Hawkins George: Budget Debate 
Hawkins George: Budget Debate 
[Volume:664;Page:11696] 
Hon GEORGE HAWKINS (Labour—Manurewa) 
: 
 I say to Jonathan Young that it is always difficult when one has one’s speech interrupted by a dinner break. It is especially hard for us; I ended up with heartburn from having listened to him before dinner! 
I will start by passing on a little rumour I heard on the way to the Chamber earlier today. Michael Laws is not going to be Mayor of Wanganui any more; he is coming back here with Winston Peters. I see that has got one or two members opposite weeping— 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: He used to be one of them. 
Hon GEORGE HAWKINS 
: They both used to be Nats but they saw the error of their ways and left that party. 
This Budget has been a disaster for people in my electorate. They see that the chief executive officer of Telecom will save $1600 a week in tax but what will happen to people in my electorate who are struggling? To those in Finlayson Avenue in Clendon the Budget gives just a few crumbs. What they will get with GST increasing is $3.30 a week. That is around $170 a year. Is $170 a year going to lift Maori in Clendon out of poverty? I do not think it will. Many people swallowed the line that this was a Budget for them. Well it was not for the people in Clendon in my electorate and it was not for the people in Wiri in my electorate. Those people will have to manage with much less money. From the beginning of next month they will find that the price of power has gone up. They will find that the price of petrol to get them to work if they are lucky enough to have a job has gone up. That $170 a year will soon disappear. 
What is the answer to this? A week ago at this time I was sitting in a draughty school hall at a meeting about a new prison to be built in my electorate. It will hold 1500 people. Where was the Minister of Corrections? Where was the Associate Minister of Corrections considering that Manurewa is part of his electorate? They were nowhere to be seen. Let me paint a picture. I was in that draughty hall and some 12 or 15 kilometres away a person was sitting around in her blue fluffy slippers with the heater going; she had her royal blue dressing gown on her hair was in curlers and she was holding a sherry watching  
Coronation Street 
 and reminiscing about Ena Sharples. That woman should have been at that meeting. Dr Pita Sharples the Associate Minister should have been at that meeting but neither he nor the Minister of Corrections was there. Instead they sent along Cam Calder the most junior member in the National Party caucus who tried to put forward what was happening. He asked us to think about the prisoners. The people there were not thinking about the prisoners; they were thinking about their own families and what will happen to their neighbourhood. Those two Ministers did not turn up. I have seen jellyfish with stronger backbones and that is the reality. When the going gets tough they disappear. 
The Government came up with a solution: it would not deal with things at the top of the cliff; it would deal with them at the bottom of the cliff. I would have been very supportive if instead of 1500 jail beds many of them maximum security this Government had come up with 1500 early childhood education places so that we do not make the same mistake that we have been making year after year. When one tries to get more early childhood education places one finds that they have gone off the boil. Towards the end of the last Labour Government I was getting more early childhood education places throughout my electorate as were many of my colleagues. They have dried up and that is an awful pity. The Maori Party has quite a bit of support in my electorate and what is it offering the people there? They might get a job in a public-private prison guarding some of their mates. What a promise! This Budget failed to deliver for ordinary people. 
In South Auckland we have many problems. We have the largest amount of pokie machines around. People try to win a jackpot to pay for the groceries but they lose out. There are liquor outlets all over the place. On every street corner where in the old days there used to be a dairy there is a liquor outlet which is open from first thing in the morning to late at night. I want the Government members over there to get up and say how $170 a year will help those people. They might say it will pay for so many bottles of DB or Lion but that is the problem; you see we as a community are fighting that problem. I introduced a bill some time ago to enable people to have a say on liquor outlets. I have been supported by many of the Manukau city councillors especially Daniel Newman who has taken a real lead on this matter. But Dr Sharples the Maori MP who covers Manurewa has been silent. He has been to New York but will that help the families with $170 extra a year? No it will not and I think that is a real pity. 
One of the things I do is put out a very good paper the  
Hawkins Herald 
. It is better than the  
New Zealand Herald 
 with far more substance. In the autumn edition was an article on the price of cornflakes and what people will have to pay. The cost to a Manurewa family per week— 
Dr Paul Hutchison 
: Who pays for the  
Herald 
? 
Hon GEORGE HAWKINS 
: Well Parliament pays for it and I am proud to use my money to let people know what I am up to. That member does not let his constituents know what he is up to; he is usually scurrying away from a meeting where he has been whipped. 
The thing is that those people are going to find things very tough. When we look at what they have to buy we see that their grocery bills are going up. We have very large families in Manukau: many Pacific families many Indian and Asian families many Maori families and Pakeha families. Not all of them can afford to insure their cars and putting up GST will just make things a bit harder. People do not pay their power bill on time. The dilemma they have is whether to feed their kids—get in some food—or pay the power bill. That is the question and that is why this Budget is a very poor Budget. The ordinary people in my electorate have been short-changed by a greedy Government.