Robertson GrantGENERAL DEBATEHon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): I move That the House take note of miscellaneous business.You can't claim success about a surplus if you haven't paid the bills and that is the legacy of the last nine years. We wouldn't ever do it at home. You could make your bank balance look fantastic if you didn't pay the rates if you didn't pay your power bill if you didn't fix the washing machine. Your bank balance could grow so that's exactly what the previous Government has done and we have seen the impact of that in so many areas.We have seen the impact in health and we know on this side of the House that if you underfund the health sector by $2.4 billion over nine years that's going to have some effect. It's going to see leaking hospitals. It's going to see sewage in the walls of our hospitals. It's going to see frustrated health professionals who we owe an awful lot to in New Zealand—the professionals who work in our health system who have been stretched beyond belief by that underfunding. But you know what? Simon Bridges—do you know what he calls those issues? He says they're an accounting issue. Simon Bridges says that sewage in the walls of our hospitals is an accounting issue. Well you know what they say about accountants with due respect to them: accountants know the cost of everything and the value of nothing and that is the legacy of the previous Government.We've also seen that in Christchurch with the blowout in Earthquake Commission repairs. Gerry Brownlee called that an unquantified liability". It's a little bit like going to the doctor and being told that you won't be able to run a marathon tomorrow. Yep it's unquantified but you kind of know what it is don't you. Christchurch knows all about a quantified liability—it's called Gerry Brownlee. That's what they know about.We can see it right across all of the social sector. In early childhood education (ECE) we heard from Chris Hipkins today about ECE centres losing $105000 since 2011 of parents being asked to pay more and more—the cost of basic public services shifting on to parents because the previous Government wasn't prepared to invest the money that they needed to.On this side of the House we have a very different set of priorities. That party wanted to manufacture a surplus and give tax cuts that favoured the wealthy. On this side of the House we want to invest in critical public services that New Zealanders deserve. We want to give every New Zealander a fair shot at success and we have a plan to do that.Much of what has been discussed this week we already knew but there's no way that a bland set of Government accounts can show just how badly rundown our public services are. The $2.4 billion underfunding of health will take time to turn around but we have a plan to do it: a six-year plan to invest in health. We knew about the education gap and we will reinvest in education. In our mini-Budget we have already reversed those tax cuts. We have a Families Package that will deliver on average $75 per week to 385000 families. We made sure that there was room for an investment in our future and that means making sure that we invest in giving people the skills that they will need for tomorrow—the ability to train and retrain.It means restarting contributions to the Superannuation Fund. We hear about the great economic management on the other side of the House and they didn't put one cent into the Superannuation Fund from 2009 onwards. This side of the House is proud that we are investing in a future that is sustainable for all New Zealanders.In the Budget in May we will begin to address the social and infrastructure deficits that have been left to us by the previous Government. Our priorities are around health and education and housing and giving New Zealanders the public services that they have come to rely on in the past and that we will rebuild again. I have said it once and I will say it many times again: it will take more than one Budget to undo nine years of neglect. But on this side of the House we have a determination that we will invest in the future of New Zealanders. We have the allowances in the Budget to do that and we balance those with being fiscally responsible. This is a Government that is committed to making sure that every New Zealander enjoys prosperity and success unlike the previous Government who were prepared to sit there like accountants feeling good about the numbers on their spreadsheets but failing entirely to deliver to New Zealanders. That now changes."