Brash Don: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers Questions to Members 
Brash Don: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers Questions to Members 
[Volume:608;Page:5300] 
6.  
Dr DON BRASH (NZ National) 
 to the  
Minister of Finance 
: How do this Government’s regulations in labour health and safety and resource management contribute to its goal of taking New Zealand to the top half of the OECD in terms of per capita income? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Minister of Finance) 
: 
 All the countries above us in the OECD rankings regulate those areas and the great majority of them regulate them more tightly than we do. We do not improve our sustainable growth rate by failing to protect our workers and the environment. 
Dr Don Brash 
: Is the Minister concerned that the chairman of Telecom which is New Zealand’s largest public company blames increasingly pervasive Government regulation for cutting the company’s annual capital investment in New Zealand by half a billion dollars or that Carter Holt Harvey which is New Zealand’s second-largest public company also blames Government regulation for threatening its future investment in New Zealand? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: In the case of the former company I note that other telecommunications companies have made extremely large investments and I know that some are considering some very large investments within the current environment. Telecom appears to be following a different strategy. 
David Cunliffe 
: How does robust health and safety legislation assist the economy and those who work in it? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: Workplace accidents are a cost on the economy and we have one of the worst records in the developed world in that respect. This Government believes that workers are entitled to be safe at work. 
Sue Bradford 
: Is the Minister concerned that despite positive regulatory changes figures released today show that price rises in New Zealand exceed gains in wages and that New Zealand workers now earn 25 percent less than their Australian counterparts and how is that helping New Zealand to move into the top half of the OECD? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: New Zealand household incomes have been rising strongly over the last 2 or 3 years. Wage growth has been modest and non-inflationary and that will probably contribute to New Zealand’s economic growth rather than the reverse. 
Gordon Copeland 
: Will the Government continue to streamline resource access and approval processes in the interests of growing New Zealand’s per capita income whenever and wherever constraints are identified? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: The Resource Management Act and its operations are kept under continuous review. The Minister for the Environment is continuing to work on further proposed changes to streamline processes but she will do so in the light of achieving sustainable development outcomes. 
Dr Don Brash 
: When the negative impact on economic growth of rising Government intervention is increasingly visible why does the Minister continue to ignore expert OECD and International Monetary Fund advice to remove damaging regulatory barriers to growth and continue to refuse to “continue on the path of market-based reforms to accelerate growth”? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: We do not take everything the International Monetary Fund and the OECD tell us. For example they support reducing benefits increasing the age for the pension and introducing capital gains taxes on housing. The member is on record as supporting all those measures; the Government opposes them all. 
Rod Donald 
: Can the Minister confirm that a 2001 OECD report on red tape identified New Zealand as having the lowest aggregate annual compliance costs for small and medium-sized enterprises out of the 11 OECD countries surveyed and that the same report showed those costs being significantly lower than those faced in Australia? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: That is correct. It is also correct that our total taxation burden on the corporate sector is low by the standard of developed countries and our tax revenue as a proportion of GDP at 30 percent is well below the OECD average.