Parker David: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeParker David: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 29 January 2014. Volume:696;Page:15614. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]5.Hon DAVID PARKER (Deputy Leader—Labour) to theMinister of Finance: Does he stand by his statement that “Government policies have helped to reduce income inequality at the margin”; if not why not?Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): Yes I do stand by that statement because first the Government borrowed through the recession to maintain the real incomes of those who were most vulnerable; secondly through our welfare reform and investment approach we are getting more people into work which is the best fix forpoverty; thirdly we are lifting achievement in schools among those who have consistently failed because unlike Labour and the Greens we do not believe that where you are born decides whether you can learn; and finally we have moved to free up the supply of housing so that we can change the policies of the previous Government which were designed to lock low and middle income people out of our metropolitan housing markets.Hon David Parker: Does he agree that one in four children living in poverty as found by the expert advisory group relied upon by the Children’s Commissioner is evidence of an unacceptable level of asset and income inequality in New Zealand?Hon BILL ENGLISH: First there is a difference of views about what exactly those measures mean. Secondly Labour might want there to be growing income inequality in New Zealand but there is not. Income inequality is not growing by any measure. It does not matter how often those members say that on “Planet Labour” because on planet Earth it is not true.Hon David Parker: Does the decline in homeownership to the lowest level in six decades demonstrate rising inequality in New Zealand; if not why not?Hon BILL ENGLISH: No there is no necessary connection between those two. But what I can tell the member is that the kinds of planning rules that his party favours about dense cities ensure that middle and upper-income people who own houses in Auckland do very well out of that market and low and middle-income families cannot even get into it. Labour should be supporting the Government’s measures to free up the flexibility of supply in housing so that low-income New Zealanders can get access to the housing market.Hon David Parker: Will he now admit he was wrong in opposing Working for Families which as my colleague noted today the Prime Minister called “communism by stealth” given that it was Working for Families that reduced income inequality for the first time in decades; and does he agree that the Best Start package will help the next Labour Government to do the same thing?Hon BILL ENGLISH: No. In fact the member should go back and read the press releases that his party put out when it announced Working for Families because it said then that it would fix inequality and poverty and that there would not be any more of it and of course 10 years later there is. So the solutions are not splashing cash around the place; they are about addressing complex social dysfunction which this Government is digging into in a way that no previous Government has.Hon David Parker: Why do National MPs claim that we have a rock star economy but then deny that the country can afford more provision for our children?Hon BILL ENGLISH: I think that one of the member’s banker economist mates used that term. This Government has not used that term because we know that this economy needs more work to deliver more jobs and higher incomes for New Zealanders and we know that if the policy course is changed to those advocated by the member that will not happen.