Shearer David: Debate on Prime Minister’s StatementText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeShearer David: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement[Sitting date: 01 March 2016. Volume:711;Page:9261. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DAVID SHEARER (Labour—Mt Albert): I just want to spend 5 minutes—but I want to pick up where that woman Maggie Barry has just left off. I spent my holidays in Northland this year and I did not hear the birds. I did not hear the birds and I will tell you why—because pest control in Northland is so abysmal that the birds are being killed off. The conservator up there in Northland did not even have the guts to be able to ask for any more money—which is less than $1 million a year—to ask the Government for more money to preserve those birds because she knew that she was going to get turned down. That is the legacy of this Government. The legacy is that it has got no money it has cut the budgets and now our forests—certainly in Northland—are at risk.So that is where I wanted to start off but I want to talk about a meeting that I had yesterday with a young guy called Sudhvir Singh who is from Generation Zero. He spoke at the Auckland Council meeting a few days ago. He talked about pulling up the ladder. What he meant was that while he was trying to get things that we all want—a house a job and everything else—the well-heeled people and everybody else around the Auckland area were pulling up the ladder. He was booed and hissed at as he gave evidence to the Auckland Council about the need for more housing in Auckland.We all want the same things—the same things that I want he wants. He wants to be able to have a piece of that Kiwi Dream that I have which is about getting his own house. But inequality in New Zealand has grown wider and wider. I am talking not just about the inequality between the rich and the poor; I am talking about the inequality between young and old. Today the younger people come out of university with a huge student loan. They have to pay that off and then they are confronted—if they are living in Auckland—with average house prices of $900000-plus. Who could possibly afford that? These people are being priced completely out of the market.I want to say that this Government does not look forward. It does not look to those people who need their help. It is not like the Labour Party which has just recently put up its proposal to have 3 years’ free tertiary education. At least there is a plan there to address the intergenerational inequality that exists in this country. Not only that but this Government will not address—will not even look at—the issue of superannuation. Right now this year we are spending more money on superannuation than our entire education budget and it is still going up. That is something that is a legacy once again that these younger people are going to have to pull up.Sudhvir Singh is wanting what a lot of other young people have been asking for but this Government defends the people who booed and hissed. Basically those people are desperate to hang on to their privilege and desperate to keep their property prices high—desperate to pull up the ladder so that young people do not get a chance any more. That is something that we in the Labour Party detest—we detest unfairness. We want the best for everybody.We do not want to see the inequality gap growing in terms of poverty and also in terms of intergenerational equity. So we are willing to put our money where our mouth is. We want to see people going on to tertiary training and getting it for free so that they are not burdened down with great big loans and so that they get a proper leg-up and a proper chance in life and we want to see them get affordable housing. That is why we have always supported the building of 10000 affordable houses a year. Those are two bold initiatives about addressing what we need to be doing in the future and that is something that this Government has nothing to say about because it allowed the property price to go to an average of $900000 in Auckland. It has nothing to say to those younger people who want to get a chance in life.