No bailouts for dairy farmers

 

Finance Minister Bill English must be getting good advice. Going against the wordlwide trend for such things, he has ruled out bailing out over-stretched dairy farmers.

English told TVNZ's Q+A yesterday that he doubted that would be a threat to the financial stability of the country, banks were stronger than at the time of the global financial crisis and the Government would not step in with any bailout for farmers.
    "A few billion in losses is not a threat to financial stability. The regime that's in place now means the banks are stronger than they've ever been with a greater ability to withstand those losses than they've ever had."
    He said there was a system for dealing with extreme hardship "because you are going to see, for a small number of dairy farming families, some real distress. But we're not going to be bailing them out."

Sadly, Labour leader Andrew Little can see only votes.

Little said some farmers were effectively now working for nothing and the Government could set up similar emergency provisions to those it uses in cases of drought or other 'adverse events.' …
    Little has also called on the Government to "stiff arm" the banks to ensure farmers are not forced off their land because they cannot keep up mortgage payments after the latest slump in milk prices.

Nothing like making your coercion explicit to truly reveal your underlying politicapl philosophy, eh, Andrew.

[Hat tip Eric Crampton]

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