Blumsky Mark: Address in Reply 
Blumsky Mark: Address in Reply 
[Volume:628;Page:153] 
MARK BLUMSKY (National) 
: 
 I just want to say to my daughter Kendra that I hope the next 15 minutes of good behaviour are the 15 minutes she remembers of the New Zealand Parliament. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate the Hon Margaret Wilson on being appointed Speaker and you Mr Deputy Speaker on your appointment. I am honoured that you are in the Chair tonight. 
Poet James K Baxter once famously called Wellington the “sterile whore of a thousand bureaucrats”. His rather unflattering description while it may have been accurate at the time is clearly dated. Wellington has truly changed as a city and it is anything but sterile today. It has also been a very long time since Wellington had just a thousand bureaucrats. I am extremely proud to have played a part in the transformation of Wellington from sterile to vibrant from a sea of grey to a field of colour. It was a transformation that started with pride and a shift in attitude; the physical changes actually came later. I want to see similar changes in New Zealand as a nation. I want to be part of making that change happen. Today I want to lay out my vision for the future of New Zealand and my role as a member of Parliament for the National Party. 
But I first want to thank the people who got me into this House where I have the opportunity to make a difference. I start by acknowledging the love and support of my family who are here tonight without whom I literally would not be here today. Not many people know that my dad John Blumsky stood for National in 1972. Our campaigns had a lot in common. We both ran against sitting Labour MPs—Tom McGuigan in his case—and unfortunately we both lost. Dad went on to carve out a stellar career in broadcasting and as for me I have entered the House—just not quite through the door of my choice. As a result I can assure members now that I am a huge fan of MMP and I hope to take this chance to carve out a career in politics that will make my dad proud. 
I also take some time to publicly thank my wife Corinne. I met Corinne Denis—as she was then—when she was 16 years old and had just left school with School Certificate English and typing. She started in a law firm as the boss’s secretary typing his letters and papers. She actually became interested in what she was typing and started her legal education from there. Seventeen years and many many exams later she is now a fully-fledged partner in that same law firm having been the Mayoress of Wellington and the mother of our daughter Kendra as well. I am in awe of her and what she has done. She is a role model and an inspiration for me and many many others. I am very proud of her and I do not tell her often enough. So thank you. I am delighted my daughter Kendra is here tonight. I will talk a little bit more about her later on. 
I want to thank Don Brash and Judy Kirk for welcoming me to the National Party. I want to thank the members of Parliament from the National Party old and new who have given me advice and support throughout the campaign and since the election. I would like to record my thanks to the many people who gave their time effort and support to my campaign. In particular I would like to thank Patricia Morrison David Farrar and the team who worked bloody hard to help me. It is nice to see so many of them here tonight. I also want to thank my executive assistant Susan Palmer who has my office running so smoothly that I fear it will take me months to catch up with it. Finally I must also thank the National Party delegates who gave me the decent list ranking which was just as well as it turned out. 
I stand in this House proud to be a member of Parliament and proud to be a Wellingtonian. When I say I want to be a voice for Wellington in the Chamber I mean it. This is not just the city where I live; this is a city I do deeply love. To me it is the best place to live work love and play anywhere in the world. It is a city that is absolutely positively thriving. Every day I stand on one of my balconies and look out over the inner city of Wellington—the heart of Wellington. I can almost feel the pulse of the city. I feel like I can almost touch the spirit of the city. People live everywhere in the city now—in buildings old and new. They live in little developments that even long-term Wellingtonians have never heard of or are unaware of. They do make the city what it is. 
However it is important to recognise that Wellington is not just a city of James K Baxter’s public servants. Wellington cannot be seen as just a Government town—Wellington needs new business too. Start-up companies and new businesses are what will keep Wellington growing. But one main constraint facing businesses is the cost and availability of office space. Demand from the public sector is making space in the city increasingly difficult to obtain. I actually found that out myself. During the campaign I was actually forced to move from my campaign office because the building I was in had just been leased by a Government department. That was almost a little too ironic even for me. 
Reservations about the size of the public service are nothing new. At one stage in our nation’s history the entire public service was housed in the old Government Buildings just down the road. In the course of preparing my speech as many have done before me I read the maiden statements of a wide variety of parliamentarians. One quote on this subject particularly struck me. It read: “… many of us express anxiety about the growth of the public sector … which we must control and even reduce.” I suspect—and the new razor gang may even agree—that those words are as true today as when they were spoken in 1979 by the Rt Hon Winston Peters. 
I firmly believe that life is a series of learnings. At every stage in our lives—at work with our families in our community or at home—there are lessons to be learnt if only we are open to those learnings. Over the years I have worked in a wide variety of industries with a huge array of talented and dedicated people. From the shoe industry Hannah’s and Mischief I learnt the importance of customer satisfaction and how to put myself in the other person’s shoes when trying to find a solution to a specific problem. As Mayor of Wellington I learnt the importance of leadership and the power of pride and attitude in making a change. From my work at the high-growth start-up incubator Creative HQ I saw and understood the power of inspiration and entrepreneurship. From my community work with the Wellington Free Ambulance and the Mary Potter Hospice I learnt so much about the strength of people and the strength of families in times of need and the impact and importance of volunteers. All those learnings will help shape my decision making in Parliament. 
The challenge in Parliament is to speak in terms of vision—what caused me to stand for Parliament. I want to set out my vision of New Zealand’s future and in doing so I can assure members that I am acutely aware of my place as a back-bench Opposition MP and part of a very large and very talented National Party class of 2005. I recognise my situation but I am here to make a difference. 
I am a naturally positive person but I am concerned at the way New Zealand is drifting. It is more of a drift than a conscious move but the trend is serious. As I look at New Zealand I do worry about our national attitude. When faced with a challenge too many Kiwis are saying “No” too early and too often. We need to be saying: “I think I can. Let me just think a little bit as to how.” Why are we now looking at things so negatively? We need to start teaching and talking with a positive attitude. We cannot be accepting of mediocrity or hostile to success. We seem to be lacking pride but accumulating cynicism. We seem to be moving away from self-reliance to an attitude that the world owes us a living. Young people are the future of this country yet too often their aspiration is replaced by apathy. 
To an extent I saw many of those traits in Wellington when I became mayor. I made it my priority to change that attitude. I promoted positivity pride big ideas innovation creativity and fun—and it worked too. Once the attitude changed the city could change. We could redevelop and grow and as a result Wellington has changed. We have Wellingtonians who are proud of their city acting as ambassadors to the rest of the country and the rest of the world. It is not actually a naturally Kiwi trait to be overtly proud of one’s city but somehow we made it work. I want to know why we cannot take that attitude nationally. We prove every day that our bands films food software wine fashion sport books beer and drama are world-class. Yet at home we seem to lack a national aspiration—a national attitude. 
 We need to wake up as a country and stand tall. Right now we have an education system that discourages kids from striving to excel. Right now we have a welfare system that discourages parents from working too hard to get ahead. Right now we are institutionalising the attitude that we should not stretch or strive to succeed and that we should do only what is absolutely necessary to get by. Right now we are telling ourselves and the world that this truly is as good as it gets. That is what John Key eloquently called the “Poverty of expectation and ambition” in his maiden speech just 3 years ago. We need to develop a national attitude that celebrates success supports hard work encourages excellence and demonstrates positivity and pride. I am becoming increasingly convinced that a new flag will be needed to reflect this new attitude—it may well be just the catalyst we need. 
I stood for the National Party because I believe that it has a mix of policies and leadership most likely to make the necessary changes to our attitude as a country. National is the party most likely to make New Zealand the place I want for my daughter—for the next generation. I stand for a New Zealand that has less government more business lower taxes and a better attitude. We as politicians should provide the environment where people and families and companies and cities can thrive. 
In this term I intend to work hard for the people of Wellington in order to earn their support at the next election in under 3 years’ time. I will be a voice for Wellington in Wellington. There are a number of Wellington issues that I wish to advance on behalf of Wellingtonians. We need to see progress on Transmission Gully. We need to see it now; it is necessary. Wellington needs more police. As part of the many agreements in place to cobble together a Government there is a promise of a 1000 new police in 3 years’ time. Be under no illusion Wellington needs its share. Out at the airport it is vital that the new generation Boeing 787 jets are able to land in Wellington. These planes represent the future of travel and Wellington simply cannot afford to be left out of that loop. Another reality is that there are simply too many councils in the Wellington region. It is hopeless. As an example I am not convinced that the needs of Upper Hutt and Lower Hutt are so different that they need completely different councils. We need to look seriously at some level of local government amalgamation. 
Finally I am convinced that we need to find some innovative ways of protecting Wellington from disruptive and abusive vagrants. It is simply not good enough for staff and customers at a Wellington cafe at 8.30 on a Tuesday morning to be abused by a vagrant who is high on drugs alcohol or methylated spirits. As a Wellington MP I will lead a response to this problem. Businesses are hurting. We need to solve the problem now. 
In conclusion my vision is a Wellington and a New Zealand that our children want to live in. Like 61640 other Kiwis Mark Blumsky Shane Jones Don Brash Jo Goodhew Damien O’Connor and Heather Roy all have children around 12 or 13 years of age—going on 18 if they are like Kendra. Most of us do what we do in Parliament for our children. MPs contrary to popular belief are not usually in it for themselves. I have entered politics to make a difference for my girl Kendra. I want her to learn and live and love. I want her to travel the world. I want her to want to come back home to New Zealand—to a good job to choices to safety to a clean environment and to a good education system that has marks. Ronald Reagan was at his best when he said: “Each generation sees farther than the generation that preceded it because it stands on the shoulders of that generation. You’re going to have opportunities beyond anything that we’ve ever known.” 
I want Kendra to have those opportunities. I want all young New Zealanders to have those opportunities because they deserve them. They deserve a New Zealand that does not force them to stay. They deserve a New Zealand that does not bribe them to stay. They deserve a New Zealand they want to live in.