Nah, that would never work. Part of being in government is blaming everything that goes wrong on "the previous government" during the first term - take the fiscal surplus of 2007. National could have made NZ paradise on earth and probably the richest country ever if the previous government had bought back NZ rail and frittered away that fiscal surplus on bureaucrats.
It's pretty complex and I'm not going to explain it here because I can't be arsed and I've been down at the boozer drinking beer, but basically NZ was ridiculously in debt to foreign lenders despite having a fiscal surplus (the government earnt more than it spent). It was also only $8bn, which is bugger all and didn't warrant Cullen's glee, but without it the global crash would have been much nastier to us. The government may have spent less than they earned, but the country as a whole, especially you and me spent waaaaay more, mostly on imported toys like bikes, flat screen TVs and on big flash houses. This article explains it if you're interested, if you can't be arsed reading it then listen to the National spin doctors and they'll tell you what they want you to believe and everyone will be happy.
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