Penk ChrisCHRIS PENK (National—Helensville): Thank you Madam Speaker. Good to have the opportunity to speak in this the Budget debate.The word unprecedented" gets bandied about a lot these days. Tim van de Molen: An unprecedented number of times.CHRIS PENK: An unprecedented number of times says Mr van de Molen thereby threatening to send me down a meta spiral of unprecedented speech-making. However I think it's worth assessing. Even just on the health side of things the pandemic has been unprecedented in the sense that we haven't ever had one since the last one. And in a funny way there's nothing more expected at least as a matter of fact if not timing and nature than a health crisis and a pandemic. So it behoves all Governments—and I make this point with no particular partisanship—to be well prepared for such events. Of course part of that means learning from the ones that we are experiencing at the moment. To that end in the spirit of helpfulness I would like to examine some of the lessons that we can learn—I say particularly the Government because they have been the decision makers of course in the way of things. But I would like them to take on board—and I say this on behalf of the Helensville electorate but also any other New Zealanders who might happen to agree with what I'm saying—the extent to which their response has not been unprecedented and the extent to which it has merely been a continuation of some of the themes that we've had these past 2½ years—for example the lack of delivery measured against their own promises. Of course the discussion is in the context of the Budget but it's part again of a bigger picture than that.I think one of the troublesome aspects of the Government's response has been a failure to acknowledge the seriousness of the decision making in relation to those who were affected in an employment context. The Minister of Employment no less the Hon Willie Jackson described at one point the lockdown as having been brilliant. There was a general message that was emanating from the Government at the time that we didn't initially transition from level 4 to level 3 as had been widely expected at that time that the delay was merely a further two business days rather than seeing that an extra five calendar days would have afforded five days' worth of opportunity for businesses that had been struggling greatly under the yoke of lockdown to be able to try and get back up and running. Of course a certain amount of lockdown was necessary. I don't think anyone in this House or indeed across the country would deny that. I don't wish to over-emphasise to the point that I lose that fundamental aspect of acknowledgment that the Government has made some good decisions along the way. If we are to learn from the lessons and if the response is not to be unprecedented in a way that is negative then we do need to look pretty hard at ourselves as a Parliament and the Government of course in terms of the decisions that it has been making.Looking now in the future in the present and into the future in the context of the Budget when the Government is looking for solutions to help businesses—and the reason I emphasise businesses of course is that it is they who employ people including the self-employed as well as those who work in a larger employment context—if they're looking for solutions to help businesses get back on their feet a good place to start would be in the mirror—which isn't to say that the individuals on the Government benches have all the answers; I think none of us do—and to see staring back at them those who have the power in their hands to make life better for businesses by stopping constraining their ability to trade their way out of difficulty. Sometimes the best help that can be given is for the hindrance to stop. The answer in that sense is hiding in plain sight. It is the case that for businesses who are labouring under level 2 as opposed to level 1 after 11 straight days of no new cases the best help that could be given is for them to return to life as somewhat normal. That paradoxically would be an extraordinary thing. I'll finish with a note about shovel-ready projects so-called in the area that I represent. Along with many other areas a large number of projects have been prioritised. I'm reminded of that classic line from Gilbert and Sullivan "When everybody is somebody nobody is anybody." So when all the projects have been prioritised none of them are ahead of the other ones and what we're left with is actually delays being behind schedule even as we were before the crisis hit. So things are not going well in many parts of the area in a way that is indeed unprecedented and if the Government can learn the lessons from that and start delivering on its promises better than it has been that indeed would be unprecedented but in a positive way"