Williams Andrew: Customs and Excise (Budget Measures—Motor Spirits) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWilliams Andrew: Customs and Excise (Budget Measures—Motor Spirits) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading[Sitting date: 16 May 2013. Volume:690;Page:10330. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]ANDREW WILLIAMS (NZ First): Was that not a short call from Mike Sabin the member from somewhere up in the far north—a very short call—and symptomatic of the amount of input that most of the Government members have had in most of the debates over the last 2 days? I want to tell a small story here about—Hon Gerry Brownlee: Nothing new in that.ANDREW WILLIAMS: No but this is a small story about one Mr Steven Joyce who happened to be—Hon Trevor Mallard: The member for nowhere.ANDREW WILLIAMS: —yes he is a member for nowhere as well—one Mr Steven Joyce who was the Minister of Transport at the time back in about 2008-09. We on the North Shore invited him to come to see us and explain why the incoming National Government had just cancelled the regional fuel tax in Auckland. This was a regional fuel tax that was proposed in Auckland which had taken 3 years for the local authorities in Auckland—all the local authorities which National said could not work together—to negotiate with the former Labour Government to come up with a solution to help fund the major roading and public transport initiatives in the Greater Auckland region. And what it was going to be was that it was going to be a tax along the lines of the one in the Customs and Excise (Budget Measures—Motor Spirits) Amendment Bill starting at 2c a litre and rising to about 9c a litre over a period of 5 years. It was going to help Aucklanders self-fund their roading and transport problems and issues over that period of time.But the National Government got into power and immediately cancelled it—just cancelled it outright. This is after 3 years of extensive negotiations by local and central government coming up with a solution so that Aucklanders could be self-sufficient in terms of providing for their future needs in this funding area and one Mr Steven Joyce cancelled it. He was issued three invitations I think it was by me when I was Mayor of North Shore to come to the North Shore and talk to us about why he did it. That same Minister of Transport that same Minister of Transport who lived just north of Albany just over the border in the Rodney area was driving through our city of North Shore half a dozen times a week but he could not find the time to come to explain why he was cancelling the regional fuel tax and at the same time why there were cutbacks to funding on things like walking school buses. On the North Shore we had over 100 walking school buses. In fact I launched the 100th walking school bus on the North Shore when I was mayor. And yet this National Government was cutting back funding for the likes of walking school buses which were encouraging parents to get out of their cars and get their kids to walk to school and to stop thousands and thousands of mothers and fathers in the morning hiving all around the school gates and clogging up the streets while people were trying to get to work.It was a great initiative but Steven Joyce knew better—he knew better. He did not want to have any discussions on that. He did not want to come to see what we were doing in terms of public transport on the North Shore to get people on to buses to get people on to the new Northern Busway—Sitting suspended from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m.Hon Trevor Mallard: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The first point of order is one that I would like to take slightly more seriously than I did earlier when I raised it. I think it is fair that you dismissed it because of the tone of my point of order but it did go to the importance of longstanding Speakers’ rulings—since 1996 or probably 1997;post the 1996 election—as to the method of addressing list members. I think that members who are list members are to be addressed either by their names or in this particular case as the Green list member. To refer to honourable members of this House as being members from nowhere or members for nowhere as Mr Sabin did is I think a long-term breach of Speakers’ rulings and I think it is important that we have it on the record that that has not become acceptable.Mr SPEAKER: I thank the member for his point. He is right: it will lead to disorder if members do refer to other members as members from nowhere. But that interjection was then being thrown around from both sides of the House.Hon Trevor Mallard: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. My second point of order is to ask you whether the rules have changed as to photography within the Chamber. I thought it was the practice that photographs were not to be take in here including in the lunch break unless by an accredited member of the media and I thought they were not allowed to do it in the interval either. It appears that at least one individual has been on the floor of the House taking photographs—Hon Ruth Dyson: Standing.Hon Trevor Mallard: —standing on the floor of the House.Hon Tau Henare: Name him!Hon Trevor Mallard: Well if the member Mr Henare wants—Mr SPEAKER: Could the member just finish his point of order.Hon Trevor Mallard: Well the question I am asking is whether you Mr Speaker have changed the rules and have given permission for photographs of members to be taken during the luncheon break.Mr SPEAKER: I have not changed any rules at all and if photographs were taken during the luncheon break that is not a matter of order.ANDREW WILLIAMS: It was a very nice Saturday lunch here in Wellington I can assure you. It is not often that we have a Saturday lunch in Wellington but it was most pleasant. It did rob me of the chance when I was in full flight of telling the story of one Mr Steven Joyce who at the time was a member of the Opposition and then he became the Minister of Transport. Then—Tracey Martin: What electorate does he represent?ANDREW WILLIAMS: He represents the National Party. He has never been elected to anything himself. He has actually never ever stood in an election himself but he does have a huge amount of influence in the National Party. And that one Mr Steven Joyce lives in the area of Rodney just north of the North Shore and he was the Minister of Transport at the time when he cancelled a proposed regional fuel tax in Auckland which was going to help to provide a huge amount of self-sufficiency for Auckland in its transport woes in terms of not only its roading but also its public transport.It is somewhat ironic that something like 4 or 5 years later the National Government is now saying that it needs more money for roads of National Party political significance. That is what they are called now—roads of National Party political significance. It is now putting in place an excise tax on fuel starting on 1 July of 3c a litre going up every 1 July—next year another 3c a litre and the year after that another 3c a litre. It now sees fit to charge every single New Zealander all over this country another 9c a litre but the Hon Steven Joyce when he was the Minister of Transport could not see any merit in Aucklanders having a regional fuel tax of their own to help pay for their own. It is ironic that on 18 December 2012 Gerry Brownlee the current Minister of Transport said the series of July increases will also ready the National Land Transport Fund for investment in upper North Island transport projects beyond the roads of national significance programme. Basically most of this money will be going into roads north of Hamilton. Hamilton and north is where the money is mainly going.There is a little bit in Wellington. There is a little bit down in Christchurch—a token amount in Christchurch. But the bulk of it is going north of Hamilton.So as I said earlier every single person in the small population of Dipton in Mr English’s area—down there where he has his holiday home where he visits occasionally and where maybe during this adjournment he might perhaps be visiting—will as of 1 July be paying another 3c a litre for their fuel in Dipton to help pay for roads in Hamilton and north and in Auckland and north of Auckland. I am sure that the people in the electorate of Bill English the Minister of Finance must be thrilled with that. They must be absolutely chuffed. They must be chuffed to think that in 12 months’ time they can look forward to another 3c a litre increase on top of that. And in 2 years’ time they can look to another 3c a litre increase. They must be chuffed because down in Dipton they must be thinking: “Boy we must be going to get some really good roads in Dipton out of all these extra taxes that our member of Parliament Bill English is going to charge us. We must be going to get some super highways in Dipton. We must be going to get some wide arterials. We must be going to get some four-lane highways in Dipton.” Not on your life Dipton. You are not going to get a single thing out of this Minister of Finance or out of this Minister of Transport. All you are going to get Dipton is another 9c a litre. So when you travel and drive down to Invercargill when you travel and go up to Queenstown and when you go over to Dunedin every time you take a car journey you the people of Dipton should remember that you are paying more money to get there and more money to get back to Dipton because this Minister of Finance and this Minister of Transport determined that you would help pay for the roads north of Hamilton.But what I would encourage you to do if you are in Dipton is maybe take a drive up to the North Island. Drive up to the North Island get to Hamilton and when you finally get to Hamilton and you get on to some of these roads of National Party political significance make the most of it. I would probably suggest you drive between Hamilton and Auckland and around and do it four or five or six or seven times while you are up there. It is a long way to drive from Dipton up to north of Hamilton. When you get there make the most of it because you might do it only once in a lifetime when you have taken your car all the way from Dipton to go up there to pay for those roads. So when you get there “Diptonites”—are they called “Diptonites”?Hon Trevor Mallard: “Dipsticks”.ANDREW WILLIAMS: They are not called “dipsticks”; they are “Diptonites”. That is most appalling. There is only one “dipstick” from Dipton. So “Diptonites” go up to the North Island and enjoy those roads of National Party significance. Drive up and down them. Make the most of them and know that every time you are putting the petrol in your car at the pump holding the handle pressing the button putting petrol into your car you are paying for all those roads that the National Party wants north of Hamilton.That is not fair on New Zealanders all over this country. It is not fair on the whole country. This is a tax and it is a hidden tax. It is a tax on the whole country and everyone is going to be paying to help balance the National Party’s Budget. That is what it is. It is balancing the National Party’s Budget so it can hopefully in 2014-15 come up with a tiny little minute surplus—a tiny little minute surplus. That is what it is all about. It is trying to balance the books. New Zealand First does not go along with it. It is unfair.