Finance Minister Nicola Willis attending Waitangi commemorations, Iwi Chairs Forum

Finance Minister Nicola Willis has confirmed she will be attending commemorations at Waitangi.

Willis will be there for not only Waitangi Day, but over the whole weekend, as she and other government leaders also participate in the Iwi Chairs Forum.

"I'll actually be up there on Friday and I'm staying right through to Waitangi Day on Tuesday," she told RNZ's First Up.

"We've got a programme of events and activities for government ministers, including the National Iwi Leaders Forum, making some regional economic development visits, and of course, being part of that incredibly special dawn service on Waitangi Day itself. Watching the waka go past, and being part of that celebration. So I'm really looking forward to it."

Willis said Waitangi is a special place that makes her feel proud to be a New Zealander.

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon will be speaking at Waitangi, while Willis said she will be "engaging directly" with iwi leaders at the forum.

"Particularly when it comes to how the government can work with iwi to advance Māori economic interests. There's such huge potential there to increase Māori access to capital, to ensure that we're looking at some of those consenting barriers that get in the way for iwi who are wanting to do exciting new developments, ensuring that we are working on housing together.

"There are huge areas where together we can get better results for Māori."

Tax

National's coalition partner ACT has caused controversy with its proposed bill to redefine the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi.

National's leaders have continued to say they will not support it past its first reading in Parliament.

ACT leader David Seymour, also Associate Finance Minister, has been pushing National to adopt his party's flat tax policy, which would drop the 39 percent top tax rate down to 33 percent.

Willis told First Up she remains committed to delivering the tax cuts that National campaigned on.

"We'll ensure that the concepts of ACT's policy are considered as a pathway to delivering tax relief. But subject to this very important proviso that no earner be worse off than they would be under National's."

In regard to ACT's proposal of cutting the 10.5 percent tax rate for income up to $14,000, Willis said it is not targeted enough to benefit those on lower incomes.

"New Zealanders haven't had any tax reduction since 2010, and we've had a huge amount of inflation since then, which means that in real terms, people are paying much higher rates of tax than they once were. Your median income earner, your minimum wage earner, they're all paying tax at a higher rate than they did a decade ago, and that's what we want to correct with our income tax reduction."

100 day plan

The coalition government is now past the half-way mark on its 100 day plan.

Willis told First Up they still have a series of justice announcements to make around getting tougher on law and order.

"There's still work to introduce health targets. We want everyone to be able to see how the health system's tracking and be confident, and we're really focused on those frontline services.

"Taking steps to extend free breast cancer screening and a number of other issues. So ministers are working really hard. We want to keep up that pace of making change that's positive and in line with what we all campaigned on."

Willis said the government will follow through on its commitment to remove the Auckland regional fuel tax, and there have been conversations with Auckland mayor Wayne Brown about it.

In November 2023, Brown said if the regional fuel tax was removed, Auckland could be left with a $2 billion fiscal hole, and projects like the Eastern busway would not be completed.

Interislander

In December 2023, Willis refused to commit another $1.47b for KiwiRail to purchase new Interislander ferries.

On Tuesday, she told First Up KiwiRail's proposal faced "all sorts of risks".

"Given the amount of funding at stake, we're taking the opportunity to make sure we get that project absolutely right. So New Zealanders have reliable ferry services for the future that are also good value for money.

"We will need to replace the existing fleet, but the questions that we're asking as a government are should it only be two big ships or should we be looking to have something similar to what we have now, where we have three smaller ships?

"Because of course that provides more backup when something goes wrong with one ship.

"What size should those ships be? Do we really want them to be really big? How should we have those ships working with other users of the port? Could we have joint ferry terminals for example, so that other port users can benefit from the investment and those extra facilities?

"And how do we make sure that the ferries support freight, but also let's have a bit of competition, you know, Bluebridge offer ferry services too. And I think competition is good for everyone who's buying a ticket for the ferry and those sending their freight. So how do we make sure we support that competition into the future as well."