Shearer David: Adjournment — Sittings of the House 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Shearer David: Adjournment — Sittings of the House 
[Sitting date: 12 December 2012. Volume:686;Page:7471. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DAVID SHEARER (Leader of the Opposition) 
: 
 Can I—[ 
Interruption 
] 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! I apologise to the Leader of the Opposition. Order! I ask that courtesy be shown please. 
DAVID SHEARER 
: Can I also start by wishing everybody here a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year and also by thanking you Mr Speaker for the way that you have handled the goings-on in the House over the past year with dignity and patience. I wish you all the very best with your future whenever that might be. We know that whoever is going to fill your shoes whether it be Maurice Williamson or Tau Henare will have big shoes to fill—that is when Steven Joyce makes up his mind who is going to be the Speaker. So thank you for your time in the Chair. 
Thank you also to all of those people in and around the Parliament who make this place work: to the staff in our offices who work the long hours working for our MPs and supporting them; to the messengers who keep the information flowing; to the cleaners who make our offices livable; to the cafe workers who keep us fed and caffeinated; and to the security guards who keep a watchful eye on us all. I would also like to thank the parliamentary staff in the Office of the Clerk for their work on research and on legislation. All of those people do their job with good humour with patience and with grace putting up with us politicians. 
Thank you also to the other leaders of the Opposition parties. We are like a family in many ways. We do not always agree but usually we make it work although thankfully like some families it is probably a good idea that we do not spend Christmas together. 
Finally thank you to the press gallery for what can be described only as fair and balanced reporting of my first and honeymoon year. I love your work as much as you say you love mine. 
For the Government this is the year its members would like to forget and many of them have tried very hard to do exactly that. The year 2012 will be described as the year of the brain fade—the year that the PM’s memory suddenly went “Dot-gone”. It is the year that has spawned a whole new lexicon of one-liners like if you can recall “I can’t remember.” “I don’t recall.” “I haven’t read that report.” “I don’t have that piece of paper with me.” and my personal favourite “That’s one person’s recollection.” I have another movie idea for Warner Bros and it is called  
Partial Recall 
. 
It started with John Banks and John Key having that cup of tea together over a year ago. Both could not remember the conversation. But it later turned out that they were actually talking about New Zealand First and senior citizens including one senior citizen whom they knew very well together Don Brash. John Banks continued the theme. He did not remember meeting Dotcom despite being flown to his mansion in a helicopter for dinner and meeting Dotcom’s wife whom he described as the most beautiful woman in the world. I can tell you that if I had said that to another woman in the presence of my wife she would never let me forget. 
John Key caught that brain fade bug. He did not want to read about Banks because he would need to remember what he said about ethical standards and to answer questions. He did not recall hearing about the new resident of the largest mansion in New Zealand—in his electorate. He did not recall that Kim Dotcom was wanted by the highest levels of the US establishment. He did not recall knowing about the Government Communications Security Bureau his own spy agency listening to Kim Dotcom’s conversations. He could not recall speaking to the bureau staff about it either. He did not know that his Deputy Prime Minister signed a once-in-a-decade ministerial certificate to try to hush up that spying. The reality is not that he did not know. The reality is that he did not want to know. 
Yes this Prime Minister has forgotten a lot this year from how he voted on the drinking age whether he did a backroom deal for more pokies with Skycity to exactly who it actually was who landed at the Wellington Airport just last week from the intelligence agencies of the United States. 
But I am sure that there is one thing that we can be quite clear about: he is unlikely to receive a Christmas card from the Beckhams this year. Remember too that David Beckham spent years at Manchester United wearing a gay red shirt every week. I recall that it was after the comments that the Prime Minister made about a week later that he was seen alongside other world leaders in one of those pink shiny numbers with shoulder pads strutting his stuff. And I thought: “Karma gets you in the end.” 
Hon Member 
: Carmen! 
DAVID SHEARER 
: Or Carmen. The National Party might want to forget but New Zealanders as they go into the barbecue and the Christmas season will not forget. What is it that this Government would like you to forget? Well unemployment is at the highest level in 13 years. In fact it is at the highest level since National was last in Government. Exports are down by 11 percent. Inequality increased by the highest amount in the OECD to the highest level in our recorded history. The current account deficit is the highest in the developed world exceeding that of Greece. And as one member of our party likes to say we have the worst economic growth in 50 years. Each week 1000 Kiwis are just giving up and going to Australia. Why? Because they cannot see an economic plan. Because the economic plan that this Government has is basically about selling stuff. 
When you look at what is being sold you realise not only that it is a bad idea but actually the price for what you are going to get is going to hit an all-time low whether it be Mighty River Power Meridian Energy Solid Energy or Air New Zealand. But that is OK because we can sell rural land! Our agricultural land can still be flogged off. Or you can reach into the pockets of problem gamblers and subsidise Skycity—another great economic idea. When you run out of all those ideas then comes the big idea which is about rebuilding Christchurch. When that is the big idea that the Government has for economic growth then you know there are no ideas that this Government really has for creating economic growth in this country. 
Then it would like you to forget a number of other things the number of times that sensitive data made it out into the public: ACC the Ministry of Social Development the Inland Revenue Department and I could keep on going. Then you come to education and this is what you would like to forget as well. Education—remember those class sizes that were going to be increased to actually enhance teacher quality? Then there were charter schools. You did not actually have to be a qualified teacher in order to teach in a charter school to make that even better. Then there is the idea to close down the schools in Christchurch even if they do not need to be closed down. By the way you do not need to talk to anybody before you actually go out there and do it. It used to be that when you criticised the education ministry you still got paid at the end of the month. Not any more. No there is no guarantee of that either. 
So as we go into Christmas we reflect back on the year and we realise that it has been a dismal one for New Zealand. But there is an upside—there is an upside. And the upside is that it has been a year of opportunity for the Opposition. So I would like to give credit where credit is due and thank the Government for the help it has been giving to the Opposition all year providing those easy targets setting the bar to new even lower levels and achieving none of its goals and promises. It is a year that it would love to forget and some of it it already has. I would like to encourage it to keep it up as we go into the holiday season. 
Finally I would just like to say once again to everybody here because I do not believe people appreciate sometimes how hard everybody works a very merry Christmas a happy New Year and please have a restful and safe holiday. Thank you very much.