Cliff Taylor
speaker
1,456 appearances
11 recordings
2 series
first heard Apr 2026
last heard 5d ago
Cliff Taylor’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
Trend
recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 11 in all, peaking in Jun 2026 with 3.
Appearances
all the trouble hit.
So I think looking back at the start of the year, the Department of Finance and most other forecasters saying, look, things were a bit stronger than we anticipated.
Tax revenues are a bit higher.
That said, the extent of the increase in the forecast surplus for this year is really striking.
So the original forecast, as you said, was just over 5 billion.
It's gone to over 9 billion.
That's a heck of a change.
Now, I know it's the difference between two big numbers,
perhaps the department are being cautious, perhaps they're being overly cautious in their run up to the budget in terms of putting their numbers together.
Some of the revision appears to be, is due to higher taxes.
Some of it is also due to
kind of the opaque area of non-government finances and the financing of local authorities and the revenues they raise from areas like property tax, finance of housing bodies.
And it's a little unclear exactly what's going on there, but it's all added up to a much bigger surplus.
And that's great on one level.
And it's notable that surplus is forecast despite the money that's been allocated in response to the fuel protests.
The government has some leeway.
Unlike most other governments, it has to be said, in Europe, who are scrambling for money.
But that brings its own problems as well, because every lobby group, every interest group, the unions in terms of public sector pay...
everyone is hitting the government over the head or will be saying, look, why aren't you giving us an X percent wage increase or why aren't you giving us a subsidy here because look at all this money you've got.
You know, don't be telling us about a rainy day fund, the rainy day is here.
Showing 1361–1380 of 1,456 · page 69 of 73
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