Salesa Jenny: New Zealand Flag Referendums Bill — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeSalesa Jenny: New Zealand Flag Referendums Bill — Third Reading[Sitting date: 13 August 2015. Volume:707;Page:5830. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JENNY SALESA (Labour—Manukau East): I rise to take this call on this very costly and wasteful bill the New Zealand Flag Referendums Bill. The New Zealand flag is significant to many of us. It is an emotional point of connection for all New Zealanders and it can be a rallying point a unifying icon and a brand that is of benefit to Aotearoa New Zealand.However there are an increasing number of New Zealanders who have joined the Labour Party in opposing this bill and the expensive flag referendums process that we are just undergoing. Many do not support the process or the spending of millions of dollars on the flag referendums. I would also like to point out that the decision of what four designs will actually be put through on the referendum will not necessarily be from the consultation process. It is a decision that Cabinet will actually make.People know what is actually important to them. In the last few weeks the Labour Party MPs called together a lot of people in my electorate in Ōtara in Manukau East for a housing meeting. Over 120 people came to that meeting on a cold freezing rainy Saturday afternoon in the middle of winter. Contrast that to one of the other meetings which was a flag referendum meeting held in the same electorate at Ōtāhuhu where only 34 people attended. Lest it be said that Manukau East is an anomaly here I would like to point out that at the very first flag referendum meeting held in Takapuna only 13 people could be bothered to attend that meeting. There has been a total of only about 700 people across New Zealand who have actually turned out to public meetings on the flag project and this is at a cost on average of about $550 per person. However when you take into account the exorbitant fees of the panel members and venue hire this amount rises to a shocking $2300 per person.Hon Trevor Mallard: How much?JENNY SALESA: It is $2300 when you include the price of advertising.The people of South Auckland and elsewhere have shown this Government what is actually important to them by attending the forums on issues that matter to them and their families. They attended the meeting on housing in South Auckland because they are desperate to have maintenance issues on their houses fixed—their houses that are leaky damp and mouldy—and they also attended because the rent is becoming way way too expensive in our electorate. Housing is what matters to our families not this wasteful vanity project on a flag referendum. What is the Government’s solution to the housing crisis? That is right: it is proposing to sell thousands of our State houses. I can assure you that it did not cost $2300 per person to run our South Auckland meeting on housing; in fact it cost the Government nothing at all because the hall was free—it was a church hall—and the organisers of the meeting brought the refreshments for the meeting.The engagement with the public on the flag has been very poor: 747 Kiwis wanted to be heardat the Justice and Electoral Committee but their request to be heard was refused; 43000 people signed a petition asking for a yes/no vote on the flag and they were also ignored.Already we have spent $8.4 million on this process. We should not be contemplating spending an additional $17.3 million to distract Kiwis from the Serco scandals the appalling mis-administration of charter schools and the continuing job losses in important industries to name but a few.I also want to address what the members Jono Naylor and Chris Bishop on the opposite side of the House said who actually stated what Labour’s policy on the flag referendumis. May I just say that we are focused on actually addressing issues that matter for our people. The questions that I ask are: can we afford this expensive $26 million on a flag at this time? Has this current Government produced the Budget surplus that it has promised? Well the answer is no not yet.