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There are two things that in the short time I have I want to focus on. No. 1 I want to focus on this half-baked Treaty clause. Mark my words that Treaty clause will be invoked in the most unthinkable ways as we sit here as parliamentarians today. I predict that in time to come when the majority owner of these State-owned enterprises is called to make a decision—and there will have to be a commercial decision—as to whether or not an asset requiring substantial consensus amongst the owners ought to be further alienated or to make an additional call on capital some Maori some iwi some hapu or some group will invoke the Treaty clause. When Geoffrey Palmer originally put the Treaty clause in there minds such as Richard Prebble and others were prepared to tolerate it because they saw it as an innocuous harmless piece of filigree. Well I have learnt in my short time both in politics and in Maori life that once you bring the Treaty into areas where hitherto it has not really been—and it really has not been a half-caste Treaty. This Treaty has been for the partners of the Treaty but at the moment it is almost like a half-caste Treaty and that is why that reference will not actually deliver what the Maori Party is on about.  
But that is actually an irrelevancy because what the Maori Party has been told is that it should have openly repudiated and opposed this sales process. Quietly it has encouraged those of our iwi—and unfortunately the iwi leaders are sovereign masters or mistresses over their own money and they will spend it how they like. The Maori Party has been saying to them “We can’t stop the bill and there’s an opportunity for you to buy.” A person who is not in this House but possibly will be reported to by members in the gallery is Dennis Barnes. Recently this individual the chief executive officer of Contact Energy stated really what is going to happen. What is going to happen at the moment is that within the energy sector you cannot get a decent level of return. The Crown can get a decent level of return but private investors unless they buy the energy assets at a very cheap rate—and there is no point selling them unless you are going to maximise your sale price and that is why you have had to defang the Treaty and leave it there as a tekoteko. Mr Dennis Barnes has said in respect of the only way you are going to get a decent return that he would not go with a $300 million proposal to his eight-person board—this is what he said to the Contact Energy board and he said it to the energy meeting—because you cannot get a decent return.  
The only way you can get a decent return is by generating profits. The only way you are going to be able to generate profits in the face of this slack economy which in many respects is a consequence of poor Government policy is to ratchet up prices. The only way you can get a reasonable and improved return is to ratchet up prices. So where are those prices going to come from? They are going to come from industry at a time when we are concerned about the fact that it is only 33 percent—the stubborn statistic—of our GDP that remains in the tradable sector. That sector is going to face greater costs. Communities and companies are all going to face greater costs. One consequence of this particular policy is that power prices are going one way.  
There is a great deal that has been said that this is absolutely necessary in order to meet the fiscal costs of the Government’s capital upgrade programme. I have taken the time and I may be one of the few people outside of people who study Treasury documents who had a look at the infrastructure plan. What I can make of it is that the sum of at least $50 billion is being sought after. Despite what Mr Ryall and others may say our current level of Crown debt is not of a Grecian variety. It was passed on by us in a very fit state to the current Government. It has grown and I will accept some points the Government has been making: the Christchurch earthquake and dealing with the turn-down in the economy. But let us not forget that there is ample scope for long-term capital assets to be funded from long-term bond issues and long-term borrowing not sold for short-term consumption. At one level we are being told that the assets have to be sold and that the funds are going to be put back into irrigation and schools; in another way we are being told it will improve and deepen the capital markets; and in another way we are being told that at the pith of this idea is ideology. That is what distinguishes us on this issue. The ideological conception that we have is different on this side from that on the other side.