Robertson GrantHon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): Thank you very much Madam Chair. I will answer the member's questions but I just want to reflect on the first half of what Mr Bayly just said and the absolute absurdity.So we have had a shifting of position even just within this particular debate about whether or not what the Government did during COVID-19 was useful. We previously had Nicola Willis saying it's all terrible; David Seymour saying it's all terrible; now we've got Andrew Bayly saying OK the $25 billion that you did on business support via the wage subsidy scheme and resurgence support payments that's good but the next lot is not." Well I'll tell you what the next-biggest one after that is Mr Bayly: the health system. The money that we actually gave to make sure that New Zealanders got vaccinated to make sure that our health services were ready to be able to deal with that to be able to make sure that we had the staff that we needed—Nicola Willis: Don't have the staff—a thousand short.Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: —that we had the testing kits that we needed; all of that. Ms Willis can say whatever she likes; Mr Bayly has just called that spending that saved thousands of New Zealanders lives "crap". That's what Mr Bayly's just told us all: that spending is "crap". Well that's why we did this in New Zealand: it was so that we could protect people's lives.So yeah sure we can debate the merits of some parts of the recovery part of the COVID Response and Recovery Fund. Personally I think it's a good thing that we supported our artists to stay in jobs when their work dried up. Now the Opposition doesn't think that was a good thing. Well we can go out and debate that. That as an amount of money within our total response is marginal compared to the money we spent on the health system compared to the money that we spent supporting businesses and compared to the money through Ministry of Social Development that we spent supporting households so that they could put food on the table and look after their families. That's the vast bulk of the COVID Response and Recovery Fund and that's what Andrew Bayly tells us is "crap". Well I could not disagree more with the member on that point.In terms of the member's questions around large-scale asset purchases to answer the second of those questions the member may not recall but there were two phases to the programme. The first of those was a dollar figure but we then moved in order to create some parameters to this of the bonds representing up of 50 30 and 30 percent of the different bond markets that we use. So we said within a market we'll set a percent cap than a dollar cap. So that's how we did put some parameters around it.Andrew Bayly: A quantum limit?Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: No because we set it as a percentage of the bond markets that we were operating in. So there was a cap within that because that was a much more sensible approach given that a large part of what we were doing here was trying to induce some market confidence. That's what the member again forgets given the time frame we were in: the fact the markets were spooked and part of what this was about was making sure that the bond markets were able to continue to operate. We have to have good faith to that.The member is concerned that in the process we didn't take advice about what would have been the impacts. I've already told the member that we did take that advice; we considered those downside scenarios and that one of those downside scenarios was that interest rates would rise.Andrew Bayly: By 2024.Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Ha! And again I invite the member to take himself back to that time. He can try and claim that he knew that the official cash rate would be where it is now but actually that wasn't what was being forecast. But to answer the member's question yes that was considered as part of the advice and we weighed that up against the enormous economic impact that could come from us not stepping in and allowing the Reserve Bank to go forward with its monetary policy or indeed undertake our fiscal policy.CHAIRPERSON (Hon Jacqui Dean): Members a couple of minutes ago the leader of the ACT Party took a point of order which I dealt with. The member then approached the Chair. His behaviour was disorderly and I require the member to stand withdraw and apologise.DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): I withdraw and apologise. Point of order. Madam Chair if a member can't approach the Chair and ask for the reasoning—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Jacqui Dean): The member will resume his seat. I'm going to give the member one warning. The member will not contest the Chair's ruling."