National leader Judith Collins has described Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern as "arrogant" and accused her of hiding behind the COVID-19 recovery ahead of the election.
Collins came out swinging against the Prime Minister on Tuesday morning, telling media the Labour Party leader needed to "front-up with some policies" before the election and stop "hiding" behind COVID-19.
"We have a massive issue facing New Zealand in terms of jobs and the economy and we have the current Prime Minister incapable of delivering on anything except slogans," Collins said.
"I'm going to have a rolling wall of policies announced before the election and we'll have some more out this week. You can expect a lot of policy from us, a lot of ideas and only promises that we can keep.
"I think hiding away is never a way to actually win an election. She can hide all she likes but I am absolutely going to be putting out there the policies, meeting the people, listening to their concerns and delivering on policies, because I will only promise what I know I can deliver."
Collins took issue with the Prime Minister telling media last month that she accepted the election was coming up but was focused on the COVID-19 recovery.
"She's hiding from policies," Collins said. "Why doesn't she just front up with some policies? She needs to front up with them, and saying that she accepts there's an election coming up, that's just arrogance."
The Prime Minister said on Monday the next three years have been "predetermined" by the need for whoever makes up the future Government to continue to lead Kiwis through the COVID-19 health and economic response.
"We have already laid out a very significant plan including a very significant investment regime as part of our plan on COVID recovery and rebuild - and it is significant," Ardern said.
"We, for some time to come, will be continuing to make investments in skills, in job creation, in small business investment, and the work we're doing with foreign partners around trade and export growth.
"Yes, COVID will predetermine a lot of what we debate this election, but voters still have a choice to make as to whether or not they continue with the plan that we've pitched or whether or not they choose to stop and move on to an alternative programme," Ardern said.
The Prime Minister pointed to her five-point plan announced last month at the Labour Party congress for New Zealand's post-COVID-19 economic recovery.
The five-point plan:
"You can expect that we will have points of difference. We will still have policy that as a Labour Party we'll roll out. But it is clear that the fiscal position we as New Zealand finds itself in is tight," Ardern said on Monday.
"We have had to include additional borrowing for the likes of the wage subsidy which is the right thing to do, but we also have to maintain careful fiscal management and that will be part of our thinking for any future policies."
Collins said the National Party will have more policies out this week and she promised to challenge the Prime Minister to release Labour's policies, including its much-anticipated tax policy.
Newshub asked Ardern on Monday if she could rule-out campaigning on a higher tax bracket.
"I've been very careful to point out that we haven't put out some final parts of the Labour Party's policy. Happy to debate those at the time we do," she said. "But you can already see some clear differences emerging between Labour and National."
Collins promised to release more than just infrastructure announcements.
"We just happen to have quite a lot of infrastructure to put out. But you will acknowledge, I'm sure, that infrastructure is really important for the country."
