Banks John: Adjournment — Sittings of the House 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Banks John: Adjournment — Sittings of the House 
[Sitting date: 21 December 2011. Volume:677;Page:75. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon JOHN BANKS (ACT—Epsom) 
: 
 I want to pay tribute to all the small parties in the House. There are certain advantages in being part of a small party. You can have very meaningful caucuses. You can do a lot of self-reflection and navel-gazing without being accused of either and you can have quite a good time discussing matters of great interest with yourself bringing them to the Parliament here and standing and making big speeches. I am looking forward to that as I am to this occasion. I want to thank you for setting aside with special Standing Orders an hour for me to say thanks to this House—just joking. I get worried when members on the other side of the House are not just looking at their watches but shaking them when I have spoken for only 30 seconds. That starts to worry me.  
I want to pay tribute to the small parties because it is very very difficult in this parliamentary democracy to be part of a small party and make it back to this Parliament. The hurdles are high and the hoops are very very tight. So congratulations to all of the small parties on getting back to the Parliament.  
I am very proud and privileged to be a member of the ACT Party. I believe in the values of the ACT Party: choice freedom and responsibility. I am absolutely and passionately signed up to the policies of the ACT Party: less Government lower taxes more opportunities a world-class education paying our way with the rest of the world and economic sovereignty for our future. I am absolutely committed to the mantra of the ACT Party—that everyone counts everyone in this country makes a difference and we are all in this together.  
I am glad that John Key has been re-elected as Prime Minister of this country. John Key’s contribution to this nation in a relatively—by our measure Mr Speaker—short existence and life in this House shows that he has adapted remarkably well has picked up the challenges of high office particularly well and has done a good job.  
I want to tell the Prime Minister—who I am sure is listening on his crystal set nine floors above this place—that the ACT Party brings the reinforcing steel to the National caucus policy-making machine over the next 3 years. In other words we are going to give National a nudge in the directions that we think we should around those matters that I narrated just briefly.  
We are very pleased in the ACT caucus that we have been able to negotiate such an outstanding supply and confidence agreement with National. We are excited about having some constraint about Government expenditure that in recent years has got ourselves out of control and runs the risk of compromising our economic sovereignty. We are very excited about the opportunity for changes to the Resource Management Act. I was in Parliament when we moved that legislation through its third reading speech in 5 minutes flat one night unanimously.  
I have never seen a piece of legislation which has been so acrimoniously debated over such a long period of time moved through this Parliament in 5 minutes flat with total support from all corners of the Parliament. But it means that sometimes you can get legislation wrong—sometimes the people are right; more often they are right than they are wrong—and that legislation needs to be addressed and changes need to happen. We need to get off the back of private enterprise we need to get out of the pockets of small businesses and we need to give the mums and dads who employ fewer than 10 people in this country—there are 200000 of them—every opportunity to make a profit employ people and make this country great.  
The ACT Party believes that all greatness for this country will come from the people; not from Parliament not from politicians not from the bureaucracy but from the spirit of private enterprise. While I am here addressing you can I say—and I always wanted to say this in the last 12 years—thank God for the farmers. Thank God for the men and women who farm the land and grow the tradable sector of the New Zealand economy and help pay our way in a very competitive world. Without farmers this country would be indeed greatly lost.  
I say to the ACT Party board and the president of the ACT Party Chris Simmons a class act thank you very much and have a happy Christmas. I say to all of my team in Epsom thank you for giving me such great support in Epsom to allow me to come back here and make the day of every member of Parliament who is prepared to stay and listen to this closing debate.  
I thank all of my staff in my office and I particularly thank your office Mr Speaker for the graciousness they showed me in the interregnum. Your senior private secretary Beryl Trish Wanden and others have made me welcome from day one and helped me get through the gap. I thank all the staff here. I am amazed at how many people are still left in this place but there is one thing about this place—the staff that serve the interests of the members of this place are absolutely first class. They deserve a rest and I wish them a very very merry Christmas.  
Every single member of Parliament is extraordinarily well served by the Parliamentary Service and Ministerial Services around this place. This is the 50th Parliament of this country so it is incumbent upon us as soon as we have had our break and as soon as we are back in this place rolling up our sleeves that we do things right and we do the right thing. As I said in my Address in Reply speech there is too much “left-thinking” and too much “right-thinking” around this place. There needs to be more capture of the common ground and common-sense policies so the little people can become great people and so this country in some financial difficulty can become great again in the world.  
Finally can I say what a privilege it is for me to give support to a National-led coalition Government at this time in the history of this country. What an honour and what a privilege it is for me to be able to do that. We will not agree on everything but we will agree on most stuff. What we do agree on is that the interests of this country are absolutely paramount and the people will make the difference. We live in a nation of truly wonderful international citizens and that has never been represented more so than in disasters like the Christchurch earthquake and it has never been represented better than it was at Eden Park when we won the Rugby World Cup.  
We have a lot to celebrate in this nation—it is a great country. We are in difficult times but the spirit of New Zealand and our forebears will carry us through. This is a time of celebration for everything good about the country. It is a time to sit back and say: “Are we not blessed that we are born and live and have chosen New Zealand as our home.” What a great place to be at this time in history and what a great future we have as long as we this Parliament the 50th Parliament take decisions that are in the best interests of the people and the country going forward.  
Mr Speaker congratulations again to you. Very best wishes for a happy Christmas and a prosperous New Year for New Zealand.