Cosgrove Clayton: Taxation (Business Tax Measures) Bill — First Reading 
Cosgrove Clayton: Taxation (Business Tax Measures) Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:652;Page:1094] 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 The previous speaker Chris Tremain talked about the great National rolling maul. I refer him to a learned business person called Brian Gaynor. Whether one is on this side of the Chamber or in Government I think most people would say that Brian Gaynor is an eminent business person and commentator. He said this in the  
Weekend Herald 
 of 7 February when comparing the National Government’s effort—the so-called package that will save us from a deepening recession and an international economic crisis referred to by the previous speaker as a rolling maul—with what our trans-Tasman neighbours are doing: “… our transtasman neighbours are planning to take the direct and aggressive route to the try line while we have a slow moving maul with little idea who is carrying the ball and which way the maul will move next.” I think that is probably a damn good quote that sums this up. 
If we compare what we are doing here in New Zealand with our Government—and I am not talking just about the dollar for dollar head to head quantum I am talking about the aggressive action that say the Americans are taking—I point out that it is very interesting that Mr Key today as he did in the election campaign likened himself to President Barack Obama. It was very interesting. Barack Obama was elected about the same time as Mr Key—within days—and as President-elect before he had any constitutional power to do anything he had announced planned and began jawboning lobbying and gathering support for his aggressive economic package and its second phase before he even had his hands on the constitutional levers to do anything. Then when he was elected he was in the process of punching it through. He did not wait because unlike Mr Key the rest of the world knows that the economic crisis coming towards us—the likes of which no one in any country can predict the outcome of and probably the depth of which we have never seen in our lifetime—is like a tsunami. We have a couple of hours warning that it is on its way. We have a choice. We either start to prepare sandbag and do what we are supposed to do or like Mr Key and this Government we wait until the wave rolls in and we measure the height of the water and we hope that it will not be over our necks. We can make a big international comparison between what we are doing and what we are not doing in New Zealand and what they are doing in the United States. As I say before Barack Obama could do anything constitutionally he had planned lobbied brought up his list of infrastructure projects costed them and got the show on the road so that when he was sworn in 3 months later he was able to move. Mr Key of course was elected at the same time and 3 months later he was on the beach. 
Let us look at Australia. Let us not talk mark to mark dollar figures but let us see what the Australians have done. They have been aggressive. They are running the ball up as Mr Gaynor says to get the country across the line. He makes a very interesting observation: “Australian initiatives are mainly directed at low-income individuals and families because they are far more likely to spend additional income. By contrast the National Government’s revised tax cuts are more beneficial to the well-off who have a greater propensity to save rather than spend.” So I do not quite know how we get fiscal stimulus if we fund those who can afford it and their greatest motivation in life is to put it in the bank and save it because they can actually afford to do so. We can compare Kevin Rudd’s package which is aggressive and running the ball up over the try line to the sort of rolling maul of this Government where he funds the bottom end and this crowd funds the top end and there is no strategy there. 
Let us look at Gordon Brown’s second package—identified projects which I think they call “shovel-ready projects” all ready to go with money going through the system. And what do we have here in New Zealand? National says there is vision. I quote again from one of its own people Bill English who said in the press 
on 6 February—and if this sums up vision I do not know what does—when he was talking about the Australian and US Federal Governments’ packages: “We hope it works because anything that helps Australia’s economy helps us.” I agree with that. The report goes on to say: “Mr English said the best outcome New Zealand could hope for was stimulus not only in Australia but also in the United States and China. ‘These three countries are all on the go.’ ” He was right and he is right. They are all on the go with aggressive stimulus packages fiscally responsible stimulus packages and his strategy is “Let’s hope they get it right because the old tsunami in a positive way might wash over Australia wash over the UK wash over the US and maybe touch us in some sort of positive way. The stimulus might flow through New Zealand and help us. Let us just hope it works.” That is the depth of the National Party vision and I quote from the Minister of Finance himself. 
So what have we got tonight? We have a tax bill and others have outlined many similarities to— 
Nathan Guy 
: You are supporting it! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Yes indeed and we will support it but the challenge for that member and his ilk is to put some strategy around this great vision which only the National Party knows about—no one else knows about it. And 3 months down the track we have a great unveiling in the next day or so whatever it is of the great infrastructure plan which will form some sort of centrepiece and we know of course that the great infrastructure plan like many of the things they have done in this bill and others is simply a regurgitation of what we did in Government. 
The first point is home insulation. Do members remember that? We had $1 billion put up for home insulation. What was the first thing that the new Government did? It killed that. Now we hear I think it was in response to the Green co-leader’s question Mr Key saying that we would be quite happy when they announce their infrastructure package because there will be a bit of green stuff in there. They say that they will do a bit of stuff on home insulation. National members are not the authors of original thought on this. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: Or anything else. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: My colleague is right. Compare us mark to mark. 
Mr English likes to say that we cannot compete; dollar for dollar what they are doing in Australia we cannot do here. That maybe the case but in Australia in the UK and in the US they have a plan. In Australia in the UK and in the US they have a strategy that is written down. It is public it is working money is injecting into the economy and jobs are being saved. Some people sadly will still end up on the scrap heap but those countries are determined to minimise the economic damage that this international crisis will do. 
But here Mr Key waits as the tsunami comes toward him to test the level of the water. What did Mr Key do when he got back after Christmas during the great 100 days? Apart from a nice holiday in the sun and we are all entitled to that there was the great announcement as Ms King said when he rushed back to face criticism from the media about the fact that the Government was doing nothing that—and I could not believe it when I read it in the paper—a summit of five Ministers would meet urgently and with Gerry it might have been six and a half who knows but five whole Ministers would meet on a Monday. It raises the question as I said to Simon Power about what they call a Cabinet committee and what they call a whole Cabinet meeting. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: A million man march. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: That might be a huge seismic political event as Cabinet meets on a Monday. Give us a break. I say to the Government that the people are not silly. It is a five-Minister summit—with the Minister of Labour suddenly dropped off the list and that Minister is supposed to be responsible for generating employment. And then we have a Maori employment hui—an interesting concept. Then we have an employment summit. 
This all adds up to a lot of talk about what we should maybe do when other countries are implementing their economic plan as we speak and as they have done for months and months and months. I would have thought that the new Government would go to a summit to say to business people: “This is what we were elected to do. This is our plan that we have been formulating for years months minutes or whatever and we want your endorsement of the plan we want your buy-in and we want your support.” But oh no this employment summit apparently will come up with new ideas; it will ask people what the Government should do; it is chaired by Mark Weldon head of the New Zealand Exchange—an interesting person to chair it—rather than the Minister of Labour the Minister of Finance and the Minister for Economic Development saying: “Here is our bold vision here is our strategy here is where we want you to walk with us.” No it will be: “Can you give us an idea a strategy or something because we are bereft of them.” I say finally to those members that if they leave New Zealand in the lurch they will put us deeper into recession because of their inaction.