Bring back locally made school lunches
What it actually does
Labour would return to locally made school lunches from term one 2028, prepared by school kitchens, iwi and hapū partners or local caterers, for about 244,400 students at 1,014 schools. Meals would be funded at $5 each, or $6.50 for Years 9 to 13; its fiscal plan does not fund the programme beyond 2029/30.
Source: 1News · 2026-10
The Trump take
“Free lunch, every day, paid by the government? There's no such thing as a free lunch, except at Mar-a-Lago, and those are the best lunches anyone's ever seen.”parody
Why it scored this way
Welfare
Expands a free government meal programme
-1
Dislikes it
Big government
Higher per-meal state spending
-1
Dislikes it
On the same topics
Budget 2024 income tax cuts and landlord interest deductibility
Budget 2024 delivered income tax relief averaging about $3.7 billion a year and restored the ability of residential landlords to deduct mortgage interest. The government said it funded the package partly through public service savings and cancelling some previous programmes.
Cut spending and foreign aid back to 2017 levels
ACT's fiscal plan would return non-welfare spending to 2017 levels (adjusted for inflation and growth), cut the annual operating allowance from $2.4b to $2b, reduce foreign aid to 2017 levels (excluding aid to Ukraine) and abolish 'demographic' ministries. ACT says net core Crown debt would be $12.4b lower than forecast; health, education, defence, police and children's services are exempt.
Disestablishment of the Māori Health Authority
A National 100-day plan commitment, the bill to disestablish Te Aka Whai Ora passed under urgency 68-54 in February 2024, with most of its functions and staff moving to Health New Zealand from 30 June 2024.