Needed: the will to improve the economy

Needed: the will to improve the economy

The latest OECD recommendations for the New Zealand economy are similar to those consistently made by Business NZ and other business organisations.

Business NZ Chief Executive Phil O'Reilly says the latest OECD report focuses on the key challenges of raising productivity growth and improving the management of public finances.

"OECD recommendations include restraining government expenditure, improving the quality of that spending, and getting more flexibility in the labour market and more competition in the electricity sector. These points have also been made by Business NZ in recent publications.

"Other points of similarity include the need for better use of capital to improve roading (we recommend fixing the Land Transport Management Act to make it easier to use private investment for roading) and the need for an effective way of allocating water among competing uses (we recommend a market of tradeable rights).

"While it is good to see consistency between the OECD analysis and our own, it also highlights the fact that getting the right economic policies isn't rocket science - the important thing is having the will to put the right policies in place.

"The OECD report provides another useful checklist for considering political parties' economic policies in the run-up to the election," Mr O'Reilly said.

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