National's challenge to avoid looking tired

Bill English. Photo / Dean Purcell

Thursday's Budget will be judged just as much by what is missing from the document as by what it actually contains.

Had National remained in apparent denial and refused to acknowledge that seemingly insatiable demand is responsible for the Auckland housing "bubble" along with the shortage of new homes, then Thursday would have been a political disaster for it.

The Budget would have been rubbished and ridiculed. National would have been accused of being not just asleep at the wheel, but absolutely comatose.

Despite the front put up by John Key, it had to be assumed National was burning the midnight oil in large quantities in the Beehive seeking mechanisms to stifle demand. It now turns out that was the case; that work on the crackdown on property speculators unveiled by Key last Sunday had been under way for four or five weeks. Key could have saved himself a lot of bother had he dropped the odd hint that was happening. The apparent lack of urgency instead made the Government look powerless.

Sunday's announcement has provided breathing space for those Budget items still under wraps which Key and Bill English will want to highlight on Thursday without unwanted distractions. That includes measures to tackle "material deprivation" - bureaucrat-talk for "child poverty".

National's fumbles have allowed Labour to claim minor victories in the battle over which major party can claim the right credentials for running the economy.

Knowing the Government holds all the cards on Budget day, Labour leader Andrew Little and his finance spokesman, Grant Robertson, have been making pre-Budget speeches

The message to the suburbs, provincial cities and small towns is that National has been in charge for nearly seven years, yet most people do not feel better off.

If this is as good as it gets, then National's policies are not working and a new approach is needed.

The two speeches were notable in having the Prime Minister in their sights rather than English.

The blunt fact is that if Labour is to have a chance of winning the 2017 election, it has to implicate John Key as a poor economic manager.

Planting doubt in voters' minds about National's economic competence will not happen overnight. It is a slow-burner.

The challenge facing National on Thursday is to deflect this attack by presenting a Budget with fresh ideas and innovative policies.

National must avoid looking tired and like a third-term Government playing safe and merely going though the motions.

First-term governments get criticised for packing too much in their Budgets; third-term governments get crucified for not having enough in theirs.

English's seventh Budget potentially has far more significance than what might first appear to be the case.