Tizard Judith: Budget Debate 
Tizard Judith: Budget Debate 
[Volume:608;Page:6003] 
Hon JUDITH TIZARD (Minister of Consumer Affairs) 
: 
 That speech was a leadership bid from a man who never gets to ask a question in this House let alone will ever have the opportunity to answer one as a Minister because he cannot even get a vote in his home town. He was beaten by Judy Keall and by Judy Keall’s secretary; next he will be beaten by Judy Keall’s housekeeper. That man could not fight his way to Australia let alone— 
Hon Roger Sowry 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I think it is quite wrong to refer to Mr Hughes as just a secretary and a housekeeper. All members are honourable members in this House— 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: That is not a point of order. 
Hon Roger Sowry 
: But I do not think that a member should bring another member into disrepute just because that person happens to have been a secretary. It is not a profession that many males do and I think the member should stand up for Mr Hughes rather than criticise him. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: That is not a point of order. 
Hon JUDITH TIZARD 
: That man who became apoplectic yesterday on the deep political importance of knitting in the House should not talk about denigrating people on the basis of their gender. 
It is truly pathetic to see that the National Party is not even able to put up a decent programme for government. We have National Party speakers saying we should spend more on immigration education and health. But what is the answer from the Opposition’s spokesperson on the economy? He says the unemployed should line up at post offices. 
Jill Pettis 
: But National closed them. 
Hon JUDITH TIZARD 
: It closed the post offices so that is a bit of a problem. 
It is a great pleasure to stand and speak in this Budget debate as part of the Labour-Progressive Government which is supported by United Future. This Government is working for economic growth and improvements in education so that we will have a successful and an innovative society. This Budget is about opportunity and security which are the keys to success in a society. It is about keeping New Zealand safe. It is about promoting and protecting our environment our culture and our heritage. This Budget celebrates and confirms 4 years of economic and social progress in New Zealand under a good Government that does listen to New Zealanders and does work in partnership with local government with businesses with iwi with the community and with the voluntary sector rather than sneering at and deriding them constantly. 
We have seen under this Labour-Progressive Government 4 years of prosperity of recovery of spirit and energy of enterprise and of innovation. There have been 4 years of planning and investment in the basics like health education housing jobs and exports and of building infrastructure—the physical infrastructure of roads railway services and public transport. There have been 4 years of innovation and investment in the human infrastructure in health in welfare in job training and apprenticeships and in education and training. There have also been 4 years of investment in the environment—in our physical environment in our sustainable cities in liveable urban environments where we focus on the needs of our young people in the needs in terms of housing for the future and in looking at issues like air and water emissions that cause sickness and death in this country. This is a good Budget and it is a result of the Government having talked about the issues and listened carefully to people’s views on what New Zealand is and hopes to be. 
This Government has kept its word. We have clearly said what we stand for and what our vision is as New Zealanders who are citizens in the world. We have had an important message for our people here at home and for the world: New Zealand has always stood for an inclusive tolerant and just society where everyone gets a fair go. When we look at this Budget we see more New Zealanders are in work than ever before. We see fewer people of working age as beneficiaries than we have seen for many many years. We see reduced costs for primary health-care more security for superannuation and more investment in secondary schools in primary schools in industry and in small businesses. We see more training with 5102 people having taken up Modern Apprenticeships. The apprenticeship system was destroyed by Roger Sowry and the pathetic little bunch now over there on the Opposition benches when Bill Birch and Ruth Richardson abolished it in the “mother of all Budgets”. We have seen strong stable Government with a responsible careful fiscal plan and a good Minister of Finance a great Prime Minister and a party of people who are determined not to get into the stupid vicious mean-minded personal carping of those people in the Opposition. 
I want to say on a very personal note that 10 years ago today I was diagnosed as having major invasive cancer. The public health system of this country—the cervical-screening programme—was the reason that that cancer was diagnosed. The service I received at Green Lane Hospital and at Wellington Hospital in follow-up visits over the following 5 years has been an extraordinary experience for me as it is for every New Zealander who has a serious illness. I am proud of our health workers just as I am proud of all those people in pre-schools primary schools kohanga reo kura and universities who are providing those basic services that all New Zealanders need. 
I say to members of the Opposition that I made a major and life-changing decision when after 3 years in this Parliament I became a patient with cancer. I made a decision that I would spend my energy positively. I do believe that this is the greatest country in the world and that it is an honour to inherit the vision passion kindness and the services that our ancestors believed we needed in a civilised society. I watched with great grief for 9 years while those people now on the Opposition benches—in the belief that if we cut back those services we could make people work harder—destroyed the underpinning of the New Zealand welfare State. For me the most important thing in this Budget is that this Government is making a commitment to New Zealand now and for the future because we are the beneficiaries of the investment in services in infrastructure and in the young people of this country. 
It is very very important to understand what makes a good society. It is my honour to be the MP for Auckland Central. I have worked very hard for Auckland all my life and I am proud to say that this Government is working in partnership with local government. We have produced the Auckland regional economic development strategy which is a fine strategy that looks at the combination of public services housing health education and job support that businesses and families need in order to build strong communities. I look at the astonishing progress that we have made with the provision of public transport. I look at the work that we have done to get “Spaghetti Junction” being developed and State Highway 18 being built and also to get the Puhinui interchange and the North Shore busway. It is very exciting to see the progress that we have made in Auckland. 
I will finish by talking about some work that I have done with a man called Richard Florida who came out to New Zealand for the Catching the Knowledge Wave conference where he said that the key fact of our age is that more of us than ever are doing creative work for a living. His basic argument was that access to talented and creative people is absolutely essential to modern businesses and that those creative people want to live in and are attracted to tolerant stimulating energetic cities where they can get a creative life across their lives—lives that lead to prosperity where highly skilled creative people cluster. All the policies of this Government in our growth and innovation work in our arts culture and heritage work and in our industry and trade work focus on that development of New Zealand as a creative tolerant inclusive place where people can work and live in the best possible way to the full extent of their ability. 
The role of creativity is a fundamental source of economic growth and every time that I hear those people from the Opposition sneering at what this Government is doing for music film small businesses industry growth and exports once again I think that they have failed to understand the absolute basics of prosperity of social cohesion and of this country’s heritage. It is our job to build a country that is tolerant and diverse and that is open to and encourages creativity. That is where we want to live and that is where people—we—can make prosperous businesses with greater numbers of better-paid jobs and with higher-value exports. That is also why our voice will be respected internationally whether it is on the matter of free trade trade agreements or the sort of society we and the rest of the world want to live in.