Dyson Ruth: Annual Review Debate — In CommitteeText is subject to correctionDyson Ruth: Annual Review Debate — In Committee[Sitting date: 29 April 2015. Volume:704;Page:2977. Text is subject to correction.]Hon RUTH DYSON (Chairperson of the Government Administration Committee):I move that the reports be noted. I am taking a call as the chairperson of the Government Administration Committee which has responsibility for a number of the topics under this theme. It is really interesting to speak in the first themed bracketed debate of this sort in the Appropriation (2013/14 Confirmation and Validation) Bill. I am referring specifically to the Appropriation (2013/14 Confirmation and Validation) Bill Mr Chairman because you may be inclined to have the same very hard-line approach to refer to the topic as your predecessor in the Chair had and I just want to cover all bases before I get on to a broader contribution to the debate.I do want to take the opportunity and I will be upfront with you Mr Chair that it is slightly outside the mandate of the debate but given the contribution that I am going to make next I think you will excuse me. I want to take the opportunity while the Hon Chris Finlayson is in the chair to acknowledge and thank him not on behalf of my party but on behalf of all New Zealanders for the drive and leadership that he demonstrated in enabling our National War Memorial to be completed in time for the 100th commemoration of the most tragic episode in New Zealand military involvement the landing at Gallipoli. I know that previous Ministers and Governments were involved in the purchasing of the land but I am reliably informed that if it was not for the Minister’s personal passion and drive to have this completed on time it may well not have happened. So Minister Finlayson I will not do this too often. I know that it is extremely risky for my reputation as it possibly is for yours but it is a genuine commendation of the work you did. I think that the whole nation has benefited from that experience which was broadcast throughout the day on Radio New Zealand and probably featured on Campbell Live too possibly because that is a fine contributor to public debate as well.I want to talk in general about some of the reports that we are considering that our Government Administration Committee considered particularly on the State Services Commission the Ministry for Culture and Heritage and the Department of Internal Affairs. I say that for core public services they were plagued by a lack of policy leadership and a lack of vision from their Ministers to the point that there was quite a lot of despondency. And the icing on the cake was clearly that they were in large part underfunded. Despite the significant funding cuts that many departments have had to face—even in health which has not kept pace with population growth or inflation—the National Government this year is still going to break a significant election promise that it made in 2011 and 2014. It was the No. 1 commitment from the Prime Minister in both those election campaigns that in this year’s Budget we would see a Budget surplus and now we have been told that that Budget surplus has been put out yet again. So it is hard to work out where the money has gone to.We know we have had a recession. We know we have been part of the international global financial crisis. We know that the Government has put in significant amounts of taxpayers’ money as we in Canterbury have put in ratepayers’ money to the rebuild facilities that are needed particularly in the infrastructure. But that does not make up for the poor financial management that the Minister of Finance has demonstrated and the waste of money that we have seen. There were wastes of money like the bailout of corporates. Skycity and Rio Tinto are the two obvious ones. There was the extraordinary amount of money that was put into giving the highest-income earners—or those who declare their income—the 10 percent of top-income earners a significant tax cut in the very same National Budget that was cutting home support services for older New Zealanders.So the priorities of this Government have been wrong the financial management of this Government has been weak and we have had New Zealanders duped—told in two successive election campaigns that the No. 1 priority is that there would be a Budget surplus this year. Now we know that that is a broken promise. I wonder how National members of Parliament who are elected as constituency MPs feel when they go back to their electorates and have to face up to people they have duped. They have misrepresented what was going to happen and now they have to go back and say: “We’re breaking our promise.” It is a very sad indictment on our political system.