Mapp Wayne: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Mapp Wayne: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
[Volume:623;Page:18218] 
Dr WAYNE MAPP (National—North Shore) 
: 
 After listening to that member Dianne Yates members of the public might be inclined to ask whether that was the face of political correctness. It is a little bit like pornography—often we do not know it until we see it. What we heard from Dianne Yates in her criticism of family values is that she is not prepared to judge anyone at all—total relativism prevails. So she is not prepared to say that the family of “Lillybing” might have had bad values. For that member all families are equal and all values are equal and I suggest that that will ultimately be the crucible upon which this Government fails. The people of New Zealand are tired of being told by the Government how to think what to do how to do it and when to do it and the Government will be judged on that. 
I want to talk about the issue of productivity. Behind that issue is this question: will New Zealand ever catch up to Australia? It is topical because hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders make the choice and can make the choice of which country they live in. Most often that choice is actually made on living standards—on which country provides the best opportunity for people’s families. That is the competition New Zealand is involved in. 
I suggest that under this Government’s policies New Zealand will never catch up to Australia. It does not have a single hope of ever doing that. We are squandering the best economic times we have had for a generation and the truth is that the Government knows that. 
I want to refer to the Prime Minister’s speech in which she made much of productivity and the things that have to be done to catch up. In fact she admitted that unless we have productivity gains that are the same as those of the United States we will lag. It is worth knowing that Australia and the United States have essentially the same productivity increases each and every year. That is why they grow better and that is why in the last 5 years family incomes in Australia compared with those in New Zealand are now $5000 greater today than they were 4 years ago. That is the real difference between our two countries and that is why New Zealanders lose hope. 
The Governor of the Reserve Bank Dr Bollard gave a speech late last week in which he said that we need to boost productivity from 1.5 percent per annum to 2 percent per annum. That would mean we would be on a par with the United States and Australia and we would then be able to start to catch up. That is the test he has put before the Government and Helen Clark actually seems to recognise that that is the test. 
What is the Government’s solution? It is twofold. The Government has set up a productivity working group—very noble. The Prime Minister is very proud of that. The productivity working group was a major part of her speech. The other aspect is a change in microeconomic policy particularly in the area of employment law. The only problem is that the changes the Government will make are the very things that harm productivity growth. The Government may say pious words about boosting productivity but it is doing everything it can to make it harder. So the truth is that we do not hear from the Government any more now that it is going to catch up with Australia. It knows it is not going to achieve that because it is doing all the wrong things. 
One might have thought that the issue of productivity would have inspired Business New Zealand. I am sure the Government was hoping to get its endorsement today. Let me read directly from the Business New Zealand media statement of today: “Many businesses would find it hard to agree with the Prime Minister’s statement that recent employment relations legislation will improve productivity.” 
It is not surprising is it? Right around this country during recent statutory holidays one-third of service businesses in the restaurant and entertainment industries were closed. This country relies on tourism which is now our largest overseas export earner. But what do we do? We pass laws that make it hard for those businesses to open. How will that boost productivity? Air New Zealand a State-owned company said in its annual report that the Holidays Act would add 14 percent to its wage bill—a cost of $7 million—with no gains whatsoever in productivity. 
The Government cannot use pious words and expect them to be a self-fulfilling prophecy just because that is the sort of thing it happens to believe in. The Government thinks that saying the words establishing the committee and using the centre-right language will somehow make it happen. I have news for the Government: it will not and the Government will fail. That is why we will see—as indeed my colleague Dr Lockwood Smith pointed out—a continuing drain of New Zealanders over to Australia. People are voting with their feet. 
I want to refer to what National would do—because that is the choice really is it not? The choice is between Labour’s formula—committees bad workplace legislation and increased taxes—and National’s. Those are the choices we have. 
National believes in more flexible workplace law. We know we will not be going right back to 1991; we know the world evolves; but we also know that the legislation passed last year harms productivity. Every business owner knows that and they say so to me. They write to me and I absolutely guarantee that they are writing to Labour members saying precisely the same thing. If the Government needs further proof it needs only to look at today’s Business New Zealand statement about that. 
The second thing we would do is introduce a 90-day trial period particularly for new employees. Businesses want to be able to take a chance. They want to be able to employ perhaps people who have had some difficulty in the work force—people on benefits for instance. The way to do that is to give people the ability to make those choices. A 90-day trial period is actually about giving people opportunity. 
Finally and most crucially we will reduce taxes for every working New Zealander. That is what we have said. [ 
Interruption 
] Just wait—we will tell members in due course. We will do that and it will be on the table for the public of New Zealand at the general election. Labour’s junior whip knows that the cool chill of electoral defeat is staring at him because when the public get to know the real choice—high taxes and a $7 billion surplus from the Government or tax cuts for every working New Zealander—frankly it will be a pretty easy choice to make. 
National has a plan. We will roll out these policies. We will do so in a systematic and staged way and just as with Orewa I and Orewa II it will turn the public mind because it will focus on the real issues. That is the contrast fundamentally. 
Labour certainly has the pious language. The Prime Minister’s speech today was absolutely full of it. But Labour does not know how to deliver. Its policies harm New Zealand. 
National will have a series of policies that deal with the serious and focused issues which will give us the real opportunity we need to catch up with Australia and make this country a wonderful place for New Zealanders to choose to stay in rather than have to make the choice for themselves and their children as to which country offers the better future. We ask people to give us the chance. We will show the way and we will have our country growing and catching up. If people vote for those guys in the Labour Party they will see a continual desertion of New Zealanders to Australia.