Seymour out to show some Hide with perk attacks

David Seymour. Photo / Natalie Slade

But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks? Is it the dawn of a new Rodney Hide, Perkbuster Extraordinaire?

The former Act leader invested a significant amount of time crusading against the perks MPs were afforded in the olden days. Hide had done so partly because perk busting was a guaranteed way to get headlines. Ironically, the most effective thing Hide did to end the international travel perk was to actually use it himself. Now new Act leader David Seymour too is trying to rebuild Act and is clearly taken with Hide's technique. Whether it is effective remains to be seen. It is at least entertaining.

These days the perks are fewer so there is less to crusade against. That didn't stop our new crusader. First in his sights was the Easter goody-box the Food and Grocery Council sent to various MPs, staffers and some Press Gallery reporters. Seymour inspected the mouth of the gift horse and returned his without even a nibble. "What is the purpose of these big boxes?" he wondered in his weekly newsletter. "Surely no MP would be influenced by Easter eggs, even an inexplicably large number of them, but then why go to such an effort?"

That was just the warm-up. Then the Speaker's Tour started and Seymour was into it like a Jack Russell burrowing in a haystack for rats. He said it was of little value. He was derisive of those on it, saying "frankly, if the rest of the world is a mystery to these guys, maybe they shouldn't be in Parliament." The next perks he sought to bust included trains and the dole. The Budget was looming.

Seymour observed on Q+A that the Government was "giving out money to this group, this group, this group, and nothing for taxpayers". The "groups" included beneficiaries, whose filthy lucre was indexed to inflation. He wanted tax brackets to be adjusted in the same way. Another culprit was KiwiRail which needs a further injection on top of the $1 billion it already got. Then there were superannuitants, first home buyers, and working parents having babies. Seymour wanted to put the meaning back into the words that make up the Act Party's acronym: Association of Consumers and Taxpayers. He came out with the gravest insult of all for the National Government: "It's starting to look awfully like Michael Cullen in his third term."

Meanwhile, with the Budget fast approaching, Finance Minister Bill English was beginning to show some frustration in his ongoing courting of a surplus. He recently accused the surplus of being a very promiscuous minx indeed, describing its brief appearance in January's Crown accounts as a "flirtation". After making come-hither eyes at him, the very next month she ducked back behind her veils and became a deficit instead. The surplus was playing hard to get and our noble suitor was not impressed.

The "decade of deficits" National swore it would stamp out back in 2008 is proving to have the survivability of a cockroach. Seven years later and it is still here. It is true the deficits are nowhere near as large as those forecast when National took over. But it was National which created the surplus as the symbol of its success. It can't disavow itself of that now. Nonetheless it is trying. Key has taken to describing it as "an artificial target". He blamed Treasury for reassessing the value of assets. He ruled that a few hundred million either side of the line is neither here nor there and New Zealanders will not care.

One reason for this is obvious: the obsession with the number seven over history has bestowed upon the Opposition a number of puns to ridicule the Government with. For a start, there are seven year itches, Seven Old Ladies Locked in the Lavatory, the seven Wonders of the World, and, most terrifying of all for a good Catholic finance minister, the Seven Deadly Sins. Labour's finance spokesman Grant Robertson roadtested one just the other day with a reference to "Bill English and the Seven Deficits". Bill English would baulk at being described the fairest of them all, but the reference is rather apt. English is sitting up there in his tower, dolefully singing Some Day my Surplus Will Come. The trouble is that the courtiers at Treasury charged with delivering the princess insist on presenting him with just the frog.

Disclosure: Claire Trevett received one of the Food and Grocery Council Easter boxes. She gave the bits she didn't like to a colleague and ate the rest, except for the Anti-Flamme and herbal toothpaste. She could not be bothered reading the accompanying letter, which was recycled.