
It's just horribly inconvenient for you that the country that has come closest to implementing Georgism is also the greatest economic success story of the past 75 years. Looking at other countries who have adopted elements of Georgist policy doesn't help your case much either - Taiwan? Australia? Hardly economic disaster zones.
You're also ignoring the fact that land tax has lower scope than existing council rates, and that TOP have been quite clear that superannuitants will be able to defer their proposed LVT.
Also totally invalidated when the banks charge citizens twice as much than the state taxes them to work, to live in their own homes.
Which, should a land tax come in, become less and less as land values decline to affordable levels, and the economic flow on effects will be healthy long term.
Extraordinary that Brownlee lost Ilam. After all as Fendalton, it was blue ribbon, Sydney Holland’s seat, National’s first prime minister. Up until now Ilam was being spoken as still touch and go for National. This poll indicates instead a massive return to basics by the electorate and within that a priority of before anything else, this government must be put out of power. In itself that is a likely bellwether for the same swing in all the electorates National lost last time, plus a few more and an accompanying boosted party vote If so, this Labour government can expect to be punished by the electorate even more than National were three years ago.
to charge people rent to live in their own houses, even grannies earning no income.
People who rent are charged rent to live in their homes - many being grannies as well, of course.
Just like rates, the TOP policy makes provision for deferral of the tax until such time as the asset/house is sold. In that sense, grannie doesn't miss out - only grannies' descendants do. Additionally, grannie gets a tax break due to the tax-free threshold. It really is a non issue for grannies themselves.
The great thing about land is it doesn't go anywhere if the owners sell and move overseas; someone else is then able to use the land effectively.
This is one of the great benefits of LVT; the holding cost of land increases, so land bankers sell up and move their assets to more productive investments. Sitting on land waiting for it to go up in value off the backs of everyone else's work is the definition of rent extraction and is a leech on society. In fact, we should pair LVT with a reduction in corporate tax, to really encourage moving our money into productive businesses.
I see a quote at the bottom of interest.co.nz: "
Gold is a great thing to sew into your garments if you're a Jewish family in Vienna in 1939, but I think civilized people don't buy gold, they invest in productive businesses.
~ Charlie Munger"
You could just as easily replace gold with land.
Yes, land doesn't fly happily (except through space, at pace).
Let's say you're a property investor and you own 10 properties values at $1,000,000 each. The LVT comes in, and you decide that property investment is no longer worth it for you because of it. You sell your properties, and now have $10,000,000. With a generic wealth tax, you'd still leave the country and take your $10 million with you (capital flight).
With an LVT, though, you actually have other options for your $10 million. If you want to stay in NZ, you merely invest in businesses instead (or term deposits, or some other form of investment that doesn't have as much taxation).
Now, with a generic wealth tax, not only would you take your money out of the country, but the asset class you took your money out of would become less useful. Let's say we had a tax on business value; every business owner would sell their business or close it down, resulting in a net loss for society. With LVT, though, the land doesn't go anywhere! It's still available for anyone willing to put it to good use as long as they can pay the LVT. The property investor sells up to someone willing to accept the increased holding cost because they can still do something sufficiently productive with the land, a win for society.
Workers are much less likely to leave the country under TOP than under your beloved Labour . And in case you hadn't noticed, it's the workers, not the landowners that produce our real wealth - the goods and services that we are actually able to consume. Owning land, even paying tax on that land, contributes zero to our total real wealth.
LVT is never going to happen.
There are plenty more avenues to raise revenue before ideas like this, including:
i) Eliminating current avoidance practices, and enforcing current taxation law.
ii) Removing tax-exempt status for Charities.
iii) Removing tax-exempt status for Iwi-owned businesses.
iv) Removing the tax-exempt status of the church.
The reality is that these things should have already been done, but, likely they would get done prior to any silly ideas like LVT.
DD, your post just sounds like a rant. I won’t be voting for them but I can appreciate that we need another minority to get air time. On MSM.
Grannie has had a good run, education, property, healthcare and Super. Mad by it’s her time to pay? Does she need to be in that big four bedroom home alone?
Maybe Granny has family that visits and stays. Maybe Granny has support networks, access to medical services and friends nearby?
This argument gets dangerously close to being that Granny has no rights once she reaches a certain age, and should simply make way for everyone else. That is not a just or equitable outcome. If your tax policy sees Nanny need to take on a reverse mortgage with the state just to stay in her own home in her senior years, then maybe the tax policy is the problem, not Granny.
Why are you ignoring the fact the LVT can be deferred? If “granny” had a massive share portfolio we would expect her to sell some of that to fund her retirement, this way she still has the ability to live in her own home as long as she pleases until it is either sold or ownership transferred. Why should the state fund her just so her asset can be passed down to her descendants? Other investments aren’t treated that way an we expect people to sell them at some point.
At the proposed rate it would take something like 80 years for a deferred LVT to become worth more than the property so the risk of getting nothing is incredibly low.
I'm not ignoring it, it just doesn't change the merits of what's actually being proposed here.
If your tax policy requires Granny to effectively take our a reverse mortgage with the state just to live in her own house, then your tax policy sucks. The fact it can be deferred doesn't redeem it in anyway, it's still garbage.
All of this hinges on the idea that the state has some inherent right to the house that you have lived in and paid for with already-taxed income, and that's abhorrent. TOP's policy seems to require me to accept big numbers of Kiwis as collateral damage for the 'greater good' and almost none of the TOP acolytes here are willing to acknowledge the multitude of issues that are being pointed out.
I'm a third-generation Aucklander in my late thirties, a middle-class professional.
I already have to choose between staying in the city where I have family, friends, history, and work -- or moving somewhere where I could possibly own my own property and stop paying rent. It simply isn't possible without an inheritance or an exceptional income in Auckland.
Me and my wife rent a pokey little unit in a row of pokey units. The units are overcrowded with young working families. Most of the street is 3/4 bedroom houses with a single elderly inhabitant or couple.
Something is out of whack. We treat the elderly like garbage, as human beings, but we treat their capital as sacrosanct.
Our current tax policy has a lot of godawful externalities as well. People are already getting priced out of the places they grew up and forced to live in cars. If you work for a living you get taxed to hell whilst asset owners get a free ride so something needs to change. Reward and encourage the people who work for a living.
Have you read their policies? I'm not sure on the specifics of the granny you are referring to but I am an above average earner, in the Ilam electorate as it happens with an about average house in terms of CHCH values and I've worked out that when you include their tax changes, I actually stand to gain under their policies.
The granny in your scenario has probably seen her property value multiply since owning it and she can defer those payments. She is still unlikely to come out at a loss. The LVT should help to keep property values in check so the younger generation should actually benefit.
The key thing is LVT incentivises productive use of land and disincentivises land banking empty or decaying property for future profits. It's about re-orienting things around productivity, not just selling each other property at ever increasing values. Of course if you're a National/act voter you probably prefer the latter.
Great comment. I fear however that the potential inheritors of grannies property will never view this from a rational, humanitarian perspective. Odd really, that they would deny future generations a fair go for pure self-interest. This argument has nothing to do with grannies welfare but their own greed.
I grew up in Ilam, went to school there - used to have Mr Brownlee himself come and talk on occasion actually - many of my friends and family still live there, and I voted there until moving away after 2020 so I'm now stuck picking between Megan Woods or whatever generic candidate National has put up, who will probably get my vote as Labour is so useless.
I'd personally vote Raf Manji for my electorate candidate if I could, even though I dislike the land tax policy and don't particularly like TOP as a party (my primary reasons being I dislike the pseudo-intellectual smarminess of many of its supporters, I'm not on board with LVT unless it applies to all land with no exceptions, and ultimately I think TOP has wasted its potential and brand cachet by trying to do too much when it just needs to do enough to get 5% - should have focused on crushing the scourge of property speculation and leave owner occupiers alone) simply as I think he would be a robust voice for Christchurch, as he has been to-date.
However, I don't think he will win for a few simple reasons:
- Ilam is as blue a university gender studies student's hair-rinse - 2020 was a total aberration. Sarah Pallett rode in on the coattails of peak Jacindamania and the de facto 'Covid referendum'. As far as I can tell she's never been seen since (I go past her office at least 5 times per week and have never seen it open). Couldn't tell you anything she's done. Most of those who voted her as a means of thanking Labour for saving them will just go back to National.
- Leftie vote gets split hard by uni students voting Green and then Labour in the worse-off bits of the electorate e.g. Aorangi road area and surrounds. Chippy should have done a cuppa with Raf.
- The wealthiest bits of the electorate will be overwhelmingly National, and then there are plenty of homeowners who will be sitting in houses that aren't all that grand but with a decent bit of land who might be rather put off by the output of the TOP tax calculator. Not everybody benefits from an LVT.
Will be interesting to see if he does better or worse as a TOP candidate than as an independent as he was in 2017.
Went to New Brighton recently for the first time in ages. My goodness that place is run down. There are parts of eastern Ukraine that I'd imagine are more welcoming right now.
Couldn't find anywhere for a coffee at 9am in the morning, just a total desolate ghost town apart from a bit of fishing off the pier.
Yes they are lovely and a great attraction (I haven't been personally but my wife has a few times and raves about them), and there are some nice newer facilities e.g. the lifesaving club down the road and that great playground, it's just such a shame about the surrounding area.
I believe our geography, population density, and other factors played a much larger part in nulifying the impacts of Covid in NZ rather than any particular Government action.
In terms of the Election itself. I still think Collins was a prime driver in Labours victory. She was quite likey the worst leader this country has ever had.
I believe our geography, population density, and other factors played a much larger part in nulifying the impacts of Covid in NZ rather than any particular Government action.
It's a bit of both. NZ had a relatively faster and more serious response than other nations who took longer to come to terms to the fact things were going to be doo-doo.
Kate how. They opened up land quickly hence why house prices in Christchurch was always way below National medium price. They got on with the most major disaster NZ had ever had before or after. Nobody knew what to do or how. If any blame it should be laid at the feet of EQC who like most govt dept fill of coffee meeting after coffee meeting civil servants who need to book another meeting. And how do you think Labour would have done if they were in power. They would still be having a health and safty meeting on how to shape those shovel ready projects while booking another meeting.
How? Purposeful delay in settlements both from EQC and the AMI takeover Crown Entity. Purposefully ignoring the community's feedback for city planning of the re-build.
“The ‘People’s Plan’ (Share an Idea), created after wide consultation with the public and other groups, had delivered a clear mandate for a compact, liveable and sustainable city, a ‘green city’ with energy efficient buildings along tree-lined ‘eco-streets’, according to one report.”
However central government usurped local government and the People’s Plan was replaced by the government’s own blueprint, the ‘Christchurch Central Recovery Plan.’
“Activist John Minto said Share an Idea was ‘an outpouring of what is at the heart and soul of Christchurch’, whereas the government’s Recovery Plan was simply ‘a corporate plan’ based on ‘private sector-led redevelopment, and it’s been an absolute disaster’, a view echoed by a number of people I spoke to.”
https://www.auckland.ac.nz/en/news/2021/08/25/the-christchurch-rebuild-a-tale-of-two-cities.html
Kate first off the slowing down of EQC payments was because they were concerns of corruption and over paying it is tax payer/insurance money. Most of the slow payments were at the insurance companies feet. As they weren't prepared to replace like for like. As for John Minto he wouldn't have a good idea if it hit him in the face. Like this forum ever one has an opinion and in a community situation everyone had one I went to several and literally everyone had different ideas. In the end As a govt they had to make a decision to move on wereby if Labour were in they would be still dithering about trying to please everyone but achieving nothing.
"Manji has been campaigning on a proposed billion dollar investment package for Christchurch, based on needs he identified while serving as a city councillor....$ 40M to repair the Christchurch Cathedral" wait, what...
Which Cathedral ?
The one already 50% over budget and on track to double https://i.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/128186034/inflation-risk-could-add….
Or the Catholic cathedral the Vatican has walked away from https://cathnews.com/2023/03/30/vatican-halts-plan-to-rebuild-christchu…
On Law & order
NZ - lets keep home invaders out of prison https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/home-detention-instead-of-prison-for-burg…
Yep a white elephant cathedral in the CBD but to worship you will need a bike and 4 hours drive away a new international airport in Central Otago. Oh yes, the council really know how to prioritise spending of ratepayers’ money for the benefit of ratepayers’ basic needs, not.
Agreed. Anyone working struggling to buy a house, and anyone wanting their kids to stay in NZ and enjoy the security of their own house should vote TOP. Will a land tax capture all the speculative and lazy land bankers...?
Absolutely. Promote working via less tax. Disincent land speculation with an annual tax and make every serial tax avoider pay something.
The usual tax free gain at all costs will obviously not like this.
Disagree. TOP has a calculator that allows you assess the impact. For the group you mention you will be generally better off unless you are leveraged to the moon in an effort to rinse tax prior to the ringfencing rule.
High income and serial leverage specuvestors will be worse off. No one has mentioned the most exciting policy. All rentals require a deposit of 100% of the purchase price.
No leverage....oh the humanity.
Rubbish. Plenty of people who require high incomes to maintain a costly mortgage will be worse off.
I broadly agree with the leveraging policy though, that could be bought in independently of the land tax nonsense which is unworkable in its current form. Could be a good coalition bargaining chip if Labour have a look in, but they probably won't.
Absolutely! Cant understand why people here are finding it so hard to get the purpose of LVT - its simply to push money out of land and into more productive stuff. That applies to everyone including grannies. Fact is, we in NZ have become so used to property as the safe, lazy way to wealth, it scares many that they'll have to think of something else.
But I've done good by me and my kids so this is somebody else's problem :(
Granny herald has an additional note:
A leaked survey from the Manji campaign showed a very different result.
Campbell was still ahead on 27.2 per cent, followed more closely by Manji on 23.4 per cent.
Pallett was a distant third on 17.7 per cent.
That survey picked random addresses in the electorate from the 2020 electoral roll, and interviewed 2591 voters (1339 male and 1252 female) between August 9-18.
Labour should definitely do a deal with TOP, they have no chance of winning Ilam at this point, but they have a better chance of getting into government if they have a potential coalition partner in TOP. Copy the Remuera playbook!
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