Tabuteau Fletcher: Budget DebateText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTabuteau Fletcher: Budget Debate[Sitting date: 28 May 2015. Volume:705;Page:4130. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]FLETCHER TABUTEAU (NZ First): This Budget has cemented in place National’s acceptance and reinforcement of its reality of having a designated and permanent underclass in New Zealand. This Government is deeply in debt and the promise of that surplus is always for tomorrow. This Budget claims—actually quite wisely Mr English does not actually claim this Budget will do anything in particular—that it is a plan that is working. So all the Government members planned for Australia’s economic decline and a drop in world oil prices. Without doubt there is nothing in this Budget that will fix this Government’s finances and secure New Zealand’s economic prosperity. Net core Crown debt has risen consistently under National and is now greater than $80 billion. What is more the sell-off of Crown assets did nothing more than undermine the revenue we could have received from these very assets.Despite consistent and thorough evidence to the contrary this Budget promises that everything will come right in 2017. Is that not amazing? It is just before an election. One can be a bit suspicious. I suppose we should be grateful that the Government is not promising that everything will come right in 2018. At least New Zealanders will be able to judge for themselves on the evidence as to whether this Government can actually keep a promise. Although to be fair election after election promises are made and promises are broken. I tell you what New Zealanders are the most forgiving people I know. However for the benefit of some members the Budget forecast is actually made given a few assumptions. It is made by Treasury and the assumption that the Government has chosen to accept is that everything will be rosy only if a few things come to pass. So what has the Government taken as given? Businesses will enjoy higher commodity prices and we will have only moderate wage inflation reasonable interest rates and a dollar that works for all of us. Given this scenario the Government will come out all pretty and blue—higher tax revenues actually reaching the Budget surplus and cutting income taxes—all just in time for the 2017 election.But I want to point out today that that is not the only version of the future. There are several scenarios and one of them is not quite as rosy. If for example the Chinese economy continues in its slow decline and if commodity prices and inflation remain stagnant then GDP growth does not materialise and the tax take hits the slides as well. And what do you know Mr English’s deficits will once again materialise out of nowhere in his plan that is working. Add to this the likely fact that dairy prices will remain low for longer—with most of Europe gearing up to produce more milk than ever before and with restrictions being lifted by the EU—and National’s rosy interpretation of the future is starting to look a shade of grey. I put it to this Government that not only has it failed to address the issues even under its preferred interpretation of the world—for example there is a bit more nominal money for health education corrections and other core services in this Budget—but even in National’s rosy world those small increases do not cover the increases in the population and the rising costs of provision and if inflation rises as forecast these so-called increases are actually a real decrease.But my point goes beyond this. More significantly this Government has its head buried in the sand and has no plan or idea for any other quite plausible eventuality arising in New Zealand or around the world. There is a real world that needs to be dealt with. I would ask this Government to stop trying to bribe the nation with talk of tax cuts coming into 2017. I would ask it to deal with the very real and explosive debt it has allowed to happen and try to reduce its debt with some actual surpluses before bribing the people of New Zealand. Get a plan stop inadequately filling the gaps and actually lead this country into a prosperous future. It is well past time. Thank you.