Cosgrove Clayton: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Cosgrove Clayton: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:623;Page:18791] 
2.  
CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
 to the  
Minister of Finance 
: What recent reports has he received on business confidence? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Minister of Finance) 
: 
 The latest National Bank business confidence survey showed a net 31 percent of businesses are confident of their own firm’s prospects over the next 12 months; employment and investment intentions are running above average which suggests to the bank’s chief economist that GDP growth will exceed 0.7 to 0.8 percent in the current quarter and in the last quarter of last year. 
Clayton Cosgrove 
: Has he received any further reports on sentiment in the business sector? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: Yes the most recent  
Dominion Post  
survey of business opinion in the Greater Wellington area shows 67 percent of those surveyed were either satisfied or very satisfied with the Government’s economic management. I have also heard the retail sector is anticipating a boom in pyjama purchases from loyal members of the National Party. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The last sentence was irrelevant to the answer. 
Dr Don Brash 
: Given that the Minister has provided us with a good summary of what the private sector has done to generate economic growth perhaps he would like to have a stab at what the Government has contributed other than higher taxes more regulation more bureaucracy and lower-quality public services? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: I will try to take a few of those points. The number of surgical procedures carried out has significantly increased under this Government; the Government of course is now under some attack for excessively increasing participation rates in tertiary education; and the Government has massively increased the investment in roading and in public transport. There have been a number of major announcements in relation to electricity generation over the last year a significant proportion of those—nearly all in fact—coming from public sector organisations and from the State-owned enterprises; and of course we are trying to upgrade the transmission system but that member’s mates south of Auckland are trying to stop it happening. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: If business is so confident about its future and the country’s future how come we have a massive balance of payments crisis looming in this country the highest interest rates in the OECD energy and fuel prices rocketing out of all proportion and a massively inflated dollar; and what does the Government think about that? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: Taking the last point the primary cause of the high New Zealand dollar is the low US dollar caused by the massive double deficits in the US. The United States Government has been following National Party policy: cut taxes but do not cut expenditure and hope that somehow or other it all pays for itself. 
Sue Bradford 
: If business confidence is so good will the Minister heed the call from the president of the Labour Party to support the unions’ 5 percent wage rise campaign? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: Wage negotiations are a matter between employers and their employees or the trade unions representing those employees. We are not going to interfere in that matter as I think the National Party did not interfere between 1990 and 1999.