Robertson GrantHon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): I'm very keen to take up the member's invite to talk about the Budget Policy Statement. Perhaps we'll kick off where she ended which is that yes the process that agencies and departments are going through in preparing their bids for this year's Budget is indeed the most rigorous it has ever been in New Zealand's history. That's actually what's happening because agencies and departments are now required not just to put up a bid and say Here's what we think we'll be able to do. Here's how many services we think we might be able to provide as a result of putting the money in.". It actually asks those agencies and departments "What's the impact of this going to be? How will this affect people over a period of generations? What will the distribution of the impact be? How will it actually affect who gets to benefit from it?" Tim Ng who is the chief economist at Treasury actually said "This is the most rigorous approach we've ever seen to a Budget."So Amy Adams is actually completely wrong in her assessment of this and in her final comments around the cost-benefit analysis tool she is in fact misrepresenting that tool because what she's doing is comparing the way that tool measures cost to Government for a service and private benefit of something that a person gets. They are two completely different parts of the tool and they have existed since the member was a Minister. She knows that and I actually think it really does undermine what is world-leading work by the New Zealand Treasury on their Living Standards Framework which began under the previous Government and suddenly now that the National Party is in Opposition they decide that this is not worthy. Well I think this is a huge advance for New Zealand in terms of the way we put Budgets together and the way that we measure the success of our country. We also heard from the member her concern—and the Budget Policy Statement does cover this area—about where New Zealand is going in terms of its growth rates. It may have escaped the member who spoke before me but actually New Zealand's GDP began to slow at the beginning of 2017. That trend had started then and it was part of a global trend and actually just today Australia has released its fourth-quarter GDP numbers from last year which have 0.2 percent growth for that quarter and 2.3 percent growth for the year. That is a slowdown. It's happening across the world. I'd encourage Ms Adams to get out and about and see what's actually happening in the world. The IMF have said that advanced economies for this year in 2019 are projected to have growth around 2 percent. New Zealand is projected to have growth well in advance of that so in actual fact New Zealand continues to outperform those other economies. But we don't exist in a vacuum. We're a small open trading nation that has to make sure we're resilient and robust when things do turn down in the world and the good news is that we are. Ms Adams cherry-picks a few statistics out in her speech but it would be fair to say that the people I'll listen to about the strength of our economy are Standard & Poor's who upgraded their view about the strength of the economy in New Zealand last year and Moody's who continue to say that we're in a strong position. So Ms Adams can take the political stance but the truth is that on those core economic indicators New Zealand continues to do well. We are part of a global economy—we have to understand that—but the reflection and the negativity on the other side I guess is now something that we're coming to expect. This is a very different Budget Policy Statement the report of which is in front of the House today because for the first time we have within it a well-being outlook. That outlook includes information about the state of our core finances. It shows that the Government is on track to meet its Budget responsibility rules around issues like having a surplus and managing our debt. It shows that the growth track of the Government is steady and solid and as I say is outperforming some economies that we would normally compare ourselves to. It shows that unemployment is heading towards its lowest levels in a decade—indeed is actually already there at the moment. So those core economic indicators are part of our well-being outlook but in addition we're actually describing the state of New Zealand. Our people—how educated are we? How healthy are we? How secure do we feel? We're talking about the state of our environment. Are our rivers clean enough to swim in? Can we have air that we can breathe? And we're talking about the strength of our communities: how much people trust the Government how much they trust the people around them how they feel about their own culture and who they are as a person. Those are a wider set of indicators of success for our economy but they recognise a fundamental principle: the economy is a means to an end but it's not the end in itself. The problem we get ourselves into as a country if we see it as the end is what we experienced in the last nine years. Yes the growth rates were higher but the OECD told us we had the world's worst homelessness. We've got rivers that we can't swim in. We've got child poverty indicators getting worse. So that's what we're trying to address through this Budget Policy Statement—a much wider picture of what success looks like. What the Budget Policy Statement also indicates is that in doing so we will then have better information to address the real challenges to our well-being and our living standards. I'd really encourage members opposite to take a look at the Living Standards Dashboard that is available because what that shows is that we've developed this Budget on the basis of evidence. So the member who spoke before me spoke about the fact that she had a study where New Zealand was ranked in a particular place on disparity. Well take a look at that dashboard—take a look at it and input Māori and Pasifika people and on most indicators on that dashboard of living standards which covers issues like homeownership and income Māori have a far worse performance on those indicators than the average population. The ones where they don't are around issues of social connectedness and the community coming together—something that is a strength of our Māori and Pasifika communities. So we've got that evidence and we've made it a Budget priority. We've said that the priority in this Budget will be lifting Māori and Pacific income skills and opportunities. We chose that priority because the evidence told us that that's what we should do. So for the Opposition to stand up and tell us that this is somehow or other fluffy or woolly it's not—it's based on evidence. We have prioritised the things that the evidence has shown us will lift the living standards overall for New Zealanders. That is different from the past—I understand that—but it is a better way in my view of ensuring that Budgets actually reflect back to New Zealanders both what's important to them and the evidence that we have about what we do need to invest in. Within those other Budget priorities that are in the Budget Policy Statement are two critical elements to lifting the productivity of our economy. The first of those is investing in a long-term transition to a sustainable and low-emissions economy. It's time for everybody to get into the 21st century and understand that not only is this the right thing to do for our planet; it is where economic opportunity lies. We have huge opportunity to be able to be leading the world in new and clean technology in a fair and just transition to a lower-carbon economy and that is what that priority is about investing in. The second priority is about investing in innovation and in social and economic opportunities in a digital age. This is the future of work. This is making sure that New Zealanders are actually prepared to be able to adopt and adapt to technology and that businesses are able to take that on and use that to improve their productivity. To my mind these are the two big economic challenges facing New Zealand: how we make that transition and how we lift our productivity particularly through new technology. The other three priorities I've already mentioned—lifting Māori and Pacific income skills and opportunities. The other two are around reducing child poverty and improving child well-being and supporting mental well-being for all New Zealanders. These are critical issues to our success as a country and it was interesting to note that the member opposite when she spoke suggested that there wasn't an accountability for this Government on these measures. As the Minister of Finance I am now required to report every year on the Government's progress to reducing child poverty against a specific set of indicators. I would have thought the member who spoke before me would have known that because her party voted for that legislation. That is accountability. That's standing up and saying "We know that the economy is not an end in itself and that we actually have to talk about what it means for people and in this case for children." So there are specific indicators. We will report on them every single year and as the Minister of Finance I will report on them every single year in terms of the way we do the Budget and the Budget outlook. So I am very proud of this Budget Policy Statement. It represents a significant advance and step forward in measuring the whole of the success of New Zealand society. It includes critical measures around making sure that we continue to have a prosperous society. It focuses on being fiscally responsible but what it also shows is the sign of a Government that doesn't care just about prosperity for prosperity's sake. It cares about who shares in prosperity and that is a vital step forward for New Zealand."