Labour will not say if it will adopt the families income package announced in yesterday's Budget if it wins the election.
Finance Minister Steven Joyce, delivering his maiden Budget, shakes Labour leader Andrew Little's hand. Photo: RNZ / Rebekah Parsons-King
More than a million people would benefit from the $2 billion in spending which was the centrepiece of the election year budget.
It includes changes to Working for Families tax credits, income tax thresholds and accommodation subsidies - all of which would come into effect on 1 April, 2018.
Labour would not say if it would dump the changes if it won the election, but for now it would vote against the plan.
Its leader, Andrew Little, said it did not help low-income families and was an inadequate election-year bribe by National.
"The plan is too heavily skewed, giving the greatest benefits to the wealthiest families. That's not right.
"We want to have a detailed look at the figures and put our own plan together."
Labour finance spokesperson Grant Robertson said the party supports the Budget's lift to the accommodation supplement but the tax cuts are unfair and poorly targeted.
"Everyone recognises we're in the middle of a housing crisis and clearly we do have to do something to help people out with the increasing cost of rent," he told Morning Report's Susie Ferguson.
"The problem is we don't solve the housing crisis by increasing the accommodation supplement.
"We solve the housing crisis by building more affordable homes, by getting emergency housing in place for the homeless, by not selling off state houses but by building them."
Watch the interview with Grant Robertson here:
