Foss Craig: General Debate 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Foss Craig: General Debate 
[Sitting date: 07 November 2012. Volume:685;Page:6366. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon CRAIG FOSS (Minister of Commerce) 
: 
 Well we know something is up because Mr Cunliffe is growing his beard again and Mr Jones has had a fresh new haircut. The last time that happened there was some movement over on the other side. Have a look Mr Speaker. Mr Jones has had another haircut and Mr Cunliffe is once again growing his beard. Something is up. 
Of course I do not know what is going on in the Opposition because a couple of weeks ago there was a manufacturing crisis apparently. Then we showed the Opposition the numbers and it realised there was not a manufacturing crisis. Today Opposition members are talking about a supposed housing crisis and the Acting Minister of Housing pointed out today that there are 634-odd more State houses than there were when we came in to Government in 2008. I am not sure what the next crisis is but apparently I do suspect happily that it is there to try to cast a shadow or avoid the leadership crisis under David Shearer. To be fair to him he has had a bit of a rough year. His 1 year is not quite up—I think he has got 20 or so days to go—but the knives are being sharpened. We watched the leader’s lead-off debate at general debate time and it was very revealing to see those who were not paying any attention whatsoever. 
I will move on to the coalition of the unwilling presenting its solutions recently—Labour and the Greens. Future Minister of Finance apparently Russel Norman will be casting aside Mr Cunliffe and casting aside Mr Parker perhaps. Who would be the Minister of Finance under the coalition of the unwilling over there? But that team has given us some insights into Labour’s deep thinking. Mr Parker Mr Cunliffe and Mr Norman want to fix our exchange rate. They want to fix it at a certain rate. No one has actually asked them what rate is the correct rate. No one has actually asked them how much capital should be put at risk to defend the exchange rate at a certain level and for how long. No one has asked them how much capital should be diverted from schools hospitals health and superannuation to be used to defend some artificial exchange rate that they think is correct. Those questions will be asked and they will be very revealing because once again those members’ rhetoric and their grabbing for headlines do not actually match reality. 
The only other solution they have got out there that they have told us about is that they just want to print money. It is a fair enough response I suppose which they keep coming out with day after day when we challenge them—“How will you pay for your promises?”—that they are just going to get the xerox out and the printing press out. What a solution! I do not know why after hundreds of years we did not think of that—why standard normal economics did not think of that. But incidentally there are examples around the world where they have tried that and our Prime Minister Key pulled out some Zimbabwe money the other day to demonstrate that to us. 
There is no crisis. New Zealand is performing in growth statistics better than anyone else in the OECD right now—better than anyone else—so there is no crisis. The dream or the nightmare team over there want to abandon our inflation vigilance. Abandoning our inflation vigilance which has been stable for so many years is like throwing the sprinklers out or turning the sprinklers off because there has not been a fire in the house. It is the vigilance the prudence of our Public Finance Act and of our Reserve Bank and its independence that have served this country so well and have essentially created so many jobs. 
I want to quickly bring us to Hawke’s Bay. Hawke’s Bay has great proposals in front of it—a huge storage dam to help our economy and to create jobs for our families. I challenge the Labour Party to put on record whether it supports that proposal because its potential coalition partners are doing all they can to disrupt that proposal. That is about 3 percent or 4 percent growth for Hawke’s Bay if the dam goes ahead. Eugenie Sage from the Green Party was sacked after 19 years of not having a water plan in Canterbury and is trying to disrupt the water plan of Hawke’s Bay. I challenge the Labour Party to say where it stands because Damien O’Connor said when he was in the Hawke’s Bay that he supported it yet one of its candidates is now saying that they do not support it. 
Hon Annette King 
: What candidate? We don’t have candidates. 
Hon CRAIG FOSS 
: Former candidate former MP Ms King. The Opposition party—it says no to everything. It says no to every initiative to create jobs that grow real growth and real after-tax incomes. It says no to every Better Public Services announcement or change we try to put in place. It says no to families’ aspirations of a brighter future. I am so surprised we have to fight for so many of the initiatives that we try to put in place for a much better brighter future for all of our families in Hawke’s Bay and beyond.