Mahuta NanaiaHon NANAIA MAHUTA (Labour—Hauraki-Waikato): Having listened to that member Todd Barclay you could be forgiven for thinking you were at kindergarten listening to show-and-tell. That person had the biggest the brightest the shiniest thing you have ever seen and it is Budget 2017. The fact of the matter is that the budgets that we should be talking about are the budgets of everyday New Zealanders people who are struggling to make ends meet and are listening to this debate and saying: This is so far disconnected from my reality. How is this really helping me at home?".Think about those on fixed incomes. Where will their extra $5.13 a week go? Probably actually on bills. It is not discretionary income. It is not the kind of extra added bit on top to afford that little bit extra or something different. Actually it is going on maintaining the status quo and that is the reality of people who are managing budgets on a day-to-day basis being responsible and struggling to make ends meet because the cost of living is increasing. It is just getting overall much harder.Yes Labour did vote against the Budget which delivers tax cuts to those earning more. They get more—very simple. But those who are on lower incomes fixed incomes working a couple of jobs are getting less. It is simple arithmetic. Why would we accept that? And sure you could have the argument that you get something now and a little bit is something but when it is going on maintaining the status quo not even helping people to get ahead that indicates that the Budget creates a further structural inequality that we just cannot accept and will not accept—we cannot accept and will not accept. That is an important difference for anyone listening to the Budget debate about Labour's position—a hard decision. Labour is the only party that voted against the Budget that has delivered something. But that was because we believed that that "something" was simply not enough—simply not enough.I have heard the debate in the House today and it boils down to a number of simple things. Families are struggling and that has created a number of challenges. But if we look to some of those things that are creating pressure in our communities we cannot ignore the issue of housing. Whether it is homelessness the insufficient provision of State houses the inability to get the priority ranking to go into those State houses or private rental markets driving up the affordability for people looking even within their own home town for a rental—these are the types of pressures that people are feeling on a day-to-day basis.Take a young woman whom I spoke to just yesterday. Her husband is working—fantastic. She is so proud. He has been given a job albeit under the 90-day situation. They are fluctuating hours—anything from 30 hours in a week to 80 hours in a week. They have one child who is 5 and is going to school. She is very proud about that. She is proud about her husband working to support her and her child. The thing is there is no housing availability where she lives so she went into Work and Income to see whether she could get assessed to be in a Housing New Zealand house. But because they have a fluctuating income they have insecure work—no they are not eligible. She rings me desperate: "Can you help?". Well we will try to help but here is the reality for her. Housing New Zealand is under pressure and overloaded in the system the private rental market is actually ratcheting up the cost for people who are struggling and it is very difficult for them to get in so that extra accommodation supplement will be sucked out by landlords and the rental market in itself in many small communities is actually insufficient to deal with the growing demand. These are the realities that people are working with.Take another girl who came into my office. She is looking after two of her children and a kaumātua. From week to week she is grateful for the support that she gets from Work and Income to be able to be in a hotel because it is better than being in a car. But every week when she has to go and renew that amount from Work and Income she has to pack up all her gear go into the office get the approval and then go back to the hotel which hopefully has not let the room—with a kaumātua. Now that just simply cannot be right can it? Is this the kind of Budget that delivers to the most vulnerable? Is it? Is this the kind of Budget whereby we can be in this House and claim that it is the biggest the brightest the shiniest thing going and it is helping the most vulnerable? I do not think we can.So we need to be responsible in terms of the way in which we ensure that the structural inequalities of a system do not put those who are at the top of the tree further up the tree and those who are down at the bottom right into the ground. That type of structural inequality is the reason why I came to Parliament. I do not think it is good enough and I think we need to re-prioritise where the emphasis of a Budget should go.And this is a hard debate. It is not an ideological debate now. We are at a tipping point in New Zealand where crisis exists in the mental health system. We cannot ignore it. Young people are not supported in the community unless they present with acute mental health symptoms and then if they do and pass the test they go into an acute service and are medicated. Actually what they would have needed probably is respite care and a specialist adolescent service to be able to help them. The system is broken. It is not getting fixed by the biggest brightest shiniest Budget that is being promoted today. It cannot be the case.I went to the A & E department at Waikato Hospital. It just so happened it was the day when the crisis team was called. A woman fainted in the aisle and everybody came out and tried to help her. Within a period of about an hour you had at least 50 people going through A & E. Many of them were sent from their GP service to go into the hospital service. What is that indicating? The system is broken. So there is structural damage being done to our society in the way in which Budget priorities are being set and if we do not do something about it this is only ever ever ever going to get worse. Should we tolerate that? No. Should we try to do something about it and have a constructive discussion in this House about the way in which Budget priorities are set—that it is actually OK for those who are earning a lot not to be given a tax cut—so that we can reorient the priorities into the areas that are going to give the most benefit to those who need it?I wish that we were speaking on a Budget where we were talking about building more State houses to relieve pressure on the system beyond Auckland out into the provinces out to where I know that many of our communities are looking to the types of regional economic development opportunities that keep people in their community and keep their young people in their community.I wish we were talking about a Budget that ensured that when we invest in education we are investing in the operational grants that really help the core of what makes the system work so that parents are not stressing out about having to fund-raise for some of the core things that schools need to have to keep a good education system and learning environment thriving.I wish we were talking about a Budget that ensured that those children aged between 16 and 24 who are classified as not in education employment or training are able to be supported into positive pathways. The simple fact of the matter is there are far too many—around about 30 percent in our region—in that category and if they continue to not optimise their full potential through any pathway they are headed for the "big house" where there is a significant investment by this Government in Te Awamutu and I do not want that to happen.I wish that we were talking about the kind of Budget that simply restored equity and that restored the kind of equity that meant it was OK actually for those at the top of the tree to kind of come down a bit so that those on the ground in the dirt can lift their sights higher. We restore the balance. That is the type of society I want to see. That is the type of show-and-tell that I think is a useful one to have in this House. It is not about the biggest the brightest the shiniest thing going; it is actually about ensuring that we get the priorities of this country right so that everybody can benefit.The last thing I want to talk about is simply this: when we think about opportunities for regional economic development let us spare a thought for our community providers our non-governmental organisations and our faith-based organisations that are picking up the slack right now because people are struggling. They will do it because they have always done it. They will do it on a shoestring. They would do it on the end of the shoestring because they know it needs to be done. If we really wanted to build the type of society that not only fills the gap but thrives most where there is support it is in this space. And I do not think that they got the support they needed in this Budget.It is a shame that we are not talking about the Budget I really want to talk about. It is not about the biggest the brightest and the shiniest; it is about getting the priorities in the right place."