McAnulty KieranKIERAN McANULTY (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. What a marvellous time it is to be in Government. What a marvellous privilege it is to be a member of one of the three parties that are supporting this Government that is delivering on addressing the long-term challenges that are facing this country. You know there's one rule in politics that's always true: it's cyclical. If you can't learn from the mistakes of the past you'll never evolve and succeed in the future. That is a lesson that the National Party are not taking on board at the moment. For nine years they were in Government and they saw the Labour Party struggle to go up in the polls and they are repeating the same mistakes that we made because they are negative—they are negative and they are inward-looking.We learnt from that and now we're in Government and what are they doing? Sitting there and whingeing and wishing things were different. But the fact is that their scaremongering and their empty words are not ringing true. You only need to look in the regional areas of this country to see how things are not living up to what the National Party are saying. Primary exports: up $9 billion. But if you listen to the National Party there's no future in agriculture—a 36.3 percent increase in dairy a 34.8 percent increase in forestry a 22.2 percent increase in horticulture 11 percent in seafood and 10.5 percent in meat and wool. So much for a dying industry. These are the facts—the facts are that rural New Zealand is thriving under this Government and the only playbook that the National Party can even consider doing is whingeing.They could get behind this Government's approach to cleaning up our rivers because there is a clear economic argument to do so when New Zealand depends on overseas the most discerning consumers to buy our products. The only way in which we can increase the value that we expect and want to extract from our products is to live up to demand. They demand environmental sustainability. They demand that their products are coming from a country that is doing their bit to address climate change. They expect high nutritional and safe food. They expect animal welfare standards to be the best in the world and they expect the industry to look after their staff. In every single one of these areas this Government is delivering and what do they say? This is bad news".That is the negative approach of the National Party. They cannot see—at the moment anyway. They've changed their tune—now that the proposals that this Government is making are going to ensure the long-term sustainability of agriculture in this country. I say they've changed their tune because I see a quote here from their now agricultural spokesperson Todd Muller who says and I quote "My view is that there is a waste product that we can easily reduce reuse or recycle in some shape or form to help drive an environmentally sustainable economy". It was important to them then but not so much now. He continues: "We should be striving to do so. That is what responsible economic and environmental stewardship is all about".Why—I ask why—when they were in Government were they saying these sorts of things and now when we're in Government and they're our ideas they're opposing them? Why? Because they are barking up the wrong tree and chasing every car that's passing. We've seen it today in the general debate the things that they're talking about. They're not focussing on the long-term challenges that are facing this country. Their commitment to this conservative political approach and the desire to maintain the status quo will not deliver for rural communities. It will not deliver for agriculture. Both my grandfathers farmed in Eketāhuna. One was Labour and one was National. When I told them as a young man that I was interested in politics they both said the same thing: "Make sure you look after the farmers and the communities that they live in." That's a true story. But what this shows is that regardless of what colour you are you can have the same aspiration and people that live in rural areas and farmers know that the proposals that we're making are for their long-term economic sustainability. They know that the National Party with all their claims and all the hyperbole are just simply yelling into a void. It's not resonating. People do not like negativity. That was a lesson that we learnt. It is clearly a lesson that National has never learnt thus far and I suspect they will not learn it anytime soon."