Baldock Larry: Budget Debate 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Baldock Larry: Budget Debate 
[Sitting date: 16 June 2004. Volume:618;Page:13685. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
LARRY BALDOCK (United Future) 
: 
 I rise to speak in this debate on behalf of United Future and to welcome this family-focused Budget. When I first came into this House our leader Peter Dunne made me aware that in the 2002 Budget speech there was not a single mention of the family. But now all we are hearing about is family family family. It is music to my ears that this Parliament is concerned about families in New Zealand. In fact it would be a fabulous exercise to take the  
Hansard 
 of the debate when it is finally posted on the website and see how many times “family” is mentioned compared with previous years. 
Strangely enough there are still young parties outside this Parliament that are saying that if they are elected next year they will make families the centre of Government. It is a shame people from those parties are not sitting up in the gallery throughout this debate and realising that we in this Parliament are definitely concerned about the plight of families in New Zealand. There is still a long long way to go and much still needs to be done for families in this country but it is tremendous to hear every party speaking in this debate about families. Of course in United Future we are far too modest to claim— 
Jill Pettis 
: Some speak with forked tongues. 
LARRY BALDOCK 
: Well perhaps. We in United Future are far too modest to claim all the credit because we know that many members in this House are concerned about families. What is happening in this debate is that Opposition parties are arguing about the delivery of assistance for families and that debate may be a healthy one. We may not ourselves be comfortable with the entire package that has been presented for delivery of assistance for New Zealand families but at least we will see some much needed assistance going to them. I look forward to the day when this House has the same debate about marriage in this country because if we do not begin to focus on marriage in the same way that we are focusing on families we will not be building the kinds of families New Zealand needs. We will not see the statistics that are so deplorable in our country being reversed and taking the proper direction so that children grow up in more stable family homes and are cared for in the way they ought to be. 
So far in this debate there has been a great deal of discussion about tax cuts. Some have said that there should be equality that we should have tax cuts for everybody and that that is the only fair way of delivering assistance. But to me that is ridiculous. This Parliament ought to be discriminating in the way it delivers assistance and that assistance should go to families. Families are the ones who have been forgotten for so long and who should be given assistance before others in this nation. If there were an abundant supply of funds the Government could deliver them to everybody but with the resources it has it must focus its attention on those who are most in need. 
The argument about discrimination is absurd in my opinion. In this country we ought always to discriminate on the basis of families and on the basis of marriage because that is the right thing to do. There are good reasons why we discriminate. Only the negative kind of discrimination should be outlawed in this country not the positive kind that is of benefit not only to those who receive it but also to society as a whole. We should not put those who marry and embark on raising a family on an equal plane with all other adults or with all other forms of relationships. I am sure we will have more of that discussion next week when the House begins to discuss the introduction of the Civil Union Bill. 
If we are to have tax cuts in this country then let us first of all talk about tax cuts in the form of income splitting for married couples. Let us also talk about free education not double taxation for parents who want a choice about where they send their children to be educated. Let us not see headlines like in the  
Dominion Post 
 this morning stating:“The rising cost of free education”. That is occurring more and more around our country as parents have to scrape their pennies together in order to meet the costs of sending their children to our so-called free education schools. Let us talk about removing GST from rates so families can get some relief in their rate expenses as they seek to own their own homes and begin to develop an equity base in order to provide for their families in the future. Taking GST off rates is a tax cut that really does make sense—not the sort of lunacy of the 20 percent or the 20c across the board tax cut. Such a measure would be targeted at those who should be getting assistance and United Future will continue to promote that. Let us pay for a greater percentage of the Government’s contribution to the building of local roads around our country so that councils have less of a burden in the building of those roads and are therefore able to reduce the rates they have to charge on property owners around the country. Those sorts of tax cuts would make sense then if there is still a surplus it might be time to discuss a more equal distribution in the form of general income taxes. But we must first of all target the areas of need in our society. 
In this Budget I welcome the doubling of the allocation to the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority. That is something that United Future put forward in its Budget bid so that more finance would be available to give grants to those who want to install solar heating into their homes. This is something that I believe is still tremendously underfunded. We welcome the fact that the funding has been increased from $200000 to $400000 but it is still only a drop in the bucket of what we need to do if we are to make efficient use of our energy in this country. Solar heating should be installed in all new homes and refitted into existing homes as much as possible and the Government does need to step in with some interest-free assistance to enable families to do that. If there is a limitation in the capacity right now in the industry to supply sufficient units then I hope the Government will send a very strong signal very soon that it will begin to invest in the industry so that it will be able to handle an increase in the amount budgeted next year and so that we can make real progress in that regard. 
One other area that I will touch on—unless Madam Speaker is about to rise to her feet—is the issue of the money spent on trying to eradicate possums from this country. Something in the order of $40 million is being spent on trying to get rid of possums yet on today’s market rates the cost of possum fur increased to something like $75 a kilo. We have a resource in this country with 60 million possums of something around $300 million to $400 million. It is just ludicrous that we are funding 1080 poison programmes to get rid of possums when there are hunters all over the country who are able to go in and harvest them as a resource and assist in their eradication. I hope there will be greater cooperation with the Department of Conservation the regional councils around the country and the animal health boards so that we can make the most of this resource while still seeking to eradicate that awful pest and others that exist alongside it in our biodiversity struggles.