Credit: Luke
The Muppet Show that is our government continued yesterday.
NewtalkZB reports:
Labour has released costing estimates for its boost to student loans and allowances – just hours after Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern defended not doing so.
Education Minister Chris Hipkins announced yesterday the pledge to boost student allowances and student loan living costs by $50 a week was now in place.
However, his release didn’t include cost estimates, and National’s finance spokesman Steven Joyce later challenged Labour to front on its numbers.
Hipkins said the costings would be released in the coming weeks when detail on another policy – fees-free tertiary education – was made public, given that change would affect overall student numbers.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern spent much of her stand-up with media today defending the lack of costing information, saying delaying the release would mean “the most robust numbers possible”.
However, later in the afternoon Hipkins’ office released preliminary costings that were taken to Cabinet, estimating the total cost of the two increases at $200m in 2018/19, rising to $210m by 2021/22.
That is lower than the estimate of $270m a year, given during the election campaign.
Labour has not released estimates of up-take for the extra loan and allowance money.
Is there anyone who believes Labour’s numbers?
This government, the Labour members especially are making screw up after screw up. They have been in government 27 days and so far it has been disaster after disaster, flip flop after flip flop.
Chris Hipkins must be right up there for the first minister to get a kick in the balls from Heather Simpson. He is showing he is but a child at this politics thing. He seriously needs to be sent to the naughty step.
He’s made him PM look like a right chump. He won’t be getting the concern face, he will be getting the scowly face about now.
Helen Clark would never have tolerated this level of incompetence.