Christopher Luxon talks foreign investment, cross-party collabs and Māori relations as he wraps 2024 - The Front Page

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says he favours a longer-term pipeline of infrastructure projects. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Christopher Luxon is proud of what his Government has achieved while in office, but that doesn’t mean there haven’t been challenges.

“If they were easy decisions, they would be made somewhere else in the system. The difficult decisions come on to your desk and they’re often complex and a bit more layered than you may initially think or observe from the outside,” he said.

Luxon has faced criticism personally in recent months, including for his tendency to use ‘corporate speak’, which Luxon has admitted in the past he needs to work on, alongside his use of the phrase ‘What I say to you is’ in media interviews.

The Prime Minister told The Front Page he receives criticism every day in his job, but he is not consumed by it.

“I am from outside the political system, I’m not a career politician and that’s a fantastic thing.

“I get it, the beltway, pundits, commentators they can say whatever they want. They’ve been saying that for four years since I came to politics. Frankly, I’m informed about it, but I’m not consumed by it because I know why I’m here, because I choose to do this job. I chose to come to politics because I think this is a fantastic country with an awesome future.”

Labour leader Chris Hipkins is amongst those criticising Luxon. He told The Front Page last week that many New Zealanders believe Christopher Luxon is a bad Prime Minister and “they’ve got grounds for that”.

Luxon did not hold bac when given his chance to respond.

“He [Hipkins] was a terrible Prime Minister. He took the keys to the car, drove it at tremendous speed, put it into the ditch. We’re hauling it out of the ditch, getting it the right way up, and we’re moving forward.

“How do you spend more, borrow more, tax more, hire more people, and deliver worse outcomes in every dimension? So, I don’t take lectures from Hipkins, with all due respect,” Luxon said.

our wrapped looks pretty good this year

Posted by New Zealand National Party on Wednesday, December 4, 2024

The Prime Minister recognises that New Zealand has major challenges with infrastructure.

This week, it released its Public Private Partnership (PPP) framework - a blueprint to the market outlining how the government will approach future transactions.

It’s something that has Labour’s tick of approval, with the party’s Finance Spokesperson Barbara Edmonds supporting the move.

“We could use domestic pools of capital more and we will continue to look at that. But, the other thing is that we also need to make sure that we attract foreign investment to New Zealand,” Luxon said.

“New Zealand is 38 out of 38 now in terms of being an attractive place for big international superannuation funds all around the world, of which there’s lots of money in those funds, looking for a home to invest, who are very open to investing in New Zealand, but don’t because they think it takes too long and costs too much.”

The Prime Minister is keen to get the ball rolling on major infrastructure projects, saying at the moment, getting things built takes far too long.

“What we’ve got to do is have a longer-term pipeline of infrastructure projects and then have our city regional deals and an agency that actually knows how to get the funding and financing in place for it. And so that’s the mechanism we’re putting in place.

“It shouldn’t be as politicised as it is in New Zealand. If you just think about a project like Auckland Light Rail, which the last Government mismanaged so badly. Montreal started a project similar to that, they started it a bit later and finished it within five years,” he said.

National’s economic plan is working.

And it’s delivering results for hard working Kiwis through lower inflation and lower mortgage rates.

We know times are tough right now. That’s why we’re so focused on driving the economy forward so you and your family can get ahead.

— Christopher Luxon (@chrisluxonmp) October 17, 2024

Job No 1 for Luxon’s team is putting financial discipline back into the Government.

“We have to go back and relearn some lessons that the country learned 35 years ago.

“You’ve got to have good financial management, just like you do in your family budget, just like you do in your small business. You’ve got to then get inflation down for people. It’s now within the band of under 3%, which is fantastic. Because of that, because we’ve been good fiscal plan operators, you end up in lowering your interest rates.

“That doesn’t just happen. It doesn’t just miraculously sort of happen. It happens because there’s a plan and we’re working our way through it,” he said.

Listen to the full episode to hear more from Luxon reflecting on 2024 and what he’s looking forward to in the year ahead.

The Front Page is a daily news podcast from the New Zealand Herald, available to listen to every weekday from 5am. The podcast is presented by Chelsea Daniels, an Auckland-based journalist with a background in world news and crime/justice reporting who joined NZME in 2016.

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