Scott Lynda: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Scott Lynda: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
[Volume:615;Page:10894] 
Dr LYNDA SCOTT (National—Kaikoura) 
: 
 The last speaker said that there is excitement in the provinces. Well I can tell members the only excitement in the provinces is that Don Brash has had the courage to stand up and say what 90 percent of New Zealanders are thinking; that the political correctness on Maori issues has gone too far. That is the only excitement in the provinces. That Minister said the  
Holmes 
 poll last night—35000 people responded to it—is a little nit-picking thing. No it is not. It is an issue that touches the hearts of New Zealanders because it is about where this country is going. Those members can sit over there on those Government benches but New Zealanders are extremely concerned about the issues. 
 The issues are defined by the seabed and foreshore claim. This Government rather than choosing to legislate and make it clear right from the beginning has chosen to try to find a way through the middle of that claim that will please nobody. That seabed and foreshore legislation it is developing is only going to create massive bureaucracy and dissension in this country. It will achieve nothing to solve the problems. National has made it very clear what we would do. We would legislate straight away. 
So there is no excitement in the provinces only an absolute sense of being fed up with a politically correct Government that is destroying democracy. You cannot disagree with this Government—that is what people thought. We are. We are standing up to it. We have put a line in the sand and I tell you watch the opinion polls because 90 percent of New Zealanders agree with our leader Don Brash. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Please don’t bring the Speaker into the debate. 
Dr LYNDA SCOTT 
: We have got rather used to the Prime Minister’s speech being boring but this year really topped it off. Even her own people were having such a hard time trying to feign some sort of attention. But where was the vision? There was none. It was tired and staid. Nothing new was said. The Prime Minister should take a look at some of the issues affecting the electorate of Kaikoura which I represent. It is a beautiful electorate—stunningly beautiful. Of course the tourists will come. They will come no matter what Government is in power because we have the best and most beautiful country in the world. When I go on holiday I go to the Sounds because I think that is the best place in the world. It is a wonderful spot. 
But let us take a look at the aquaculture industry. What has happened to the aquaculture industry under this Government? It was growing at 20 percent—that was phenomenal growth. It was growing because we kept out of its way and let it get on with things. But no this Government has absolutely shackled it. It is being affected now by the high dollar. Lower returns are coming in. It is being affected by the increased bureaucracy. When the Government came in it said that it would get the Aquaculture Management Bill through. Now it has delayed it because of the seabed and foreshore claim. The moratorium has been extended. 
Then we have the Employment Relations Amendment Bill. What will that do to the ability to produce? It will be a disaster. The bureaucracy the increased legislation the high dollar—all of that is affecting the electorate that I represent and that brings uncertainty. In the latest aquaculture magazine there is a line where a writer says: “See you later I’m off to Chile.” That is right. That is where they are going—somewhere they can actually work and earn for their country and themselves. 
But the line in the sand with the foreshore and seabed is the Marlborough Sounds. Members should not forget that. That is the claim where this line has been drawn. 
Dr Brash talked about having one law and one standard of citizenship for all. How can anyone disagree with that? New Zealanders do not. Most New Zealanders are extremely fair-minded people. When one travels around the world that is one thing one really notices—New Zealanders are very fair-minded. They looked at past grievances and wanted to settle those claims. There was quite a level of acceptance of the Waitangi Tribunal and having past grievances brought out into the open and documented and then having those claims settled. But it is the contemporary claims that send a shiver down the spine of New Zealanders because they do not know where this is going to end. There is a level of fear that a country they may have been in for five and six generations is no longer going to welcome them. 
I will never forget coming into this House the angriest I have ever been when Tariana Turia said to me that I was a visitor in her house. I am a fifth generation New Zealander and I consider myself a New Zealander. I think I have every right to be treated as a New Zealander. I am not a visitor in her house. That sort of extreme attitude is what has put fear into the minds of New Zealanders and it is why contemporary claims send a shiver down their spine. 
But I want to talk about health actually. I am National’s health spokesperson. The Prime Minister talked about some things in her speech to do with health. As a doctor and a nurse I am very privileged to be in this position and I think I can bring some expertise to this House. The Minister of Health was quoting the Commonwealth Fund’s “mirror mirror on the wall” looking at the quality of American health-care and comparing it with Australia New Zealand Canada and the UK. In that one has to say that we rank No. 1 for patient centredness and the reporting of that was all about doctors. 
Do doctors make the goals clear? How do they interact with patients? Are they accessible? We rank No. 1 and I have to say “Congratulations” to New Zealand doctors because they are doing an extremely good job. This Minister of Health does not like them. She does not value them. We see general practitioners demoralised all over the country but I say “Congratulations” to them because this report shows that compared with all those other countries they are doing a very good job in the eyes of their patients. 
But doctors have been extremely concerned about primary health organisations. Nobody disagrees with the primary health strategy that is putting more money into primary care. But the implementation has been appalling. The Minister has completely messed it up. She sticks her head in the sand. She will not listen to the problems. The Audit Office is going to do a review this year the ministry did a review and showed massive problems but this Minister does nothing to try to sort out those problems. 
One of the cruxes of the problems is that the funding is based on race and location not on individual patient need. All over the world the indicators for poor health and high mortality are poverty and previous poor health. It does not matter what race one is those are the indicators. Whether one is a poor white a poor Chinese a poor Maori or a poor Pacific Islands person poverty and previous ill health are what affect mortality statistics. 
Primary health organisation funding has meant that in Auckland we see what we call pepper-potting. They take a location they say that because it has 50 percent Maori and Pacific Islands people in that area people will pay only $10 to go to the doctor. I know somebody in this House who pays only $10 to go to the doctor. Yet a poor person—whether it is a white person a Maori person or a Chinese person—in the Wairarapa or the South Island still pays $35. 
That cannot be right. We have to base the funding on individual patient need not on location and not on race. Also we must base our health decisions on evidence-based medicine not on political correctness as we have been seeing in Manukau. Sure we might all like a massage but should the State pay for it? Is it effective? And should only one group of people have access to that? No of course not. We should support evidence-based medicine. 
We heard there were going to be some improvements in the breast-screening programme. The evidence has been there for the last 3 years that we should expand that programme and that women of 45 to 70 years should also get access to that. New Zealand statistics when compared with Australia’s show that 28 percent more women die in this country. They cannot get access to radiotherapy in a timely manner. It just demonstrates the rhetoric of this Government which has continually harped on about doing something—doing something about Auckland roads and that has not been achieved; doing something about business compliance costs and that has not been achieved; doing something about breast cancer and mental health and other areas of high need like the workforce and none of that has been achieved. It is all talk with no achievements. 
This Government must do better. The Government’s own report on waiting times for elective surgery shows quite clearly that in a comparison between 1999 and 2003 less cataract surgery is being done fewer hip replacements are being done and fewer knee replacements are being done. The access to elective surgery is poor under this Government and it is elderly people who are affected by that.