Bennett David: Annual Review Debate — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBennett David: Annual Review Debate — In Committee[Sitting date: 28 April 2015. Volume:704;Page:2947. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DAVID BENNETT (Chairperson of the Finance and Expenditure Committee):I would just like to congratulate everybody on the way that they are going to engage in these debates. I think that they will actually give an opportunity for a bit of wide-ranging debate rather than the traditional way that we have approached these issues.When we look at this debate here there are seven issues—or a number of issues anyway—that are quite broad and that cover a range of issues. First of all as the chair of the Finance and Expenditure Committee I just want to cap off that previous debate. When we look at economic development and some of those issues that are listed here in the services for business debate it is very important that you have that economic environment in place. That is what this Government has been doing through working towards Budget surplus through getting unemployment down through keeping interest rates low through keeping inflation low and through seeing strong economic growth. All those things are important for business because the environment that we as a Government deliver for business is the most important thing that we can do. It is much more important than any one-off decisions that we may make about what we prefer as the business of the day that we should be supporting or about the nature of any changes to the way that those businesses direct their affairs.There is one issue in there that is quite an interesting one in our list which is immigration. It is not necessarily something that the Finance and Expenditure Committee deals with. I dealt with it previously on the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and I notice the chair here is Mr Jonathan Young—and a very good chair he is as well. I just wanted possibly to have a little bit of a talk about immigration. I think that in this House we have a very restrictive approach to immigration in New Zealand and we should be looking at a broader way that we as a country could develop and take more migrants in to enable this country to develop. The changing face of New Zealand that would be the result of that would be something that I think would add value and diversity to our country going forward. We are providing an economic environment that people will want to be part of. The human pool of capital that is out there—that talent of young people around the world who are looking for an opportunity and a future—will see New Zealand as a place to come to. They see us as somewhere that is free and open that has a strong economic environment that will allow them the ability to prosper and that will allow their families to grow up with the opportunities that they might not have had in their home country. And yet we deny so many people that opportunity and as a country we deny ourselves the ability to have the strength that they would bring to this economy and this country going forward.Over time that will change. In 50 years’ time we will not have these kinds of debates. As you have seen a globalised world evolve you will see a globalised capital world of talent evolve. There will be no limits between countries around human capital; it will be something that will travel freely between countries as they all strive to get the best people to come to their country. For New Zealand it is also important that we actually take part in that process. Imagine the city of Auckland at 4 million to 5 million people being competitive with Sydney and Melbourne. Imagine the cities of Hamilton and Tauranga at 500000 or 600000 people. Imagine if we built a city between Hamilton and Auckland. Imagine those kinds of changes which would arise if we had a greater immigration policy. That is the future of building economic growth in this country through having a more modern and progressive approach to our Government to our planning and to the development of our people.Those people will come with energy passion and desire. They will come with the ability to work hard. They will come with a desire for education. They will come with a desire to make their children have the best opportunities. That is the future of New Zealand. That is an opportunity where we can leapfrog our neighbours as well. Many countries will fail to take advantage of that opportunity. They will have situations where they are very restrictive in their approach to their country’s population growth and that will limit their ability to grow as an economic base. It would be sad if any party in this House were to take that approach because that would be to deny New Zealand our future and it would be contrary to any good economic judgment and that party will not be here in 50 years’ time. So that is why we will not have to worry about that.