Rutherford Tom; Tuiono TeanauTOM RUTHERFORD (National—Bay of Plenty): Thank you very much Mr Speaker. It's really fantastic to be back in Parliament after our three-week recess. It would be remiss of me not to mention that unlike many others I made the most of my three-week recess period. Last week I asked my beautiful partner Hannah to spend the rest of her life with me to marry me and—[Applause] Oh clapping for the Budget from the other side; I love it!James Meager: What did she say?TOM RUTHERFORD: Well she said yes. I just thought I'd put that on the record. I'd been thinking about it for a little while. We got a taste of what parliamentary life was like and she was still committed to me after that. [Laughter] So I am really grateful—ha ha! We're not talking about the budget on the ring! But I am really appreciative to her. It's highly unlikely that she's watching but if she is: I'm looking forward to spending the rest of my life with you Hannah and thank you very much for saying yes.What also happened in that three-week recess period was the election at our Tauranga City Council. Fantastic for our local community and the wider Bay of Plenty area to have local democracy restored last weekend with Mahé Drysdale selected and elected as our new mayor along with nine other councillors—Rawiri Waititi: He doesn't even live there. TOM RUTHERFORD: —to make up our Tauranga City Council—oh yeah. Anyway we had a great election. It was great to see the community turned out. I enjoyed being at the meet the candidates debates and actually just sitting in the audience for a change as an undecided voter and deciding on who I wanted as my local ward councillor and then also as my mayor. So it was great to see local democracy restored in Tauranga.Budget 2024 is great news for the Bay of Plenty. The coalition's first Budget stops wasteful Government spending; invests in front-line services like healthcare schools and the police; and it delivers tax relief to help hard-working Kiwis in the Bay of Plenty with the cost of living.On 31 July this year next week New Zealanders will experience tax relief for the first time in 14 years. This relief—James Meager: Oh you were at school.TOM RUTHERFORD: I was at school. This relief is well overdue and will help hard-working Kiwis who have endured a prolonged cost of living crisis.Our tax relief package targets relief to low and middle income households. Families with young children are set to benefit the most. It gives average-income households up to $102 a fortnight plus FamilyBoost childcare payments of up to $150 per fortnight for eligible families. A single person earning $55000 a year will be better off by $51 a fortnight; a working couple both earning $150000 a year will be better off by around $80 a fortnight; a single adult working 40 hours on the minimum wage will be better off by about $25 per fortnight; and so on. Our tax package is funded through savings and new revenue measures meaning it will not add to Government debt.On the matter of health in the Budget one of the parts of the Budget—Helen White: They're going to have to pay for their prescriptions now; cuts into their tax cut doesn't it? TOM RUTHERFORD: —that I'm most excited about is the extension of breast screening. I'm getting heckled from the other side of the House around the additional funding we're putting towards breast screening. Budget 2024 provides over $24 million in operating funding and $7.19 million in capital funding over 10 years to extend the BreastScreen Aotearoa programme to include free mammograms for women up to the age of 74 which is fantastic news. The current screening age for the programme is women aged between 45 to 69. Breast cancer is the most common cancer among New Zealand women. Detecting more cancers early can result in better treatment outcomes and save lives. Expanding free screening to women aged up to 74 will mean about 120000 additional women will be eligible for screening every two years. On average women will be eligible for an additional two to three mammograms over their lifetimes as part of the free national breast-screening programme. This means the average number of free mammograms that New Zealand women will receive over their lifetimes will increase from about 13 to 16. The chief executive of the Breast Cancer Foundation said the extension to free breast screening is excellent news."Furthermore one of the other parts of the health budget was the announcement that we'll provide $24 million over four years to Gumboot Friday. This is welcome news for my constituency of the Bay of Plenty. Gumboot Friday provides young Kiwis who are aged between five and 25 with free mental health counselling services. As the youngest MP in the National Party I'm well aware of the issues that youth are most passionate about. One of the biggest issues facing young people is mental health concerns. Gumboot Friday provides an opportunity for support and early intervention while someone waits for a referral to other services. It provides young Kiwis who experience mild to moderate mental health issues access to free counselling services earlier. This funding will mean at least 15000 young people across New Zealand will have access to free mental health counselling services every year. When you visit the Gumboot Friday website you're able to put in your location and find a counsellor who can support you. I'm proud to be part of a Government who's committing to getting money out of Wellington and into grassroot organisations like Gumboot Friday.Another part of the Budget that I was really proud of was our announcement around fees-free. Our Government backs a sustainable tertiary education sector that supports and incentivises hard-working learners businesses and tertiary education providers. The first year fees-free policy was an expensive failure and it did not deliver its aim of more students going to tertiary education nor did it increase participation; in fact there were fewer fulltime-equivalents in tertiary education in 2023 than there were in 2017. We're changing the fees-free scheme from the first year to the last year of study which is a much better way to incentivise students to complete their studies. Eligibility for the scheme will start in January 2025 and will be based on similar settings to the previous scheme. It will include provider-based and work-based learners studying at level 3 and above on the New Zealand Qualifications Authority framework. Every education dollar must be applied to its maximum value. Our fees-free change will create a more effective policy which will produce savings of $877 million which will help deliver better education outcomes.Furthermore let's discuss law and order. The Budget also delivers on National's priorities of restoring law and order and delivering better public services. We are investing $651 million over four years to deliver an extra 500 police officers and provide them with the tools they need to do their jobs. Our coalition Government is serious about restoring law and order. That starts with having more police officers on the beat. The $191 million over four years to recruit 500 extra officers by 2025 is a priority in the National – New Zealand First coalition agreement and this funding boost will help us deliver on our commitment to restore law and order.In transport and infrastructure Budget 2024 includes an additional $1 billion for the New Zealand Transport Agency to accelerate the delivery of the roads of national significance and other transport projects. This includes State Highway 29 over the Kaimai Ranges and the Tākitimu North Link stage one and two both of which the Minister of Transport has announced as roads of national significance in the beautiful Bay of Plenty. We will deliver roads of national significance roads of regional significance and reliable and effective public transport in our main cities to get New Zealand back on track.One of the other things I'm really proud of is that we're spending over $1 billion to ensure that people with disabilities can access the essential services equipment and support they need. We're putting more money into Pharmac . We will deliver more teachers more support for teachers more classrooms funding for structured literacy the healthy schools lunch programme and charter schools through our $2.9 billion investment in education.I wanted to finish with a couple of quotes from some members of the public. Let's look at Business New Zealand. Business New Zealand said "Budget 2024 shows a responsible approach to spending in areas that have the potential to significantly improve New Zealand's economic growth." Hospitality New Zealand said "The Government has been clear in the lead up to Budget 2024 that it would focus on being fiscally responsible. We were not expecting a package specifically for hospitality but we welcome the moves to reduce tax keep communities safe and improve resilience and connectivity." I commend the bill to the House.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Teanau Tuiono): Members it's time for me to leave the Chair for the dinner break. The House will be resumed at 7.30.Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m."