Brownlee GerryHon GERRY BROWNLEE (National): There is nothing so comfortable as basking in the warm embrace of delusion and that's what we've seen tonight from successive speakers from the Government. Let's be very clear: firstly this bill is here because of a degree of mismanagement of the Budget. We're only a few days away from the 2021 Budget kicking in but there is a gap in the Government's available spending permission and so they're now filling in—and Michael Wood throws his head back. Well this is a guy who is really not at all in control of his portfolio—a man who is totally a victim of the maddest officials that are available in Government giving him all sorts of wacky advice about how to reduce emissions from transport. The last speaker Helen White just spoke about how lovely it is that you can walk from Lincoln Road all the way through to the North Shore somewhere or ride a bike or perhaps an electric bike. Wonderful! The estimate is there'd be about 3000 people a day who might use that. How much does that reduce the transport emission profile for New Zealand: 0.04 percent—0.04 percent—and at a cost of about $200000 per tonne $200000 worth of the cost of emissions. For every one tonne of emission reduced the cost of that bridge will be $200000. Well how many of the 4000 families currently living in motels could benefit from some of that money? I don't see too many of them skipping with delight about the prospect of riding a bike across the Auckland Harbour Bridge—can't afford a bike let alone an electric bike. Then there is of course the 23000 families who are currently waiting for a State house five times the number of just four years ago. What's gone wrong? Well what's gone wrong is we've got a Government that's extremely good at making announcements—extremely good at making announcements—but very very poor when it comes to anything like delivery. Where would you see a better example than in the area of mental health that's been covered by the television coverage tonight and was a subject of the House today—totally deluded responses from the Government. Three years ago I think it was they put up $1.9 billion to provide better facilities for people who are suffering from mental illness. No one's going to argue that that's not a good idea but it's no good if it's not delivered on and in all that time of the $1.9 billion—$1900 million—half of $1 million has been spent. The Minister comes out in front of the House today and on the TV tonight and he says Oh I'm very worried about this. I'm going to have"—guess what?—"a review." He's going to have a review. So the Minister of Health for four years has sat there never asking officials about what was happening with that money never looking at his appropriations to see where it's all going never expecting a report from Treasury. And where were Treasury? One of the most useless Government departments in the nation. Where were they? Nowhere to be seen because that's not their thing. They don't like that—they like saving money. So they've put that $1.85 billion now across to one side and let the suffering continue and where was the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet? Where were all the bloated officials in that department who are supposed to be there to guide Ministers through their portfolios on that? Nowhere to be seen—nowhere to be seen at all.If you go through all of the indicators for how a society should be working you'd get no better description of the things that matter to people than was used by the great Labour Prime Minister Norman Kirk. Quite apart from some of his more prosaic sort of statements that actually weren't written by him—I do know who they're written by—he said that the key things are housing health education personal security and having a job. Well let's go through those. We've just covered off health and what a mess that's in. I'll come in a minute to the debacle that's out there over the COVID-19 vaccinations. It's an absolute mess. There is nothing consistent about that roll-out from one end of the country to the other—Hon Michael Wood: Into the conspiracies. Just ask some interesting questions. Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: —nothing consistent at all. Well I'll tell you what Minister Wood. There may be a lot of consistency in the tiny wee world that that member lives in—tiny wee world that he lives in—but across the rest of the country there is no clarity whatsoever. Then you look at the stats I just gave on housing—4000 families in motels 23000 families waiting for a house—and then of course the debacle over the massive property price rise that we've seen under the watch of this Labour Government. Why has it happened? They're scared to tackle the problem which is land supply better State regulation etc. When we were in Government they fought us all the way—all the way—on the Resource Management Act fought us all the way on the special housing areas. Nothing was right because they had a plan: "Just build 100000 houses and everything'll come right." Well 800 houses into it after four years. That's not exactly a stellar performance—absolutely hopeless. Then there's the issue of personal security. Why have gangs and gang membership grown so much in New Zealand in the last four years? But I see the member over there laughing because we know that a lot of them consort with the gangs. They go and ask them how they're feeling about things. They invite them into their office to have a bit of a chat: "Why are you harassing people? Why do you commit so many murders? Why are you selling drugs in our community? We don't like it but by the way you're OK. Carry on and we'll see what we can do for you." That's the sort of attitude that's got us in big trouble. So there's four out of the five things that they should be getting right and then you come to the issue of education. Look at the shocking truancy figures for this country. They are unbelievable. The member over there's laughing because of course you don't need to go to school—just take a holistic view of life. Duck down to the road and have a talk to some people about the things that really matter and what are they? Nothing. Drugs a bit of gang membership an electric vehicle if you're lucky—you don't need any education. That truancy figure is a massive and black indictment on the current Government. Well now he's shaking his head saying "Yes you're right." He's suddenly woken up to what it's all about. But that sums up the Government's position. We heard of course the speaker earlier on—the V8 ute driver from Wairarapa—was saying how important it is that we follow the Government's lead on COVID-19. Well COVID-19's a thing that's happening; it's what Governments deal with. But then you see this situation developing this week where suddenly electric vehicles are going to be the salvation for us. Oh yes the electric vehicles are going to be the salvation for us: every car manufacturer in the world listened to Jacinda Ardern last week and they are now planning mass roll-outs of electric vehicles in New Zealand. I don't think so—I don't think so. So what we've got is a very small part of society who are going to be able to participate in this wonderful new emissions-free society. But what will it cost others? Here's a question: what would you do if you knew that a country was the best in the world at producing protein—the country that can produce protein with a lower carbon emission than any other country in the world. Would you go to that country and say "Produce more. We need more of that. We want to shut out the rest of the world from producing the same product with a much bigger carbon emission profile."? Of course that's what should happen but no not in New Zealand. We're saying to our farmers who are the best producers in the world and who are very conscious of the environment that they work in and work with and telling them "Produce less—produce less." Angela Roberts: No we're not. Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: And if they're—well the member over there says "No we're not—no we're not." Well I tell the member over there to catch up with what her Government is doing and then she will be able to speak authoritatively on this matter because that is exactly what's happening. Stop production—a lower turnout of production off our farms. This is an imprest supply bill that allows a ratty Government to continue very very low-quality expenditure without achieving anything for New Zealand. Not one of those bad statistics is going to change as a result of the Government exercising their massive majority here tonight. I say to them: why so timid when there is such a big majority? It's because they simply can't deliver on what they've got and have no capacity to develop new ideas least of all to deliver on them. Thank you."