It always intrigues me when people rail on about our current government by calling it a socialist one because at its most basic, all governments are socialist.

In essence they tax us all, if there is a progressive tax system that means they take more money from the rich and then they redistribute it to the poor.

So all our governments are socialist. We just have rightish and leftish versions of the same thing. Which is why over the past 30 odd years since Rogernomics we have had basically the same system. The deckchairs are just moved about on the Titanic.

This government is more leftish than the last more rightish socialist government. Some say they tax more which if you consider the regional fuel tax rises is true. But it’s also worth noting that the basic tax system is unchanged from the previous governments.

Certainly the very first thing they did was give more money to beneficiaries and Working for Families which is classic re-distribution of wealth. But other than the budget the benefit system is unchanged from the last rightish socialists.

So it’s really in the so called virtue signalling that you can see a difference.

So we’re seeing that in a debate over Kiwibank branch closures in Wellington. Kiwibank is considering closing the Petone and Johnsonville branches. A couple of the local Labour MPs including Greg O’Connor say it’s just not right. They claim the areas are booming.

They also invoke the thoughts of the father of Kiwibank, Jim Anderton who wanted Kiwibank to remain a part of the community and not close branches like the Australian banks.

But is this the right thing to do? Kiwibank is still a business, they have looked at the numbers, they don’t add up. They have a differing charter than the Australian banks but even taking that into account they’ve decided to close.

So can we say this is a more socialist government because they’re telling a business what to do? We probably can. Though to muddy the waters there is the fact that the National MP Chris Bishop is also joining the calls to keep the branches open.

And then we have reports that David Parker is considering telling the Super Fund to invest 40 billion dollars in early stage companies. It’s often called angel investment. While that could have some major benefits in growing young New Zealand companies it also carries much more risk that the Super Fund could lose in the investment which no-one ever wants.

When government starts telling businesses what to do, even if they are state owned, it’s a slippery slope. Really socialist governments start telling everybody what to do and think. To my mind these two situations are not worth the grief for the government and they should step away before the scare even more horses