Goodhew Jo: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Goodhew Jo: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
[Sitting date: 29 January 2013. Volume:687;Page:7549. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon JO GOODHEW (Minister for the Community and Voluntary Sector) 
: 
 I would like to greet the House by saying that it is nice to be back. It is nice to be back in business again. It is nice to be back in a position where we the National Party can continue with our plan that will mean a brighter future for New Zealanders. It is already reaping the benefits of the very disciplined plan of action under John Key our Prime Minister. There is lots to do. 
I am delighted to be beginning this year with the portfolios that I held last year and in addition to those the very exciting addition of being the Associate Minister for Primary Industries which is something very very close to my heart and my electorate of Rangitata. But even more so it should be close to the hearts of all New Zealanders. New Zealand is very heavily reliant on primary industries for its economy. So it is a very important portfolio and one that I am absolutely delighted to be working on with the Hon Nathan Guy. 
The previous speaker William Sio talked about Labour creating jobs. You know that really is where there is a huge chasm between this side of the House and that side of the House. On the other side of the House the Government creates the jobs. On this side of the House the Government creates the environment where the jobs will follow where the businesses thrive where they want to take on more employees where they want to invest in their businesses and where they want the economy of New Zealand to grow. Let me remind the House of something I have said many times before. When the biggest business in town is the Government we are going backwards—to hell in a handbasket in fact. When the biggest business in town was the Government as it was under successive Labour Governments there was a huge clean-up to be done—a huge clean-up to be done. And that is why considering the clean-up exercise that we were left with after Labour went out of office coupled with the worst recession since the 1930s—a global financial situation that has in fact tested many countries around the world—in fact I would have to say that New Zealand is doing remarkably well growing at just under 2 percent and projected to grow around 2.5 percent. You know—my apologies Mr Speaker; of course you will know this already but the rest of the House may not know or may need reminding—that is stronger than in the eurozone Japan the UK and Canada. That puts us in pretty good company in terms of where we are at. New Zealand is on the right track but it will not be without further huge effort on the part of this Government and all New Zealanders that we will get ourselves out of the mire that we found ourselves in in 2008 with a projected 10 years of deficits. Surpluses were great. The Labour Government had them and it squandered them. It does drive me mad from time to time to think about the terrible job Labour did. 
What have we got now? This year should be a year of positivity. It should be a year of positivity because we are heading in the right direction. New Zealanders have toughed out some very dark days. Certainly they have put in the hard yards and the Government has put in the environment that will allow them to move out of those tough days. 
 We have four priorities which the Prime Minister outlined earlier today. Responsibly managing the Government’s finances—was that not a change 5 years ago? It is a very changed way of thinking about things. Building a more productive and competitive economy—again that is how jobs growth comes. It is not about the Government creating the jobs. They are not sustainable when the Government creates them. Better public services—a number of my portfolio areas are looking towards that and I will certainly enlarge on some of those a little later. And rebuilding Canterbury. 
I want to pause for a moment and actually talk about the sorts of headlines I am seeing in the mid-Canterbury and South Canterbury papers at the moment. The headlines say: “Unemployment numbers down again”—unemployment numbers down again and at record low levels. The headlines say: “Businesses feeling the pinch of skill shortages”. Those new apprenticeship numbers will certainly help the businesses in my electorate. At the same time we have businesses like the new salmon processing factory being built in Timaru and we have Light Leathers taking on more and more staff. In fact we have good news stories strangely enough. I cannot remember that in other years gone by. I cannot remember having good news stories under Labour as often as we have in the local papers at the moment. It means that those businesses are finding that the environment they are working in—with lower taxes and less regulation—helps. They know that not only have we achieved change in the Resource Management Act but we are planning more change. We still have some tough tasks ahead of us in reforming the Resource Management Act—things that will be helping businesses. I tell you the people of my electorate know how important irrigation is to the future increased productivity of our land. They also know how important it is that water is used wisely well and responsibly so that it does not fall victim to high productivity. In fact it is a balance—of course it is a balance—but the people of my electorate certainly know that the potential is there for the $80 million newly announced irrigation project as a cornerstone with private finance in there as well to be a real boon for my electorate. 
Those were the four main priorities but underpinning those is the Business Growth Agenda. Again businesses actually employ people. Businesses give jobs to people without jobs. Businesses give people pay increases. Anyone would think that what we are seeing in headlines is: “Pay goes down again”. That is not what we are seeing. It has been very tight. It has been very tight but actually I cannot remember inflation ever being so low in the years when I have been noticing it. I certainly cannot remember interest rates being so low. If you have got a $200000 mortgage that is a $200 a week benefit compared with what it was in 2008. That is certainly a bonus. But the work programme under the Business Growth Agenda is the plan we are enacting. And I just want to remind members that those six parts of the Business Growth Agenda are around export markets; innovation; skilled and safe workplaces; infrastructure because building infrastructure is very important; natural resources—and this is where water comes in amongst other things—and capital markets. 
In my own portfolios—just to touch briefly on my own portfolios—when it comes to better public services under my Associate Minister of Health portfolio responsibility for aged care all facilities will be participating in the rollout of an interRAI tool which is about actually assessing all people across the whole country in a consistent standardised way. All aged-care facilities will be doing that. We will be publishing quality and safety markers. The care received in hospitals is getting better and safer all the time. We are meeting targets for more people having elective surgery and more children having their immunisations done on time. And we as a Government do not rest on our laurels. When we hit a target we set an even more ambitious target. That is not something we saw under the previous Government. So now we want 8-month-olds to have had all their vaccinations—not 2-year-olds but 8-month-olds—because when they are at their youngest they are at their most vulnerable. That is why we have changed that target. 
I just want to briefly talk about one of the targets around making hospitals safer. There are some targets that will be announced about surgery being safer about falls being prevented and about healthcare-acquired infections. These are important better public services. Each member of this Government is playing their part and getting the message out about the National Party’s intentions for New Zealand. We are coming out of the recession—the period when there have been difficult times. But at the same time we have lowered taxes. Superannuation has gone up even more because of lower taxes. In fact members of the House there are now better results indeed for women and their families as well. The gender pay gap has closed to 9.3 percent. It has been coming down each year—something we do not hear the other side of the House making much of. In terms of the better public services again we are making sure that money is well spent. We have put an extra $100000 into the volunteering fund. We have so many volunteers in this country doing an absolutely fantastic job. It is important that the Government is using the money that it has set aside for a portfolio like mine in the best possible way and to make use of it. So we have increased our support to volunteers. 
In terms of the SuperGold card for seniors well it is just incredible. It started out at 188 businesses and 2215 outlets. There are now more than 4300 participating businesses and 8600 outlets. That is true value on the SuperGold card not like the empty card that was waved around when it first came into being. Actually what that took is commitment on the part of this Government to put the resources in to build that resource so that older New Zealanders want to put the card in their wallet. Up until now they were saying “Why bother?” unless there was public transport in Auckland that they wanted. 
This Government is committed to all of our goals and that is a better and a brighter New Zealand and future for all New Zealanders. I am proud to be playing my part.