$7 Billion Debt Pays for Lower Taxes on the Wealthy
The milestone of $7 billion in student debt is to be reached today.
This figure is a staggering indictment of the Labour government which is allowing its baby boomer generation to steal
from the emerging generation.
Heavy debt is being piled onto our young people to pay for economic policies which have transferred wealth to wealthy
New Zealanders and foreigners over the past 20 years.
Fully government funded tertiary education would have been possible from the profits alone of a single state enterprise
which was privatised in 1990 – just as Labour and National governments were increasing student fees for tertiary
education.
Since that time more than $12 billion in profit has been removed from New Zealand by the foreign owners of Telecom. This
money alone would have fully funded tertiary education over the past decade.
This huge tail of student debt is now wagging the tertiary education dog and young New Zealanders are paying the price.
It is incredulous for Tertiary Education Minister Steve Maharey to say that “the student loan scheme is successful in
allowing more young people into tertiary education”. The precise opposite is the case.
Labour has the opportunity to return to fully funded tertiary education with a $5.6 billion budget surplus last year and
the upcoming budget is the opportunity to set the ground for this to be achieved.