Hughes Darren: Budget Debate 
Hughes Darren: Budget Debate 
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Hon DARREN HUGHES (Labour) 
 Labour has no confidence in this Budget because it does not have a plan to protect or create jobs or to support our country through the difficult economic times we are facing. All through this Budget debate we have heard nothing from the Government about how it wants to make this Budget about jobs. In fact the only policy that one could point to that might be slightly related to employment is of course the bicycle lane and we all know that is just one big in-joke between the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance. They laugh about the way the bicycle lane managed to make its way through the Budget process. They do not laugh because they want the jobs that come from it—and we all know how few jobs will be involved—but because it is just a little palsy-walsy joke between Mr Key and Mr English. 
Throughout the Budget debate it has become clear how little Government members know about what is in the Budget. Whenever members are questioned about areas where there have been cuts in this Budget they do not know which programmes have been affected by it. At question time Ministers cannot explain or elucidate on what will change as a result of the Budget process and the Budget funds are being misdirected. As this Budget continues to be unpacked more and more issues are being found by the Labour Opposition in which the Government is under pressure and not delivering to the people of New Zealand and not keeping its word from the time of the election. 
I will now say a quick word about the changes we have seen in the House in the last few days. I would like to congratulate Nathan Guy on his promotion as a new Minister in the Government. We do not agree on a lot of things about how things should be done in the community of Otaki but I am personally pleased for him that he will have the opportunity to serve as a Minister. I can assure him of my representations to him on Transmission Gully in his role as Associate Minister of Transport. I acknowledge the new Government whips and I look forward to working with them. I would like to make a special acknowledgment of the election at the weekend of David Shearer a man of substance and quality and a worthy successor to the Rt Hon Helen Clark. In the Mt Albert by-election David Shearer showed how one should campaign. There is no doubt about that. Candidates should campaign on things they believe in they should campaign on things they know are true and can be done and they should focus on what matters to the communities in their electorate. That was one thing that the National Party fell away on. 
I cannot let this moment pass without making a reference to the strategist of the Mt Albert by-election. This is the person who called all the shots when it came to Mt Albert— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: “The Maestro”! 
Hon DARREN HUGHES 
: —the man whom I have heard described as “The Maestro” of New Zealand politics Dr Jonathan Coleman. I say to members that if Dr Jonathan Coleman ever gives them a prescription they should see another doctor. Members should get another doctor’s opinion if Dr Coleman ever tries to give political advice. He was in donkey deep with the strategy for Mt Albert. If any person has “The Maestro” visit him or her with some political advice I say that he or she should run a hundred miles. If Dr Coleman says turn left go right. If he says move ahead put it in reverse. Whatever Jonathan Coleman says do not follow his advice. He reminds me of Murray McCully. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: McCully’s better than him! 
Hon DARREN HUGHES 
: But McCully took the National Party vote from 47 percent in 1990 to 20 percent in 2002. Jonathan Coleman has a great role model— 
Jacqui Dean 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. It would be good if the member speaking could refer to the member by using his full name—the Hon Murray McCully. 
Hon DARREN HUGHES 
: Sure; the Hon Murray McCully. If the member wants to engage in worship of one of her colleagues and she chooses Murray McCully I say good on her. I say to members that we now know something about the political judgment of Jacqui Dean. She will be praising Jonathan Coleman next week. Jonathan Coleman went on  
Q+A 
 on the weekend and he said that National had a strategy in Mt Albert. His voice became more and more strangulated as the interview went on as if not even he could believe that he was saying this. Dr Coleman said there was a strategy; then he said that they followed it to the letter. National planned what it did in Mt Albert. The party members sat around and said: “Here is an idea. Let’s insult every member of the community we can think of. Let’s insult poor people 2 days before the poll. Let’s park in disabled car parks on television. Let’s do all these things to follow the strategy down to the letter because Dr Coleman is “The Maestro”. I say to members that someone should know he or she is in trouble when it is only Don Brash who thinks that person will be the next leader of the National Party. That is what Jonathan Coleman has: Don Brash in his corner. 
Then we come to the issue of John Key the Prime Minister who up until 6 weeks ago could do no wrong. What a tough 6 weeks it has been for the Government. The political management of the Government has been all at sea in the last 6 weeks and we saw that on Saturday when nobody was present to support Melissa Lee. No senior member of the National Government was there. Jonathan Coleman looks surprised—I said no “senior” member of the National Government. You know on a political show on television when it was said that no Ministers were there one of the commentators said: “No Jonathan Coleman was there.” Two of the other commentators said: “Who?”. They had no idea who he was. Where was the Deputy Prime Minister the man who really runs the National Party? Where was the president of the National Party? They had all cleared off. John Key said that he had a longstanding personal commitment as though he had nothing at all to do with setting the date of the election. The Prime Minister personally chose the election date. If he could not look in his diary to see where he was going to be on that date he has less control of his office than I thought he had. 
Let us wind back the clock to when the Mt Albert by-election was called. All the right-wing bloggers and the Government’s friends and columnists were saying that it would be tough for Labour and that the party vote was pretty close in last year’s election. They said: “Since the election the Nats have gone up to 60 percent in the party vote. Labour’s down to 30 percent. This could all be on; this is a big test for Phil Goff.” They all fed into that. That is why “The Maestro” wanted to be involved in the strategy. He thought: “If I could pull this off I might get on to the second row of the Government benches instead of being marooned on the third.”—for reasons we just do not understand; however that is where he is. By the time the by-election came it was a rout. We got a higher share of the vote than we got in the 2008 election. Ravi Musuku did better than Melissa Lee did and that is why “Musuku” has entered New Zealand politics. To be “Musuku’d” is to be abandoned by one’s political party and forgotten about. 
We know that John Key has always said that explaining is losing; that has always been his political mantra. But has he not spent 6 weeks explaining? He has spent 6 weeks explaining Christine Rankin. He has spent 6 weeks explaining the Auckland super-city debacle. He has spent 6 weeks explaining why he promised tax cuts in November passed them into law under urgency in December and welshed on the deal in May 2009. He has spent 6 weeks explaining why he has put in jeopardy the future of New Zealand superannuation and why he has slashed KiwiSaver for working New Zealanders over the course of their lives. He has spent 6 weeks explaining who Melissa Lee is and why she says the things she does. He has spent 6 weeks explaining why the Waterview Connection now costs $8.4 trillion or some ridiculous cost that the National Government keeps exaggerating. And he has spent 6 weeks explaining the ministerial personnel of the National Government. Last Monday he said he did not want to talk about personnel issues any more and today he was still talking about them in question time. 
This Government is beginning to come apart at the seams after just 6 months. I am surprised at that because it had an extraordinary start. But in the last 6 weeks we have seen mistake after mistake being made. What I find curious is that normally parties learn from their mistakes but this bunch keeps on repeating them. National members have no mechanism or ability to learn from their mistakes and that is why they should enrol in night school classes not cut them. They should be enrolling in adult and community education and in Politics 101 not cutting those courses which they are doing. 
I will say a word about the adult and community education sector because it provides an opportunity for 400000 New Zealanders. This Government is cutting it and saying nothing about it. I have been contacted by people in my community of Horowhenua who are really worried about this issue because those kinds of courses represent real hope and a chance for people to get back into the workforce. 
Hon Parekura Horomia 
: It says they were hobby courses. 
Hon DARREN HUGHES 
: But what happened? National is too keen on making jokes about the courses and calling them hobby courses as Mr Horomia points out. It is too keen to mock them and be silly about them even though Bill English—when he was in Opposition—acknowledged how important they were for people to have a better chance to get ahead. 
What I am most opposed to in the Budget is not actually the tax cut changes. I think the Government misled the public over that and at the 2011 election those members will have to account for the fact that they gave a personal guarantee. They even used the words: “We will not cancel the tax cuts like Labour.” They could not have been more explicit. But what I am worried about is superannuation because last December the Government halved the contribution from employers to KiwiSaver and it has now gutted the Superannuation Fund. There is not a single member sitting over there who will be responsible for fixing up that problem in the future. It is the same old Tory way. The Muldoon Government did it and none of its members were around to fix the problem. The Bolger-Shipley Government did it and none of its members are around to fix it now. 
And now once again a National Government is ruining New Zealand superannuation for people. It will be impossible to deliver superannuation in the future at the current rate of entitlement and at the current rate of superannuation as a result of what National has done. John Key and Bill English will be footnotes in history by the time that expensive bill affects the country. I think the National members ought to hang their heads in shame about that because they have transferred a massive problem on to the future. It is not something that will go away. 
Technology will not change an ageing population. Technology or policy-setting changes will not get away from the fact that New Zealand superannuation will be needed by people. National has walked away from every idea that was good about dealing with this problem: KiwiSaver allowed workers to build up their own individual savings; and the Cullen fund allowed the Government to put money away for the future during the good times. This Government has walked away from both of those things. I do not know who those members think will fix the problem for them but they do not seem to care because it will not be them. That is the legacy of this Budget. This Government cannot make any decisions about the long term; its decisions are about lurching from one political crisis to the next. In the last 6 weeks we have seen that holus-bolus and I think we will continue to see it.