Faafoi Kris: Customs and Excise (Budget Measures—Motor Spirits) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFaafoi Kris: Customs and Excise (Budget Measures—Motor Spirits) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading[Sitting date: 16 May 2013. Volume:690;Page:10384. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana): Welcome back from the dinner break everybody. The cutaways on Parliament TV may show faces on the other side of the House being a little bit forlorn and a bit angry about being here but I think they secretly want to be here. Secretly they are quite thankful that they are here at Parliament because they are the ones who have not gone back to their communities yet. Instead they are going to stick their motorists with a 9c increase on their petrol excise. They are the ones who would basically prefer—[Interruption] It is 10.5c sorry because of the GST. I stand corrected. It is not a 9c increase at all; it is 10.5c. These are the members who are quite happy that they are here and not having to front up to the people in theircommunities to say that when they fill up their petrol tanks as of 1 July this year it will be another 3c per litre and on 1 July next year it will be another 3c and another 3c in the year beyond that. These members might think that they are the unlucky ones but these are very happy MPs because they are not going back to their home electorates and having to front up to their constituents. They may look unhappy about being here—they are the last ones left the ones who may have missed their flights for the night—but they are actually very happy to be here. They are happy to be here because they are not having to front up to their constituents to tell them that this is a Budget measure of broken promises.I just want to remind the party over there of what its leader John Key said in 2008. He said that National was not going to be raising GST—wrong. It did. He said that National wanted to cut taxes not raise taxes—wrong. This is a measure that will increase taxes by 3c per litre each year over the next 3 years for every Kiwi who is using their car or their truck. What have we heard about this? We have heard one member the MP from Wairarapa John Hayes say that the $45 more that taxpayers will have to pay to fill up their cars is not much money—it is not much money. Well it may not be much money to Mr Hayes but it certainly is a lot of money to his constituents. A lot of those people will be filling up their tanks and paying $45 more a year on top of the $40 more in prescription charges that this Government has lumped on them and also the GST that this Government has lumped on them. This has been a Budget measure of broken promises.I did not really get a chance to speak in the title and commencement clauses debate on this Customs and Excise (Budget Measures—Motor Spirits) Amendment Bill and I just want to offer something up. I want to offer up an alternative title and that is the “Customs and Excise (Budget Advice Measures—Motor Spirits) Amendment Bill”. When people out in our communities are struggling to pay something this is a Government that makes them go out and get budget advice. They have to go and get budget advice before the Government will help them. I would suggest that this Government—which has set out on a blind mission to try to build these roads of national significance and has realised that it cannot afford it—get some budget advice then the people of New Zealand would not have to pay an extra 3c a litre for their petrol each year over the next 3 years.Of all the bills that we have seen in relation to the Budget under this urgency motion we have actually had a decent regulatory impact statement for this bill. In it very helpfully it points out why the Government has had to do this. I will quote from this document: “Forecasts of revenue and expenditure for the National Land Transport Fund in November 2012 indicated a total revenue shortfall of around $1.6 billion over the next five years. The shortfall is due to the timing of the Roads of National Significance programme which is identified as a key priority in the [Government policy statement] 2012.” In English for those people who are watching—and I am sure they are thrilled to be watching Parliament TV at this time of the night—that means that the Government promised something could not afford it and is now asking the people of New Zealand to stump up the cash to make sure it can do it.I want to give you one example of a road of national significance that the Government is pushing in my area and that is the Kapiti Expressway. Let us look at the value for money of that expressway. Last year there was a leaked report and there have been quite a few leaks—quite a few leaks—out of this Government. That report said that the engineering consultants thought that the half-billion-dollar motorway project had a benefit-cost ratio of 0.2—0.2. So for every dollar the Government spent the economic benefit of that is 20c. I am sure there are a few people over there who can count beans but in my very simple maths that is not a very good investment. In factthat would be an awful investment. To make it even worse this Government is spending $515 million on this expressway—Andrew Little: How much?KRIS FAAFOI: —$515 million—and the return on that investment that it will generate over the next 30 years is $118 million. We could have saved the Government a considerable amount of money if it had just stuck to the plan that the people of Kāpiti and the Labour Government had implemented at the end of its term.Interestingly enough so did Mr Nathan Guy the MP for Ōtaki. Late in 2009 he was all go for the Western Link Road which was the original plan for the Kāpiti coast. The locals were on board the mayor was on board Nathan Guy was on board—we were loving it. The Kāpiti coast was looking forward to it until Steven Joyce turned up—until Steven Joyce turned up. I would like to read a press release from the Hon Mr Nathan Guy because he was delighted to see the Western Link Road get started. He said: “This is fantastic news for Kapiti because it will connect up our communities. This new road and bridge will significantly ease traffic congestion on the existing State Highway”. [Interruption] Here he is—here he is. I have got your press release here Nathan. I am just reading it out for the benefit of you: “This is a fantastic”—just so I can be more precise it is actually dated 20 February 2009—“news for Kapiti because it will connect up our communities. This new road and bridge will significantly ease traffic congestion on the existing State Highway where we have about 24000 vehicles movements a day.” Then it goes on to say: “The Transport Minister Mr Steve Joyce will be briefed on this project when he visits the Otaki electorate next month to understand how important it is.”Well when Steven Joyce arrived Nathan Guy got rolled. He got rolled and in comes the Kapiti Expressway. Instead of a local link road that all the residents of Kāpiti want Nathan Guy got rolled and what the Kāpiti coast gets is a four-lane motorway through the beautiful and picturesque Kāpiti coast. I will look to table that press release if Mr Guy has forgotten what his position was in February 2009. [Interruption] If they do not like it the truth hurts. They are quite happy about that at 7.10 on a Saturday night.Mr SPEAKER: Order! Would the National members please give Mr Faafoi a reasonable chance. [Interruption] Order!KRIS FAAFOI: This was going to be a split call but I think I will take the whole 10 minutes.Where was I before I was so rudely interrupted? This Budget measure is all about creating the illusion that this Government has a surplus. It is only a wafer-thin surplus. It is only a wafer-thin surplus of $75 million in 2 years’ time. So when this Government says it is balancing the books it is balancing the books by a thousand cuts—nipping and tucking. It is not enough to have a bit of a nip and tuck when people go to the petrol station and fill up with petrol; they are having a nip and tuck at the Ministry for the Environment and they are having a nip and tuck at the police.Actually I will spend a couple of minutes on the police because what is this Government doing to the police? It is running them into the ground. There have been huge budget cuts—especially around traffic cops; huge budget cuts—to run our police force into the ground and this is a Government that said it backs our police on law and order. It absolutely is doing the opposite. In the last 8 months the budget pressure that the Government has put our police force under has seen 219 front-line police officers leave their jobs. If anyone wants to see the latest Ten One have a look at it: 56 front-line police officers resigned in the last month—56. That figure is only going to get worse.This is an awful Budget measure. It is there to try to create the illusion that the Government has got a surplus—a wafer-thin surplus at that. It is an awful Budgetmeasure of breaking promises around lifting GST and saying that it will lower taxes. Instead it increased taxes. With that I wish the members opposite a very lovely evening in Wellington.