Cosgrove Clayton: Address in Reply 
Cosgrove Clayton: Address in Reply 
[Volume:628;Page:346] 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Minister for Building Issues) 
: 
 Firstly as is traditional I pay my respects to Her Excellency the Governor-General to the Hon Margaret Wilson who was re-elected as Speaker and to yourself Mr Assistant Speaker. I also join with other members in passing on my compliments to Clem Simich. I think it is universally known throughout the House that he is a chap who plays fair and who provides a high degree of dignity. Mr Assistant Speaker you and Ann Hartley—unlike some members down there who could learn from you—bring to the Chair a high degree of style and elegance as a team and I am sure that you will both do well in this House. 
As Mark Gosche conveyed to the House I also am deeply honoured and humbled to be re-elected to a third term as the member of Parliament for Waimakariri and I thank Simon Power for his kind and generous words on my and others election to Cabinet. I was asked on the night I was elected whether it was the greatest honour I had received in my life. I have to say I answered “No.” because the greatest honour in my life was to have the people of my electorate elect me and re-elect me because in our system without that mandate one does not have the ability to stand up put one’s name forward and ask one’s colleagues for their support to enter Cabinet. 
Having said that as a new Minister I realise the awesome responsibility I have when I walk into the Cabinet room. It is a realisation that this is an adult game that this is real and that this is as my colleague Mr Gosche said about people’s lives. There is a lot of banter across the House and we do get into each other from time to time. Some of it is deserved— 
Judith Collins 
: Ha ha! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I see that Judith Collins has perked up. Some of the banter is deserved and some is undeserved. That is the side of Parliament that people most often see through the lens of the television camera. However I think all of us—or most of us anyway—believe that Parliament is about people’s lives and about our attempting to make a difference. We have different ways of walking down the path to try to achieve that but hopefully that is the universal goal for us all. 
I thank the people of Waimakariri for the honour and privilege they have given me by electing me to represent them as their constituent MP. I also acknowledge my opponent in the election Kate Wilkinson who will possibly be my opponent in the future also for the race she ran. Waimakariri is a fantastic electorate because it is a little slice of New Zealand. It is rural it is urban it has rich it has poor—it has everything. That in my view is what makes it so interesting. Some electorates are totally rural and others are totally urban. Statistically Waimakariri is the fastest-growing electorate in the country and it is now the electorate with the biggest population. It is interesting because the people there are straight shooters. They come and tell me when I do things wrong—and I am guilty of being wrong from time to time—and they tell me now and again when I do things right. 
I am proud of the achievements in that electorate and of this Government putting about $13 million into the Styx Bridge which had been a major choke point in my electorate for many many years. The former Minister of Transport in the last National Government abrogated his responsibility to put that money up. We were then told we would wait 20 years but under this Government after some negotiation and a couple of months it has been finished. I am proud of the fact that this Government put money up through the district health boards to give elderly people hospital beds in Kaiapoi for the first time. I am also proud of the fact that this Government’s priority was not tax cuts but in education for instance to put $7.5 million into Rangiora High School for new buildings and about $1.1 million into Papanui High School for new buildings. I think I lost count at around the $50 million mark of the amount we have poured in since we have been in Government over and above operational—[ 
Interruption 
]. Well that member is like a rugby ball—over-inflated and covered in pigskin. I am proud of the fact that our Government saw education as its priority and as I said I lost count in terms of the amount of money—it was about $50 million—that was put in over and above operational funding to bricks and mortar and school kids in the electorate. I am proud of that. 
Mr Hide who is trying to interject might like to rise and tell us the secret of his success given that he took a party from seven or eight members down to two. What an awesome achievement in only a number of months as leader! That is the man who celebrates defeat and tries to make it into success. I suppose it depends on how we define it but we will leave it there. We are all hoping he will carry on as he left off. On that ratio if he splits his party down from two seats he will be gone next time. 
I am also proud of the fact that this Government in terms of its achievements has kept its promises. As Mr Gosche said Labour is not a party fixated on tax cuts and that is the ideological choice— 
Dr Don Brash 
: It makes it clear—you’re absolutely not. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: There is the Leader of the Opposition Dr Brash—a political carcass with a coat and tie hanging from it. When Dr Brash made his awesome lively spirited speech in this Address in Reply debate the person who looked most happy was John Key. John Key is now bouncing in as preferred leader at 5 percent. Now one can see the line in the sand the smoke and the nervousness of the Leader of the Opposition by the beads of sweat on his brow as he contemplates his future which could be a near-death experience in coming days. 
I am proud of the fact that we as a country have achieved the lowest rate of unemployment in the OECD at 3.4 percent. We have achieved an average growth of 4 percent over 6 years while the average rate of growth in OECD countries has been 2.5 percent. I celebrate that unlike the Leader of the Opposition whose biggest attribute in this House is to stand up every day and praise Australia or the United States saying what wonderful countries they are bagging New Zealand running us down and choosing not to stand or walk beside New Zealanders and celebrate their success and not to put forward some policies. Rather he stands there and bags Kiwi achievement. 
I am proud of the fact that since we became the Government in 1999 300000 new jobs have become available taking 100000 people off welfare and putting them into work. What is the Opposition’s answer? It is to try to create some smoke and mirrors around the unemployment figures by talking about those who are sick and are invalids. That is right—pick on the most vulnerable because they cannot fight back of course! Those who are sick or are invalids cannot stand up in this House and rebut Dr Brash. I have the honour as does Mr Gosche and others of standing up and doing that job for them. On election night and in the days following those people made their choice. 
Let us look at the Working for Families package. There is the difference in ideology between the National Party and the Labour Party. The National Party went to an election promising—and I know it hates having people reminded of this—$9 billion worth of tax cuts that would have resulted in most people getting very very little. I believe that my opponent in the election tried to dispute John Key’s own words when John Key admitted that National would borrow to give a tax cut—$3.5 billion. Then Dr Brash went on television and said National was not borrowing for a tax cut but for other things. But if the tax cut was not given there would be no need for borrowing. All those Kiwis who Dr Brash treated as fools are not fools. They thought again and worked out that it was voodoo economics by Dr Brash. It was a bribe. 
Labour will back Kiwis with families so that almost all families with children who earn under $45000 will benefit from substantial inputs and tax relief from this Government. Once the Working for Families package is fully implemented child poverty will be slashed. 
Judith Collins 
: Ha! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Judith Collins groans; she is not interested in slashing child poverty—not from her electorate. She is interested in a tax cut. That is all she is fixated on. If she is asked about child poverty she yawns. Well I say she should go and yawn to some of the kids in South Auckland and Christchurch and their mums and dads and talk about a tax cut for those at the bottom of the heap. She should go and yawn at them and see how much traction she gets politically. 
So there are our achievements and our goals in health education and family assistance with our Working for Families package—and what do those members talk about? They talk about tax cuts. What a terrible week it has been for the National Party. It started with the carcass over there swinging on the hook. Then of course the deputy leader Gerry Brownlee made history. I cannot remember any other time that a member stood up and attacked the head of State’s representative. He got stuck in knowing of course—as National members do because they attack only those who cannot talk back and cannot respond—that our head of State’s representative could not respond. There is a word for that. I will not use it. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: No you will not. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: But Mr Brownlee may well rue the day he made those statements.