Parker David: General DebateText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeParker David: General Debate[Sitting date: 07 May 2014. Volume:698;Page:17577. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon DAVID PARKER (Deputy Leader—Labour): I have some respect for the Attorney-General but a week out from the Budget as we approach an election I have to say that that was a very lightweight speech. As we head into the election season a few weeks away from the Budget you are going to hear less from the Labour Party about the other side and more about the difference that we are going to bring to New Zealanders’ lives. Of course we are still going to be exposing the cronyism that is rife under this Government. I do not have time to go into that any more today other than to say that it is the responsibility of the Opposition to hold the Government to account for poor practice in the interests of democracy.I want to talk about why it is that our revisions to monetary policy struck a chord with New Zealand. It is a topic that is not particularly sexy but it was well received by New Zealanders because they are now seeing the linkages between what the Labour Party stands for and the lives that they live. They see that our policies are connected to improving their lives in the way and in the areas that they worry about. They know that despite the fact that New Zealand had low general price inflation in the last quarter—zero percent excluding the increase in tax on cigarettes—house price inflation is out of control particularly in Auckland and that is why the Reserve Bank put up interest rates which in turn put up the exchange rate. They know that there has been a 40 percent increase in house prices in Auckland. The average is now $680000. Homeownership rates are at a 50-year low. That is one of the most important measures of rising inequality under this Government.New Zealanders know that because interest rates went up because of poor housing policy it has meant that people have lost their jobs in the forest processing industry that we export too many raw logs and that the problems of insecure work and of an unemployment rate still at 6 percent are related to housing policy and monetary policy. They know that the Government hides the lot of ordinary New Zealanders in its averages. It says average wages have gone up when it knows that 45 percent of New Zealanders did not get any wage increase last year and that even on average the average wage rate went up by only 1.6 percent which is exactly the same as the increase in inflation. They know that we are on to something and that we have got to align the objectives of the Reserve Bank with our export sector.We hear Steven Joyce coming in here and trying to minimise trying to dissect down to the littlest thing and trying to reject the idea that we have actually got some pretty comprehensive policies that work across the economy to reduce interest rates to get our interest rates down to lower levels which are always higher than the rest of the worldand which jack up our exchange rate and mean that we have not covered the cost of our imports in interest for 40 years. They know that those changes are complex but important. They know that it is better to save a bit more money than to pay it on interest. They know that the Australians have done that and that is why the Australians sustain higher income rates and lower interest rates. That is why they like universal KiwiSaver.New Zealanders know that there are lots of other tools that the Reserve Bank has got like macro-prudential tools that it could use differently. They know that a capital gains tax to tax speculators not the family home would take the heat out of the price of houses and would therefore have less lead from the Reserve Bank to jack up interest rates. They know that we should restrict foreign buyers buying existing homes. They can build a new one; they cannot just buy an existing one because that pushes up prices to the detriment of New Zealanders and their children. They know that the same thing is happening with farmland.The Labour Party is determined—it is determined—to bring our interest rates back to international norms. We have got a once in a lifetime opportunity as we transition to compulsory or universal KiwiSaver to get saving rates up and interest rates down to get people into their first home by helping them save for a deposit and to help people in our productive sector because our exchange rate will not be overvalued beyond its fundamentals. What was the Government’s response? Bill English said that it is bad that the exchange rate is too high but it is bad if it settles at realistic levels. He said there is nothing new in this but no one has done it before.On this side of the House we are determined to bring forward policies that will help people have secure work better-paid jobs lower interest rates more export earnings and better lives.