Hayes John: Supplementary Estimates — Imprest Supply Debate 
Hayes John: Supplementary Estimates — Imprest Supply Debate 
[Volume:655;Page:4534] 
JOHN HAYES (National—Wairarapa) 
: 
 I have listened to Parliament for some time this afternoon and it strikes me that any fool can criticise and many have been doing so this afternoon. I stand to congratulate John Key and Bill English on a wonderful Budget which is full of common sense and leadership and makes the choices that have to be made. Contrary to comments made in the House this afternoon by luminaries like Ruth Dyson a perfect example demonstrating that “critics are the stupid who discuss the wise” I have to say that the Opposition has come up with nothing that should concern our electorate. It is carping criticism for the sake of it. 
I want to report to the House that the people of the Wairarapa in my electorate stretching from Ngawi in the south to Waipawa in the north are absolutely delighted with this Budget. They keep stopping me in the street and they say they are really supportive. They say that John Key is doing a great job and Bill English is doing a great job. They are really proud of the Government— 
Hon Phil Heatley 
: And Phil Heatley! 
JOHN HAYES 
: They say: “Thank goodness we moved the people on who tried to send us to the cleaners.” Yes they like Phil Heatley because he is about to announce more honorary fishing officers to come to the Wairarapa coast. So even the people in my electorate are very supportive of the Minister of Fisheries and good on him! They are highly supportive of this Government. They can see that John Key and Bill English have moved to cushion our community from the sharp edges of this recession. Those people see that new core Crown spending of $2.9 million on projects like improving Muldoon’s Corner and upgrading the Kuripuni school in my electorate combined with the tax cuts will keep supporting this economy and will keep this country ticking over. Contrary to comments made by the previous speaker and the one before I can confirm that superannuation has been preserved at 66 percent of the average wage and all this carry-on from the Opposition about cuts being made to superannuation is simply not true. 
We have also maintained benefits for the students and Working for Families. We have improved public services by putting $3 billion extra into the health sector over the next 3 years. We have put $1.68 billion into the education sector and yes some cake-decorating courses are being cancelled. We have put 600 new police into the community. We are strengthening the economy for the future so that businesses can thrive. I can report to the House that for example JNL Juken Nissho Ltd operating in Masterton went from— 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member but the time has come for me to leave the Chair. 
Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m. 
JOHN HAYES 
: I will just recap a little. Earlier on I made the point that I had been sitting through the debate in the House this afternoon; I have to say that any fool can criticise and this afternoon many have been doing so. On top of that because a lot of fear and misinformation was being promulgated by the Opposition I will point out and really make it clear that the Government moved very specifically to guarantee superannuation at 66 percent of the average wage. The Government also went out of its way to maintain benefits to students and to those on Work and Income benefits. It also made a commitment to improve public services and agreed in the Budget to spend a further $3 billion on health and $1.68 billion on increased education expenditure. And my colleague the Minister of Police has found the money to provide an additional 600 police. 
I feel that the Government has moved very strongly to strengthen this country’s economic future and we support that. People in my electorate are saying they are very very supportive of the Key-English direction of this economy. In my electorate we are beginning to see improvements. One of our biggest companies Juken Nissho Ltd which processes logs went from three shifts to one shift but it has now just gone back to two shifts. If we look at other entities in the Wairarapa like the Taratahi Agricultural Training Centre which employs 700 full-time equivalent students and which has a total budget of $25 million annually we see that these sorts of institutions are making huge fundamental differences in driving our economy forward. We need to grow the educational capacity of our young people if we are to move this country and this economy forward. 
There are two areas though where I am a little bit concerned. Although the Government is going through Government agencies line by line and is making sure that the taxpayer money it is spending is being spent wisely and necessarily I do not see the same happening in the five local bodies in my electorate. I am very concerned that some local bodies under their long-term plans feel that the Government can move through tax cuts to put more money into people’s pockets and keep benefits flowing but those bodies then seem to think they can vacuum up that surplus. For example the South Wairarapa District Council is planning to raise rates by 20 percent next year and the Masterton District Council is going to raise its rates by 30 percent over the next 3 years and rates are due to rise in Waipukurau by 16 percent and Waipawa by 10 percent. These sorts of rate rises are unacceptable to the people in my community and in the context of our present economic environment and in the direction this country is trying to go under John Key’s leadership I think these rate rises really have to be addressed by our communities. 
As well the South Wairarapa District Council has 29 councillors servicing a community of 40000 people. We can traverse then to Mr Hide’s moves on the Auckland super-city where there will be 20 councillors dealing with 1.4 million people. Something is out of whack. I am finding that our communities want change my constituents want change but the obstacles to change very often are the councillors who do not wish to vote for an early Christmas; I think that that is highly unfortunate. We must as communities take charge of our circumstances in our communities and drive efficiencies in a way we have previously not moved. 
So I call on my communities to rise up against these rate rises and to force common sense on our local bodies. We have seen that the Government led by Michael Cullen and his colleague “Put-it-on-the-bill-Phil” left a series of black holes for the following Government—us—to fall into. We saw it in accident compensation expenditure where there was a black hole of between $1.5 billion to $2 billion. But I was astonished last night to discover that in South Auckland we have thousands—I am told—of young Pacific Island children who are not in our schools and not getting access to health care because their parents are too afraid of being caught out as being overstayers. This is the problem that that previous Labour Government has left to us; it did not address this sort of problem. Just as that Government did with accident compensation it has dropped us in a hole. Well we must address these problems. We cannot let this country go on in the shambolic way our Labour colleagues drove it over the last long 9 years. For those reasons I am very supportive of the direction this Government is taking. 
We are seeing that the global shocks are now abating we are seeing firms that cannot continue to cut their stock levels we are seeing investor panic receding and we are seeing householders rehabilitate their balance sheets. Our Government’s activism is helping this country to recover more quickly and we are seeing markets in China and Brazil rebounding. We still have tough challenges to address in this country but John Key’s Government is up to it. Thank you.