More than 100 North Dunedin residents turned up at the Opoho Presbyterian Church last night to learn more about their candidates and their policies, in a lively debate moderated by Philip Somerville (in the funny hat).
Each candidate was asked if New Zealanders lived in an economy or a society; what they thought of the proposed water tax; and whether New Zealanders were taxed fairly.
Mr Somerville preambled the last question by saying the Inland Revenue Department collected $64.4 billion in the 2015-16 financial year and $59.7 billion in the year before. Was it too much, about right, or too little?
Mr Purchas believed it was too much: "I think there are solutions that come more from personal choice — you being allowed to spend your own money and distribute it how you want — the solution that is tailored to you rather than the one size fits all."
Mr Gray believed it was not enough.
"Our party is proposing income tax cuts of one-third of every tax rate, and we’re able to do that because our wealth tax of 1.5% on people’s assets will allow us to take a lot more tax, whilst still reducing income tax. That will allow us to fund universal-based income, more social health spending, more mental health spending and much more."
Mr Voight wanted to bring tax levels down for those who were least able to pay it, by taking GST off things such as food and rates.
"Even out the corporate tax rates, put incentives in there for people starting businesses. That lifts productivity, and then you can afford to pay more tax."
Dr Bould said the tax take was about right but it needed to be restructured so people who earned less than $40,000 per year would be taxed "a lot less".
She wanted to introduce parental tax credits to help families.
Mr Woodhouse said the top 3% of income earners in New Zealand were paying about 16% of the tax, and the top 16% were paying about 76% of the tax.
"We think that’s about right, but if we can ease the burden on those lower-income workers, we will."
Dr Clark believed the level of tax was right but was concerned about the fairness of the system.
"Right now, there are people who own many properties that don’t pay a good deal of tax. They sell a third or fourth property and they don’t pay tax on that. We don’t think that’s fair. We want to make the tax system fairer."
