Webb Duncan; Rurawhe AdrianDEBATE ON BUDGET POLICY STATEMENTDr DUNCAN WEBB (Chairperson of the Finance and Expenditure Committee): I move That the House take note of the report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee on the Budget Policy Statement 2021.What a pleasure it is to rise after the last speaker—I must say he was outstanding. I'm not sure I could better him but I'll give it a go. I must retract somewhat from my previous pugnacious approach because my role as chair of the Finance and Expenditure Committee is a little less partisan. My role is to perhaps bring to the House the proceedings of the Finance and Expenditure Committee—a great committee a committee which tries its hardest to work together across the board. I must say the hearing into the Budget Policy Statement was one where I think both Grant Robertson the Minister of Finance and the Secretary to the Treasury were fulsome in their replies. I think members from the other side had a pretty good effort at probing and inquiring into the Government's finances. Of course we then took submissions. We had 58 submissions in total and we heard from quite some number of people on the Budget Policy Statement. I must say that they came from across the board. CCS Disability Action obviously came with a particular perspective about the need to have a Budget policy that looks after their community. Caritas the Catholic aid agency talked about foreign aid. The Child Poverty Action Group that great friend of the Labour Party—you know they do a lot of good work but they absolutely let their views be known that child poverty should be a focus as it is. And of course others from perhaps different areas. The rural sector was well represented. Federated Farmers gave a submission the National Council of Women the Salvation Army—and that is just a short selection. But I do want to say that they were pretty much all useful submissions. There were some that were perhaps a little challenging suggesting that we should defund the police or perhaps you know do away with military spending. I just want to say that I certainly recognise that those parts of the Public Service are really important and across the House I'm sure we all agree that we need to fund them adequately to do the very important role that they do. Whilst not particularly mentioned in the Budget Policy Statement that was one theme in the submissions that I wanted to touch on. But importantly the focus: the fantastic wellbeing approach—the world-leading wellbeing approach—that Grant Robertson launched in New Zealand. Quite rightly the world is looking to New Zealand to see how we are implementing this and to see the improvements that can be made. Now I know even the National Party accept that it is a really important question to say that when we invest taxpayer funds Government funds into any initiative we want to make sure we're getting the best return for them across the board not just whether we have a particular output whether we can tick a box but how do we measure all of those other ripple effects that we might have? All of those things that make lives better—or perhaps tragically to make them not as worse as they otherwise would have been you know? So when we are putting money into childcare or into Oranga Tamariki things like that how do we measure not only that we've spent some money on supporting a family but also those effects that that child might go to school that child might in turn have a family which is stronger and more resilient than the one they came from and have better life prospects? That is what wellness is: not just looking at how we spend our money in a kind of appropriation and audit sense but looking at it in a far more textured and contextual way. That is world-leading.I'm not saying it is without its challenges. Quite rightly in the Finance and Expenditure Committee we are having an ongoing conversation across the board with a lot of agencies about how we measure those outcomes. I welcome that and I know Treasury welcomes that as well. This Budget Policy Statement really reiterates that the wellbeing approach remains the right approach. We absolutely want to ensure that the outcomes aimed at are being achieved. One of the really important things in doing that is a collaborative approach a cross-agency approach and a collective responsibility—the idea that even though the appropriation might go to justice or to police or to corrections those agencies need to be cooperating with each other need to be talking with each other and need to be connecting with each other to make sure that it is not simply the case that Well this is a question for the courts. This is an issue for sentencing. You deal with it over there. Don't worry what corrections outcome it has. Don't worry what housing outcome it has." We absolutely need to have an approach which isn't siloed. And that is a challenge right? Because for anyone in any job to broaden their horizons outside of their own department their own immediate circle of influence is a challenge. That's the challenge that we've got to get out there: that we need to have agencies and agencies are only individuals so that means people talking with each other talking not simply to people in their own department but across agencies.Of course one of the real questions is measurement. Again the Minister was very useful very knowledgeable and articulate when he talked through the Living Standards Framework the fact that across all of those domains—whether it be the environment whether it be human capital whether it be infrastructure or whether it simply be the economy—there are multiple measures that we can look at to determine. Again the joy of being world-leading and the difficulty with being world-leading is that we are developing this as we go. But do you know what that means? It is getting better. It is getting better and better and better. So the Living Standards Framework is something that we are really going to be working on.I do want to touch though on the COVID response. The Minister and the secretary were very clear that wellbeing took a step backwards. I just want to recognise that for a lot of people COVID hit them hard. People have lost their jobs—not as many as Treasury had predicted. But in terms of maintaining and enhancing wellbeing our COVID response is really important. Absolutely part of the Budget Policy Statement—its main thrust really—is saying that we've got to maintain our COVID response; first of all maintaining the protection of the health of our people because that is part of our wellbeing right? And a critical part. But the really interesting lesson from the past year or so has been that our health response having a healthy population a population that can go about its business has benefited us economically beyond compare. We are the envy of the world not only because we can sit close to each other chat socialise and do all the things that we usually do but also because we have an economy which is still thriving. Now it took a step back.I think the other thing that came out clearly in the Budget Policy Statement in the debates and so on in the examinations was that we have uncertain times ahead that it is not absolutely clear that we are on a flat upward trajectory. We've had some outrageous growth periods. The September quarter was I think 13.9 percent growth—unprecedented. And then the next quarter we went back 1 percent. That kind of up and down may well last a while so we need not be alarmed. We do have a predicted steady growth and we need to be aware of that. But let's be very clear: just because it appears the worst is over this Minister of Finance won't be embarking on any austerity measures. We are not going to start tightening the belt and paying back the loans simply because we look like we are through the worst of the woods. No there is a clear plan in place. The projections are that we will be back to surplus in 2027. It would be utterly counter-productive and quite harmful not only to the economy but to ordinary people to mum and dad New Zealanders if we were to start slashing Government spending now. We didn't spend all of the COVID response fund; there's a good amount left. That is not there simply to be spent but we absolutely need to be prepared for anything that is ahead. So that is sitting there in the kitty for the rainy day. And what that means is that we are in a lot better—wildly better—position than we thought we would have been.Helen White: Wildly.Dr DUNCAN WEBB: Wildly better Helen wildly better. And that is a good thing but let's not get complacent. We absolutely need to remain vigilant and remain ready to respond.But as chair of the select committee it was a great discussion—great submissions—from members from all sides of the House and I am looking forward to the constructive contribution from the other side. Thank you Mr Speaker.DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is that the motion be agreed to."