Maybe it's time we came up with pragmatic ideas for Government to consider, because surely they must be running out of money for Consultants?

Current times are scary. No government would have had the cash reserves to cover anything like the extra costs involved that Covid has created. Not just cost for vaccines and medical intervention, but also the costs that they've incurred trying to support business.

We can argue as much as we like about some of the dumb decisions, like the $12 million for the Green School, or the money spent on the slide and playground at Parliament, but all the bitching and complaining solves nothing.

If the PM really does think of us as a "Team of 5 million", then maybe it's time for Labour and the other parties to give us some credit for common sense and business nous? That's the experience we can bring to the table, and for free, if only we are asked, if only they will listen.

One of the simplest strategies for businesses has always been to pick the low hanging fruit - provide easy to make products that are easy to sell to get points on the board. Yet how much of this do we see from Government? How often to we hear of some high-powered committee being established, often at great cost to the tax payers, to come up with ideas that could be translated to policies, and how often are those policies unpopular and unwanted?

So lets give ourselves a challenge through the medium of Linked-In to come up with some simple and pragmatic solutions that Government should be able to accept in a heartbeat, that can materially help our wonderful country.

I've got a couple I'd like to suggest, but I'd like the rest of NZ who are on this medium to post up your ideas.

Idea 1. With all the talk of imposing a Capital Gains Tax and how unpopular it was, instead we've seen policies created that are driving landlords out of the rental game, and yet at the same time the property market hasn't really cooled. Yet there was a massive piece of low hanging fruit that Government has missed, perhaps deliberately? The rise in the property market, and especially in Auckland, was fueled in part by Foreign investors purchasing houses and benefiting both from rental income and capital gain. They can afford to be in for the long haul, avoiding bright line tests, and pocket a huge cash profit when they do sell up.

So, why not charge an Annual Capital Gains Tax on the increase in value on all residential property owned by non-residents? Would that make sense? The Government coffers must be pretty low, so surely the annual increase in value could be estimated by QV and a tax on that then be invoiced via the IRD. I doubt many Kiwi's would complain, and the foreign owners, judging by how hot the market is, are still making a handsome return. Surely that is pretty low hanging fruit worth picking? So whose going to adopt it?

Idea 2. Triple Bottom Lines. These are simple. For those who don't understand the term, all businesses need a financial return - without it you close the doors. But surely it's not too much to ask that all businesses also post in their premises an annual goal for a Social and an Environmental Project to enhance society.

We did that as a group of seven small(ish) firms, by getting together in our Selwyn District with a programme to purchase and plant fruit trees, bushes and vines in the primary schools in the district, providing up to 10 plants a year over the five year term of the project. We put in over 1050 edible plants through that project, and now have kids who thought fruit only came from New World, taking home fruit from those trees, and hopefully learning a lesson that will see them planting trees and shrubs at their own homes as they go through life.

Now this is literally low hanging fruit, so which party might have seen to it that this was promoted? Surely you would have said the Greens, but have you heard anything like this come out of the Beehive? I haven't, yet it's about as low hanging as you can get. Now I also know it's trendy to plant native shrubs and trees, and it's amazing how much money is available to do so if you look for it, but why aren't we seeing enabling people and councils push for the planting of more edibles? And why hasn't government looked at it.

They're two very simple ideas that could make a real and useful difference in Aotearoa. There was no hard mahi required to come up with them, and not too much effort to implement them surely? That said there must be hundreds of simple ideas we can come up with that we can present to the political parties for them to consider, that could make a positive difference to our world.

After all, home grown fruit tastes the best!!