Music to my ears

The Dom Post reports:

Departmental chief executives were ordered to a meeting with Mr Key and Finance Minister Bill English within days of National taking power and were told to review all spending, so cash could be freed up for the new government’s priorities.

Mr Key confirmed that ministers had been working “aggressively” with officials on the line-by-line expenditure review, and reports by chief executives were now being considered by Cabinet committees.

A hard line appears to have been taken, as Mr Key revealed that he had rejected the first round of savings put up to him by officials and made them go away to find more.

With a decade of deficits and tens of billions of dollars of borrowing projected, it is vital that spending be focused on high quality essential areas.