Dyson Ruth: General Debate 
Dyson Ruth: General Debate 
[Volume:638;Page:8839] 
Hon RUTH DYSON (Minister of Labour) 
: 
 Every week sitting across the Chamber from National Government members see increasing tension between the co-leadership of John Key and Bill English. Every week that tension is increasing. The public of New Zealand expect the leadership of a party to provide direction. The leadership team of the National Party is providing direction but there are two different directions—one is going in one direction and one is going in the other. Did members notice how many press statements Bill English put out while John Key was overseas? Did members notice how those press statements suddenly all dried up the minute he came back? 
Hon Phil Goff 
: Like a pig in muck. 
Hon RUTH DYSON 
: Absolutely! Like a pig in muck—as if John Key was not following what was going on in the country. But he did not seem to do much about it. That is very bad news for the National Party. 
Actually there is worse news for every working family in New Zealand because both John Key and Bill English want to get rid of the Working for Families package and replace it with tax cuts for high-income earners. We have heard this recipe before it is not new but now it is finally being confirmed. National would start off by winding back the Working for Families package. My colleague Phil Goff gave some examples of what that would do to hard-working New Zealand families with a mortgage and with children who are trying hard to make their best contribution. They could see that $80 to $100 of the money they receive under the Working for Families package would be taken away by National so that people on high incomes would get more money in their pockets. It does not make sense. 
I have to acknowledge the decency of John Key who is now on public record as saying that middle-income New Zealanders who are eligible for Working for Families money would get less if anything under National’s tax cut package. That is a direct quote from John Key. At least he has had the decency to front up to middle-income New Zealanders and say: “Here’s the truth. You will lose money under National’s policy.” I want to give members another example because there are many such families in my electorate and in the electorates of my colleagues. Currently a family with a total family income of $52000 a year three children and a mortgage gets $246 a week under Working for Families. That is good money. Under National that family would lose $80 a week. 
In my home region of Canterbury nearly 30000 families are getting assistance through Working for Families. Over 10000 of those families receive an average of $75 a week from the accommodation supplement and nearly 4000 of them receive an average of $72 a week in childcare assistance. Today in this House I challenge John Key and Bill English to come to Christchurch. I want them to meet a family in that position—earning $52000 a year with a mortgage and three children. I do not care where that family lives. It could live in Opawa Halswell Hornby or Papanui. I want John Key and Bill English to go to that family with three children and a mortgage and say: “You deserve to lose $80 a week and I”—and I am speaking on behalf of Mr Key and Mr English—“should get an increase of over $100 a week.” 
I want those members to front up to good New Zealand families and explain why that is fair. Why is it fair that a member of Parliament earning over $120000 a year would get extra money from the National Party’s tax cuts while that family would lose $80? Why is that fair? How can we explain that to a family? How would anyone explain it? I have issued the challenge and I look forward to Mr English and Mr Key being on that plane to Christchurch. I am sure that many members of the media would be very interested in their explanation of why their tax cuts are so good and why the Working for Families package which is helping hard-working New Zealand families with children and a mortgage needs to go. 
But if one thinks that is bad enough—that a middle-income family would lose $80 a week and money would go into the pockets of backbench National list MPs—it is not actually bad enough because National has more in store. It also wants to cut health it wants to cut education and it wants to cut social services. It wants to cut the number of nurses teachers and social workers and it wants to cut the pay in those professions. That is the only way to reduce expenditure in the way that Bill English says he wants to do in order to fund tax cuts for those on high incomes. I challenge the member opposite whose name totally escapes me to go back to her electorate and explain to her families why they should lose money under her party’s policies in order to put money in her pocket.