The Finance Minister's painting a grim picture of the economy, signalling her Government will further cut into the Public Service.  

Treasury's opened its books for the half-year economic and fiscal update, showing the expected surplus has been pushed out from 2027 to beyond 2030. 

Nicola Willis has adjusted the way the surplus is calculated, but says come Budget day next year, she'll be forced to make some tough decisions.  

She says from now on the official measure of surplus —officially called the OBEGAL— will no longer take into consideration the $4.1 billion ACC deficit.  

She's calling this new measure OBEGAL-X. 

Political Editor Jason Walls told Matt Heath and Tyler Adams that in terms of the fiscals, things are looking worse than expected, but they’ve done a bit of “swanky PR”.  

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