Clark DavidDr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North): That motion was moved by the new patron saint of lost causes the Hon Todd McClay. He made an earnest plea to this House to support an agreement that will not be ratified that will not enter into force. This is a bill that his own Prime Minister his own leader has pretty much said is dead in the water. Yet poor old Mr McClay was sent here to the House today to try to defend the indefensible. I think there are a number of us around the House who actually felt a little sorry for him.Hon Members: No.Dr DAVID CLARK: I am hearing protests. Maybe I have gone too far. But Mr McClay is over there now defending a bill that his own Prime Minister says has no future. The real question then becomes: what is the Government's plan? This bill it has repetitively said is critical to New Zealand's economic future. I look forward to the research coming out of the Parliamentary Library and elsewhere around the country and to the journalists going back and looking to see how many times members of that Government have said that the passage of this bill is critical to New Zealand's economic future. When this bill does not succeed—when this Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPPA) is not enacted—the Government is left without a plan. It was asked today what its plan is. There was no answer. We heard nothing. We heard absolutely nothing from Mr McClay there. Does it leave a hole?" the Prime Minister was asked in the House today—does this bill not going through does the TPP agreement not going through leave a hole—and the Prime Minister or Steven Joyce as his surrogate could not answer that question. He could not do anything but bluff and bluster. That is what we have come to expect from them across there. They are arrogant and out of touch. The Government would not listen to the people. The people said: "We do not want the TPPA. We do not think the TPPA is a good agreement for New Zealand." It is more than just a trade deal. There is too much in this. The benefits are not being shared from trade deals and certainly not in this one. The people have been left out in the cold by this out-of-touch arrogant Government. But it has no other plan. It has no other plan and it has not yet even focus-grouped what this means for it. The Government members did not know how to answer the questions in the House today. They do not know how to speak on it in the House. I will listen to the rest of the speeches because I think they will be entertaining at the very least as the members go off in different directions before they have got their marching orders as to how they are going to defend the indefensible. Labour did listen. We listened to what the people were saying about the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). We laid out a principled position that said: "We cannot support the TPP because it does some terrible things to our housing market." It allows non-resident foreign speculators into our housing market which is causing a huge distortion and future Governments cannot block this from happening under this agreement if it goes through. Other countries—Vietnam Australia Singapore the Philippines—sought an exemption so that they could stop non-resident foreign speculators in their housing market because they knew it was causing a distortion. Tim Groser did not even ask for it in the negotiations. Tim Groser did not even ask for it and I have heard no member opposite defend him on that score I have to say. Then they slipped in a little tax thing. They said: "Well let's just charge people who want to speculate in our housing market extra tax." Then subsequently Ernst & Young pointed out that they cannot do that—that would negate the double tax agreements that we already have. Those members have been trying to defend the indefensible in this House for some time and they will go on I have no doubt trying to defend it. But I do look forward to the barrage of questions that ask: "If this was so critical to the Government's economic plan what is plan B?". Government members do not have one. They have said they want to grow exports as a percentage of GDP up to 40 percent. That has been their war cry as a Government—up to 40 percent. We know that exports as a percentage of GDP have dropped under this Government. They are now down below 30 percent and dropping. They are failing by their own measures to grow our economy to grow exports and here again they are failing. Whilst they were busy defending this deal they were not out negotiating other deals. They put all their resources into this deal rather than going out and doing deals that were really in New Zealand's interest. We have seen the dairy aspect of this deal equate to about nine extra jobs by 2030—that is what it amounts to—or three large dairy farms. Three large dairy farms—not the profit from three large dairy farms; the output from three large dairy farms—is all the access they got on dairy. Their modelling said a whole lot more than that. Their modelling was terrible. One of the factors in the modelling was out by 300 percent for goodness' sake. Hon Todd McClay: Sounds like one of your polls.Dr DAVID CLARK: That is Mr McClay interjecting again—the patron saint of lost causes across the House there. You have got to give him a little bit of credit for trying but this is not his day I am afraid. The people are speaking and the people have spoken and they have said that this Government here—the National Government—is increasingly arrogant and out of touch. It is not listening to where the public are and the public want nothing more to do with it. The public do like trade the public do like coffee the public do like bananas and the public do like other things like iPhones and so on but we have deals in place that get us those things already. When we sign new deals they have to bring new benefits to the whole citizenry not just to the mega-rich not just to the corporate interests that negotiate behind closed doors for a 6000-page agreement Mr McClay. Mr McClay I think knows that this deal was not in the interests of New Zealanders. That is why he is quiet and that is why it is not his day—because the deal is falling over as people around the world say this is not just a trade deal. There are too many fishhooks in this deal. It is not good for our country. Of course we know it interfered with the Pharmac model. There were going to be increased costs imposed on New Zealand if it succeeded. We know that in fact small businesses were not really in support of the deal ironically. We also know that the time frames were rushed as the Government tried to ram it through the House. This legislation is going through the House now because the Government members curtailed the examination of the treaty in the first part of the year up to May. They curtailed the examination process to cut off the public feedback because they did not like the public feedback they were getting. They did not like the public feedback so they shortened the feedback process for the treaty examination and it was all to get this deal through by Christmas because they wanted it out of the way. They did not want to be facing this deal in an election year. They know that it signals to the public that they are out of touch but they were arrogant enough to think they could get it through this House without the public noticing. Well they will notice. They are waking up and saying today that they can see that this bill will not be enacted that the TPPA will not happen and that the people of the world will not face the fishhooks of this deal because too many of them oppose it around the world. The Labour Party has always been the party of free trade. It was the Labour Party that pushed for increased access to Britain for our exports. It was the first Labour Government that built State houses made public education affordable made public secondary education free brought in free public healthcare and gave New Zealand State housing. That first Labour Government pushed for market access and Labour on this side of the House has supported every single free-trade agreement that has gone through because we believe in trade. But we do not believe in this kind of deal which is more than a trade deal. This is a deal with fishhooks that harm New Zealand and so it is rejected by the public and yet the Government still arrogantly pushes ahead—it still arrogantly pushes ahead. I bet several Government members will try to defend it today—I bet they will still try to defend what they are doing today. Even though they have seen Mr McClay attempt to defend the indefensible they will still try. We will not support the ratification of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. We have said it before. It is not a good deal as it stands it does not benefit our exporters as it should and it introduces big distortions into our housing market and locks them in. It locks in distortions in our housing market. If we want our exporters to get ahead we have got to make sure the incentives are right for money to flow to the productive sector so that we grow our complex manufacturing which has been dropping under this Government so that we grow our exports as a proportion of GDP which have been dropping under this Government and so that we put our energies into trade deals that actually bring growth for New Zealand and mean that we can continue to afford the social services that we all rely on and come to expect as New Zealand citizens—in the healthcare sector the education sector the roads and so on. We do believe that we need good-quality trade deals to afford those social services. In fact that is what New Zealand is all about—making sure everybody has equal and affordable access to those basic services. They will not be afforded by this deal which was not a good trade deal for New Zealand and that Government still will try to defend it. That Government is so arrogant and out of touch that it will keep trying to defend it until it fails completely."