“...more on Taika Waititi’s controversial comments later. Now, I’m joined with Leader of the ACT Party, and the Opposition, /u/Fresh3001. Great to have you on. Now, we’re here today to talk primarily about health - healthcare, New Zealand’s health system, ACC, DHBs, and so on. But first I’d like to get you to comment on some recent developments - Labour’s new tax plan outlined by FTMP, the current Finance Minister. They want to lower the corporate tax rate to 25% and they also want to drop GST to 12%. Thoughts?”

“Well Duncan, first off - thanks for having me on, it’s a pleasure. But about Labour’s new tax plan, I think it’s great that they’re following ACT’s example. We’ve had our business tax plan - cut to 25%, implement a 15% small business tax - in our party manifesto for weeks, as soon as it’s publicised in our official manifesto launch, Labour suddenly pick it up as a policy of their own. Guess it just proves that ACT is on the right track if even the left agrees with us on tax policy.”

“Right, I thought exactly the same thing. Now, health. You were a Minister outside of Cabinet during the 6th Labour Government, with the Health, Regulatory Reform and Regions portfolios - health clearly being the most significant there. Do you want to just briefly touch on what you did then and whether you’d pick up the portfolio again in government?”

“Great question, and yes I’d certainly be looking to be Health Minister again. Basically, as Health Minister, I passed 3 major reforms in terms of legislation and our health system itself. Cannabis and assisted dying legislation both came from my time as Health Minister, and of course so did the DHB reform. Basically, New Zealand was wasting millions of dollars paying bureaucrats and board members six or seven figure salaries to do bugger all and, y’know, with support from multiple international and domestic studies, I merged our 20 district health boards into 7. Pretty much, we now have to spend less money on health to get the same or better service and you’re avoiding the duplication of resources and services - much more efficient. The only problem is, we’re currently spending far, far too much on healthcare. Logically, the result of my reforms would have been to cut health expenditure to whatever extent.”

“Interesting, interesting. No, our health system was very bloated before then - red tape and all that. Now, new policies, new reforms - what would you do in power?”

“Well, ACT has a fair few but we can group some of them together to make things easier. The first group would be reducing strain on ACC by promoting private health insurance, and the second would be a continuation of my efficiency reforms and freeing up money to return to the taxpayer. So ACT will allow Kiwis to sue businesses for personal injury negligence for compensatory damages, which basically means that if an employee working for a company injures you, or you’re damaged by a faulty product, that you can take them to court. We’d make it so that whatever the ACC pays out is taken into account when damages are awarded, but basically we think that the taxpayer shouldn’t be paying for injuries caused by corporations. And also, if for whatever reason someone was unsatisfied with or were shafted by their ACC payout they could supplement that with whatever damages they’re awarded. ACT would also incentivise - and legalise - private insurance in work related accident insurance, with a means-tested rebate of up to half the cost of that policy. We’d also introduce a levy of 1% on high-income earners who don’t take up a private insurance policy.”

“So you’re basically making it so that people who can afford to pay their own way aren’t relying on taxpayer dollars to supplement their already large incomes?”

“That’s the jist of things, of course we’re also cutting tax on incomes over $70,000 by 3%, but we basically think that, yeah. And the second half of our policies - y’know, improving efficiency and cutting costs - will be done by firstly reducing that unnecessary expenditure, but we’ll also end DHB elections and reduce the number of board members. ACT thinks that merit should be rewarded in our public service, not blind partisanship in what is effectively a popularity contest. Kiwis already elect a government which has control over our health system, so there’s not need to elect potentially unqualified figures to sit on our DHBs.”

“Very interesting, can’t say that I don’t see the value in that. Glad to have you with us, Fresh3001.”