Williams Andrew: Taxation (Budget Measures) Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Williams Andrew: Taxation (Budget Measures) Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 24 May 2012. Volume:680;Page:2480. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
ANDREW WILLIAMS (NZ First) 
: 
 Thank you Mr Chairman and I am not Mr Australia either. It is nice to stand and take a call on behalf of New Zealand First on Part 3 of the Taxation (Budget Measures) Bill in relation to the student loan scheme and the bonus payment programme. It was introduced by the National Government only in 2010 and now it is planning to remove it. It is symptomatic of basically a Government that is blundering along muddling along and really just not in charge of the train. And this train wreck seems to be just coming off the rails everywhere it turns. In this particular instance the Government brought in something in 2010 without much thought and it did not really work it was not a great result and now the Government overturns it. It is symptomatic of so many other things that this Government is doing. If the people of New Zealand the public of New Zealand were to analyse much of what this Government is doing they would see the same thing time and time again. It is bringing in policies and trying out policies and it is real hit-and-miss sort of stuff. As a result there are big U-turns being taken left right and centre. This sends a very poor message I believe to the young people of New Zealand. Basically how can they have faith in the Government of New Zealand—or the National Government of New Zealand—when it can bring in a policy one year and a year or so later it just dumps it because it did not quite work out where there has not been much analysis of it and it has not really resulted in what it was expecting it would?  
New Zealand First has had a policy for some time now that would actually resolve the whole student loan problem. We put it out at the election and it was greatly supported by young students all over New Zealand who saw real merit in it. That was the dollar for dollar student loan scheme where we would incentivise students and say that for every dollar they pay back the Government would match them with another dollar. At the present time when there is more than $12 billion in student loans sitting out there on the Government books and when very very little of the money is being recovered—something like only a fraction is being recovered—the New Zealand First scheme would ensure that we actually started to get most of that money back. Students would have an incentive: they would know that basically they can get rid of half of their loan if they get on and start paying it on a dollar for dollar scheme. It came with some caveats. It came with the caveat that when you completed your degree you would have to stay in New Zealand and work and repay that loan. You could not just wander off; you had to stay and work here to get that dollar for dollar scheme.  
What that would do is ensure that our students and our graduates did have an incentive to stay in New Zealand—we would keep their brains keep their knowledge keep their expertise in New Zealand—and work in New Zealand. And—and this is the win-win part of it—of course if they are working in New Zealand and they are paying tax the very dollar that the Government would be providing to subsidise them in the student loan scheme the very dollar that the Government would be helping them with on a dollar for dollar repayment scheme would actually be coming out of the very taxes that they would be paying as a new working person within the New Zealand working environment.  
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: Just come back to Part 3.  
ANDREW WILLIAMS 
: Well no it is very important because what we are saying is that this is failed policy. This is failed policy and it is proven that the Government has failed on this and what we are saying is that this whole Budget is full of failed policies again.  
It is a shame that this Government has not had the foresight to bring in some policies with vision which would actually solve the problems. We could have vision in some of our policies which would actually get on top of the problems such as the policies that New Zealand First was expounding in terms of the student loan dollar for dollar scheme. Here we have students now marching in the streets in Auckland in relation to this barricading Symonds Street and up in arms. It is a sad thing in this world that we have now got to the stage where a Budget can result in young people marching in the streets because they are so dissatisfied with it. New Zealand First does not support this latest move by the Government. Again it is an attack on our young people. It is not too different to the attack on the young paper boys and paper girls of this country. Basically this Government is going for the lowest form of resistance that it can. It is going after anybody it can attack and who cannot fight back: so it goes after the students after the young people after the families after the elderly—after all of those. But it leaves the Government’s wealthy rich friendly mates exempt.