Coleman Jonathan: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
Coleman Jonathan: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:632;Page:4301] 
Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (National—Northcote) 
: 
 We are talking about the estimates of appropriations but quite frankly when it comes to health we might as well be talking about the estimates of misappropriations. This debate goes right to the heart of what is wrong with health under this Labour Government. The Government is now spending $10.5 billion a year on health. That is a 66 percent increase on what it was spending when it came to office. As everyone knows and as the Labour members know health is actually not improving in New Zealand. Those members have nothing to say about that. The marginal member for Otaki Darren Hughes was saying that this was a debate. Well why do Labour members not get up take a call and actually debate some of these issues? Why do they not get up put their money where their mouths are and tell us what they will do? 
Frankly health has been an abysmal failure under Labour. The reality is that the more the Government spends on health the worse it gets. For 6 years we had a Minister of Health who was a dental nurse. Now we are counting the problems in oral health. We all know that oral health is a problem in New Zealand. It has been going on for 6 years and what is the Government doing? It is commissioning a report. It will have another committee it will have a hui but it will not have any answers. Goodness knows what we will have after 3 years of having a vet as Minister of Health. We may be counting the number of successful dog microchippings—it will be just as relevant to the health of New Zealanders as what we have had so far. 
We can conclude that the more money Labour throws at the health problem the worse it gets. Labour members are averting their eyes—they do not have the answer. They know that health is a minefield; it is a disgrace. The Minister of Health is a joke. He is an embarrassment to the Prime Minister he is an embarrassment to the front bench and he is not even here to take a call today. It will be very very interesting to see what happens when the Associate Minister gets up and tries to justify the $10.5 billion of expenditure. We know that the system is in crisis. We know that one has to be sicker than ever to get an operation in New Zealand. One cannot fool the listeners at home. They know that that is absolutely correct. They would be absolutely appalled to know that one dollar in every five of Government expenditure is going into health yet the kids are getting fatter people are getting sicker parents cannot get operations— 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: What would you do? 
Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN 
: The member for Waimakariri asks a very good question. I will tell him. The one line that should be in these estimates of misappropriations is the big line called bureaucracy. I can tell the member that under this Government we now have 12000 bureaucrats and 12000 hospital beds. That is one bed for every bureaucrat. We have had an increase of 2000 bureaucrats in health alone under this Government. I say to the listeners at home that Government members are not saying anything now because they know it is true. They know that since this Government came to power 17 football fields are now needed to accommodate all the bureaucrats in Wellington in terms of office space. 
Darren Hughes 
: Ha ha! 
Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN 
: That is a joke. It is a disgrace. Darren does not have an answer to that—he knows it is true. We have fewer general practitioners fewer people having operations— 
Darren Hughes 
: Rubbish! 
Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN 
: It is true. We have more bureaucracy. Labour thought health was in a safe pair of hands but it has turned out to be the nightmare portfolio. Who on that front bench would want to have that portfolio now? The answer is no one. The fact is that health under Labour is in the cart Mr Hodgson is in palliative care and the people of New Zealand are waiting for a change of Government so we can start to get the services that the people of New Zealand deserve. They are not getting those services under Labour. 
Last week we had the roll-out of primary care. What a dismal failure that will be. Three million dollars will go to the poorest people in New Zealand and $60 million will go to people who can already afford to go to the doctor. How is that targeting need? The reality is that Labour is letting down the people who voted for it—the poorest people in New Zealand who have the highest health needs. The message is actually getting through because those Labour voters know that this Government does not represent their interests. 
This Government is more concerned with irrelevant fringe social issues rather than with strengthening health strengthening education and strengthening the economy. That will come back and bite it in 2008 if not earlier. Government members are not saying anything now because they know it is true. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Minister for Building Issues) 
: 
 It is too difficult to resist having a crack at that member who is allegedly a general practitioner. When we asked that member what his policy for health would be all he talked about was bureaucrats. Has he forgotten the Health Funding Authority? Has he forgotten that when something went wrong in the health system before we had district health boards we had bureaucrats? But no one would take any responsibility when things went wrong under the Health Funding Authority that Dr Jonathan Coleman’s crew in National set up and that he as a general practitioner milked and got his income off. Now at least we have district health boards with accountable people. If communities do not like what the health boards have done they can get rid of them—they are accountable. That member as a general practitioner milked the system under the Health Funding Authority all right and National created the bureaucrats in the system—a huge monolith of bureaucrats. 
But here is the deal: Dr Coleman said we should get rid of the bureaucrats but what does that mean? I will just talk about that. Here is an economic fact: the health sector requires money. Where do Governments get money from? They get money from taxation revenue. Is that not right? That member—a general practitioner—was elected on the basis of National’s policy of a $7 billion tax cut. I will explain to him what happens when revenue is reduced. The money has to be found from somewhere. When a $7 billion tax cut is given—[ 
Interruption 
] The member did not do very well when he was on his feet; he is doing even less well now that he is squawking like a headless chook over there. Half of the $7 billion tax cut was to have been based on borrowing. Where would the other half have come from? The other half would have come from cuts in expenditure like that on health or from asset sales. One could not sell enough assets to cover what National wanted to do. 
I ask Dr Coleman to tell the truth. I ask him to get up again take another call and explain to the people he hoodwinked in the electorate he won that if he had his backside on the Government side of the Chamber he would cut health expenditure in order to give away a $7 billion tax cut and then he would borrow the other half of the money needed for the tax cut. That does not mean getting rid of bureaucrats. If he got rid of every so-called bureaucrat and administrator in our health system he still could not pay for the tax cuts that he wants to give people. What would Dr Coleman do? He would get rid of nurses cut services and put cash registers back into the hospitals as National did in the 1990s—and that genius over there was a general practitioner in the 1990s. I ask him to go back and think about the legacy that the National Government put through. I ask him to look at the health figures that that Government left—at the cash registers in the hospitals. Under that Government people were not bumped off a waiting list; they were bumped off permanently because they could not get into a hospital. 
I challenge Dr Coleman to say whether he would get rid of the primary health organisations and the Public Health Care Strategy. There is silence. He is lost for words and so is that other thing over there beside him. Would Dr Coleman get rid of the primary health organisation system? Would he get rid of the district health boards? We do not hear anything now. The reason is that this is not an election year. In election year the only thing he came out with of course was a $7 billion bribe. I say to that member that he has no credibility. He may be a general practitioner—he may be a witch doctor for all I know—but he has no understanding of economics. What is even worse is that he stands up in this Chamber and thinks everybody who listens to him is an idiot who does not see through that. Well I say people are not idiots. 
Darren Hughes 
: He is arrogant. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: He is arrogant—absolutely arrogant. 
Would National get rid of the primary health organisations? Would it do away with the free doctors’ visits for under-sixes? No Dr Coleman will not say what National would do away with. He will not tell us how he would fund his health proposals because he does not have any health proposals. That member over there has shown himself for what he is. He is a political fraud—an absolute political charlatan. He is a naive new member who is up himself to the point where he goes out and tells people whatever they want to hear. I say to Dr Coleman that if he were in Government Rangiora Hospital would be gone by lunchtime. If he were in Parliament on the Government side of the Chamber Canterbury District Health Board would have its budget slashed under him. Why would that happen? Because we know he could not pay for tax cuts without doing that. We know—as John Key said—that National would borrow half of the $7 billion needed in order to give a tax cut. [ 
Interruption 
] The member says that is right. That is the first truthful thing he has said in this contribution. John Key said that. I wonder whether the folks who are listening to this debate—the elderly who would have been turfed out of rest homes or the people who would not have had cheaper prescriptions—heard that. 
We know that when we got into Government many people could not access the public health system and if some of them had been able to access their doctor and their specialist for treatment of their injuries they would not have needed to be put on a waiting list. If they had minor injuries those could have been stitched and fixed up and they would have gone away back to their normal quality of life. This Government has put a heap of money in the pot in order to clear the existing waiting lists out—and we are doing that. Also for anyone with a minor injury or illness surely it makes sense to do what we are doing: providing those people with the drugs they need and getting them in a measured and cheap way to their specialists and their primary health care providers so they can be fixed up and stitched up without needing to be put on a waiting list—because by God they are healthy. That is our policy. 
We did not hear anything from members on the Opposition side of the Chamber except for a lot of voodoo economics. The National members are running like mad from their tax cut bribe.