Key John: Budget Debate 
Key John: Budget Debate 
[Volume:618;Page:13561] 
JOHN KEY (National—Helensville) 
: 
 That was the MP for Otaki—the translucent Mr Hughes. I can see through him the way the people of New Zealand can see through this Budget. What a load of rubbish this Budget is. The Government is going to spend $21 million promoting the Budget. It has spent years working on it. Hundreds of officials at Treasury and the Ministry of Economic Development have been working on the Budget and Darren Hughes got up and did not even want to talk about it Labour members know that it is such spoilt goods they wanted me to deliver a Budget. Well I have good news for Mr Hughes. A Budget will be coming from this side of the House in 2006 and it will be a Budget welcomed by more than one in five households. It will be a Budget welcomed by people who do not just vote for us. It will be a real Budget that will deliver economic growth to the people of New Zealand. 
This was the largest Budget surplus in New Zealand’s history—the greatest opportunity for any Minister of Finance to deliver a really ground-breaking solution for the people of New Zealand. He had at his fingertips the opportunity to deliver prosperity for the years ahead and what did we see? We saw a typical Labour Budget—no growth no opportunity and no hope. It was so bad that even Treasury as a result of the Budget stated in the documents that the growth rate for the next 10 years will be on average 1 percent lower than it has been in years earlier. This was the largest opportunity in history and the growth rate going forward will be 1 percent lower. 
This Budget was the opportunity to really invest in the infrastructure of New Zealand the opportunity to fix the roading crisis that pervades our cities the opportunity to restore the welfare crisis in our society and the opportunity to go out there and fix the energy sector which we know is creaking and about to fall over. This was an opportunity to do some real things for New Zealand so that we can have relative living standards that are equal with Australia or maybe better than in Australia and that are up there with world-class OECD economies. And what did we really see? The most cynical vote-buying Budget. And even then the Government has got it wrong. Labour members are embarrassed by the news that they have delivered to working families an effective marginal tax rate that in some cases is 90c in the $1. That is right. Mr Hughes is shaking his head in absolute amazement. The average working family—the poor old working family—will be giving back 90c of every $1 earned. To make it even worse if the wage earner has a student loan the family will be giving back 101.2 percent. The family will lose more money than it receives. 
This Budget has some of the most bizarre results ever delivered in New Zealand’s history. Consider this for just a moment. A family earning $38000 with three children will after this Budget have a take-home pay of about $48000. In other words the family will get more money than it has earned in gross terms. But if the family next door earns $70000—nearly double—and has three children and an average student loan its take-home pay will be less than that of its neighbours who are earning $38000. The Minister of Finance had the audacity to come down to the House and tell us that the No. 1 aim of this Budget was to make work pay. I would like the Minister of Finance to explain that to us. 
 This was a Budget that had incredible design faults. Those design faults have even shocked the Minister of Social Development and Employment the Minister of Finance and the Prime Minister. They were all caught on the hop when they were interviewed. Each one of them had answers that were more pathetic than the ones before. When I was on  
Morning Report 
 with Steve Maharey a question was put to him about effective marginal tax rates for a family earning $38000 with two children compared with a family earning $60000 with two children or for a family earning $38000 with three children compared with a family earning $70000 with three children. What was the response from Steve Maharey on  
Morning Report 
? 
Judith Collins 
: So what?