The 2014 Budget signals the economy has turned a corner and it provides businesses with a greater degree of certainty, according to the head of a major financial services company, Deloitte.
Bill English says the Government remains on target to return to surplus in 2014-15. Photo: RNZ
A higher-than-expected surplus for the 2015 financial year was forecast, the Government's books expected to move into the black by $372 million.
That's up from the wafer thin, $100 million predictions that had been bandied about.
On top of that, economic growth is expected to average 2.8 percent over the next four years, and peak at 4 percent in 2015.
Net Crown debt is forecast to fall to 20 percent of economic growth in the 2019 financial year.
The chief executive of Deloitte Thomas Pippos said the budget offered little in the way direct benefits for for actual businesses - with the exception of some well foreshadowed tax breaks for innovative companies - but he expected generally businesses to be happy with this budget.
"There have actually been no major initiatives announced," he said.
The key issue now was how large the surpluses available to the nation became, and what decision governments would make as a result of those surpluses.
