Chadwick Steve: General Debate 
Chadwick Steve: General Debate 
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STEVE CHADWICK (Labour—Rotorua) 
: 
 This is a hallmark month for Labour. It is a month in which we are going out with policy not spin and it is policy that we developed well before we were elected into Government in 1999. We have centrepiece policies not just spin over substance. Our policies are good for New Zealanders especially families from the cradle to the grave. Everybody in New Zealand is a winner with Labour. 
I want to talk quickly about the primary health organisation roll-out. This completes policy undertaken in 2001 with 25 to 44-year-olds now paying low-cost fees when visiting doctors. That is the end of the cake. The scheme now extends right across the age spectrum in New Zealand and I say “well done” to Pete Hodgson for finishing this work. It has taken $2.2 billion to make this happen. National members support raising fees for doctors’ visits in this age group. They said so in the last election campaign. They will do it again and we will be out there reminding New Zealanders to be very afraid of their hollow promises. 
I am just getting started. In my electorate of Rotorua we have covered the entire district with low-cost access to doctors. It is wonderful policy not spin. Everybody can get to the doctor for half of what it cost in 1999. In 1999 it cost $50 to visit the doctor; now in Rotorua visits to the doctor cost $22. 
KiwiSaver begins on 1 July. People will get a $1000 kickstart when they open an account. What a wonderful thing for New Zealand families. Young people in Ponsonby Road were asked after the Budget announcement whether they would join. “I’ll join up”—they said—“I’d rather start a savings scheme now than have a tax cut.” That attitude is spreading like wild fire throughout New Zealand. Security in their old age and getting a savings mentality is what KiwiSaver will help people to get on 1 July. That is good for New Zealand families. It builds resilience for their children and opportunities for a secure future. 
 KiwiSaver adds to the superannuation scheme. It is designed as a top-up. National has already dropped hints about scrapping universal superannuation. The old-age pensioners and Grey Power remember when National cut the superannuation rates. National should come clean. If National ever gets the reins of power people should be very afraid of what it would do to senior citizens in this country—lest we forget. 
Labour’s policies are from cradle to the grave. From 1 July paid parental leave is rolling out even further. We have over 90 percent buy-in in this country now and from 1 July parents are going to get an increase from $372 per week to $391 per week. Is that not fantastic? The Opposition and the women members in the Opposition voted against paid parental leave. Women in New Zealand will never forget that. We women members of this Labour Government will make sure that every women’s group we meet in the country will be told about the Opposition’s hard-hearted approach to paid parental leave. What is wrong with parents being paid to be at home with their children until they are able to enter the workforce again if they choose to? 
Now let us go to the next aspect of cradle to the grave which is early childhood education. The comment from the Leader of the Opposition today that it is “something for nothing” is simply outrageous. We are laying the best possible foundation for our young children for access to quality learning experiences with 20 hours’ free education. Paula Bennett is simply wrong on this one and she knows it. We will make sure New Zealanders know it. This is exactly the strategy that the Opposition undertook with the primary health organisations’ roll-out and low cost doctors’ fees. Opposition members went around every general practitioner’s surgery to say: “Don’t join the PHO. Stay out of it.” It is the same strategy that they used then. Hello when 30 percent of general practitioner practices in New Zealand joined the primary health organisations the whole country tumbled and the Opposition hated it. Well we are hearing the same rhetoric now about 20 free hours’ childcare. Those centres that have joined up—and good on them—have done their sums; they are joining up. Once we hit the 30 percent threshold all the centres will be in there. Who is going to benefit from this? It is going to be our children and our children’s future.