If anyone had any doubts that National is worried about potentially losing votes to New Zealand First in this year’s election, National’s first big campaign pledge should have dispelled that. Announcing that, if elected, National would make KiwiSaver membership mandatory, is a policy straight out of the New Zealand First manifesto, where it has sat for many years. National has long doubted the wisdom of compulsion when it comes to superannuation: most famously, after being elected in 1975, it abolished the contributory superannuation scheme introduced by the former Labour government and introduced a non-means-tested pension available to all. Christopher Luxon speaks during the National Party Annual Conference. Photo by Hagen Hopkins/Getty Images Party deputy leader, and Finance Minister, Nicola Willis, was dismissive of that piece of history when asked about it on Sunday, saying she was part of a National Party of today, one which was looking to the future. That is as may be, but the root cause of the superannuation affordability conundrum is a baby boom the 1975 National government was well aware of, and which the government of 2026 is now having to pay for. Arguably the horse has well and truly bolted on the question of how to support the superannuitants of today, who could be forgiven for having paid their taxes in expectation of a universal pension later in life. But New Zealand’s historically low level of retirement savings remains to be addressed, and enforced membership of KiwiSaver — no matter which party thought of it first — is now most definitely an election issue. While the KiwiSaver contribution rates, for now, sit at 6% for employers and employees, National policy is for them to reach 12% — matching the present rate in Australia — by 2032. National’s other coalition partner, Act New Zealand, is adamantly opposed to compulsory superannuation, arguing that people should be free to do whatever they want with their own money. That is an entirely reasonable argument, but National knows that any disagreement on this point is unlikely to dissuade Act from wanting to remain a part of a National-fronted government after the November 7 ballot, should that be the way the country votes. Likewise, adopting a New Zealand First policy as its own will likely do National little harm if it wants to maintain the three-party coalition after the election. It also provides an additional hurdle for Labour to clear if its path to power would need to include NZ First. There are strong arguments against compulsory savings schemes. They have a greater impact on those who earn less — although, arguably, they are the people who also stand to gain the most through them. Also, schemes with a finite maturity date at retirement deny people who do not live that long access to their government-ordained hard-earned savings. Many of those people are from demographic groups which traditionally vote for opposition parties, meaning they will need to tread carefully on this issue. Notably, National has also backed workers aged over 65 by proposing that employer contributions not automatically cease at that age — something that would be entirely fair and long overdue. A sweetener National has added to the policy include automatically enrolling every baby into KiwiSaver at birth and contributing a $1500 ‘‘Baby Boost’’ to their account, and the government matching a new parent’s KiwiSaver contribution while they are on paid parental leave. While no-one is going to complain about receiving money, the baby boost policy is somewhat cynical politics: it was a previous National government, after all, which scrapped the government ‘‘kick start’’ payment which was part of the original KiwiSaver scheme. National leader and prime minister Christopher Luxon breezily dismissed that point on Sunday, noting that he was not in Parliament then and that, just like Ms Willis, he was focused on the future. Another National policy Mr Luxon might be hoping people forget is that the retirement age be raised to 67; a proposal which may be based on solid fiscal arguments but which would be more difficult to convince voters on when coupled with compulsory retirement savings.
