Nash Stuart: Taxation (Annual Rates Trans-Tasman Savings Portability KiwiSaver and Remedial Matters) Bill — First Reading 
Nash Stuart: Taxation (Annual Rates Trans-Tasman Savings Portability KiwiSaver and Remedial Matters) Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:659;Page:8302] 
STUART NASH (Labour) 
: 
 I find it astounding that Mr Foss believes that a lot of New Zealanders are looking fondly across the Tasman and wanting to come home. Maybe they are doing so if they earn more than $100000 but if they are earning $40000 or less than the minimum wage why would they? The Government gave no tax cuts to anyone except the wealthy. 
I stand in support of the Taxation (Annual Rates Trans-Tasman Savings Portability KiwiSaver and Remedial Matters) Bill. It is common-sense legislation that simplifies the law for many. As mentioned by the Minister of Revenue Peter Dunne the bill also includes a number of technical changes to rules surrounding KiwiSaver gift duty exemptions and binding rulings in order to improve the way the rules work and to reduce compliance costs for taxpayers and other remedial matters. 
I suspect that the main talking point will be that the bill introduces changes to the tax rules as alluded to by other speakers to allow New Zealanders returning home from Australia to bring their retirement savings with them. This is good for a number of reasons. It is a way of future-proofing New Zealand. 
We all know that the current Minister of Revenue was a Labour member of Parliament for a number of years—10 I think it was—and he worked with the Labour Party for a number of years. But he has fluctuated philosophically and politically and has now gone back to the past. In coming from a background such as his I personally cannot see as a Labour man myself how the honourable member could possibly align himself with a National Party that has overt philosophies around privatisation and tax cuts for the wealthy. What was that figure? It was that one-third of tax cuts went to the top 3 percent of income earners. How could a former Labour MP for 10 years sit over there and agree with such philosophies? 
Hon Member 
: Under urgency. 
STUART NASH 
: Especially when they are brought in under urgency. It is amazing is it not? It is absolutely astounding. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: It was a hell of a lot longer than 10 years. It felt like a century. 
STUART NASH 
: Yes. But I suspect that deep down he still retains those social democratic values that define our philosophies which the next Prime Minister of New Zealand the Hon Phil Goff personifies so clearly. 
I say that this bill is future-proofing the country because the Minister must know that precious few Kiwis will be returning to this wonderful country as long as the National Government is in power. After all what is attractive about privatising the accident compensation system? In fact I will tell members who will be coming across the ditch in a great hurry. It will be the Australian insurance companies who will be wringing their hands in glee at the anticipation of the privatisation of the scheme. It is coming and I ask members opposite what is next because that is what the voters in Napier and New Zealand are asking. Will the Government force children who play sport to pay their own accident compensation levies? And what about the elderly? Let us face facts: the elderly use up a fair bit of the accident compensation budget so will the Government start charging them as well? What about primary school kids? Will there be another tax on their parents? Of course kids fall out of trees and they use the accident compensation scheme. So what is next? What sort of country is the National Government turning this wonderful New Zealand into? 
Shall we go further? I wonder whether the Government will privatise Kiwibank. After all Mr English refused to recapitalise so the bank had to start borrowing offshore. It was disgraceful. What about privatising Television New Zealand or even the Department of Conservation. Well the Government has already done so to a certain extent because it is allowing a preferential planting right on Crown land for selected groups. 
I wonder whether National will accept the advice of its former leader and privatise schools. There is a plan for Mr English and Mr Key: let us make money out of education. Well let me tell members something. Kiwis are not simply pieces of data on a spreadsheet to be manipulated and manoeuvred in a sick attempt to save a dollar here and a dollar there at the expense of our long-term future and well-being. We are hard-working mothers and fathers sisters and brothers who are struggling at this point in time and this just makes it worse. 
We have seen too much of this with the axing of the KiwiSaver contributions as my colleague the Hon David Cunliffe mentioned. As for adult and community education courses I ask whether members know that in Napier there will now be no night courses run next year. A total of 6000 people took night courses in Napier this year but none will be doing so next year because there is no money to fund them. Those courses survived for decades even under the Rt Hon Sir Robert Muldoon who really stuffed this country up. But at least he understood the value of education. For a lot of people it is second-chance education. 
What about the axing of the tertiary incentive allowance through which the honourable Minister who cut that allowance got her degree. She stood up and said that if it had not been for the tertiary incentive allowance she would not have got her degree. Then she cut it. And now we have a former leader of the National Party appointed to the head of a Government working party called the Productivity Commission. The Prime Minister stated that this report had some nuggets in it. Well I wonder what those nuggets are. Maybe they are doing away with interest-free student loans or cutting the minimum wage by $100 a week. Imagine that! Imagine cutting the minimum wage by $100 a week. Wow that is amazing. Or maybe there will be a flat tax structure. That would be great if we earn over $100000 a year and do not give a damn for ordinary Kiwis. For the vast majority of Kiwis this sort of productivity report is a slap in the face for ordinary good hard-working New Zealanders and the Government should be ashamed of itself. 
What will we see next year? The whole of New Zealand will hold its breath in anticipation. We will watch the rush to travel agents as Kiwis book their tickets to Australia for a couple of years before coming back to New Zealand once Phil Goff becomes Prime Minister in 2011. 
Amy Adams 
: The next Labour Prime Minister hasn’t been born yet Stuart I am sorry to tell you. 
STUART NASH 
: I say to Amy Adams that he is a man of integrity honesty and substance and he will make a great Prime Minister. 
As mentioned this bill is future-proofing the country for when Kiwis choose to return. This is a sensible arrangement that allows New Zealanders to bring their Australian superannuation funds back into New Zealand and consolidate them under one account. This is a sensible and common-sense measure for a number of reasons but one of the most compelling is that there is potentially $16.6 billion in lost contributions from New Zealanders working in Australia who under this scheme could come back to New Zealand. Even if a fraction of that money was to come back home it would have a positive impact. Let us look at the problems that are going on in Australia at the moment. Australia is into its fire season—I think it has 52000 fires a year—and it has a water shortage problem. Water is our competitive advantage. New Zealand is an oasis. New Zealanders will be coming back in 2011—members should not worry about that. Like I said if even a fraction of that figure were to return once Labour regains the Treasury benches it will be good for the country. It is only 2 more years but those are 2 years too long for many hard-working New Zealanders who are struggling to make ends meet under this Government. 
Members can imagine the outflow from this country if Don Brash’s suggestion that the minimum wage should drop by $100 a week was one of the nuggets that Mr Key and Mr English liked. That is not a way to achieve parity with Australia unless parity means emptying out the country of people who simply cannot afford to stay here. As we know the Australians actually have a compulsory superannuation fund which makes this bill look like a very attractive proposition for us in New Zealand. In fact believe it or not New Zealand used to have a compulsory superannuation fund. So when Mr Foss stands on the other side of the Chamber looks across here and says that the Australians seem to have that side of things better sorted than us in New Zealand he is dead right—they do; they have compulsory superannuation. We used to have compulsory superannuation over here did we not I say to Sir Roger. We had compulsory superannuation over here. I ask Sir Roger who designed the scheme that was in place until a chap called Sir Robert Muldoon—illegally apparently—abolished it. I ask members to imagine how much better off this country would be if he had not done so. Goodness me—it is unbelievable. 
We are on the way a second time. The first step which was implemented by Dr Cullen Phil Goff and Labour was to introduce KiwiSaver which is very popular. But true to form National cut the employer contribution from 4 percent to 2 percent. That is amazing. How will that increase productivity? It will not. 
I will support this bill going through to the Committee stage. Labour members will go over it with the level of scrutiny that it deserves and that New Zealanders expect. We will end up with the type of robust legislation that New Zealanders came to expect over the 9 years of a Labour Government. However under this Government they have been let down recently due to a lack of process and too much urgency resulting in poor legislation. Thank you.