Budget 2024 initiatives
The Government has made significant investments in Budget 2024 that support families and whānau with children currently experiencing poverty. Several tax and transfer measures, outlined below, directly lift the incomes of working households and can be modelled for their impact on child poverty measures.
- Introducing FamilyBoost, a new childcare payment for low-to-middle-income households to help with the costs of early childhood education (ECE). Under this scheme, households can get back up to 25 per cent of their ECE fees, to a maximum amount of $150 per fortnight.
- Increasing personal income tax thresholds to recognise wage growth and allow hard-working New Zealanders to keep more of what they earn. This is the first reduction in personal income tax since 2010.
- Increasing the In-Work Tax Credit (IWTC) by up to $50 per fortnight for working families with children, on top of personal income tax relief. The extra IWTC, together with income tax relief, will support an estimated 160,000 families, including those receiving the Minimum Family Tax Credit.
- Extending the upper limit of eligibility for the Independent Earner Tax Credit (IETC) to $70,000, to recognise wage growth and assist people who are not receiving a benefit or Working For Families. The IETC extension is not, however, likely to benefit households where children are in poverty.
Other Budget 2024 initiatives that could impact on child poverty or wellbeing include funding 1,500 new social housing places, the Healthy School Lunches programme (including a new targeted programme for two-to-five-year-olds who attend low-equity, not-for-profit, community-based early learning services), investments in the ECE sector, funding free period products in schools, and contracting Gumboot Friday to deliver free mental health counselling for young people.