Yeah? Well What're You Doing About It! - National's Bemusing Attempted Distraction On CGT Claim

I read in my newspaper yesterday afternoon that Luxon had had a rather ... odd comment in reply to ANZ's CEO saying that a capital gains tax on investment properties was, in principle, fair.

What did he say?

"She’s more than welcome to enter the political domain, [...] But the point I'd make is that the big Australian banks make a lot of money off the New Zealand public, and maybe taking more money isn’t the right way forward."

The way Luxon probably intended this to come across was something like "taking money from New Zealanders Bad" .. in the sense that his government collecting tax from its citizenry is apparently somehow comparable to profits levied by private sector enterprise, and that higher profits are ... ok, so maybe it doesn't actually work very well as an analogy.

But here's the thing.

Luxon using this as his response to Watson (the ANZ CEO aforementioned) upon the comment with relation to CGT 'fairness' is revealing.

Effectively, when somebody brings up a point with some logic for it (in this case - somebody who literally wrote their dissertation on tax  remarking that while they're not hugely enthused about it, it's "fair" to tax investment property as investment in property) , National doesn't really have an answer.

What they've got instead is whataboutery and insults.

Nicola Willis' contribution was similarly glib:

"If she's really worried about the wellbeing of New Zealanders, then there's a lot the bank could be doing".

Ok, but you guys - Luxon, Wills et co. - you're the Government.

If you're genuinely of the opinion that our banking sector is not acting in concordance with the "wellbeing of New Zealanders", and is (as is generally agreed) taking rather eye-watering profits at our literal, direct expense ...

... then why not actually do something about it?

New Zealanders gave these guys (rightly or wrongly) the power to govern.

That means much more than being 'theoretically aware' of a problem but only deigning to decree via press-encounter that a bank (or, indeed, the entire banking sector) 'should' do something better ... when one of their CEOs happens to mildly embarrass you in a media cycle.