Brownlee Gerry: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Brownlee Gerry: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
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Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Minister for Economic Development) 
: 
 I am very very pleased to stand and speak today in support of the Prime Minister’s statement tabled in this House on 9 February. This document outlines the Government’s ambitious plans for the year ahead. It recognises that if New Zealanders are to be better off the Government needs to do some things to ensure that the income is there to make them better off. The document says that if we can be fairer to New Zealanders through the tax system then we will look at that. If we can be fairer to New Zealanders through the benefit system then we will look at that too. There will of course be announcements on both of those matters later in the year. 
This speech is traditionally given each year by the Prime Minister and normally the media are able to comment on the way in which the Leader of the Opposition responds to it. The expectation is that the set piece from the Prime Minister will be somewhat dismantled by the free flow of speech from the Leader of the Opposition. That did not happen this year and it did not happen because the Leader of the Opposition has no answer to this particular work plan. Opposition members in fact to a person have no answer to this particular work plan other than that they do not like it. 
The only response that we have had this year from the Leader of the Opposition to the current economic difficulties this country faces is for there to be a cap on the salaries of those who lead Government departments. He does not tell us of course that 31 of those 35 people were appointed by Labour 31 of those 35 people had their salaries approved by Labour and what is more they were signed off by Annette King who was the then Minister of State Services. I will not say any more about that because I think that just shows the politics of envy that the Labour Party has got itself caught in and the fact that it is a party that has exceptionally low aspirations for New Zealanders. 
I will speak today though about the section in the Prime Minister’s statement that talks about New Zealand making more of our oil gas and other minerals available to us throughout this country. It is a little-known fact that New Zealand’s third-largest export product is now oil. Last year we exported some 21 million barrels of oil from this country and that is adding to the value that we have inside our economy in quite an extraordinary way. Most people do not see it most people do not know it is there but they understand its effects because it has a positive effect on making sure that the balance between what we spend and what we earn is kept within a fairly tight band. It is one area where we can rapidly increase the national income if we are bold enough to have a go at it. 
This summer due I think to the encouragement of the National Government over the previous year we are experiencing the biggest drilling programme in the oil and gas sector in both offshore New Zealand and onshore New Zealand that we have ever seen. I am told that the results coming through so far are extremely encouraging and later this year I expect that the size of New Zealand’s confirmed oil and gas reserves will be greatly expanded. That is very much a good news story. 
On the mineral front I can sense that the various Opposition parties are starting to gear up for a scaremongering campaign aimed at getting New Zealanders distracted from the benefit that can be accrued from very very minimal intervention in the landscape and from the extraction in a surgical fashion of the minerals available to us in this country. I want to make it very clear that right now there are 82 mineral concessions on Department of Conservation land— 
Hon Member 
: How many? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: —82 concessions on Department of Conservation land—and most of those were granted or re-approved by the previous Labour-Green administration. In total mining occupies 40 square kilometres of this country’s entire land mass of some 2 million square kilometres. Not all of that area is actually involved in mining; it is taken up as areas where mining could take place. The return to the New Zealand economy from that activity is around $175000 per hectare. We can compare that with dairying. Dairying covers some 20000 square kilometres—so that is 40 versus 20000—and has a return of $3500 per hectare versus $175000. I think the Green Party in particular needs to consider the economics of that. 
One of the interesting things is that as these organisations gear up supposedly to fight the Government and threaten civil disobedience and all sorts of other things I notice they are using every modern media communication device available to any one of us such as cellphones computers and all that sort of stuff. It is all being used yet those parties are not prepared to recognise that none of it would exist if someone had not extracted minerals somewhere to make the products—to get the minerals that make the materials that go into the manufacture of those communications devices. Millions of people throughout the world are alive right now because they have surgical assistance—implants or other such—all because somewhere someone extracted some minerals from the ground. There are virtually no households in New Zealand that could survive today without the good effect of some mineral extraction somewhere in the world. 
The question is why are these parties so excited about using all of this equipment—so excited about modern medical technology etc. some of the educational equipment that is around these days and the energy-saving technologies that are developing throughout the world—but then saying: “Well not us. Let someone else do that.”? That seems to me to be a position that has two sides to the argument if members get my drift; there is a word there that we do not use in Parliament. In my opinion it is unacceptable for people to rail against this sort of consideration—because that is where we are at the moment—but then take all the benefits of the activity at the same time. That is completely inconsistent and I have to say that I think it is somewhat hypocritical. 
New Zealand is one of the few countries in the world that is blessed with large deposits of what are called rare earth elements. They are a range of metals that have names that most of us have never heard and frankly that most of us cannot pronounce. The reality is that they are used in compact fluorescent lights hybrid vehicles wind turbines and catalytic converters as additives in some fuels to reduce consumption and in flat-panel screens disc drives digital cameras and all sorts of medical appliances. The interesting thing is that the one other country in the world that has significant deposits at the present time is China. We can ask ourselves whether we should say: “No we will not avail ourselves of the opportunities we have in this country. We’ll leave it to China.” But I ask members how New Zealanders will improve their incomes and their way of life by leaving it to another country to corner a monopoly on these very very important rare earth elements. I have to say that I do not know. If anyone on the other side of the House knows they should be saying so because this is an opportunity that is unique to this country. 
We are putting out a paper that indicates where these metals are inside the New Zealand conservation estate and we will be asking New Zealanders to make a choice. I make a suggestion to those who want to fight that: if it is all so very important they should not use any media or communications equipment that relies on those metals. The message I tell those members is to prove themselves to be true to what they saying. 
Hon Members 
: Don’t be ridiculous! 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: Oh over there they are telling me not to be ridiculous because the hypocritical stance is OK for them. That is what they are saying. This decision will be interesting for New Zealanders. It is about our deciding whether we want to grow the wealth base of this country or whether we want simply to sit around and accept the crumbs off another nation’s table.