Machinion Post

Wellington, Aug. 13 - Asked on Morning Report what new taxes a re-elected National government might introduce, the Prime Minister, Christopher Luxon, pointed to what he called existing policy: a rise in the fuel excise tax, and an accommodation levy. Neither idea was set out in any detail. No figure was given, no date, and no account of where the extra revenue from either measure would go. This newspaper takes leading articles from stray answers on morning radio with some caution, but the Minister of Transport, Chris Bishop, holds the portfolio into which any such change would fall, and the country is entitled to more than a passing remark before the next election.

The case for raising fuel excise is not without merit, and this newspaper has said as much before. The tax funds the National Land Transport Fund, and that fund is under real strain. Vehicles are more efficient than they were, electric vehicles pay through a separate charge rather than at the pump, and the take from excise has been falling in real terms even as the roading network ages and the maintenance bill grows. A user charge tied to distance driven has a defensible logic to it: those who wear out the road pay for the road. Deferred maintenance does not go away because a tax has been left untouched; it simply arrives later, and costs more when it does.

What has not been said, by the Prime Minister or by the Minister, is where the money raised would be spent. That is the question that matters most. A rise in fuel excise that is quietly absorbed into another round of Roads of National Significance, chosen for the map rather than for the return on the money, would be a poor use of a tax rise that working households will feel at every fill of the tank. The same money, put toward bus priority, rail renewal, and the unglamorous business of keeping existing roads in repair, would do more for more people at less cost. The Minister has spoken before of wanting value for the transport dollar. This is the test of whether that was a settled conviction or a passing phrase.

This newspaper does not oppose the principle of a fuel excise rise, and does not pretend an accommodation levy is without any logic either, particularly given the pressure tourism places on local infrastructure in places that see little of the revenue it generates. But a tax rise floated without a plan for its proceeds is not a policy. It is a placeholder, and the country deserves better than a placeholder from the department that decides how New Zealanders get to work, to school, and to hospital.

Wellington, Aug. 12 - A transport subsidy relied upon by people with disabilities has been cut, and those affected say the change feels less like housekeeping than like being singled out. That is a serious complaint, and it deserves a serious answer.

What is at stake is not abstract. For many disabled New Zealanders, a subsidised taxi or mobility service is not one option among several but the only practical way to reach a doctor, a workplace, or a marae. Where a bus route does not run, or a footpath cannot be managed, there is no cheaper substitute to fall back on. A cut that saves little money can still cost a great deal in missed appointments and lost independence, and that arithmetic does not appear anywhere in the record before this newspaper.

The fairest case for the Minister of Transport, Chris Bishop, is not hard to state. Every line of the transport budget is under pressure, and a Government asking motorists and ratepayers to accept restraint cannot exempt every subsidy scheme from scrutiny merely because the users are sympathetic. Reviewing eligibility and cost within Total Mobility and related schemes is a legitimate exercise, and this newspaper would not ask the Minister to treat any budget line as untouchable. But a review is not the same as a cut announced without its reasoning made plain, and the material available to this newspaper does not show what savings were sought, what alternatives were weighed, or why this group bore the reduction rather than some other.

Until that reasoning is published, the cut cannot be judged sound, and a change that cannot be defended in the open should not stand while its costs fall quietly on those least able to absorb them.