Clark DavidHon Dr DAVID CLARK (Associate Minister of Finance): That member is trying it seems to live up to the negative National stereotype. There's no other explanation for that speech where he said he could agree with all of the principles in the bill but he couldn't bring himself to support it. He thinks that GDP is of course not the only thing Governments ever do; they of course are concerned about wellbeing and other matters. But could he bring himself to support the bill? No he could not—no he could not. Negative National over and over and over again. They just seem to be opposing things for opposing things' sake.This bill represents a huge step forward building on the successes of the Public Finance Act the transparency the accountability that came in 30 years ago and acknowledges that in 30 years things have changed. The world has changed. We do have a more nuanced understanding of things. We do believe that we can walk and chew gum at the same time that it is possible on this side of the House at least—on this side of the House—to have other objectives other than simply growing GDP. We believe that you can grow GDP and actually share it with the population for goodness' sake. We think we could actually make sure that everybody is better off not just the precious few that might be represented by interests on the other side of the House. We all know why GDP is not the perfect measure. I mean if we go and smash the window out the front then of course that contributes to GDP because some insurance money comes in and the economy gets a boost. But if somebody stays home and looks after a sick child that does not contribute to GDP because they're not earning the money that would keep the economy going. Yet we know that looking after the sick child is the more important of the two. We all know why it's important to measure things more broadly and we've got an example of the Budget just gone where the Minister of Finance provided the leadership and worked with the Chief Science Advisors to come up with some clear wellbeing objectives to look out for child wellbeing to make sure that we actually take mental health seriously. We are the first Government to take mental health seriously and to make the significant investment necessary to get us on that path and I'll come back to that because I can't let some of the things that the member opposite said go unchallenged around the delivery that's already happened in that area.We also looked at Māori and Pacific aspirations and the wellbeing in that area. We looked at how we could make our economy more sustainable to ensure that our growth wasn't just built on trading houses with each other or on immigration or growing the population as seemed to be the strategy from the other side of the House. We're more interested in going from volume to value making sure that we have an economy that's truly sustainable in the longer term and that benefits all of our citizens in a shared prosperity. So on this side of the House we do believe that you can walk and chew gum at the same time.Now I do want to concentrate just a minute on mental health delivery. I heard a colleague challenge member Goldsmith across the House about the fact that he might have been sleeping under a rock if he'd missed the progress on mental health and the member didn't directly confront that; he carried on after pausing briefly with another set of accusations that were just ill-founded. In mental health already we've delivered a Mana Ake programme that has mental health workers on the ground across Canterbury and Kaikōura in all of the schools—in all of the schools—to make sure that people are supported in the wake of the quakes. We have the Piki programme across the Greater Wellington region having free counselling and thanks to the Greens as part of our agreement with them free counselling available to young people from 18 to 25. We've got the nurses in schools programme which we've continued to roll out which has good evidence around it thanks to Simon Denny of the University of Auckland. We know that contributes to mental wellbeing. We've lowered the cost of visiting a doctor for 600000 New Zealanders making it easier because we know many people go to the doctor to get their first mental health consultation.Angie Warren-Clark: How many?Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: 600000 New Zealanders have cheaper doctors visits as a result of action this Government has already taken and we put $200 million in our first Budget into specialist mental health services; $213 million in our second Budget into specialist mental health services. We've put $200 million into buildings to make sure that the stock of buildings that were tired and run down after the previous Government are built up again and that's just the mental health and addiction buildings—that $200 million that we put aside for that. So we're getting on and delivering and already there are 170000 New Zealanders able to access—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Is this related to the bill?Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: —primary mental health services which was specifically mentioned in the Budget that mirrors exactly this bill that we're putting through with the wellbeing objectives that are being implanted into this bill. I bring it back to the point that I was making Madam Speaker with your guidance.So these are the very things that we know we can do and we know if we embed them in this bill and require the reporting of the wellbeing objectives we can then measure the progress we are making as a nation toward ensuring a shared prosperity across our country. So the bill itself of course requires the Government to state the wellbeing objectives upfront—those wellbeing objectives that will guide the Government's decisions as it goes through the Budget process and each Government will have the freedom and the flexibility to describe its own wellbeing objectives. It will have the ability to articulate its own vision for wellbeing for this country. It's not prescriptive and it's very disappointing that the member Goldsmith opposite thinks that it is too challenging to both think about wellbeing and grow the finances in the corner. I mean history will tell us that Labour-led Governments have actually grown the economy faster than National-led ones which is an interesting observation along the way that shows that maybe walking and chewing gum is more productive than just walking alone if we want to continue the metaphor a bit further. But maybe that's stretching it a bit far if I can step into bad puns as well.The bill also then in Part 2 requires Treasury to report back periodically on the state of wellbeing in New Zealand and that first report would be due at the end of 2022 and then at least once every four years. We know Treasury are developing tools around this. So we've got the Living Standards Framework which looks at physical and financial capital which is of course the stuff we're familiar with through the normal Budget process but also looks at social capital: the connectedness and cohesion of our society. It looks at human capital—the skills the education the wellbeing of our citizens that goes with that—and also looks further at the environment and its sustainability over the longer term recognising that that is also important to our wellbeing and prosperity in the longer term. So it's a balanced package. We think Treasury is capable of giving us a broader picture of how our Budgets are shaping the future of our nation of how they are contributing to us being a wealthier more prosperous and happier nation in the future.We know that achieving genuine enduring change requires establishing a public finance system geared towards this new way of working—this newer way of looking at the world. We know that the Public Finance Act has served us well in the past but it is actually time to require Governments to set wellbeing objectives to make sure that we are reporting to the public transparently and having that conversation about where we are headed and then reporting back on how we are achieving better wellbeing for our populations and of course we know this is against the background of long-term challenges. Unfortunately under the prior Government whilst it did grow the economy certainly sometimes faster than at others we saw homelessness grow we saw child poverty grow and we saw the inequalities rising under that Government's watch.The OECD data backs this up. It's not conjecture. The OECD has put out reports on how this has happened and how it's grown over time. If we set in train a Public Finance Act that measures our progress towards prosperity and towards addressing homelessness and child poverty addressing inequality making sure that our Māori and Pacific people are sharing in our prosperity making sure that we are addressing the mental health crisis that we've inherited with so much growth in need but the services are not geared up to deliver and respond—we know all of this is possible. We are determined to have a Public Finance Act which brings us into the modern age which sets objectives to be reported on periodically and that is accessible to the population so that we can see how Governments are delivering for the people of New Zealand.Certainly this Government has many achievements which I have already listed in the mental health area. We want to be able to report transparently across all of the areas that we're delivering and I want to thank all of the partners to this Government for their constructive contributions to this. I hope the negative National view does not continue opposite. I hope they find it within themselves to not only support in spirit this bill but actually to put their vote towards it recognising that New Zealanders will actually value having objectives around wellbeing spelt out and accountability around those objectives. It should not be something that a National Party opposes in my view. I hope they see the bigger picture and support this bill.