Hipkins Chris; Brownlee GerryBUDGET DEBATERt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the Opposition): I move That all of the words after That" be deleted and replaced with "That this House has no confidence in the Government because it is taking New Zealand backwards it has no plan to tackle the cost of living crisis it has failed to deliver on the promises it has made to New Zealanders and it is prioritising the interests of landlords and property owners over hard-working Kiwis."There was one major test that Nicola Willis had to pass in today's Budget: to demonstrate clearly that she was not borrowing to pay for tax cuts. And this Budget fails at the first hurdle: $10 billion worth of tax cuts; $12 billion worth of borrowing. You don't need an abacus to figure out that this is a Government borrowing to pay for tax cuts. At a time when the Reserve Bank is trying hard to bring inflation down the fiscal impulse in this year's Budget is positive. The fiscal impulse next year as a result of this Budget is positive. In other words at a time when the Government says it's trying to help the Reserve Bank bring inflation down it is doing the opposite. The fiscal impulse this year and next year as a result of this Budget is positive. This is a Government that is fuelling inflation through tax cuts rather than helping to get inflation back down and interest rates back down again.Are New Zealanders getting the tax cuts they were promised? No they are not: $250 per fortnight the average family with children was promised by this Government and what are they getting? $60 per fortnight under the tax cuts that the Government has delivered. But let's look at some of the other people who are missing out the most. I was somewhat surprised by this one: superannuitants—a couple on superannuation—promised $13 a week by National before the election gets $4.30. That's $2.15 per person. That's less than a packet of chewing gum. I am astounded Winston Peters agreed to that. Perhaps he wasn't paying attention when he realised that superannuitants were going to get a third of what they had been promised. The $250 a fortnight promised by National during the election campaign undoubtedly has not been delivered. The tax cuts that have been delivered won't keep up with the increasing cost of living and the changes made in this Budget will see Kiwis paying more. New Zealanders will be worse off.Let's go back to the Reserve Bank and what it said just in the last week about what's keeping inflation higher for longer and run this Budget up against those tests. Rates are going up at astronomical levels; nothing in this Budget will tackle that. Rents are going up at high levels; nothing in this Budget is going to tackle that. The $2.9 billion in tax breaks for landlords has so far resulted in rents going up more. Insurance is going up because of the increase in natural disasters we're seeing in New Zealand among other things and nothing in this Budget is going to address that. This is a Budget that is going to leave New Zealanders worse off. But let's look at it against some of the other commitments that the National Party have made. They made much of this notion of fiscal cliffs—that time-limited funding was such a terrible thing. Are there new fiscal cliffs in this year's Budget? Yes; there are seven. It turns out that Police operational funding is now a fiscal cliff under this year's Budget.The Government said that it was going to be increasing health and education spending at least by the level of inflation. Remember that? Nicola Willis said that during the election campaign: "at least by the level of inflation". I think her calculator must be broken because when early childhood education providers get an increase of just 2 percent and schools get an increase of only 3 percent—for some schools and not for others—that's not keeping up with inflation. In fact as a former Minister of Education I can tell you this means that schools will be laying off teacher aides as a result of this year's meagre Budget increase. That's more jobs that are going to be cut because the Government is effectively cutting funding for schools and cutting funding for early childhood education providers.Social services are going backwards. Health and education are going backwards. The increases in this year's funding are less than those required. Te Whatu Ora made it very clear before the election to any incoming Government what was going to be required just to meet cost pressures and this Government's Budget does not meet those requirements. They have not allowed additional funding to meet their new targets that they have set; so they can have no credibility. No funding to meet the targets that they've set the health system; in fact the health system is going to be expected to meet those at a time when its funding in real terms is going backwards. What does that mean? It means other front-line health services will have to be cut in order to meet the targets that the Government has set. And we have seen that before. We saw that under the Key Government. When targets for the health system were set and not properly funded other front-line health services suffered as a result of that.No responsible modern Government in 2024 would be cutting the level of investment that we make as a country in tackling climate change and yet that is exactly what this Government is doing. One of the things you won't see in this year's Budget is accounting for the massive financial liability that is coming down the pipeline at us if we don't meet our emissions reductions targets. Billions of dollars will need to be paid out by the New Zealand Government if we fail to meet our emissions reductions targets. Not one dollar has been provided for that in this year's Budget. They are simply kicking that can down the road increasing the liability the New Zealand Government will face in the future potentially by billions of dollars and just forgetting about that in this year's Budget. And in fact they're doing worse than that; they're cutting the very things that would help us to avoid that future liability by decreasing our emissions. Cutting the initiatives designed to reduce our emissions is not the thing that responsible 21st century Governments do.Another thing that the Government has been very quiet on is the issue of child poverty. I'm not surprised because this year's Budget makes it clear that child poverty in New Zealand is increasing and it is going to continue to increase and the measures that the Government has implemented in this Budget mean more children are going to be pushed below the poverty line. Here's another thing that responsible 21st century Governments don't do: they don't celebrate more children being forced below the poverty line as this Government is. The Government has choices. The Government could choose to prioritise keeping New Zealanders in work. It could choose to prioritise lifting children out of poverty rather than forcing more children into poverty. It could choose to prioritise tackling climate change. It is not making those choices. Instead it is choosing to prioritise tax cuts that are going to lead to higher inflation for longer.Let's talk about what that actually means for the recipients of tax cuts. A minimum-wage worker will be lucky to get 30c an hour extra in their pay as a result of the tax cuts. That's not even going to compensate for the fact that the Government lifted the minimum wage by less than the rate of inflation in the most recent adjustment. Minimum-wage workers are going backwards under this Government. A Government that is pro-worker does not leave minimum-wage workers behind. A Government that's pro-worker does not celebrate 27000 more people going on to the Jobseeker benefit which is what this Government's Budget is forecasting. A responsible Government does not prioritise $2.9 billion in tax cuts for landlords while hard-working New Zealanders are worse off as a result of this Government's Budget.Backing out of their promises to New Zealanders this Government is going back to the notion that if the rich get richer and everybody else gets pennies somehow those at the bottom of the heap should be grateful for that. As the number of people being left behind in the modern economy grows and grows this Government is reverting back to trickle-down economics—the idea that if you give more people at the top more money everyone else will benefit; despite 40 years of very clear evidence that that simply is not the case.There are plenty of other New Zealanders being left behind by this Budget but actually it's future generations that will be worse off: more children in poverty and young New Zealanders working hard to create a better future for themselves. All those students who are in years 11 and 12 getting ready to do their NCEA exams this year will now know that when they go on to tertiary education they will pay more under this Government. This Government's Budget stacks more cost on to today's secondary school students for their study. There is no getting past that. Those same young people will also have more costs stacked on to them for public transport. They'll have more costs stacked on to them in rent because rents are continuing to go up and the Government is doing nothing about that. And of course those same students if they're in lower socio-economic areas will find that the free and healthy school lunch programme they currently benefit from is turned into little more than an unhealthy snack under this Government's Budget cuts because let's be clear that's exactly what they will get.Let's compare that with what they're doing for those on some of the highest incomes. A high-income person who has just one investment property will be getting an extra $2085 a year in tax cuts and an extra $15000 a year in the tax breaks that are being dished out for landlords; $330 at least a week better off compared to a minimum-wage worker who gets just 30c an hour.Where is the Government relying on this extra revenue? Well they're going to be taxing more on gambling. They're going to be taxing more on tobacco. A Government that wants to fund tax cuts by increasing gambling and increasing the smoking of tobacco has certainly lost its moral compass. Every time you hear the Government saying "We couldn't afford that; we had to make tough choices." just remember: $2.9 billion in tax breaks for landlords was the number one priority that they had in this year's Budget.I want to speak to the Kiwis who feel forgotten and left behind by this Government. The parents who are working hard to create a better future for their children who are finding that the public transport subsidies their kids relied on have been slashed the free and healthy lunches programme is gone and they are undoubtedly going to have to take more money out of their own pocket to make up for the shortfall in education funding as a result of this Budget. To the disabled people who have been left behind by this Government I want to say to them that we see you and we hear you and we absolutely recommit to the notion that nothing about you should be done without you—something that this Government has failed to do.I also want to acknowledge the tangata whenua and others who stand with the tangata whenua who are out on the forecourt of Parliament today and I want to acknowledge Māori all up and down the country who have felt attacked demeaned and belittled by this Government. When Māori in New Zealand thrive the whole country will thrive and non-Māori New Zealanders have nothing to be afraid of from that.To the reading-recovery teachers who are losing their jobs as a result of this year's Budget: we see you and we hear you. To the scientists who see their funding drying up and disappearing: we see you and we hear you and we thank you for the contribution that you are making not just to this country's future but to the future of our planet. To the public servants who have been demeaned and maligned over recent months: we see you and we hear you. To those who are working to prevent child exploitation who are finding their jobs disappearing: we thank you for the hard work that you do. You deserve better and the victims of child exploitation absolutely deserve better. To those who work to prevent family and sexual violence who are also finding their jobs disappearing: we thank you and we hear you as well. To the children in the care system who are finding supports provided through Oranga Tamariki—like lawyers—being laid off: we see you and we hear you. To the people working to prevent suicide: we see you and we hear you. To the Customs officers those at the border those working in biosecurity who work to keep New Zealand safe who have had their work demeaned by saying that they are "back office": we see you and we hear you as well and we thank you for the hard work that you have done. To those who work so hard to eradicate Mycoplasma bovis: we celebrate the contribution that you have made as does the primary sector. What's very clear from this year's Budget is that that Government would not have made the tough choice to eliminate Mycoplasma bovis; they just would have let it rip and let the devastation take hold in our primary sector as a result.To the Department of Conservation workers and the WorkSafe staff to those who are working on climate change and to others who find their jobs under threat: we celebrate the work that you have done and we thank you for it.To first-home buyers who are finding that the dream of first-home ownership is being ripped away from them by this Government: we see you and we hear you as well. You deserve better than you are getting from this Government.To all the community organisations out there working on the front line who asked for more funding certainty: we see you and we hear you. We also say that funding to your organisations should not be contingent on your support for the current Government.Five-thousand jobs cut and counting—that's just in the public sector—with tens of thousands of jobs across the country going under this year's Budget. Rising unemployment. Higher inflation. More borrowing. A longer time to repay debt. Business confidence down. The infrastructure sector left in ongoing limbo laying off staff who are leaving the country because of the actions of this Government. We absolutely recognise you.To local authorities up and down the country who have been lumbered with the huge bill for upgrading water infrastructure because this Government have simply abandoned any notion that they could have a role in fixing up the country's water infrastructure: we recognise the pressure that you are under and we particularly recognise the pressure that ratepayers are now going to be under as a result of this Government's decision.To those who support Smokefree Aotearoa and see that smoking has no role in New Zealand's future: we recognise you too and we will continue to fight for that.There are tough choices to be made. This is a difficult point in the economic cycle. But this Government's choices are making things tougher for the majority of hard-working New Zealanders. They are taking New Zealand backwards.I note that Nicola Willis and Christopher Luxon said that they would resign if they didn't deliver tax cuts. They've clearly chosen to prioritise their jobs over the jobs of the thousands of New Zealanders whose jobs are now at risk as a result of this year's Budget.On the number one test that was set for this Budget by the Government themselves not borrowing for tax cuts they failed. Let's look at the numbers stark as they are again: $10 billion worth of tax cuts; $12 billion worth of borrowing. A fiscal impulse that is positive—i.e. the Government's injecting more stimulus into the economy at a time when the Reserve Bank is trying to bring inflation down. This Government's Budget will result in interest rates staying higher for longer. The warnings issued by the Reserve Bank just in the last week have been completely ignored. The big cost of living challenges faced by New Zealanders like increased rents like increased insurance like increased rates—those things haven't been tackled in this year's Budget. The cost pressures faced by our public services: not addressed by this year's Budget. Health and education: going backwards. Future generations of New Zealanders: left undeniably worse off as a result of the changes made in this year's Budget—future generations of New Zealanders who have been forgotten. The children being forced below the poverty line and the young New Zealanders who will pay more for their education more for their public transport more for their rents: left behind by this year's Budget. Their families who work so hard to support them: forgotten by this year's Government Budget. The New Zealanders promised $250 a fortnight by this Government before the election getting a fraction of that: forgotten by this year's Budget.New Zealanders could and should have had much better in this year's Budget. It is a Budget that is taking New Zealand backwards. It is a Budget full of broken promises. It is a Budget that will leave the majority of New Zealanders worse off.SPEAKER: The question is that the amendment be agreed to."