KEY POINTS:
Business groups are generally unimpressed by the Budget with one describing tax cuts as patronising.
"The Government's tax cuts total $1.5 billion though it has been running surpluses four times that for years; this is patronising and a complete letdown," Employers & Manufacturers Association (Northern) chief executive Alasdair Thompson said.
"Telling people with pockets emptied by rising food and fuel prices they can only have $12 to $28 a week to prevent inflation is laughable."
Business NZ says the Budget has made some "useful" microeconomic reform, but has not delivered a transformational change for the business environment.
Chief executive Phil O'Reilly said the Budget delivered some welcome investment in the productive capacity of the economy, including changes in research spending, broadband and company compliance.
He said the decisions on the international tax regime were generally positive, but that the thousands of small and micro-sized businesses that pay tax at the top rate have received little relief.
The Manufacturers and Exporters Association said the Budget delivered very little towards lifting industrial performance.
"We are pleased to see the R&D tax credit in effect, that encourages winning behaviour, but the Government persists with its policy of 'picking winners' rather than widening the behaviour based approach."
Federated Farmers president Charlie Pedersen said the broadband initiative was welcome.
Don Braid, group managing director for Mainfreight, said the the Government was lacking a long-term vision and there were no bold initiatives we can hold on to as a country.
Fisher & Paykel Appliances chief executive John Bongard said the Budget held no real surprises.
