King Annette: Taxation (Urgent Measures and Annual Rates) Bill — Second Reading In Committee 
King Annette: Taxation (Urgent Measures and Annual Rates) Bill — Second Reading In Committee 
[Volume:651;Page:153] 
Hon ANNETTE KING (Deputy Leader—Labour) 
: 
 What a collection of blatherskite we have just heard from the Minister in the chair the Minister of Finance!. He was trying to put the Tory spin on policy that is going to hurt the most vulnerable in our society. It does not matter how Mr English cuts up the Taxation (Urgent Measures and Annual Rates) Bill package here in this House: we know the truth about what is happening to vulnerable New Zealanders today. 
He had the cheek to tell this House and New Zealanders listening that if we had wanted to discuss the National Party’s tax policy we had had a whole year to do so. That is what he told us. Well I have to say to Mr English that his nose grew an inch because the National Party released its tax policy in October this year and New Zealanders and this House had no opportunity to debate it. People on the hustings had to get what information they could from a website. They had to scrounge for information in order to be able to debate that policy. That is the truth of the matter. The National Party released its policy in October this year. 
I ask why it would release it so late. It was because National did not want scrutiny of its tax policy. It did not want New Zealanders to know that it was going to pull the biggest Christmas hoax on New Zealanders that anyone has pulled since Ruth Richardson in 1991. That is what National was doing. Mr English backed up Ruth Richardson then and he is doing it now. She was the mistress who taught him the tricks he is using now when he has the opportunity. 
Mr English said this bill is going to help hard-working Kiwis who had got nothing under a Labour Government for 9 long years. He referred to people who did not have families. He said the Labour Government had looked after those with families. Of course that was “communism by stealth” a few months ago and National voted against it at the time; now it has adopted it. But he did say that we had looked after families. What National has bravely and courageously done is to look after people who have not got families—hard-working poor New Zealanders. Mr Bennett is shaking his head. I hope he realises that hard-working poor New Zealanders must have a net income of $24000 before they can access National’s independent earner tax credit. So the lowest-paid New Zealanders who do not have children the most vulnerable who probably have a gross income of around say $30000 do not get anything. I ask Mr English why they are not included. I ask why they do not get the tax credit which he said was for the battlers the hard-working Kiwis of New Zealand. They do not count. They do not count because they do not vote National. That is how cynical it is. This policy is not about giving something to those who have not got children; it was a smart little manoeuvre during an election campaign to try to garner a few more votes. 
Perhaps Mr English will tell us what happens to the hard-working battling Kiwi families who earn $23500 net—the husband and wife both earning $23500—and whether they get this tax credit. No they do not qualify. They have a very low income they are working hard but they get diddly-squat. The words about caring about New Zealanders the low paid the vulnerable and the underclass of New Zealand are nothing more than a hoax on the people of New Zealand. I ask why this tax credit does not cover all of those people if caring about New Zealanders was the genuine intent of the National Party. We have seen through the tricks. 
I just have been in a taxi. We all know that taxi drivers know everything. They are already starting to wonder what this is all about. National has been in this House for 3 days and its first attacks are on the vulnerable New Zealanders. Its first attacks are on women children the low paid and the people who do not have children—the very ones National said it was going to support. I can tell members that in my own constituency of Rongotai almost 30000 people earn less than $40000. In some way or other they will be affected.