Budget 2013
Last Friday I was proud to be at the opening of fantastic new facilities at the Horowhenua Masonic Village.
The new wing is a $1.2 million investment which has six state-of-the-art villas, all built by local builders.
Residents living in the village who receive great care from the 120 local staff, making them one of the bigger local employers.
The Masonic Village has come a long way since it started in 1973 as a 10 acre paddock. As our population continues to age we will need more services like this.
Last week’s Budget 2013 also confirmed more investment for health with an extra $1.6 billion coming over the next four years for new initiatives.
We’re almost doubling funding to tackle rheumatic fever, and $100 million is going towards insulating 46,000 more homes for low-income households. As we’ve seen in Foxton with the recent ‘Warm Up’ programme, home insulation makes a huge difference to the health and wellbeing of families.
The big news from the Budget is that the economy is growing again, there are more jobs, rising wages and we will be back in surplus next year.
This is a huge achievement given the challenges we’ve faced as a nation over the last five years. The global financial crisis has rocked the world economy and Christchurch has suffered devastating earthquakes.
While New Zealand will be back in surplus next year, across the ditch in Australia they are now facing a budget deficit of $19 billion this year.
This is thanks to good policies and sensible management of Government spending. Our economy grew by 3% last year which most other countries can only dream of.
You can find out more on the Budget at http://www.beehive.govt.nz/feature/budget-2013.