Hipkins ChrisHon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the House): If this the adjournment debate the final debate of the 52nd Parliament is setting out the terms for this year's election campaign I say bring it on. Because one thing has been very clear from every comment from the members opposite and on this side—this election campaign apparently is all about the Labour Party. Because listening to the members opposite—and I've sat through plenty of adjournment debates during my time as a member of Parliament and the one thing you get to do as an Opposition member when the adjournment debate finally rolls around is you get to stop being the Opposition and you get to set out your shingle for the campaign. You get to say what you would do differently for the country. Not one single new policy idea from the National Party. Gerry Brownlee mentioned the fact that they've been up and down the country announcing their policies. You'd never know that listening to the debate in the House today. They did not mention one single policy one single thing that they would do differently. I remember what it's like to be in Opposition and I do remember that. On your dark days you wake up thinking about how you're going to trip up the Government how you're going to bring down the Government and you forget in the midst of all of that that you've got to give New Zealanders a reason to vote for you and for your party. That is exactly the hole that the National Party have fallen into. They're so busy trying to criticise the Government trying to bring down whatever it is that we are doing that they're giving New Zealanders no good reason to vote for them. And it's the reason they're looking so glum over on that side of the House—because they know it and because they can feel it. Been there done that don't want to do it again. That's the reason why my message in this debate is let's keep moving" because the message that we're getting from the members opposite instead is "let's go back". Although for Mr Brownlee it's more "let's just stand still" because as he has proven over his entire parliamentary career if you stand in one place for long enough eventually you become the deputy leader. He's proven that not once but twice and it hasn't worked out for them either time. Gerry Brownlee's right about one thing though. This is an incredibly difficult time for New Zealand and a very very difficult time for the world. And what are people looking for in such a difficult environment? They are looking for leadership. They are looking for positivity. They are looking for hope. And they are only finding that on one side of the debating chamber today and that is this side of the Chamber. We have an opportunity to build back better and that is exactly what our Government is focused on. We've set out over the course of the last few months a comprehensive plan to rebuild our country to get New Zealanders back in work to keep them in work and to tackle some of the long-term challenges that New Zealand has avoided for far too long. When we came into Government it became abundantly clear that our infrastructure was ageing it was creaking and it was desperately in need of investment. And that is what our Government has been committed to doing over the last three years.By "infrastructure" I don't just mean roads. Infrastructure does not start and end with roads. Roads are an important piece of infrastructure but so are our schools so are our hospitals so are all the social services that we rely on so are the community facilities that we rely on that over decades have been run down and that our Government is investing in rebuilding and we're putting Kiwis into work while we do that. But we're not just investing in infrastructure. Most importantly we are investing in people.After the global financial crisis the National Party the then National Government cut investment in both of those things. Government capital investment was reduced after the global financial crisis when that was our opportunity to increase it and our investment in people was reduced. The amount of money spent on adult education and training and on tertiary education reduced in the midst of the global financial crisis. At exactly the time when we needed to focus on upskilling our workforce the National Party went the other way and cut the funding and pulled the ladder out from in front of people so that they could not prepare for recovery. And we suffered for a decade as a result of that neglect. It meant that when the building and construction industry started to recover when the infrastructure industry started to recover they did not have the skilled workers that they needed to do the work that was in front of them. And the National Government's response was simply to say "Bring it in from overseas." when actually our Government is saying "Let's invest in our people. Let's train them up for the jobs that are available." Here's a shining example. In the wake of the global financial crisis (GFC) tens of thousands of on-job trainees and apprentices lost their jobs. We suffered for that because it meant that we didn't have the skilled builders the plumbers the electricians that we needed for the economic recovery after the GFC. So what's our Government doing? Well we are backing our apprentices. We're putting money into subsidising apprentices. And instead of that number reducing we are seeing it going up and that is something that we should be proud of because it offers hope for our economic recovery post this huge shock of COVID-19. We've heard a lot of comment from the Opposition about COVID-19 so let's just be clear about that. Look around the world I say to the members opposite and see the devastation that COVID-19 is continuing to wreak around the rest of the globe. We went hard and early in New Zealand and all of us—all of us—played a role in that and all of us should own that success and feel proud of that. But we now need to bring the same focus and leadership that we brought to the health response to the economic recovery and part of that focus has to be: don't take our eye off the ball. The health crisis rages around the rest of the world and New Zealand is not immune from that. We have to stay vigilant if we don't want to go backwards and that is exactly what we will do and we will do that right up to election day. We will not take our eye off the ball. We will keep focusing on keeping COVID-19 out of New Zealand. That's not scaremongering. That's dealing with facts that's dealing with science and that is exactly what responsible Governments do. And that is what our Government will continue to do. So while we get a whole lot of insults and vitriol from the members opposite what New Zealanders are looking for from their Parliament from all of us here is leadership and that is exactly what our Government is going to continue to offer. That is the shingle that we are putting out for this year's election campaign because we know there are tough times ahead but we've got the plan we've got the people and we've got the ideas to continue driving the country forward.Finally I want to offer a few words of thanks of my own. I'd like to thank all of my parliamentary colleagues in the Labour Party for their support. I can tell you that as the Leader of the House they have been unflinching in their support for the Government's legislative programme and I do want to thank them for that. I want to thank my colleagues in New Zealand First for the very constructive working relationship that we have had over the last three years. They said it wouldn't last. Not only has it lasted it's lasted with a great degree of strength. We've passed more legislation in this term of Parliament than in any term that the National Party was in Government and we can all be proud of that. So I thank my colleagues in New Zealand First. I'm loath to single out one person but I do want to single out my colleague Tracey Martin Associate Minister of Education who I have thoroughly enjoyed working with and I do want to thank her for that. I want to acknowledge the Greens and I do want to thank them again for the very constructive working relationship that we have had with the Green Party over the term of Parliament. They have had an interesting role in the Government in being partly in and partly out of the Government over this term. They've made that work and I want to say thank you to them for that. I think they've been to some extent the conscience of the Labour Party in their work in this Parliament and I want to thank them for that as well. And again I thank all my own colleagues for the work that they have done in that regard.Finally to the parliamentary staff all of our ministerial staff the people that keep this place operating on a day-to-day basis a very big thank you. So much of that work goes unnoticed and unthanked except for when we do an adjournment debate or where we wrap up at the end of the year. We should thank those people more often. We could all do it on a daily basis a bit more often if we actually thought that and we should.The families of members of Parliament have been in the debate far too much lately. So I want to take a moment to thank the families of members of Parliament on both sides of the Chamber but take a particular moment to thank the families of those members who have had some difficulty in recent times on both sides of the House and acknowledge how difficult that has been for them and the dignity that they have showed in that. Frankly an attack on one member's family is an attack on all members' families and I think that we should all stand together in saying that we won't tolerate that. I want to thank all of our families for the support they give us. None of us—none of us—could do the jobs we do without the support of the people who love us and care for us when we are not here so I want to very warmly conclude by thanking all of them."