English Bill: Debate on Prime Minister’s StatementText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeEnglish Bill: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement[Sitting date: 28 January 2014. Volume:696;Page:15550. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): Can I start by acknowledging two of my colleagues. Sam Lotu-Iiga just the third Pacific member of Parliament to become a Government Minister is a man of real capacity who will benefit not just his community but New Zealand. I also acknowledge Jo Hayes whom the Labour Party members may not know well but they should understand that she was the person who helped us win the party vote in Dunedin South with an excellent campaign on the ground in heartland Labour territory increasing the National Party vote by thousands and she is a welcome addition to the caucus—Hon Christopher Finlayson: Even with Clare Curran as her opponent.Hon BILL ENGLISH: Even with Clare Curran as her opponent. Can I also acknowledge the leadership of the Prime Minister. I think in his address today he demonstrated again that his leadership of New Zealand through these last 5 or 6 years has been critical to lifting New Zealanders’ sense of confidence and aspiration their greater sense of self-reliance and resilience which has seen this country come through very difficult economic times in about as good a shape as it possibly could and he has helped lay a platform for this country and its families to enjoy the benefits of one of the better-growing economies in the developed world.What a sharp contrast with the Leader of the Opposition.Hon Member: Who?Hon BILL ENGLISH: Well nothing has really changed in 12 months with Labour. Twelve months ago it had an unpopular leader who was going nowhere and Grant Robertson was undermining him and the same thing is going on now. Quite apart from the huge difference in their speeches the Prime Minister enjoys the support of his caucus. The Labour caucus is not enjoying David Cunliffe and that shows up in its support.You see what we heard was a speech about the kind of country and Government that Labour and David Cunliffe wish they were campaigning in. They wish income inequality was growing but it is not. It is not growing. The facts are clear: the poor are not falling behind the middle class is not flat-lining real incomes are growing the most vulnerable have been protected and income inequality is stable to slightly improving. But on “Planet Cunliffe” something quite different is happening or he wishes it was happening. He wishes he was campaigning against a Government that was hostile to the most vulnerable but of course it is not. We borrowed billions of dollars to protect the most vulnerable through a recession. He wishes there was no innovation in the economy but in fact we are seeing a blossoming of New Zealand’s IT and manufacturing sectors public floats international deals—you name it. He wishes there was a manufacturing crisis—what happened to that inquiry—but there is not. In fact because those members declared a crisis manufacturing started doing well. He wishes the regions were weak but actually the data shows very clearly that the regions are doing better than the metropolitan areas—again because Labour declared that they were doing poorly. He wishes that public confidence was on its knees but it is not. More New Zealanders believe more positively in the aspirational future of this country than at any other time I can remember in 25 years of public life and they know that it has got a solid basis.But on “Planet Cunliffe” there is no confidence. People are fearful. People have no hope. And you can hear it can you not? He stood in front of the mirror and said that lineand enjoyed it. But it is just not true; that is all. It sounds really good; it is just not true. He wishes that all those people who have traditionally supported the Labour Party in the social service sector—iwi churches—and he wishes that teachers were marching in the street. And what did they do last week? They applauded the Government’s education policy in a way that I cannot recall for a National Government in a long time in this Parliament. Those people who used to feed the Labour Party cases of Public Service breakdown are working every day with this Government and its agencies to improve our communities to make our communities safer to lift the achievement of those who have underachieved to reduce the reoffending rates of our prisoners and to reduce welfare dependency because the policies of this Government in those areas are meritorious they are thoughtful they are progressive and they are working.So again on “Planet Cunliffe” all those people would be supporting the Labour Party. In fact they might go and vote for it in the booth if Labour can achieve its brilliant new strategy which is to get Labour voters to vote Labour. That is the strategy: get Labour voters to vote Labour. Well I can tell those members that we are doing a better job of getting Labour voters to vote National and that is why we can go into this election year with some confidence.I used to think it was “Planet Labour” but increasingly I think it is “Planet Cunliffe”. I think there are two planets now actually. There is “Planet Labour” which is still sitting there pining for the return of Helen Clark and Michael Cullen—leaders whom those members took seriously and the country did for a while too—and then there is “Planet Cunliffe” which is a noble and lonely place to be. There is no doubt about that. It is a noble and lonely place.It is the “Bad Start” policy that has highlighted that gap enormously—the announcements in the last week or so. David Cunliffe’s policy around payments to families is based on the idea that he can save $1.5 billion by not pursuing promises he made that would cost $1.5 billion. At least the Greens went to the trouble of running their money through the photocopier. On “Planet Cunliffe” you just imagine it. It is like going into the shop and saying: “It’s a bargain. I saved money because it was going to be $200 for the running shoes but they are on sale at $100. I’ve saved $100 so I can go and spend it on something else.” The $1.5 billion does not exist in the Government forecasts so it is not available for saving and the media and David Cunliffe and the Labour Party have figured that out only today.The other thing that those members have said today is that in order to enforce international tax obligations on companies like Facebook they might ban them from New Zealand. They might ban Facebook from New Zealand. Well we know that that works. We know that that works because they have done it in North Korea and it has worked there. [Interruption] Well there is no income so they pay no tax. That is how they do it: get rid of the income and then they get rid of the tax problem.The Labour Party is dealing with the New Zealand public who are suspicious of any cash splash as we have seen in the last few days but it is too lazy to deal with the problems that are actually about our most vulnerable: getting immunisation rates up protecting children from violence and lifting educational achievement. The Government will continue to advance its Business Growth Agenda this year. It will continue to advance its prudent fiscal management. It will continue to advance a programme of microeconomic reform to support jobs and incomes. Jobs will come faster and incomes will grow faster under an ongoing National Government. Our process of considered and consistent change working closely with the community and the business community is starting to yield real benefits. Communicating openly and being accountable for those policies has built real confidence that the National Government has its finger on the pulse of what is required the political will to do whatis required and the leadership to take the public along with it. That is why we can face this motion of confidence in Parliament with some real confidence.