Robertson Grant: General Debate 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Robertson Grant: General Debate 
[Sitting date: 17 October 2012. Volume:684;Page:5897. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
GRANT ROBERTSON (Deputy Leader—Labour) 
: 
 I move  
That the House take note of miscellaneous business 
. This is a Government in total disarray. There has never been a time in New Zealand’s political history when so many Government agencies have been out of control and without leadership. The Ministry of Social Development the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the Government Communications Security Bureau are the examples just this week and it starts at the top. 
It starts at the top with the Prime Minister—the Prime Minister who says “I don’t know.” “I can’t remember.” “I’m not in a position to comment on that.” and “Who knows? I crack jokes from time to time. I crack jokes about all kinds of important material.” Well the message for John Key is this: New Zealanders want hope; they do not want Bob Hope. And that is what they are getting from this Prime Minister—he is cracking the jokes but not doing the job that New Zealanders expect of him. 
His Government is in disarray and it starts at the top of the Government Communications Security Bureau. We entrust in the Prime Minister as the Minister who is in control of the Government Communications Security Bureau the responsibility on behalf of all of us to look after the spy agencies to look after our security and yet this Minister—John Key—has no idea what is happening in his own agency. He has not been briefed. He does not know what is happening. That is the story he is asking New Zealanders to believe. 
That is the story he wants New Zealanders to believe but day by day his story unravels. Day by day he has to admit that he got it wrong. He said “It was not September; it was really February.” and “I am not going to be talking about Kim Dotcom in Hollywood. Oh no I am going to be talking about Kim Dotcom in Hollywood.” Mr Key’s story is unravelling day by day and his lack of leadership his lack of focus on these agencies is going to come to this House again and we will see it. 
But it goes right across the National Party front bench. If the National Party had a Malcolm Tucker from  
The Thick of It 
 he would have a desk placed in Hekia Parata’s office. It would be there permanently as he tried to unravel what it is that she is telling this House. But what we know on this side of the House is that she has treated the people of Christchurch shabbily. That is what she has done. She has not gone down there and looked at these problems. She has not even got a proper assessment of each school. She has simply gone there with a one-size-fits-all solution and that is disrespectful to the people of Christchurch. Her story unravels every day as well. 
Then there is Paula Bennett and the Ministry of Social Development. The ministry was told about the weaknesses and vulnerabilities in its system and it did nothing. It did absolutely nothing. In 2009 Paula Bennett told John Key that she would be closely monitoring everything that went on and she completely failed to do that. She is overseeing an agency that is in disarray. We have had that we have had ACC—this Government is letting New Zealanders down. 
New Zealanders have a right to be disappointed in this Government because John Key came into office and told New Zealanders: “I expect high standards from my Ministers.” That is what he told New Zealanders. Well he today in his ministry has a Minister in John Banks who has consistently misled New Zealanders and who has consistently misled the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister clings on to the political corpse that is John Banks to save his Government’s majority. Well what he is doing is letting down the standards of ministerial behaviour and letting down New Zealanders. He is not upholding the standards he said he would and he is not upholding the standards that New Zealanders would expect. He is now seen in the eyes of many New Zealanders as being the one thing that John Key always feared: just another politician. But he is worse than that. He has lowered the standards of ministerial accountability and New Zealanders have every right to be disappointed in him. 
The other thing that this Government is doing is overseeing a decline in the New Zealand economy. It is not even prepared to take its head out of the sand to stop practising the ostrich economics that this Government seems to think are OK to actually look at the loss of jobs around New Zealand and say to New Zealanders “We will be there with you.” Instead it is prepared to sit on the sidelines of the economy waiting for something to happen. Instead of doing what any good Government would do which is to get in there get its hands dirty and help New Zealanders create jobs the Government waits and it sits on the sidelines. This is a Government in disarray managing a decline. New Zealand can do better. Labour will have a better path for New Zealand than this.