A Fly on the Wall of the 9th floor...

An imagined Fly-on-the-wall conversation:  The PM and the FM.

PM:  Granters, I've just come back from talking to those Teachers.  Can't we shake that Money Tree you have, and give them a few raises?  I mean, who's gonna edumicate little Neve if the teachers cannot afford houses in Auckland?  And I'm sure as heck not gonna Buy in Wellers....

FM:  Jace, Jace, Jace.  I'm none too sure it was a brilliant move to munge your schedule and go talk to them in the first place.  Neve, teaching, you've been reading those Signs, haven't you.  You know a good chunk of them were painted by Children at Art period - I've already had Ian LG chewing my ear about Child Labour.  And as for schoolkids being paraded about the streets with signs - I know it is supported by a few Parents but the optics - oh, dear, it really does seem like Child Abuse...You of all people have gotta parrot the Party Line - we cannot fix Nine Long Years of Neglect in a single term oops I mean year.  And I've just had to spend a quarter of a billion on more freakin' Trees, to keep He Who Must Not Be Named away from our throats (golly, that man makes me Quake).

PM:  But Granty-poo, if there's that much in kitty that we can shell out scads of it out to Vol - I mean, you know who - then everyone in the queue - Teachers, Tertiary, Police, Defence, and I'm told MBIE and IRD although I must confess not to have noticed - they went Out too, or something? - where was I, oh yes, everyone in the queue, which seems to be growing daily, can See the dosh getting spread around and I sense that they are getting that FOMO thing - they are worried that the cupboard might be bare soon, and so they wanna get in Now, and with Big Percentages.  Oh, Grant, what are we gonna do?

FM:  Well, we have got the Cullen Tax Grab - I mean, the TWG - working away in the background, and perhaps we could advance the pace a little there.  Don't let this get outside the room, but the TWG is basically a Rich Prick's Squeeze, and all he, I mean They - haveta do is to get the definition of the RP's down low enough that we'll have a few more tens of billions.  Let me have a quiet word.  But please, for Financial Prudence' sake, don't go addressing howling mobs of tax-funded employees.  That's what Unions are for....