The full EcuAction tax proposal is available on the Alternative Aotearoa website. Give it your consideration.

As General Election 2023 draws closer, what we need is a Robin Hood styled Minister of Revenue and Government prepared to tax the rich more and the poor less. To his credit, David Parker, the present Minister of Revenue, recently commissioned a study which found that the wealthiest 311 families in NZ paid approximately 9% in tax whereas the rest of the country paid an average of 20%.

But given that Labour (at the time of writing) has not indicated any change to the present system, one is left to conclude that the Sheriff of Nottingham would be very happy with the present NZ tax system which takes so much more from the poor and middle-income earners to support the lifestyles of the rich. So, Robin Hood, where are you?

At the heart of this iniquity is goods and services tax. We all pay GST when we buy things so it sounds fair. But a person in the lowest income decile pays 14% of their income in GST, because they have to spend all their income, while those in the highest income decile pay less than 5% of their income on GST because they are able to save and invest part of their income rather than spend it.

Income tax has similar distortions. IRD has been reporting for a number of years that wealthy individuals have been declaring incomes low enough to ensure they avoid the highest tax bracket! This unfairness is hard-baked into our tax system. Wage and salary earners pay tax on every dollar they earn and every dollar they spend and cannot avoid tax. It's taken out of their pay before they get it and is deducted by retailers when they buy anything. But for the wealthy and super-wealthy, tax is almost voluntary as they find myriad ways to avoid or reduce their tax responsibilities.

This is unfair. It is morally wrong. The wealthiest 5% now own 37% of the country's wealth and their share is growing at the expense of the rest of us. Meanwhile the poorest half of our society, who pay the highest rates of tax, have just 2% of the country's wealth. Tax policy is a key reason for this growing number of people becoming fabulously wealthy and avoiding paying taxes the rest of us can't escape.

So again, Robin Hood, where are you? EcuAction, a Canterbury interfaith justice group decided to do something about this. So, in association with Canterbury Progressive Network Coordinator John Minto, First Union's Paul Watson, Budget Adviser Dave Marra and ex-union secretary Paul Piesse, we developed an alternative proposal which is fairer to everyone.

Financial Transactions Tax; Wealth Tax; Capital Acquisitions Tax; No GST

In a nutshell we are proposing to abolish GST and raise the $26 billion needed to replace it with three taxes/levies which will shift responsibility to the wealthy and super-wealthy who are currently paying pocket-money levels of tax. The three taxes are a comprehensive Financial Transactions Tax (FTT), a Wealth Tax and a Capital Acquisitions Tax. We have promoted this alternative in a number of quarters including within a coalition of organisations known as Tax Justice Aotearoa which has agreed, amongst other things, to look again at GST.

Meanwhile, we are getting on doing our own thing and this recently culminated in a well-attended public forum on "Fair Tax" held at the Christchurch Transitional Cathedral on June 29 (2023). The Revenue spokespersons for seven political parties were invited but only Chloe Swarbrick MP and Revenue Spokesperson for the NZ Green Party fronted. So much for political accountability! John Minto outlined the EcuAction tax proposal and explained the three alternatives to GST which EcuAction is proposing.

The Financial Transactions Tax (FTT) would put a small percentage tax (0.1%) on all money transfers through banks and financial institutions. For the average person this would amount to about $2 per week in tax (alongside a saving of hundreds in removing GST) but would bring in large amounts from the high value money flows in areas such as currency trading which take place each day. Dozens of countries have various kinds of FTT. Our proposal would bring in about around $15 billion for the Government annually.

The Wealth Tax would bring in about $10 billion and would apply only to the top 5% of income earners who would pay a small percentage tax each year based on their wealth. Wealth taxes are common in countries around the world and help in a small way to reduce inequality. The Capital Acquisitions Tax would be paid when receiving a cash windfall such as through an inheritance but again it would only affect very large inheritances.

When one looks through the countries which already have FTTs, Wealth Taxes and Capital Acquisitions Tax they are the same countries we like to compare ourselves to. John Minto also stressed how much of an outlier NZ is on tax. We tax the poor more and the rich less than any other country we like to compare ourselves with. This suits the rich and big business but it doesn't work for low-and-middle-income earners. John said: "It's morally wrong to expect those on the lowest wages to subsidise the wealthy and super-wealthy through a Sheriff of Nottingham tax policy". Chloe Swarbrick responded positively to the EcuAction proposal and went on to outline the equally progressive tax proposals of the Green Party.

A wide-ranging question and answer time followed with a common point of agreement being the need for tax to be seen as positive rather than negative; tax provides the health, welfare and education services we take for granted. Tax contributes to the common good of society as well as to individual wellbeing. A major discussion point of the evening was how to change the narrative on tax in society from negative to positive? Like Robin Hood battling against the Sheriff of Nottingham, we need to win the hearts and minds of the common people. We did it in achieving a nuclear free Aotearoa-NZ. We can do it again with a progressive tax policy!