Clark David: General DebateText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeClark David: General Debate[Sitting date: 03 June 2015. Volume:706;Page:4261. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North): This is a dodgy tired out-of-touch Government mired in scandal. It is led by a Pinocchio Prime Minister who continues to make unfounded allegations in this House that he would not make outside it. That tells you a lot about the Government. It is making accusations that it just cannot back up. It is writing cheques that it just cannot cash. Then there are its foot soldiers of course. Murray McCully was sent out of the country for 3 weeks for his part in an $11 million scandal that should lead to his resignation. On top of that Saudi sheep scandal we have got foot soldier Joyce who has obviously been to the same school. He has attended the Murray McCully school of micro-management. Just today we heard from him about his obsession with the small things in his department but heard his refusal to take overall responsibility for the bigger mess-ups there and the flagrant abuse and misspending of taxpayer money. This is of course fresh from the Northland by-election. That was not so long ago.Mr Joyce’s obsession with his $40000 erection—which would be funny if it was not so serious—is a symbol of what is going on with this Government. It is distracted. It is focused on the small issues because it is out of ideas on the big issues. Mr Joyce himself as we have learnt today is concentrating on the layout of documents on the colour of the covers and on the full stops. This is a Minister who is out of ideas and it is no wonder that he is failing to reach his own targets. Forty percent was his target for raising exports as a proportion of GDP. Well it was 32 percent when his Government took office; now it is down to 27 percent and the best projection we have at the moment is that it is down as falling to 26 percent next year. It is a Government that is out of ideas out of touch and that is failing to achieve its own goals. Now Mr Joyce is concentrating on improving the feng shui of his reports. Well Minister I am saying now that it will not work.We know of course that this is a Minister who is responsible for the Skycity deal where we have a 10 percent smaller cut again on top of the other cuts to the centre. He talked originally about a maximum of 5000 people at this conference centre when the other players were knocked out of the bidding. Now he is down to 2850 which is just 57 percent of the size of the convention centre originally promised and to be built off the back of problem gambling.Then there is the Chorus deal. I cannot talk about that given the limited time but this is a Minister with a failed reverse Midas touch. He has tried to set up his glorious empire in the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment. He has sent a hospital pass though to officials who have an interfering micro-managing Minister. Treasury said from the start that the ministry would never achieve the efficiencies that were promised and it is showing every day that this is the case. This is an MP who is out of touch. He has set up this Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment empire to rival Bill English’s Treasury and he is failing.We have seen that in the Budget. Bill English is cutting his expenditure Budget by Budget by Budget. In 2013 just two Budgets ago he had $470 million of new expenditure. Then it was $363 million last year. This year it is $259 million. He has got fewer dollars to spend because the Government is losing faith. The Government is losing faith with its main foot soldiers. It is deep in scandal and it is out of touch.Northland should have delivered a clear message to this Government but it does not seem to have done so. The list MP who ran the Northland campaign could not win one of the safest National seats in the country—the list MP who ran the campaign could not win one of the safest seats in the country. The public is sending a clear message: the regions can no longer be neglected. The 10-bridge bribes were seen for what they are—74 percent of New Zealanders said that those bridges were a bribe. The pig in front of the sign said it all.That was not a unique set of circumstances there either. Mr Joyce claimed it was but of course Taranaki used to have a real wage premium over Northland; now it does not. Gisborne - Hawke’s Bay used to have a real wage premium over Northland. Now its wages are actually behind those of Northland. And of course we know that the West Coast - Nelson-Marlborough area is struggling too. Moving on to unemployment we know that Manawatū-Wanganui used to have 3 percent unemployment when this Government took over. Now it is up to 9 percent.This is a Government that is failing. It has no new ideas no plan and the regions are hurting. Then we have the wasteful spending which caps it all off. There was $43000 on this Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment monument $360000 on luxury couches motorised desks and apple stools. Skycity is going to the pot. This is a Government not taking responsibility. It is breaking promises and it is failing. It failed to achieve its central election campaign promise to get the Government to surplus. It was the seventh failure in a row.