NZ First leader Winston Peters has promised to make KiwiSaver compulsory, with contributions from employers and employees rising to 10% and tax cuts to curb the extra cost.
The current Minister of Foreign Affairs highlighted the policy in his keynote speech capping off his party’s annual meeting in Palmerston North.
He also condemned immigration, promoted nationalism, spent a significant portion of the speech criticising the left-leaning parties and transgender ideology as part of the “woke” left.
He announced an agreement from Cabinet to legislate that English would become an official language of New Zealand.
In his brief opening remarks on Saturday, Peters predicted “massive political victory” next year, with the 2026 elections in sight.
About 280 members attended the party’s 32nd annual meeting at Palmerston North’s Distinction Hotel. On Sunday, a crowd the party estimated at more than 1000 turned up to the public speech down the road at the city’s Convention Centre.
The two-day event was planned for wider party membership to vote on 55 policy remits, and hear from four guest speakers and the leadership.
New Zealand was suffering from a fire sale of our banks, energy and dairy companies, which are now under offshore control, Peters said. Part of New Zealand First’s response would be to reform KiwiSaver.
After a flashy pre-prepared video, he said, in 2023, the dire state of the economy was “very, very, very understated”, and New Zealand First said back then that the country’s finances were in dire straits.
“The sad thing that others did was say that they could fix it… you’re not going to do that overnight.”
He said Labour left the “economic tanker” to be turned around with what he described as “waste, incompetence and indifference”.
“They’ve got nothing, they have left us with a mess and now shout ‘you fix it’, all while being encouraged by a culpable mainstream media,” he said to raucous applause and cheers.
This was why the coalition was emphasising the Fast Track infrastructure approach, working on a minerals mining strategy and promoting energy interventions, he said.
Peters outlined a policy increasing KiwiSaver contributions from employees and employers to eight percent, and subsequently to 10 percent. KiwiSaver would also become compulsory.
He said tax cuts would “cover the increases”, but speaking to reporters after his speech, Peters offered little additional detail. He gave no figures for how much the tax cuts could cost, when the contributions would be increased or how it would work.
“The policy is not being introduced today,” he said. “No, I’ve given you all the principles of it.
“It works overseas, by the way.”
Immigration
Peters highlighted immigration, saying almost a third of people living in New Zealand were not born in the country.
New Zealand First would campaign on all new migrants having to sign up to a public values document, he said, a policy the party had campaigned on previously, as had the ACT Party.
“In as little as just another 15-20 years, that percentage will be approaching 50 percent of people living here not being born here,” Peters said. “That’s your children and grandchildren’s generation.
“It’s not just about the number of migrants coming into our country, it is about all of those young, trained, driven, smart, working-age Kiwis that are leaving.”
He said the conclusion was that New Zealand was being used as a steppingstone into Australia “and we want to be used no more”.
He talked up the nationalist philosophy of the party, saying detractors “paint nationalism as something evil… it is vital for the future of our country, our nation. We believe in a country called New Zealand”.
ACT’s Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden said she had already asked the Department of Internal Affairs to “begin policy work on a values pledge for people applying for citizenship”.
“I plan to have this work done and get ready to bring to cabinet this year,” she said. “I also spoke to my NZ First colleague, Shane Jones, about the work I am doing.
“I’m glad to see NZ First is on board with the idea.”
NZ First leader rounds out the annual general meeting with familiar overtures and criticisms. (Source: 1News)
‘Woke’ trans ideology
Peters railed against “sandal-clad Greenie Luddite activists” and transgender ideology.
“It is not about being anti-anyone or anti-anything, or stopping anyone from participating in sports. This is about girls, women, safety and fairness for goodness sake… fair access to bathrooms.
“Can you believe this sort of stuff? No-one with a male appendage will be walking into a female bathroom.”
He said New Zealand First continued the fight against DEI – diversity, equality and inclusion – use of puberty blockers for children, and relationship and sexual education in schools.
“We need education in our schools, not indoctrination,” he said.
Fluoride in water sources would also be “your choice”, rather than being decided by Wellington bureaucrats.
Left-leaning parties
Peters spent a significant proportion of the speech attacking Labour, Greens and Te Pāti Māori, saying a government formed by them “is something to be really concerned about”.
“They would be an absolute circus, and utterly destroy our country economically and socially. Do not underestimate the damage they would do.
“They have become the parties of moral outrage, obsessed with accusations, gotcha politics, woke ideology and opposing anything that happens to offend anyone that gets offended.”
Labour did not seem to know who they represented anymore, he said.
“The catchcry used to be ‘a fair day’s work, for a fairs day’s pay’. They represented those workers in the very industries which have now become the anathema of who and what the Labour Party represents today.
“That’s a fact.”
He said Labour’s focus was on “race, diversity, equity, inclusion, wokeness and drumming up racial rhetoric that all only serves to divide our country and ignores the vast majority of New Zealanders”, while most wanted a functioning health system, a top-class education for their kids, first-world wages and an affordable home.
Labour has said its plan for next year’s election is to focus on “jobs, health and homes”.
Peters also criticised former Labour ministers for not turning up to the second phase of the Covid-19 Royal Commission of Inquiry.
He said the Greens were now down to the 20th person on their list, after MP Benjamin Doyle resigned last week, their last day to be on 3 October.
“Let’s wait till we hear the real reason, shall we?”
Peters said Te Pāti Māori “have tried their hardest to be the martyrs of the media”, but were “not pro-Māori, they are anti-white”.
“In fact, they are anti-the-wrong-blood-quantum Māori… how racist can you get?
“Rawiri, haven’t you got a mirror? I can send you one.”
He said Te Pāti Māori wanted a totalitarian race-based separatist country.
“Maybe Hipkins needs to start answering some questions on the Māori Party.”
Security was stepped up for this year’s event, with guards in hi-vis keeping tabs on those coming in, after the party conference was interrupted by Palestine protesters last year.
Guest speakers included Australian senator Jacinta Price, who railed against the Voice to Parliament, union organiser Dennis Maga criticising ACT Party changes to contract law and Save Women’s Sport Australasia’s Ro Edge opposing trans ideology.
rnz.co.nz
