Appropriation (2007/08 Estimates) Bill — Third Reading Imprest Supply Debate 
Appropriation (2007/08 Estimates) Bill — Third Reading Imprest Supply Debate 
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Appropriation (2007/08 Estimates) Bill 
Third Reading 
Imprest Supply Debate 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Minister of Finance) 
: 
 I move  
That the Appropriation (2007/08 Estimates) Bill be now read a third time and the Imprest Supply (Second for 2007/08) Bill be now read a second time 
. This debate marks the final passage of the 2007 Budget. Let us remember what the key features of that Budget were. The first feature was KiwiSaver. There was a massive addition to the KiwiSaver scheme that means when we next release some data at the end of this month when we will have the small employer returns I am absolutely certain we will have 100000 people enrolled into the KiwiSaver scheme. The National Party opposite which cannot make up its mind looks like it might be facing half a million KiwiSavers by the time of the next election—no wonder those members have three fingers up in the wind already on that issue. 
The second feature was business tax cuts with a cut in the corporate tax rate. Mr English attacked that as profligate spending because he includes the cost of the business tax cuts in his description of the 2007 Budget. I would ask whether National members will continue to vote against those business tax cuts as they did on Budget night. 
 Thirdly there was the introduction of research and development tax credits. This measure is seeing interest coming from offshore particularly from Australia about shifting research and development into New Zealand and it is extremely strongly supported within the New Zealand business community. 
Fourthly there have been tax cuts on savings with the portfolio investment entity regime and a cut in effect on widely held savings vehicles to a maximum tax rate of 30 percent. This will be followed up by the new offshore tax regime with the introduction of an active/passive distinction and the legislation on limited partnerships which may begin its first reading later this evening. 
That is a massive series of measures about the improvement of this country’s economy about taxation reductions and about addressing the real issues of how to lift New Zealand savings over the long term in order to make us more self-reliant to lower our long-term costs of capital and to change the nature of our economic relationship with the rest of the world. In the meantime the good news continues to flow forth. 
Just last week the new employment figures showed 362000 new jobs under this Government with the highest participation rate in the labour force in New Zealand’s history at 68.8 percent. We have a massively reduced unemployment rate compared with the situation under the previous National Government particularly amongst Maori where the rate has gone down from 18.6 percent to 7.6 percent under this Government. Not a single region of this country has an unemployment rate of over 5 percent with Southland leading the way in that particular regard. 
Secondly the dollar is starting to correct and has fallen some 10 percent since the peak that it reached just a few weeks ago. Thirdly despite all the gloom and doom the latest numbers actually show that exports have grown strongly over the last year which was one of the best years we have seen for export growth in a very very long period of time. 
And what does the main Opposition party National offer in distinction from that? It offers confusion and contradictions; it offers denial and deceit. That is all National can offer in opposition to the Government’s programmes in these areas. 
Let us first of all deal with that dollar issue. When the dollar started coming back down from that peak of 81-odd cents Mr Key proudly forecasted that it would go back up to 83c. 
Hon Member 
: Oh that’s really helpful. 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: That was very helpful for exporters. That showed just whose side he was on in terms of the great economic debate. Mr Key was asked whether he had ever speculated against the New Zealand dollar when he was a money changer in the temples of financial industry around the world and he refused to answer that question. Here is a man who wants to be Prime Minister and thinks he has some divine right to become Prime Minister. He will not even tell us whether he speculated. Of course it would not matter whether he did tell us—we would not believe the answer anyway if we are to go by his position on the next issue. 
Mr Key will not like this issue because he does want us going back to the issues that he does not like talking about but we will talk again about this member and his views on the war in Iraq. We will talk about that because in February 2003 he said he would be prepared to commit any support requested by the US for a war against Iraq including SAS and combat troops. He said that New Zealand should be prepared to fight for the values we believe in. That is what he said. 
Then in July this year Mr Key said: “We made it quite clear we will not be going. We would not have sent troops to Iraq.” When he was asked how he could square that with his saying in 2003 that he would have sent troops he said: “Oh well the caucus position in 2003”—and he nods his head—“was that we would send troops and I was faithfully repeating the caucus position.” But only 2 months earlier in May of this year he said that National would never have supported sending troops to Iraq and that his caucus did not support sending troops to Iraq. Which one of all that extraordinary mishmash of different views is the correct one? Mr Key made another attempt on 10 August to explain his views. [ 
Interruption 
] The members opposite do not want to listen to this. On 10 August Mr Key said: “Oh well the position was this. Look National supported the coalition of the willing’s right to engage in the war in Iraq. Um we believed the war was legal. It is a very technical debate but it revolves around a sort of UN resolution”—a sort of UN resolution—“which says if you believe you are attacked you can retaliate and that was really the argument the Americans put up around 9/11 but also a whole lot of funding of terrorism and various other things and of course the weapons of mass destruction.” So this member is saying—if members can work out what on earth that stream of semi-consciousness means—that he believes there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Not even Karl Rove believes any longer that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. 
John Key believes that the Iraqis were funding terrorism against the United States and what is more he believes that Iraq was attacking the United States. He believes that Iraq was attacking the United States so a war was all right. These words are not from 2003. This is not when Mr Key was in his own words the most junior member of the National caucus but this was only a few days ago. And he was not the most junior caucus member then actually; Maurice Williamson was at the time. But never mind he got that wrong as well. 
After all the previous mistakes after the chance to sort out his story he still did not have a storyline that makes any coherent sense at all. This man opens his mouth and hopes that something will come forth that makes some kind of sense. 
Let me ask something else about Mr Key. How come he is the only person I have ever met in my life who can remember not opening an email? And what is the email he remembers not opening? It was the one from the Exclusive Brethren. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Ann Hartley) 
: I am sorry to interrupt the member. The level of interruption is just too much at the moment. The members know that. 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: Mr Key is the only person who can remember not opening an email yet he knows what was in the email he can remember not opening. That is a remarkable achievement—a remarkable achievement for a hollow man in particular. 
Then of course Mr Key’s colleague to his right might care to answer the question of just who is being referred to in the article on the front page of Sunday’s  
Sunday Star-Times  
about the person very much closer to the leadership of the National Party who is responsible for certain leaks. Mr English might care to make it very clear whether he had anything to do with that matter because that story made it clear that it was not in fact anyone from the Labour Party. 
Then we have Mr Key on the Kyoto Protocol and climate change. He is a man who has “always been a believer” but only a year previously he had said: “I actually do not believe in climate change. I am very sceptical about climate change. I am somewhat suspicious of climate change.” He then claimed that he firmly believed in climate change and always had. 
You see Mr Key is a man who says anything to anybody and does not think anybody will compare what is said one time with what is said another time. He is a man whom one cannot believe because he cannot actually have a coherent policy a coherent storyline or a coherent story from one day to the next from one month to the next and from one year to the next. That is not a man that New Zealand in the end will vote for at the next election. 
JOHN KEY (Leader of the Opposition) 
: 
 I have to say that I feel a bit sorry for Michael Cullen. He is leaving and they did not even give him a gold watch; they gave him a red box. You see Michael Cullen is the man who is meant to be defending the economy. He is the Minister of Finance. Less than a quarter of his entire caucus bothered to show up to listen to him and as we know from the opinion polls on Sunday night the country not only is fed up with him but has given up on him. The country is not listening. 
 Dr Cullen had 10 minutes in which to get up and tell the people of New Zealand why they should have any faith at all in his economic management and he did not use even 2 minutes of his time on that. He is electoral death to the Labour Party. The more he is on TV the better it is for National. This is the man who is so confused about monetary policy that at one point he was going to suspend the Reserve Bank of New Zealand Act under section 12. That was until his boss came back and told him to sit down calm down and say a little bit less “because what you’re doing Michael is you’re telling the people of New Zealand what they already know.” Labour has no answers. It is an economic basket case and New Zealanders are paying for its economic mismanagement. 
I want to talk about the economy and let us get a few facts right. These are the facts that Labour does not want New Zealanders to know. We have the worst brain drain in the developed world. A million New Zealanders have left New Zealand. Kiwis leave at the rate of 760 a week. Do members know what happens when they get out to the airport and as they are having their passports stamped “goodbye”? Do members think they say to the immigration officers and the customs officers on the way out: “I want to thank Michael Cullen for his economic management. He has done such a cracker job for us.”? No; they say: “I’m “outski” I’m outta here until these guys are gone.” 
I come back to the leader of the Labour Party Helen Clark. She came into office telling New Zealanders that New Zealand would go up in the OECD. We were 20th. Under Michael Cullen’s economic management we are 22nd. We are not going up; we are going down. In 1988 they started measuring productivity in the New Zealand economy—and let us get a few facts right. In 1988 the average was roughly 2.5 percent. Well let us ask Michael Cullen today what productivity is. People are at a standstill in traffic jams in Auckland. If people want to start up a business that needs a long-term power contract they will not get one. If they want to get broadband around most of the country they cannot have it. If people in mid-Canterbury want water they will not get it. If people want to get on a train in Auckland it will take an hour and a half to go anywhere. The answer is that productivity is at about 0.5 percent and in the public sector it is negative. New Zealanders are putting in more money and getting less for it. 
Let us get back to what Labour really cares about. Labour Party members want to talk about themselves. They want to talk about electoral law reform about how they can change the rules to make it a bit easier to try to slip back into Parliament. They have no show of doing that. They want to talk about photo opportunities but they do not want to talk about interest rates. I say to Michael that he does not want to talk about interest rates because the reality is that New Zealanders now pay some of the highest interest rates in the developed world. The Sunday papers are full of stories about New Zealanders who today are tossing up whether they can sell their house and be able to afford another one. That is the truth of it. 
Michael Cullen could have done a good job of economic management. He had the chance. This is the Minister of Finance who wrote to his own Cabinet members and said: “Don’t overspend on your budget because if you do interest rates will stay up longer and they will go up higher and the exchange rate will go up.” He completely disregarded that and spent a billion dollars more because he does not care. Those members care about themselves. They care about Labour. They are happy to trawl through fish and chip papers. The Minister of Finance was happy to use 2 minutes of his time in the appropriation debate talking about the economy and 8 minutes talking about me. Labour members are not interested in talking about the economy because they do not have the answers. 
Let us get a few other facts right. Domestic inflation in New Zealand is embedded under Labour. It is running at above 4 percent and it has been doing so for 4 years. The only answer those members have is to spend more money and while they are at it New Zealanders are stuck in traffic jams and have waited 8 years for a tax cut—only to be told that miraculously in 2008 election year there is a chance that Michael Cullen might actually talk to them about that. But we do not really know. 
Even if Michael Cullen does promise tax cuts we know that the last time he rolled out a tax cut he never delivered on it. So if we want to get on to the issue of trust—well he cancelled it. While those members are doing all that New Zealanders will be working the longest hours in the developed world other than Iceland. You see these people have no economic policy at all. Actually that is not true. Helen Clark has an economic policy and she declared it in the  
New Zealand Herald 
. She said: “This is the way it works. We saved up money in the kitty and then we spent it on Working for Families. Then we saved up money in the kitty and then we spent it on early childhood education. Now we are saving up money in the kitty but we have absolutely no clue what the bribes will be like yet but don’t worry we’re working on them.” My colleague Bill English has a description of that. It is called “lolly-nomics”. They save up the lollies then spend it on someone else. 
Here is a place Labour could spend it. Yesterday I received a phone call from a constituent of mine. She is a very good woman and she is a member of a health trust. She rang to tell me this little story. Last Wednesday she went to North Shore Hospital at 10 o’clock in the morning. She had a small thing she needed to have attended to but it was acute and serious and she needed treatment. Did she get treatment? Actually despite Labour doubling the amount of spending on health—and I will come back to that later—by 11 o’clock that night she had not had an operation. Was she given a bed? No. She was given a trolley. She was upgraded to a trolley with a drip and they put her in the corridor. That is where they left her until the next morning. 
Do members know what happened the next morning? This is health under Labour folks. The next morning the chief surgeon came down and spoke to the people on the trolleys—because she was not on her own. There were dozens of them there. This is what the chief surgeon said to the people on the trolleys: “If you know someone in politics ring them up because it’s a disgrace—health under these people. It’s a disgrace.” [ 
Interruption 
] I am happy to talk about the issues I say to Michael Cullen. At exactly the same time at North Shore Hospital they were trying to treat people in an ambulance outside. My constituent finally got her operation. [ 
Interruption 
] Yes she did get it. It was a 5-minute operation which she got on the Friday night. That is what happened—on the Friday night she got her operation. 
You see this is the deal. These people are now annually taking about $20 billion more in taxes off people than they used to. They are spending a billion dollars a week but they do not know how to spend it they do not know where to spend it and they do not know what to get for it. But that is what they are happy to do. They spend so much money waste it then drive up interest rates because they do not care about us and they do not care about New Zealanders—they care about themselves. They care about dishing out a few lollies and they care about themselves. 
Why did Michael Cullen not come down to the House and use his other 8 minutes to talk about the economy? Because he has no answers. Those members have no answers. There are no tax cuts no reform of the Resource Management Act no public use or private use of infrastructure no decisions to try to fix up a failing infrastructure in New Zealand no ability to change labour laws and no interest to privatise and bring in more things like accident compensation. They have no answers. 
I say that the people of New Zealand have an answer. They have had a gutsful of Michael Cullen’s economic management. They have had a gutsful of Labour. Mark my words. When Michael Cullen has gone in 12 months’ time and Steve Maharey is chancellor or whatever he is going to be at Massey University—chancellor or cleaner; one of the two—people will look back on the 9 years under Michael Cullen and say that an economic wave rode over New Zealand and those people failed to do anything with it. I say that the New Zealand public have an answer and the answer is that they want rid of Labour. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Ann Hartley) 
: I call Doug Woolerton—[ 
Interruption 
] I am calling a speaker members and I ask for order. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON (NZ First) 
:  
I understand how those members have to keep up the morale. We used to have to do that sort of thing when Tuku Morgan was with us. 
Today I want to talk about the good things that are going through the Parliament at the present time the things that New Zealand First would like to see going through the Parliament and the things that are not going through as quickly as we think they should. 
 I would just like to say so that nobody is under any illusions that the National Party has spent a lot of time—in fact all during the last election period and since then—talking about tax cuts and what they would do for the country. But people in New Zealand should know that the last tax cut the National Party gave the people of New Zealand was back in 1960. 
Jill Pettis 
: When? 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: Back in 1960 if the member would believe it. Yet it has based its whole campaign on tax cuts and it continues to talk about them to this day. Just recently New Zealand First was proud to vote for a tax cut which the National Party voted against. We proudly voted for a reduction in tax on some financial institutions many of which are involved in the KiwiSaver scheme and National was not too happy about that either. 
A few weeks ago I stood five times in this House to introduce a bill—the Reserve Bank (Amending Primary Function of Bank) Amendment Bill—to ensure that the targets for the Reserve Bank are wider than we have in New Zealand at the present time so that instead of just concentrating on the inflation target we concentrate on exporting and so that the Reserve Bank can ensure that it looks at employment at the same time. This happens in other countries and we do not think it is revolutionary. We think it is plain good common sense. Those are the things that we as politicians are required to look at and those are the things that the Minister of Finance is required to look at. We think it makes senses that those are the things that the Reserve Bank governor and his team are required to look at as well. 
It is amazing that just recently we had an extremely high dollar that was hurting our exporters. New Zealand First wanted to do something about that. I was the person who was delegated to do that but interestingly the National Party was not interested. Bill English made a lot of comments in the select committee that there was nothing wrong with the Reserve Bank of New Zealand Act that it should be left exactly as it is and that there should be a completely hands-off situation regarding money. Out in the public arena of course they were crying crocodile tears for farmers and exporters they were saying that something should be done and they were saying that the Government should stop spending—that is mainly on roads schools and hospitals. That is completely at odds with what the National Party was saying at the last election when it made a big play on the need to put more money into infrastructure. 
So what I am really saying is that while New Zealand First is doing its best to propose solutions the National Party is proposing none. In fact it wants to go back on the work that the Labour Party is involved in regarding our infrastructure. We know that at the present time we are looking at record low unemployment. We in New Zealand First applaud that and again sadly I might add I have to draw the comparison with the time the National Party was in power and we had record unemployment. So something must be going right. Also we would not like to see the return of the days when assets were sold by both the big old parties in this House. They sold Air New Zealand the railways the tracks and that sort of thing. 
We still look forward to the day when our colleague Peter Brown’s suggestion comes into play. We look forward to a time when we not only have the railway tracks back but have gone one step further and treat the railway tracks as we treat roads in this country. Every tonne that goes across those tracks should be charged to the operator who owns the trains and there should not be just one operator. One would hope I suggest to Mr Brown that we will see the National Party and the Labour Party if they believe in free enterprise look to the day when Mainfreight operates on the roads and the railways and the Owens Group operates not only on the roads but on the railways and pays a levy per tonne as we do on our national roads. When we see that day we will believe the rhetoric that the parties engage in across this House. 
It saddens us—and I am not into giving lectures or anything like that—that when crises befall our people we just point the finger back and forth. The truth is that in the recent situation of the high dollar we saw both political parties reluctant to do anything while at the same time they paid lip-service to being concerned for our exporters. 
I hope that we are not on the cusp of some sort of recession. One cannot pick up a newspaper these days without seeing the pros and cons of that happening; some people say it will and many people say it will not. But we in New Zealand First do not think that those things should be absolutely inevitable. We have seen far too many reports recently that New Zealand is but a bit player that we are not in control of our own destiny and that if America catches a cold we get the flu—in fact we just about die—and we do not believe that we should put up with situations like that in New Zealand. 
Quite obviously there will be hardships if the major economies catch a cold. But we should not have this air of inevitability that we seem to be seeing from the two major parties at this point. We believe that it would be heartening and good for morale if nothing else if we could see some constructive action around the possibilities that might befall this beautiful little country of ours. I for one have never subscribed to a completely hands-off attitude to our economy. I have never subscribed to the situation that our exporters should just take whatever comes their way. 
I believe that it behoves us in this Parliament to take an active role and ensure that those who export and provide our standard of living are treated in a way that enhances their work and thus makes life better for all the citizens in this country. I look forward to that day. I think New Zealand First will have to be a major party in this Parliament before that happens but until it does we will work towards it. 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Minister of Education) 
: 
 I tell Mr Woolerton who has just sat down after speaking on behalf of New Zealand First that there is nothing like a good solid partnership. There has been one between Labour and New Zealand First over the last little while and when we lead the next Government I am sure that that partnership can continue and that Mr Woolerton will undoubtedly play a good part in it. 
In talking of people who have come closer together I will just take us back to Mr John Key’s speech earlier and going on his tradition of not using the names that we are asked to use in the House I will just call him “John”. He called Michael Cullen “Michael” so I will just call him “John”. Now I ask John: when did Mr Key leave New Zealand? Under a National Government—[ 
Interruption 
] Oh we do not like it now. 
Hon Bill English 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. It is the normal practice to address members by the name they put down. If the Government did not pull up Mr Key when he was speaking that was its fault. It is not incumbent on the Speaker to do so. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Ann Hartley) 
: The member is quite right. It is up to the House. 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: Madam Assistant Speaker I am glad that we do agree on that basic principle. So when did Mr Key leave New Zealand? I think it was in the time of a National Government. He went offshore to make a few dollars around the world— 
Dr Jackie Blue 
: Oh make it up! 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: Well the member says I should make it up. Mrs Tolley says I should make it up. Did he leave under a National Government or not? 
Hon Annette King 
: No no. It wasn’t Mrs Tolley; I think it was Jackie Blue. 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: Oh it was somebody over there. When did he leave New Zealand? 
The question of when Mr Key came back is even more important. When was he attracted back to this country? When did he decide that he had had enough of currency trading enough of making vast amounts of money enough of jetting around the world and enough of living in New York—one of the most wonderful cities in the world—and wanted to come back to this country? It was under Labour. He came back like many other Kiwis when attracted by a country that was finally working finally growing and finally reaching its potential. That is when Mr Key came home as so many other New Zealanders have done. 
But Mr Key came home wanting to help to lead this country and I think that is a great thing. I think it is a great thing that people come home and say they want to take up the cudgels and do something on behalf of this country. But you know Winston Churchill once said there is nothing more cruel when one is a leader than to raise hopes and then not deliver on them—nothing more cruel than to raise hopes and then not deliver on them. Labour knows that. We came to power back in 1999 and people had gone through the 1980s and the 1990s and they were saying to themselves that they were fed up with politicians. They even changed the system to MMP which is why Mr Woolerton is in this House today. New Zealanders said they did not like the political system. They did not like the way that things were being done. People in power were not keeping their promises in terms of saying what they would do and then doing it so people wanted to see a change of Government. 
In 1999 this Labour-led Government had its first incarnation and do members know what was the first thing it did? Helen Clark directed that if we said something we would do it: if we said something we would carry it out; if we had a policy we would implement it; and if we said we would spend some money we would do exactly that. And for 8 short years we have done exactly that. If New Zealanders want to know what is to come next from the Labour Government they can just go to its manifesto turn to the next page and see what is to happen. Labour has had success in the economy and success with regard to families and the national identity of this country. It has had success in policy after policy after policy. 
David Bennett 
: “Chewing gum tax cuts”—you delivered those didn’t you mate? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: But there is one person I tell Mr Bennett who is right at the heart of that success and that is Dr Cullen. Over eight Budgets that man has produced surplus after surplus. Mr English over there produced deficit after deficit when National was in Government. I do not think that the National Party knows what a surplus is. It is no wonder that it has done nothing about tax cuts. It was never able to afford to implement tax cuts. Under the National Government the country was broke; under Dr Cullen the country has had a surplus. But all that National members ever talk about is the hope that if they can just get into power one day they would like to spend the surplus that the Labour Government and Dr Cullen have built up—a surplus that is solely Labour’s claim to fame. 
Because of that success in this Budget we are able to do things like giving the research tax credit a research and development tax credit of $630 million to try to produce more investment in small to medium-sized businesses. In this Budget in the education area we are able to put in place 20 hours’ free early childhood education. What a fantastic policy! Alongside KiwiSaver and the public health organisations we have 20 hours’ free early childhood education with 67000 young people benefiting from that policy now—benefiting from the steady good funding of 20 hours’ free early childhood education. In relation to employment we have the lowest unemployment rate in this country since we have had recorded figures: 3.6 percent. Everything that should be up is up and everything that should be down is down. 
In the employment area we will carry on investing in an area like the Ministry of Social Development’s Working for Families. Working for Families has meant that for the first time in about 30 years or so we have seen a proper redistribution of money to the poorest people around our society. You know that means that kids—about whom the National Party goes on a bit—who are in poor houses have finally got money coming through the door to pay for clothes for food for shoes and for all the things that lift them out of poverty. We now have the same kind of poverty profile as a country like Denmark which is one of the richest countries in the world. We are not the richest country in the world but we have made sure that people who are in those circumstances are able to make ends meet and live in dignity. That is because of the Labour Government. 
What has the National Party said? Well I will go back to leadership—leadership with no ideas and hope with no practice. That is what the National Party has and has had. Let us take an example from today. Mr Key said he wants to see State house tenants buying houses. It is a great idea a nice idea for them to buy a house. We have some policies that allow people who move up to the level of paying a market rent to move out of those houses and buy a house. What is the National Party saying? It is saying that it wants tenants to buy their own houses. On their $300-a-week incomes it wants them to buy their own houses. The last time that happened the tenants did not buy the 13000 State houses that were sold; speculators bought them—that is who got them. That idea of Mr Key’s is OK but nothing lies behind it. 
Let us take Working for Families. National says that not everybody should benefit from the Working for Families policy but it does not tell anyone who will benefit from that policy and who will miss out. Who will not get an in-work benefit? Who will not get money coming through the door for their children? Who will not receive assistance from Working for Families? We have no idea of that. Jobs are central to all of our policies but what does the National Party say? It says it will give us Work for the Dole. It had better hurry because there are hardly any people left on the dole. But National says that if it were in power and this were its Budget Work for the Dole would be the policy. 
The central point of difference here is between a Government on this side of the House that has ideas that has a policy and that says what it will do and does it and the National Party which has a different story every day of the week. Let us just run through the issues. We could go through Iraq education— 
Hon Annette King 
: Housing. 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: —housing therapeutics; we could go through any issue at all. There is climate change which Mr Key says is a massive hoax one day and says is his firm belief the next day. On almost every single issue Mr Key is unable to hold the same story over a number of days. That is why I tell my colleagues the honeymoon is over. It is OK to be fresh-faced it is OK to have a new haircut—like Mr English—and it is OK for Mr Key to say he is a person with no real experience in politics but is willing to give himself over to serving the nation. That is a great thing but in the end people know one has to have experience one has to have substance and one has to have ideas. A leader has to know how to drive the political machine and has to know how to get results. That is why this Budget from Michael Cullen—one in a line of eight—has continued to deliver. That is why the National Party cannot outline a Budget and give us one single idea. 
I say to Mr English that when he has finished yawning gets up and speaks for his whole 10 minutes—he will have a little speech to give over here—one single workable policy will do for us. I want just one policy from Mr English. He is the grinder. He is not bouncing from cloud to cloud; he is down there in the engine room working it through. So Mr English should know that one single workable real policy that can be costed and implemented will do—just one. If we can have that we will say that the National members are not just a bunch of whingers are not people who are here just to complain and are not the natural Opposition— 
Hon Annette King 
: Yes they are. 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: —but do have a chance of offering something to people in this country. But as Mrs King says and she is right— 
R Doug Woolerton 
: They are the natural Opposition. 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: —they are the natural Opposition in this country. They are bereft of ideas and they know only how to complain. They have not come up with one single single thing that they could do. 
And I tell Mr Woolerton that I look forward in just a few months’ time to forming a new Government over here on this side of the House and to looking for New Zealand First to be our partner in that Government. I will see him then. 
Hon BILL ENGLISH (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 You know the hardest thing for a Government whose time has run out is for the people in that Government to recognise it. We know what it is like. We have been there. We gave speeches like that—speeches that were all about how the Opposition had no idea of what to do or how to do it and the only people who could keep running the country was us. That was National in 1999. Of course the truth is that the louder we said it the more we portrayed the sinking feeling we all had which was that even our own supporters thought our time was up. 
If there was ever a man whose time is up it is Steve Maharey. Let us look at his one big workable idea that could be costed—in fact he had two—the single core benefit. After $200 million of expenditure on investigating that idea it has been canned. It has gone. It will not happen. Two hundred million dollars was spent on thinking about it. He also spent 8 years thinking about tertiary education. He is the man who spent $1 billion in 2 years on courses that no one finished. He spent $400 million on thinking about tertiary education and they are going to try to implement that on 1 January. 
Here is a simple idea for Mr Maharey. We will abandon his tertiary education policy. After 8 years of reform and 24 reports it has failed and it has cost $400 million. We will abandon it. We will let the people who run tertiary education get on with running tertiary education instead of spending all their time coming to Wellington pleading for money. That is what Labour’s policy is now. It is about bringing people to Wellington to plead for money. I also want to tell Steve Maharey what Helen Clark’s description is of what her Government is going to do. This was the question to her: “You’ve been in power for 8 years. Is there any area of Government where you want to take some action but have not had the chance to do so?”. That question was asked by the  
New Zealand Herald  
in a wide-ranging interview with Helen Clark. Let us see what the answer was. 
Darren Hughes 
: Ha ha! 
Hon BILL ENGLISH 
: Here is the policy over which the member for Otaki is going to lose his seat at the next election: “So undoubtedly there will be areas we will build on for next time which will be new.” And that is it. That is Labour’s policy as enunciated by the Prime Minister just 3 weeks ago in relation to what she wants to do after 8 years in power: “So undoubtedly there will be areas we will build on for next time which will be new.” That is what she said and that came after her description of what Labour has been doing which was that it has taken a while to build up the kitty. She said it has taken a while to build up the kitty for Working for Families and it has taken time to work up the kitty for interest-free loans and the early childhood programme. That is “lolly-nomics” and that is the problem with the economic strategy of this Government. It is not an argument over whether there has been growth—there has been. But it has been mismanaged. And Dr Cullen’s time is up because he does not even know that that is what has happened. 
No one out there believes that 8 years of growth has been Labour’s own doing. What people do believe is that Labour has treated that growing economy like a cash machine instead of a plant that needs to be fertilised. It has treated it as a cash machine to feed the kitty—with middle New Zealand’s cashcard. Why do I say that? [ 
Interruption 
] People on the average wage in the Otaki electorate—and there are a lot of them—7 years ago paid 19 percent of their income as tax. Now they pay 23 percent of their income as tax. So if one is on the average wage in that member’s electorate—and he thinks they all vote for him—one’s tax has gone up. Twice people were promised by Dr Cullen that their tax would go down because he changed the thresholds. Then Dr Cullen cancelled that in this Budget. In fact in the background of this Budget he has said not only that he has cancelled those tax cuts but that he cannot afford to shift the thresholds too much next year because he needs the money for the kitty. That is why that member must know—because if he does not then he is not out and about—that people on the average wage in Otaki are not going to vote for Labour. They are moving away from Labour because they feel exploited. 
But not only that—they have found out that under the Electoral Finance Bill the union they are members of cannot campaign against National in election year. If there was ever a piece of legislation that has demonstrated—well there has not been such a piece of legislation—completely Labour’s deep paranoia about its right to electoral office this is it. You see Labour’s members use the term “a level playing field”. I ask myself who the players are on this field that needs to be levelled. I can tell members who they are. On the one side is the Government—the Labour Government—and on the other side are the people of New Zealand. That is the playing field that is not level. The Labour Government fears the criticism of the people of New Zealand so they want to tip the playing field in favour of the Labour Government—as if $55 billion was not enough on its side already. So the Labour Government has $55 billion of public money to spend—$1 billion per week plus a bit—and it is going to make sure that no group of New Zealand people can spend more than $60000 and if they want to spend more than $5000 they will have to register. And you know what if people want to spend— 
Darren Hughes 
: So covert Customs officers who campaign— 
Hon BILL ENGLISH 
: The member for Otaki should listen to this. If people want to spend $10 they will have to decide whether they are classified as publishers or promoters. If they want to spend $10 on a flyer down their street about the dog control laws and come and talk to the local MP about it they will have to make a statutory declaration to each person on that street that they will not spend over $5000. If people are going to spend anything at all in election year they will be caught by this bill. So that is the level playing field. It is a case of flattening out civil society and the wider community and anyone who has a criticism of the Labour Government while that Government goes on a rampant spend-up of public money. 
What Labour is saying to the public of New Zealand is: “Leave politics to the politicians.” Labour wants to create an elite of latte-sipping suit-wearing socialists who are the only ones who are allowed to have an opinion in this country and we are opposed to the principle that third parties cannot have a say. That is the level playing field—the Government versus the people. 
Darren Hughes 
: Oh yeah the Exclusive Brethren will agree with that bill! 
Hon BILL ENGLISH 
: I want to say to that member that the people will win. The people will win because this is a small and vigorous democracy. 
The people have run out of “lolly-nomics”. They have run out of Dr Cullen ranting at them because they are doing everything wrong—things that he does not like such as buying houses. They have run out of Helen Clark who even on the marvellous occasion of the recognition of the bravery of a New Zealand warrior overseas could not help giving it just that slight political tone by sticking with Willie Apiata all day never moving out of camera shot and not inviting the Opposition to the presentation at Government House. The New Zealand people are tired of that. They want to look forward. They want to know how we are going to face the challenges of a global economy that is showing signs of unravelling. They want to know how we are going to deliver more growth to a community that has found out that economic growth is good for people and can give them more health more education more family security and more savings. That is what people want to know. 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 The Budget is a long-drawn-out process. That is the way it is and of course it makes it an accountable process. But people may have forgotten that the Greens are responsible for some of the good points in the Budget so I thought I would remind my colleagues of some of those. 
Today Nick Smith inadvertently drew some attention to one of the gains in the Budget and that is in the area of energy efficiency. The Greens through the Budget process and through the delegation of the energy efficiency portfolio to Jeanette Fitzsimons are in the process of achieving significant gains in terms of energy efficiency in New Zealand. The National Energy Efficiency and Conservation Strategy which seems to rile Mr Smith enables interest-free loans to people to put insulation in their homes and to develop cleaner and more efficient forms of heating. For new homes we are developing a new insulation standard a code. It will enable New Zealand homes which traditionally have been pretty poorly insulated to be much better insulated in the future. One of the pluses that caught the imagination of the public was the announcement of the Home Energy Rating Scheme. When houses are bought and sold through real estate agents each home will have an energy rating. If it has a good energy rating then rightly that will put up the price of the home; if it is the other way round then rightly that will lower the price. That is very good. 
In the Budget there is $15.5 million towards the Greens-initiated solar water heating project which is being developed around quality water-heating. Not every supplier will necessarily qualify. For each device there has to be a minimum standard. That will be a success and is proving so already for new homes. Obviously when new homes are built it is good to make sure they have a solar water-heating system installed. That is going ahead well. 
One of the other successes of the Green Party in the Budget was in the area of restoring three of New Zealand’s foremost wetlands—that is those in the Whangamarino in the Waikato; the Ashburton lakes on the upper Rangitata River; and the Waituna Lagoon and the Awarua wetland complex in Southland. New Zealand has so few wetlands that it is very important to preserve them and this Budget funding allows great progress to be made in that direction. 
Another achievement in the Budget that I personally have been associated with as the official development assistance spokesperson for the Green Party is the increase in overseas aid. In our post-election agreement with Labour there was a section on increasing overseas aid and we were very pleased when the Budget announced a much greater increase than had been projected in the previous year’s Budget. Instead of overseas aid going from 0.27 percent of gross national income to just 0.28 percent as had been projected in the long-term projections the amount has gone up to 0.3 percent and is projected to rise to 0.35 percent by 2010. We welcome not only the Government’s moving in that direction but also the way that other parties in this Parliament such as New Zealand First—including the Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters—United Future and the Maori Party all pushed for increases in overseas aid. There has been a big community movement for that over some years. Several MPs from various parties—New Zealand First United Future and Labour—were privileged to be invited to a ceremony and given little awards for our contribution to the raising of New Zealand’s overseas aid level. 
We now have to look forward at how we get overseas aid to go from 0.35 percent of gross national income in 2010 to 0.7 percent in 2015. In those 5 years the figure would have to jump by a significant amount so we must start developing a timetable now to achieve that. It would be good to have consensus in the House to make sure that whichever Government happens to be in power through to 2015 that timetable is proceeded with because the people of the world particularly those in poorer circumstances who need development assistance are looking for that. 
Also in the Budget—we teased out the details post the Budget—is quite a significant development for public transport particularly for rail and from the Auckland end particularly for the electrification of the Auckland passenger rail system. There has been a dramatic increase in the number of passengers on the Auckland rail system to over 5 million. It has been going up very rapidly despite all sorts of problems particularly on the western line. People are still hopping on the trains. Completing the double tracking of that line and the electrification will dramatically increase the patronage and provide an infrastructural background for public transport generally in Auckland. The Budget allows for an infrastructure loan which the region will pay for through a petrol tax. The details of all that are being worked out. The Greens were a bit worried that some or a significant amount of the petrol tax might go on just building new highways which is not the priority. The priority is public transport right now. It seems that all of the Auckland civic leaders of the different local bodies are for the petrol tax being devoted to particularly the electrification of the rail system. 
Another big achievement in the Budget is the $11.5 million for the Buy Kiwi Made programme. I was privileged to attend an Auckland launch 2 or 3 weeks ago. It was packed; the audience was a good cross-section of the industry. We do not often get all of the lead people together in the same room: the lead unionists those in the manufacturing area business people such as Phil O’Reilly of Business New Zealand people from the Employers Federation and various individual manufacturers who are producing good-quality New Zealand - made products. It was a fantastic launch. I do not think I saw very many National MPs there. [ 
Interruption 
] It is confirmed there were none. Sue Bradford has been delegated responsibility for that area and is doing great work. 
The question looming large over everything including the Budget is climate change. The Greens are disappointed that the Budget does not make room for a carbon charge but there are rumours afoot that the Government will come forward with some proposal in that area soon. I request that the Government be quite radical in its proposal because the public mood has shifted. The public is open to serious taxes on scarce resources particularly those that contribute to global warming such as fossil fuels. The time has come for a carbon charge. For many years people thought the Greens were a bit funny talking about all these taxes on resources but I think people now realise that resources such as oil are running out and also that some of those resources are causing great harm and taxation is required to reduce their use. That applies to the carbon charge on any of the greenhouse gas emitters from the energy sector from the transport sector or from the farming sector—for methane. There has to be a contribution from all those sectors to reducing our greenhouse gas emissions. 
Another problem in the Budget is the huge increase for the Department of Corrections. The amount went up by about 20 percent in the previous 2006-07 year and in this Budget it has gone up by another 15 percent. We have to look at those figures and ask whether this law and order competition between in particular Labour National and New Zealand First to see who can imprison people for the longest time give the heaviest sentences and all the rest of it is really helping our society. I think we should have another look at it. The Maori Party in particular and the Green Party are saying there are other ways rather than increasing the budget in that way. 
Hon ANNETTE KING (Minister of State Services) 
: 
 Today in the imprest supply debate the Leader of the Opposition John Key coined another new phrase—“lolly-nomics”. Of course he has a tendency to do this; whenever there is a major debate he comes up with a catchy little phrase that will hopefully make the TV clip that night as the sound bite. Mr Key and Mr English and no doubt all National members have all been asked to say the phrase in all their speeches today so we will just tick off how many times they say “lolly-nomics”. I am quite happy to have the new name “lolly-enomics” because it means that we have to have some lollies to be able to spend. We have to build up some lollies to be able to share them with New Zealanders. We cannot share “nothing” with anybody. We have to be able to have something to share with the people of New Zealand and what this Government has done has built up some lollies so we can spend them. So I thank National for that label. I suppose the opposite of it would be “Scrooge-nomics” and we suffered Scrooge-nomics under the National Government. I think it was called “euthanasia” at one stage but it was “Ruthanasia”. It became—and I think it was—“Scrooge-nomics” and New Zealanders felt the effect of it because there were no lollies to spend. 
In fact Bill English as Minister of Finance ran deficits. He was so good in his job he ran deficits. He wants the job again I say to members of this House. He is begging for the job again and his record is that he ran deficits and people can only spend deficits if they borrow to spend the deficits. 
It is like the household budget. People take out the old credit card they go into New World they buy the milk the bread the butter and the meat they stick it on the credit card and they think they have actually paid for them—until they get the bill. Then they get the headache because they now have to pay for what they have put on their credit cards. 
I have to say that people could be mistaken in not knowing what this debate is about. It is the imprest supply debate and it is the end of the Budget 2007 debate. A Budget is the implementation of policy. We heard Mr English say today that Labour has no policy. Of course we do not have a Budget if we are not implementing something and spending some of the lollies on something. In fact this party spends the lollies on policy—policy we told New Zealanders about policy we believe in—and in a Budget we implement policy. Did we hear from Opposition members how they would implement policy? Did they tell us about a policy? They did not tell us about a single policy. In fact it was the usual rant and rave. 
Many New Zealanders may not remember this debate but they will remember that this Budget brought in KiwiSaver for thousands and thousands of New Zealanders. In fact over 100000 New Zealanders will be enrolled by 2008. This Budget brought in business tax cuts for New Zealand business people. The National Party—can people believe it—opposed that. They opposed a tax cut for business in New Zealand. I heard on so many occasions National members saying they believed that the businesses of New Zealand deserved to have the same tax rates as Australia. We heard that up and down the country for years and when the first chance came to vote for a tax cut for business in New Zealand who opposed it? The National Party! That is as shallow as a bird bath. 
Who can believe that that party ever believes in tax cuts when the first chance it got to vote for them it voted against them? Why did its members vote against them? I ask members to ask themselves that. Why would they vote against them? It can be for only one reason—pure politics. There was no rationale behind it there was no reasoning behind it; it was pure naked politics. That is why National members voted against tax cuts. 
In this Budget we also saw some of the last implementation of the Primary Health Care Strategy. I want to congratulate the Minister of Health on the work he has done in ensuring that this policy which was put in place has been implemented for the benefit of New Zealanders. I have to say I am particularly proud of that policy because I have always believed—as this party has—that the first rung of the health ladder ought to be affordable for New Zealanders. We allow people to go to hospitals where it is free but we say to them that when they want to go to their primary health care provider they pay top dollar. 
We did have a subsidy for primary health care—New Zealanders will remember it—and we were subsidised for years and years and years. In the years of “Scrooge-nomics” National members took away the subsidy for primary health care they voted to take away the subsidy for primary health care and gave people a “poor card”. If people were poor enough they got a bit of a help to go to their doctor but if they had a dollar over the benchmark they paid full price. This current provision has brought back affordable primary health care to New Zealanders—not only primary health care but affordable prescriptions as well. I am very proud that that was in this Budget implementing a policy that I know that many New Zealanders believe in. I know that many of the other supporting parties believe in it as well. 
We also saw in education the implementation of 20 hours’ free early childhood education. Last Friday I had the privilege of visiting a brand-new early childhood centre in my electorate called I-Kids. It is private early childhood education centre. If members drive around Greta Point I ask them to have a look at a beautiful new building that has gone up there—it is spectacular. And do members know what that early childhood centre has done? It has signed up for 20 hours’ free early childhood education. It believes in it. It believes that it is good for the parents it is providing a quality service and it is one of many in my electorate. I say: “Good on you I-Kids and good on all those who have signed up.” They have put first the children of New Zealand—not raw naked politics as some would do because they think they might get the National Party a vote or two. 
But one would have to say that the level of debate in this House in recent weeks has been more about getting rid of Ministers dreamt-up scandals so-called conspiracies and a lot of innuendo that we have seen over the last few weeks rather than sensible debate. 
Hon Member 
: And a lot of rubbish as well! 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: I would say to Mr Coleman that as a new member in this House it is really remarkable how fast he has fallen into those traps—traps that most people take a long time to fall into. I think that Diane Foreman in the Sunday paper put her finger on it when she pointed out that the problem she faced in terms of the theft of Don Brash’s emails—another one of the scandals and conspiracies we have heard about in this House—was closer to home. In other words the problem is around the National Party. I think what we have seen since the election in 2005 is the National Party immersing itself in pursuing issues that are irrelevant to New Zealanders are irrelevant to the daily lives of Kiwi men and women and I want to say that the Budget the Government has just put out is very relevant to the people of New Zealand. 
The big winner in this Budget was transport. Transport was a winner in 2006. It has been a winner under this Government because we believe we can transform an economy only by investing in infrastructure. Today John Key talked about transport in Auckland and the gridlock there. I ask him to think about the roads that were not built about the investment that did not go into public transport and about the decisions made in the 1990s. It is there for anyone to see as clear as the nose on your face—there was little investment. We in Auckland are reaping the benefits—or in fact we are reaping the results of that lack of investment and it has only been this Government’s commitment to investment that has seen us have a programme under way where there is now money going towards electrification of rail and into passenger transport into roads—local and State highways. In fact we have seen an unprecedented investment into our infrastructure. 
John Key also said how a tax cut fixes a traffic jam. I think he said they should have got a tax cut and he implied that that would fix a traffic jam. Well of course one cannot spend the money twice. The lollies have to go where they are needed. In my view investment into infrastructure which is in this Budget is very good spending indeed. 
SIMON POWER (National—Rangitikei) 
: 
 I have quietly been a bit of a fan of Annette King for quite some time. I have always thought that she was a good politician and somebody who could deliver the goods when the pressure came on. I think I know Annette King reasonably well. I have watched her in operation for a long long time: from back in the days when she was running the local economic development agency in the Manawatu right through to her being a senior Cabinet Minister in this Government. I can tell the people who are watching or listening to this debate that I do not think she believed what she said over the last 10 minutes. Annette King did not have the old flair about her that we have come to expect of her. She just did not have the same commitment to delivering the message that she has shown in such a strident way for a long period of time. It was almost as though she knew something was about to change. 
In the third reading today of the Appropriation (2007/08 Estimates) Bill which as Darren Hughes pointed out to me may be taken with an Imprest Supply Bill I have only 10 minutes to speak so I thought I would spend my 10 minutes on outlining 10 things that could have been done a lot better in the Department of Corrections. I think it is well worth spending just a minute—[ 
Interruption 
] I have only 10 minutes—one minute on each. 
Hon Annette King 
: You’ve only got eight now! 
SIMON POWER 
: I probably have only 8 minutes left now; that is right—40 seconds on each. It will cost $253 per night or just over $92000 per year to keep an inmate incarcerated in a New Zealand prison under this Government. Now that cost does have an impact on the Appropriation (2007/08 Estimates) Bill primarily because in 2004-05 it was going to be only $57000 per year. In fact Damien O’Connor told the House only a month and a half ago that the price was $69000 per year when he knew all along that it was $92000 per year. 
That cost is because of one thing and one thing alone: the appalling way that the process for managing and building the new prisons has occurred under this Government. The Government knows the process has not worked because the refurbishment of Mount Eden Prison will not follow the collaborative working arrangement scheme for building prisons. Damien O’Connor has given that away. It comes on the back of revelations—despite what Matt Robson said and despite what the Hon Paul Swain said—that Damien O’Connor has had to come down to the House in the last month and admit to the  
Northern Advocate 
 paper in Whangarei that Ngawha prison is sinking. He told this House there were no expected future problems with regard to site stability at Ngawha prison. This estimates bill and the debate we have had around this Budget does not allow for the massive cost that will land on this vote in order to rectify that particular engineering shambles. We know that Mount Eden Prison will not use the system that has been used in such a massive construction blowout. 
We know that during the last short time the Department of Corrections has spent nearly $1 million per month on external consultants. We know that the Department of Corrections is estimated over the next short while to spend $311000 on chartered flights for prisoners which is four times the amount that the Government spent in its first year in office on chartering planes to move prisoners around. I can advise members on the Treasury benches that there is more to come on that issue. 
We know also that in the year to 31 May $1.7 million was paid in bonuses to Department of Corrections staff on the back of everything that has gone wrong in that department in the last 18 months. It is almost impossible to believe that the senior management at the department sat around a mahogany table or the like and decided they would actually seriously reward managers at the head office for the appalling job they have done over the last 18 months by writing out cheques—taxpayer-funded cheques—for $1.7 million. We know that not everybody at the head office of the department agreed with that particular assessment of their performance because nearly a quarter of the staff there have chucked in their jobs in the past year according to figures that we have obtained. 
We also know that much work remains to be done in certain key areas of operation in the department not the least of which is prisoner transportation. We saw a damning Ombudsmen’s report in recent months that showed the department was told three times in the space of 3 months of serious concerns about the safety of prisoner transport by Chubb and the security monitoring department but did nothing. 
Looking ahead to the 12 months that this appropriation bill will grant vote money to the department for we know that still outstanding is a report from Treasury into the prison budget overspend in the sum of just under half a billion dollars on the building of four new prisons. A figure that Damien O’Connor used earlier this year was $890 million in order to build those four new prisons. In recent days the figure that has crept into debates in this House from Damien O’Connor has been $1.2 billion. The cost has moved up from $890 million to that level without too much of a fuss from those who should have been listening carefully to the Minister’s words. 
We have here a department that in the last 12 months has established such a track record for bungling incompetence that it gives the public of this country no confidence at all that the next 12 months will see any improvements in the department. We know that the money that has been spent on things like landscaping prisons—a sum of $11 million—could have been spent on drug and alcohol rehabilitation courses or work schemes for prisoners: matters that operational funding could have been used on to reduce reoffending by our prison population. We know that something like just under 80 percent of prisoners will be back inside prison within 5 years of their release—or certainly they will be convicted of an offence. With those moneys that have been wasted such as the $1.8 million or just under that sum that was paid in bonuses to the department’s head office staff how many offenders could have attended drug and alcohol rehabilitation courses or could have been on meaningful work schemes that would give them opportunities and skills that they will otherwise not have when they leave that environment of incarceration? How many of those people—not to mention the victims of their crimes—could have had the opportunity to have crime reduced by money being spent in an appropriate and a thoughtful way rather than on the wastage that has occurred in the department? 
Darren Hughes who is a well-meaning sort of character in the Labour Party made a comment earlier in my contribution today asking what National would do to reduce those costs. Well I say to Mr Hughes I think it is pretty self-evident. We would create contracting environments where contractors stick to a simple thing called a quote which they give at the beginning of a construction project. We would make sure that money is not wasted on things like landscaping prisons or on bonuses paid to head office staff and that it goes into meaningful drug and alcohol rehabilitation courses work schemes and the types of programmes that help the victims of crime to avoid reoffending occurring against them and that give offenders—particularly I say to Mr Hughes young offenders—the opportunity to redeem their lives. 
Dr PITA SHARPLES (Co-Leader—Maori Party) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Assistant Speaker; tena tatou. I have been wondering what it is with the concept of one in 10. One in 10 New Zealanders live in Australia making up the largest concentration of New Zealanders living in any other country. One in 10 European families and one in four Maori families fell behind in paying at least one bill for power gas or water in the year 2004 according to the living standards survey. Then there is the fact that over 10 percent of all households in New Zealand are experiencing mortgage stress. According to the economist Brian Easton half a million New Zealanders spend more than 40 percent of their after-tax household earnings on their mortgage repayments. There is the fact that one in 10 boys and one in 20 girls reported being bullied at least once a week. Of course the breaking news today is that the latest food price index shows that the price of a 2 litre bottle of milk rose by about 10 percent last month. All those indicators may appear haphazard or random but there is a connection between them and it is the silent violence of economic injustice. 
As we conclude the third reading of the Appropriation (2007/08 Estimates) Bill the Maori Party seeks to remind the House of the gross wealth disparity across New Zealand that is reflected in persistent and growing economic desperation. Sure the richest one in 10 New Zealanders have increased their net worth to just over 50 percent of the total median net worth of our nation’s wealth. One in 10 New Zealanders are in that position and life is looking good for the top 10 percent. The figures show that those people are at least 21 percent better off in 2004 than they were 20 years ago in 1984. But we cannot ignore the fact that for the poorest 30 percent of New Zealanders it appears that their real income is lower in 2004 than it was 20 years ago in 1984. 
The impacts of globalisation have been particularly dire for Maori workers. It is Maori who have been cut and slashed by the sharp edge of the policies of the 1980s and 1990s to liberalise our economy and expose it to the forces of globalisation. With the removal of tariff protections and State sector restructuring it was Maori workers who were disproportionately impacted on in the textile clothing footwear car assembly meatworks and forestry industries and in the railways. The price of global progress has been at great cost to tangata whenua. Statistics New Zealand’s household labour force survey gives even more room for despondency when it comes to describing the profile of New Zealanders who fall under the line and are classified as poor. Maori children are nearly twice as likely as Pakeha children to fall under the poverty line and others including Pasifika peoples are nearly three times as likely to do so. We have consistently raised in the House the shame that this nation carries in entrenching hardship for the poorest of the poor: some 250000 children who are still living in poverty. 
People are impoverished when they are deprived of access to power and resources. Lincoln University’s professor of agribusiness Keith Woodford has told the nation that life will get even tougher with further milk price rises this year and the cost of other grocery staples like bread flour and meat likely also to increase. But it is not just the material famine that concerns us. People are also suffering the impact of spiritual poverty: the lack of hope that a better future lies ahead. So although the current Government promulgates an endless mantra of working for some families or offers to some people the prospect of being a KiwiSaver while excluding all those New Zealanders who are kept on poverty wages far too little emphasis has been paid to the poorest of the poor. 
Part of the problem lies in the lack of robust data for measuring the growth in disparities or policy failures in the area of monitoring. The Child Poverty Action Group has identified that virtually identical names have been transferred across family assistance strategies yet those strategies now have vastly different eligibility criteria. What that means as the Muliaga case demonstrated so tragically is that with the radically changing criteria and the complexity of the family tax credit concept many families are missing out on obtaining their basic entitlements as a result of the policy confusion. 
The other issue is to do with the declining capacity of State agencies to adhere to a tight monitoring framework. In May the Auditor-General’s report on Te Puni Kokiri’s administration of its grant programmes revealed shocking standards of legal risk and non-compliance which is concerning for a Public Service agency. Instances of contracts signed before a legal clearance had been obtained or where recipients had failed to submit progress reports as the funding contracts required showed the devastating impact of running down the monitoring function of that agency. Just yesterday we revealed more evidence of the monitoring failure in reviewing the first annual report that the Minister of Maori Affairs had tabled in 12 years on progress made—or not made—against Treaty settlements. 
All across this House there would be unanimous agreement that the Government spend on Maori across education hospital and primary health care and community probation or jail and through the unemployment or sickness registers appears high. Those appropriations are spent for and on behalf of the Maori partner yet the Maori partner has little to say about how much the appropriation should be or about the nature of the design development implementation management and evaluation of the policies associated with that spend. Despite having little or no say and often having very little dedicated funds allocated the blame for poor performance in health education justice and the social services is consistently sheeted home to Maori. What is worse all evidence reveals that the gaps are getting worse and the injustice is becoming entrenched. 
The Maori Party the Tikanga Maori House in Parliament has a suggestion to challenge the poor performance that parties often clash over in considering the Maori spend. There is no denying that Aotearoa possesses a dual economy: the New Zealand economy and the Maori economy. The Maori-owned asset base has an estimated worth of $9 billion of which Maori-owned land-based businesses and incorporations earn at least $1.9 billion annually in revenue and Maori exports add up to a total of $1.3 billion a year. We know exactly where the spend is and the estimated profits. For example we can measure revenue owned by Maori who own approximately 40 percent of the New Zealand seafood industry own 10 percent of the forest estate and produce 7.5 percent of the value added in agricultural production. But in the spend on Maori undertaken by the Crown whether in education health justice or Treaty settlements the total amount spent on Maori by Maori is often submerged from view. Officials tell us that it is too difficult to aggregate such amounts. 
As an example it has taken the Maori Party an enormous search involving some 107 written questions pertaining to kura and wharekura and an additional 104 questions related to bilingual and immersion classes in mainstream schools before we were able to obtain the information from the Minister about the spend on Maori education. During that search we found that funds previously allocated to kura and wharekura in the 5 years from 2000-01 to 2005-06 have not been fully spent with the total difference being $16 million. We are yet to find out where that money has gone. That will probably take another couple of hundred questions and another couple of months of waiting and who has time to do that? 
It is the firm view of the Tikanga Maori House in Parliament that the Maori partner needs better financial data to properly monitor the Government spend on Maori and then to be able to assess that spend against the promises made in the Treaty of Waitangi. Long-term relief for tangata whenua from present circumstances will depend on the courage and commitment of the nation to be open to the possibility of a Maori-inspired solution. The 2007-08 estimates are not that. Thank you. 
Hon PETE HODGSON (Minister of Health) 
: 
 It is a pleasure to take part in this debate. I would like to thank the previous speaker for his thoughtful remarks and I will respond to them in a minute. But first of all I will draw attention to the speech made by the leader of the National Party Mr John Key. It is interesting that he was the first respondent to Dr Michael Cullen. The National Party finance spokesperson was not given the first slot; clearly Mr Key wanted it and fair enough. But one would expect if that were the case that Mr Key would then use his speech to give this House and this country some view as to how National would have approached the appropriations or the Budget of the land. One would expect that and one would expect a bit of policy—or if not a bit of policy then a bit of policy direction or a bit of an indication about how much those members would want to do on these benches versus how little over on those benches. One would expect a bit about where those members see themselves on the political spectrum and a little bit of a hint about what this National Party might do now that it has completed almost 8 years in Opposition should it ever take the Treasury benches. 
But no we did not get that. We got the catchy stuff but we did not get a glimpse of the general direction. We got “lolly-nomics” and that was it. Mr Key had a significant opportunity in this House to make a significant statement just as he did on Budget night. He did not do it. He did not do it and time is running out. There is no indication of what National stands for in this Parliament. 
We know what those members stand against—they stand against anything that furthers the benefit of New Zealanders. Here are some examples of the things they have voted against. They have voted against KiwiSaver. They voted against it almost beyond belief and it was one of the most extraordinary actions we have ever seen. We still have not heard whether they will support KiwiSaver but they had better make up their minds soon because New Zealanders are supporting KiwiSaver in their droves. 
National voted against Working for Families. I guess those members called it “lolly-nomics”. We call it addressing child poverty in our country and they voted against that. They voted against 20 hours’ free early childhood education and tried very hard to make sure it would not work. That is what they did about that. They probably call that “lolly-nomics” too. We call that giving every New Zealander a good start in the education system as 3 and 4-year-olds. We also say that it is a good opportunity for parents to go back to work part time or full time if they want to; to stay at home and look after the younger child the 1 or 2-year-old if they want to; or to get off the domestic purposes benefit. But those National members voted against that. 
They voted against cheaper doctors’ fees. Mrs King spoke briefly about that. They voted against that. They voted against reducing the cost of a pharmaceutical from $15 per item to $3 per item. They voted against it. I do not know why they did that. They probably thought that was “lolly-nomics” too. We thought that was making sure that the first rung of the health ladder is affordable. We knew that if we reduced the barriers of access to primary health care then we would get an increase in access to primary health care—and we knew that we would end up with better health outcomes as a result. But those members voted against that. 
They voted against the business tax cuts. I do not understand why they did that. Mr Key said Auckland’s roading needed to be fixed. Well we are fixing it. But those members voted against that too. You see they vote against everything. So we know what they stand against—it is pretty much anything—but we do not know what they stand for. 
Can I say to the colleague who has just resumed his seat that his comments about not being able to find out how much time and effort is going into Maoridom may be his truth but it is certainly not mine. I can say that in the health sector we are addressing the disparities in health between Maori and non-Maori with some success. We are not finished not by any means but boy are we making progress—and it is measurable. I can say without any hint of contradiction that Working for Families disproportionably advantages Maori that having lower doctors’ fees disproportionately advances Maori and so it goes. 
I want to talk about the leader of the National Party Mr Key. The received wisdom now is that the honeymoon is over and the scrutiny begins. Well that is fine; so it should be. Any politician would respond to that by making careful and measured statements and by developing positions or position statements on this or that as they build up their portfolio of policy preparatory to having a run at the job of Prime Minister in the forthcoming election. That is what any leader of the Opposition does and in a sense Mr Key has done that. Mr Key has used the opportunity to change the National Party’s policy on for example the pre-saving for superannuation the so-called Cullen fund. National members were against that too and they have gone the other way. They have said they are now for that. One could say that they are immunising themselves against changing the popular policies of this Government; that is a reasonable political thing to do. One could say that they are simply trying to make sure that they do not look as if they are terribly bad people such as those that existed in National in the 1990s or that they are trying to get away from the Don Brash image—whatever. 
That is something Mr Key did. But that is what happened when he had the chance to change certain National Party policies. As soon as the spotlight went on Mr Key we got a completely different kind of behaviour. Of course the issue we are talking about is Iraq. Straight away he lost his sure-footedness. It is true that he has made a number of statements about Iraq that have got him into trouble. He said back in 2003 that he was in favour of sending the troops. That is written down and we know he said it. In 2007 we know he said he was not in favour so there is the contradiction. Which way do we deal with this? 
That is not itself the issue. That was the issue last week—that Mr Key had made a mistake and had contradicted himself in the space of his time here. That is now part of the written record. But what has not been made so obvious is that since then Mr Key has not clarified. There are a range of things he could do. He could say: “Back then I said that and right now I am saying this and that is because I was a junior and now I am running the place.” But he said that once and he did not say it again. In other words he did go for that excuse and then he backed off from it. He could have said: “I needed to clarify.” he could have said: “ I need to change my position.” or he could have gone anywhere to get firm ground. But he did not. Instead what he did was to make it worse. 
He went down to Dunedin on Friday and came up with a real doozy. He said that the National Party never said that it wanted to go to Iraq. The National Party’s history has now been rewritten by the current leader of the National Party in Dunedin on Friday. That tells me that this man continues to obfuscate as soon as the pressure goes on him about what he feels. He does not give clarity; he gives another layer of confusion. 
That is an interesting position because if one wants to tell how a politician is going to do in general then one needs to look at how the politician is doing under pressure. Under pressure Mr Key continues to obfuscate even today. It is not as if he has gotten through this; he is still doing it. Not only has Mr Key made a contradiction of his position on Iraq between 2003 and last month but he has now gone on and done it again. He said that his position is not as described. He said that the National Party’s position is not as described yet he said that he was a junior which means that it was as described. 
It is not that we have such a riddle of contradictions; that is already understood. For me the interesting thing is that given a weekend to think about it given a bit of time to come to a position and given a bit of a chance to pick up the phone and say: “All right from here on this is going to be our position.” he has not done it. He has simply tried to rewrite history. We know how he does it. He does it with those fast-flowing clipped sentences that do not always finish. There is a lot of business-speak in them—often with the participles missing but we will not get too fussy. He just goes to smooth and sooth and on the radio it sounds fine. But when we get the transcript and look at the English language written down in ink then we know that we are dealing with someone who cannot get it straight who cannot get a line and hold to it and who actually writhes when put under pressure. 
He writhes. He does not come to a position and stand his ground and defend it good or bad. Instead he writhes. He moves around. It is like nailing jelly to a tree. Frankly a person who behaves like that cannot be a Prime Minister in this country so Mr Key has two choices. He needs to alter his behaviour the way that he deals with himself and the way he views himself and decide that he will stand on firm ground here for this issue and on other firm ground there for that issue or he needs to give the job back to Bill English. 
GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam) 
: 
 Kia ora. This afternoon when we came into the House it was decorated with those red boxes with the Labour Party’s name over them. Mr Hodgson points to his one now as if I had not noticed it. It was almost as if Labour members had a desperate need to create a feeling of festivity about themselves so they festooned the party with these baubles these decorations these brightly coloured boxes. Most of them are empty I note; they have clear ends and I can see that most of them are empty. 
We know that behind all of this lies the desperate need for Labour to feel as though it is a team again to get over the fact that it is in such terrible disarray from one end of the party to the other and to somehow disguise the fact that at least 11 of its members are likely to exit this Chamber within the next 15 months. Further we know that the prospects of any new members coming to replace them after the 2008 election is starting to look extremely slim. 
It is extraordinary that we can also turn to Speakers’ rulings that make it very clear that one cannot have in the House any sort of decoration like this that obscures the Speaker’s view of a member. We have looked across the House today and it would seem that most of the Labour members must be sitting on cushions in order to prop themselves up a little bit and to give themselves a further boost to the ego. It is either that or else they have been instructed by Helen Clark and Michael Cullen to get down in there and really feel like they are in the trenches. 
Today in this appropriations debate we have not heard any proud claims about what Labour has done for the nation or any proud claims about what its policies delivered in the last Budget are doing for the nation but rather a series of very very personal attacks on the leader of the National Party John Key. It is delightful for us that we can bask in the knowledge that if Labour members are attacking John Key then they know just how deeply attracted the New Zealand electorate is to him. So we are delighted by these attacks. 
We are a little saddened that we cannot get I suppose one would say a bit of information from Labour about what its aspirations are for the balance of its term. We know that some of those members cannot have too many aspirations because we noticed also that red boxes were not given to all members of the Labour caucus. I am afraid to say Mr Assistant Speaker that we looked at a certain gentleman sitting on a sheepskin in the third row one seat in and noticed that there was no red box on his desk. If that is some sort of a foretelling of that particular gentleman’s future then in his case we are saddened. 
As for the rest it is a little bit perplexing that there was no red box on Shane Jones’ desk. I cannot believe that that is because the Labour Government wants to get rid of Shane Jones—I cannot believe that. I cannot believe that he was not offered a red box. What I can believe is that Shane Jones said: “Do not be so stupid. Do not be so silly guys. We do not need this. Why can we not be proud of what we are and why can we not just get in there and do the business?”. 
Well we saw a perfect demonstration from Michael Cullen today as to why Labour members cannot do the business. He gave a 10-minute speech that never said anything about his view of where the economy is going in the next short while—nothing whatsoever. We had 8 minutes of Michael Cullen doing the sort of rant that he did last Wednesday which I have had so many letters about over the last week it is incredible. I suppose that on the one hand people might say that if people are writing about someone it is good for that person but in this case nothing those people had to say was particularly good. It is sad because we know that Dr Cullen is a retiring member. He has been a great parliamentarian and it is sad to see that at the twilight of his career and as it is coming to an end he is being forced to try to prop up the morale of the Labour Government by going on those sorts of seriously vindictive nasty attacks that really only leave people with a bad taste about the person making the attack Dr Cullen himself. 
So why did the Labour members not talk about their policies today? Why did they not talk about Working for Families? Why did they not talk about 20 free hours? Why did they not talk about KiwiSaver? And why did they not talk about the business tax cuts and everything else in a way that expressed their pride in doing those things? 
I will explain to the House why that did not happen. It is because Working for Families 20 free hours and KiwiSaver are all about taking choice away from New Zealanders. If there is anything that is characterising the current Government it is the lack of choice that New Zealanders have under its leadership. We have Michael Cullen Mr Hodgson and various other speakers saying that Working for Families is the greatest thing this country has ever had that more families are getting more money etc. etc. But these statements belie the fact that Working for Families has created a situation where the Government determines the amount of income that anyone has. 
It is the Government that puts caps and limits on people’s ability to earn. It is the Government that through the structure of Working for Families says to too many workers: “Do not do anything extra. Just accept what we are prepared to give you.” That is an unacceptable situation for many many New Zealanders. We do not begrudge anyone that income but we do think that there are much better ways to deliver it. There are much better ways to ensure the work that New Zealanders do is more productive. We need to see a rise in our productivity because that is really the only way out of the current hole we are in. 
The same applies for the 20 free hours arrangements. We know that some childcare centres are signing up for it. We know that many New Zealanders are availing themselves of it. Of course they should; we do not begrudge them that. But New Zealanders are being asked to sign up for the particular type of 20 free hours arrangement that suits the Government without having any choice on their part. For example if it were a tax relief for working mothers or if it was perhaps even a straight payment or subsidy for the choices that people make the important thing is that the choices would be there. Choices are not there under the 20 free hours policy as the Government currently structures it. 
Then we come to KiwiSaver. No one would mount an argument to say that saving is a bad thing but these days so many Kiwis face pressures in their lives that were not there some years ago in the general cost of living as it relates to the wages they earn. The Government says that if people want to avail themselves of KiwiSaver then they need to sacrifice a certain percentage of their income and that if they do that then there will be some Government contribution. It will all be locked up for 65 years without any great choice about when that money might become available to people. What is worst of all is the Government says to all those workers who cannot afford to get into KiwiSaver that they will continue paying through their taxes as well. 
If Dr Cullen wonders—in his Walter Mitty view of the world which is so perfect—why New Zealanders are not switching on to what he has to say then he need only ask himself why so many people are leaving the country. Why do we have an exodus of 760 New Zealanders each week? Why have we had a slide in our OECD rankings in the last 8 years? Dr Cullen talks about things like the health system. Why is it that in any part of New Zealand we can visit an emergency room that is under stress? If everything is so good in health then why is that the case? Why if everything is so good in education do we have one in five young New Zealanders leaving school technically illiterate? These are the things that people measure Governments by. 
Why are we becoming an increasingly violent society? Why do we so often have very very bad circumstances presented to us on the news where New Zealanders have gone off the rails somewhere in a sense of madness? We saw this sort of situation with the young child who was murdered last week and we know that that happens once every 5 weeks in this country. 
Those are the reasons why New Zealanders are not listening. They are the reasons why the phone is off the hook. They are the reasons why people are saying they want to try something different. They are the reasons why the optimism and the forward thought of John Key are attracting so much attention. 
I make the prediction that all the red boxes in the world will not make one iota of difference to the vote that is cast at the end of 2008. It could just well be that some of those wise people who did not display a red box in the Chamber today will end up winning anyway. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The member is aware that he has 5 minutes and the bell will give a 1-minute warning. 
Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future) 
: 
 There are some things in this Budget that I am very proud of from United Future’s point of view that I want to highlight this afternoon and in so doing pick up the challenge that was implicit in the previous speaker’s address. 
I am proud of the fact that as a result of our confidence and supply agreement we have delivered the biggest business tax cut since the 1980s. It is $3.4 billion over the next 4 years that will boost productivity and will retain New Zealand’s competitiveness with its nearest trading partner Australia. I am proud of the fact that as a result of that change and the significant changes to savings vehicles’ taxation arrangements as well we now have a top business tax rate of 30c in the dollar and for a number of savings vehicles the rate is 30c in the dollar as well. That will encourage people to invest more and to save more and it is consistent with the themes of this Budget overall which are about investment and saving. 
I say to the House that were it not for the provisions of that confidence and supply agreement these changes would not have been delivered. I am also proud of the fact that we will now see from 1 April next year all donations to charitable organisations made by individuals and corporates being tax deductible. That arises out of the discussion document we issued in October last year again arising out of the confidence and supply agreement of the year before and it is a very positive step forward that the philanthropic charitable and voluntary sectors across New Zealand will welcome. It will be a spur to their further development and ongoing contribution to the work and the life of this country. Again that would not have happened were it not for that confidence and supply agreement. 
I am also proud of the fact—and this is particularly topical given the report yesterday from the Environmental Risk Management Authority—that we have in place a comprehensive review team chaired by the Hon Margaret Austin overseeing a review of pest management strategies when it comes to game animals such as deer chamois and thar that will also take into account yesterday’s report regarding the future use of 1080 poison. The recreational sector tell us that the establishment of that panel is one of the most significant things to happen to it in recent years and it provides a positive way forward towards striking that balance between the management of pests in New Zealand and the promotion of recreation. Again that is something that would not have happened but for the United Future confidence and supply agreement with this Government. 
I am proud of being able to contribute to those achievements that this Budget delivers. They are ones that in time will have a significant impact on the lives of all New Zealanders. The changes to the business tax regime from next year automatically will trigger consequential changes to personal tax arrangements. That will be the nature of the debate from this point on and I give notice that as a party we will continue to promote a low tax environment for New Zealand taxpayers. Next year probably around March or April we will have a discussion document coming out again as part of our agreement relating to income splitting for households and families looking at the whole area of household taxation arrangements. Again I think that will shape the tax debate for the future moving forward. 
Further work is being done in the charitable sector on some of the initiatives that the Budget contained particularly moves towards the establishment of payroll giving. We will be making further announcements about that later in the year again to boost the contribution to the voluntary sector in New Zealand the charitable sector in its work and to establish a culture of giving across this country to promote philanthropy and people’s involvement in it. 
As a smaller party in this House as one of the MMP parties United Future seeks to be a party of influence on the Government of the day. It is a role we have performed for both major parties over the last decade. I am particularly pleased that this year with the limited resources at our disposal we have been able to deliver such significant change. Indeed I say that if we took out many of the tax changes from this Budget aside perhaps from the KiwiSaver initiative there would not be a great deal left. I am very very satisfied and proud to have played a role in contributing to that and more important to see a situation where New Zealand will benefit from these changes where despite some of the ebbs and flows of political current they will be sustainable they will be beneficial to New Zealand households and families they will be positive for investment good for jobs and they will create a beneficial and positive future for this country. That is why I am voting for this Budget this afternoon. 
Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay of Plenty) 
: 
 I would like to acknowledge the comments of the previous speaker the Hon Peter Dunne with respect to the tax concession encouragement for charitable giving which of course the Labour Party announced having stolen the policy word for word from John Key. He announced it weeks and weeks before the Labour Party put it in its Budget. At the time that John Key announced that policy what did Dr Cullen say? He said that it was Tory charity. But when he got to announce it only a few weeks later apparently it was a great new policy—something great for the community and the way forward. I have to say that I think it is a good policy. It will turbocharge the voluntary sector of New Zealand as John Key says and I think that is absolutely vital. 
But what is also turbocharged in this economy are the 700 New Zealanders who are leaving this country every week to go and live in Australia. In fact I know of a young family in my electorate that is leaving New Zealand next week to go to Australia. This is a young man and his family who has worked for 20-something years in the New Zealand economy and has contributed well. He has a couple of young kids. He has decided that the lack of opportunity the stifling political correctness the high taxes and the lack of incentive and reward for effort are sufficient for him to want to take himself his wife and his two young children to Australia to start a new life. He will be going to Brisbane and joining his brother who is there as well with his partner and young child. They will be joining more and more New Zealanders who are leaving New Zealand to go to Australia. 
What was in this Budget to make that young man and his family from Papamoa stay in New Zealand? Absolutely nothing. Where was the incentive of lower personal taxes to help families work hard and get ahead? There was not one thing at all. Where was the commitment to improve the quality of our schools? Where was the effort to get trade training in our schools so that our young people can be equipped to get into the community as John Key has announced? Where was the commitment to improve the standard of care in our nation’s hospitals to unleash the malignant spread of bureaucracy that is so stifling our health professionals in their desperate desire to help New Zealanders? Where was that? 
Chris Auchinvole 
: Where was it? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: Well nowhere. It was absolutely nowhere. It was a Budget completely bereft of any idea or any motivation to say to that young family to stay in New Zealand. [ 
Interruption 
] Hold on. Mr Cosgrove says it was full of stuff to get people to stay in New Zealand. Apparently regulations and putting up the price of land for new families is some great new thing that this Government announced. But there was nothing in this Budget to say to that young family: “Stay in New Zealand.” Where was the sense of direction the sense of purpose to say to that young man: “Stay in New Zealand and continue building your life here. We’re going to give you every incentive to get ahead.”? Where was that? It was not there. 
Where was the opportunity to say to him: “We’ll give you even more opportunity to get a better house and get ahead and get an affordable home.”? Where was that? There was none of that at all. Where was the Government saying: “We’ve got a vision for a quality education system that is going to give young New Zealanders the skills they need to make sure they can compete with everyone else.”? Where was that? There was none whatsoever. In fact all families get from the education system is the food police controlling what the kids and the mums and dads can put in the lunch boxes to take to school. That is hardly improving the standard of education for New Zealanders at all. 
 What was there in health for this young man and his family? Nothing. Where was the Government’s sense of purpose to say that it wants a health system that makes New Zealanders live longer and thrive and a health system that will bring care closer to home to make sure that people get better services coordinated with social care? Where was any of that appropriate vision from the Government? There was none whatsoever. 
Chris Auchinvole 
: A broken arm in Greymouth! 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: Break a leg in Greymouth today and one has to go and get it set in Blenheim. 
Chris Auchinvole 
: Blenheim! 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: That is what is happening in the health service in New Zealand today. It is absolutely shocking. 
Over 700 New Zealanders a week are leaving to go to Australia. There is no incentive in this Budget for them to stay. Sure there is $1 billion worth of tax cuts for business. But do members know what Labour has done? It has cancelled the personal tax cuts that Michael Cullen promised people in two successive Budgets. Michael Cullen cancelled the personal tax cuts— 
Nathan Guy 
: The bubble gum ones! 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: Yes they were bubble-gum size but he did cancel the personal tax cuts that he promised New Zealanders. 
R Doug Woolerton 
: When did you give a tax cut? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: Several times when we were last in Government I say to Mr Woolerton. Several times when we were last in Government we gave personal tax cuts and we would continue to do so. But this Government has no idea and no vision for the future. If one asks New Zealanders what was the sense of direction given in the Budget what do they say? New Zealanders cannot name one thing in the Budget that is good for them and their families. They cannot imagine it at all. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: Give us your policy. 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: Now we hear “give us your policy.” Well why would we announce our policies for the Labour Party to steal? I tell Labour members to announce their policies because they have not been announced. Let us actually look at Labour. Remember Pete Hodgson the Labour Party strategist? He gave advice on when Labour should announce its policy before the last election. The health policy was announced 3 weeks before the 2005 general election. What about the student loans policy? That was announced on 26 July about 6 or 7 weeks before the election. Remember the early childhood education policy the 20 free hours? That was announced less than 3½ weeks before the election. What about the Labour Party’s economic policy announced just over a week before the last general election? That told us a lot. I got that direct from the Labour Party website. That tells us where Labour is in terms of announcing its policy. When John Key announced his policy in relation to voluntary groups the Labour Party was downloading that from the Internet in the blink of an eye. It stole it and used it in the Budget and that is what it has been caught out doing. 
So I ask the Labour Party where the sense of purpose is that New Zealanders should be getting from the Government because they got none in this Budget whatsoever. This is a Budget where the Government is spending more money than ever before but more kids will be failing in our schools fewer people will be getting cared for within our hospitals and more people will be waiting longer and longer on trolleys under fluorescent lights in hospitals up and down this country as a result of this Budget because the Government thinks that a quality health service is measured by how much money one throws at it. That is what Labour says. It says it is so good for health and $5 billion must be better. Well tell that to the woman from North Shore who I spoke to on the telephone yesterday who stayed in hospital for 3 days with a grazed shin that got worse as she sat on the hospital trolley with no one taking any care of her and with her not getting admitted to a ward. That is appalling. That is a Third World health system happening in our country. Emergency departments are absolutely unable to deal with patients presenting to them. 
I visited the emergency department of one of the nation’s major hospitals last week. I met with doctors and heard about their frustration first hand at the inability of the system to provide the level of care that New Zealanders should expect for the $11 billion that this Budget is putting into health. One would think that if $11 billion was put in people who turned up at emergency departments would be seen at a reasonable time and that an 83-year-old woman would not be lying on a trolley under fluorescent lights for hours on end; and that a woman who presented with a badly grazed shin would not be having to hang around a hospital for 3 days and have to discharge herself because she could not get the level of care and support she needed. That is what we have under a Labour Party—and a charity hospital opening in Christchurch! What would Michael Joseph Savage have to say about that? A charity hospital is opening in Christchurch under a Labour Government. Is that Tory charity as well? 
Judith Collins 
: They have gone quiet. 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: There is silence from the members opposite because this is a Government putting in huge amounts of money and getting none of the improvement and quality public services that New Zealanders should expect. Nothing in the policy announcements in this Budget from this Government will do a single thing to stop that young man from Papamoa and his wife and two kids from leaving New Zealand in the next 10 days. Nothing in this Budget keeps them here. 
Hon PAREKURA HOROMIA (Minister of Maori Affairs) 
: 
 If anybody could understand about discharge that last member who spoke would know well about it—the verbal rubbish that came out is really really lowering the essence of this great bastion of cooperation. 
I went to the great Otaki electorate the other day and saw Nathan Guy playing rugby with Shane Jones. He was sloshing through the mud in a tigerish example of going forward. I thought: “When that boy gets into Government in about 15 or 20 years’ time he will do well.” But he was charging forward leaderless and going forward with the support of everybody else. 
I have listened to all this tirade of innocence on how great the National Party has been. So let us just reflect on some of those issues. Remember National in the 1990s? It increased the surcharge and that member talked about a lot of these issues. Let us talk about trade training. Who got rid of trade training? 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: They did. 
Hon PAREKURA HOROMIA 
: And who brought in Modern Apprenticeships? 
Darren Hughes 
: Labour. 
Hon PAREKURA HOROMIA 
: And who can tell us that 27000 people are participating in that scheme at the moment? This Government can. It is very very interesting. Those members talked about housing today. There was a question in the House about housing. Well let us talk about National’s housing policy in the 1990s which it had 9 years to work out. National took everything up to market rents sold all the State houses in Wairarapa and other areas and now it is coming back with some churlish spin saying that it will give State houses to the occupants knowing full well— 
Judith Collins 
: No they didn’t. 
Hon PAREKURA HOROMIA 
: That is what was said in the House today. National knows full well that the increased number that that member put out are on a median wage and need support. This Government’s Budget has been about supporting those who are in need not the greedy. 
There are two fundamental paradigms in any fiscal programme or financial strategy for any Government—two parts. The Labour Party’s financial strategy—and the Budget espouses it—is quite clearly about catering for those who are in need and spreading the wealth to ensure like the $1 billion business that there is a balanced stack. The National Party’s financial policy in my mind—and I am not an accountant or a financier but I certainly understand it—is about tossing big breaks to the big corporate mates and having tax discounts and all of that which go overseas to a lot of foreign people and just helps this lot up here. The fundamental arithmetic is that if we spend that money we have to take it from somewhere. 
 Yet we have had somebody standing up here saying that they will increase the health vote. They do not know anything. In the health area I think that people enjoy having $3 prescriptions. I think that people enjoy having the cost of doctors’ visits halved. I think that people enjoy knowing they will get their knees and hips improved and fixed up when once that was not even on the register. The last National Government got rid of dental technician assistants and a lot of the shortages created now in those specialist areas was through that Government’s efforts in being negative. 
Let us talk about the Charities Commission and this great policy of the National Party. Peter Dunne let out the information. He talked about it before National announced its policy. The National leader went along and listened and woke up and thought: “Geez I’ve got a policy now—to help non-governmental organisations and communities. But then National members tried to make out that Labour had stolen it off them. By crikey that is incredible—it really really is. 
We have quality education with 20 hours’ free childcare and rates rebates. The minimum wage has gone up eight times—eight times. Let us talk about helping those people who need help. During the period when the last National Government was in office—I have said this three times in this House but I want to say it again—it did not even lift up the average wage by a dollar. It did not do that but what Michael Cullen has created in this country is a strong strong level— 
Judith Collins 
: It’s a travel industry going one way to Australia. 
Hon PAREKURA HOROMIA 
: And we will talk about Australia after I tell members about the macro and the micro. The macro in this country is very stable. The dairy farmers are not going “boo hoo hoo!” and that is not just because of international impacts. They have so much income they do not know what to do with it. At the end of the day I am proud of the Maori assets that are starting to click in because collectively Maori are the single biggest owners in that shareholding. What about that! 
I want to talk about the unemployment rate because when we came in it was 16.6 percent for Maori and it is tracking towards 5 percent now. When we came in after the National Government the unemployment rate overall was between 7 to 8 percent. It is just on 3 percent now. That is how we develop people and trade opportunities for them. That is the sort of thing we do. The issue— 
Judith Collins 
: So what about the sickness rate? 
Hon PAREKURA HOROMIA 
: No that is not quite true. That is not true. And what about this great story about everybody going to Australia eh—everybody going to Australia? There are nearly just as many people coming back—not as many but quite a few are coming back. So that member is leaving out one part of the story. She is leaving out one part of the story. Nearly 70 percent are coming back to New Zealand in the same week that other people are leaving. What do members think about that? You know Maoris did not know what OE was 10 years ago. So they have the passion and the sense of roaming the globe— 
Nathan Guy 
: What is it? What is OE? 
Hon PAREKURA HOROMIA 
: It is not about overeating for which the Minister of Maori Affairs is a good candidate. But this Government recognises obesity and all those things and we front up to correct it. So why should people not go and have a look at the other side of the world? It is a bit of a natural Kiwi inquisitiveness. That member went to London. He went overseas I know. Is that right? 
Nathan Guy 
: Yes. 
Hon PAREKURA HOROMIA 
: Yes that is right. And he came back just as a lot of these people are coming back. A lot of them have been away on their OE so at the end of the day we need to get things right. 
This great leader said he was the first leader since Sir Apirana Ngata to go to visit Tuhoe. It is amazing that someone would say that when nearly 50 other politicians since that time have been there. I have been there 20 times. 
Darren Hughes 
: The Prime Minister has been there. 
Hon PAREKURA HOROMIA 
: The Prime Minister has been there. Tariana Turia has been there. A whole lot of people have been there. So on what sort of basis is this policy design being made by that party in relation to that party? 
You know the last National Government scrapped the tax rebate. It actually got rid of it. 
Judith Collins 
: What! What did we do? 
Hon PAREKURA HOROMIA 
: The last National Government scrapped that. This person who winces in horror and pain and who thinks that everybody is so bad they cannot be helped sends me into orbit. This Government has delivered one of the best Budgets this country has seen for a long time. It is about sustainability and it is about going forward. In relation to KiwiSaver everybody loves it. In relation to early childhood care there is help. In relation to maternity leave there is assistance for those mums who want to take time out and then be capable of going back to work; we have made space for that. There are a whole lot of issues. Working for Families is a great addition. It is something that is important for those who cannot quite make ends meet. So at the end of the day people need to have a good look at the Budget and appreciate and understand that it is one of the best Budgets pencilled for a long long time. 
I will be very interested in the future to see what other people will do with it—what they would add to it. The reason National has no policy is that it has literally done it all. The reason that that party has no policy is that it is struggling. It is in disarray it is wobbling and it does not know where it is going. We saw Bill English leave the House the other day and leave Mr Key stranded. In the summaries and editorials of recent times we have heard of National’s struggle. We have seen the dressing up for the types of people envisaged by those members who try to talk like them just to impress them. Some people around here have been in this House long enough to understand that the one thing people look at is the truth. This Government quite truthfully has delivered a great Budget. 
JUDITH COLLINS (National—Clevedon) 
: 
 That Minister who has just finished speaking has just shown why he was chosen to be on the front bench of the Labour Party. What a stunning speech! I think that over here we are all gasping and wondering just how bad someone has to be to be promoted in the Labour Party. And we have just seen it. 
Today in the House we have seen a whole lot of people with little red boxes on their desks. It was very well pointed out by one of the other members in the House today that one of the stunning things about those little red boxes—which are obviously there to tell Labour members where they belong and to help get themselves noticed on television—is that they are all paid for by the New Zealand taxpayer. On those boxes they have their little parliamentary crests signifying that unlike the Maori Party and even unlike New Zealand First on this occasion they cannot buy their own little red boxes so that they can prove who has paid for them. Well the taxpayers have paid for them and that is where some of their money is going from this Budget. 
One of the things I would like to talk about today—and it may not have escaped everybody’s notice—is the fact that we do have a new Minister responsible for social development. By the way he is also the old Minister who was responsible for social development because social development is of course the trendy name he gave it when he first came in as Minister of Social Welfare. He did not like that term and called it social development. We have Steve Maharey back on the boards and it is fantastic to have the architect of the single core benefit here in the House ready to answer some questions about what really ever did happen to the single core benefit. That of course was the main plank of Labour’s welfare policy in the 2005 election. 
During electioneering we were promised on television—and I remember an interview that Steve Maharey and I myself had with Larry Williams on Sky television all those years ago back in the 2005 election campaign—that the single core benefit would be rolled out in 2007 and that all the major benefits all those working-age benefits would be rolled into one and have multiple add-ons. I think there were about seven different add-ons to that single core benefit. Somehow taking seven or eight benefits and turning them into one benefit and having seven or eight different add-ons was going to save a huge amount of administration costs. What has happened? 
Chris Auchinvole 
: What has happened? 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: Well they have become phases now—a phase one and a phase two. Phase one is about asking people who can work if they would like to—work that is—just in case they would possibly like to work. 
Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m. 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: It is a pleasure to be able to speak again on this matter for the National Party. Before the dinner break we were talking about the single core benefit—and I note that the Minister over there Clayton Cosgrove who is obviously down here on duty— 
Hon Member 
: Is he a Minister? 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: Apparently he is currently a Minister but not for long. He wants to know how to get hold of Helen Clark and to see her in the House. I tell members of the House who want to find the current Prime Minister of New Zealand that they should go to www.youtube.com and search for “lonely girl 57”. That is where they will find the current Prime Minister of New Zealand. 
Anne Tolley 
: You’ve been watching  
Facelift 
. 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: Mrs Tolley says I have been watching  
Facelift 
. I have also been looking at www.youtube.com and that is where the Prime Minister can be found. She is out there trying to beat that young buck John Key age 45 in getting the youth vote. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: Speaking of face lifts! 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: I am sorry to tell Mr Cosgrove this but the young vote is deserting Helen Clark and the Labour Party. Basically those people do not want to know about them any more. The reason is that they want to believe in and be part of a country where people want to do positive things. 
One of the things we saw tonight on the television news was the news item that the number of people leaving New Zealand to move permanently to Australia has gone up by 25 percent just in the last year. That is a shocking statistic—25 percent. So 25000 people are now moving to live in Australia permanently in the period surveyed. That is a shocking statistic and a shocking situation for New Zealand. I love this country New Zealand. I am a very proud New Zealander. I have to say that if I were a young person I also would wonder—after enduring 8 years of a nanny State Helen Clark Government—what it was we were doing here. That is because people want to be around positive people—people who are not always pulling others down to the lowest common denominator people who are not always into social engineering people who are not fighting battles of the 1970s and constantly going on about life 30 or 40 years ago when they were a child. Nobody cares any more I say to Mr Cosgrove. Nobody cares about that any more. 
It has been very interesting seeing the Government’s reaction to John Key. It has been “Attack John Key”. Every single question time has been about “Attack John Key”. And what has happened? Actually the public do not want to listen. The reason they do not want to listen is that they see in John Key an aspirational leader. They see a visionary a person who is positive and a person who has come back to New Zealand to help this country move ahead. They do not want to see John Key being attacked by the hysterical Michael Cullen who apparently in his off time is the Minister of Finance. They want to know what this Government will do about interest rates. They want to know— 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: Did the Minister make the top four on that one? 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: And I was right was I not Mr Cosgrove. They want to find out what this Government will do about interest rates. They want to know why this Government is trying to shut down any comment in the media that is not pro them during the election year. They want to know what it is about the Littlies Lobby that the Government has such a complaint about. They want to know why the Government wants to stop organisations like Plunket from campaigning during election year without first registering as some sort of political entity and being able to spend only $60000. That is what they want to know. They wonder why this Government is so tetchy so bad-tempered about other people having a say when they know that every day they are bombarded with political advertising from the current Government all of which talks about whatever its policies are. They wonder why we have a double standard. 
The taxpayer as we have seen today and as we can see right now in the House is paying for Labour’s political advertising. We have the taxpayer paying for those red boxes that all the Labour members have in front of them—boxes that say “Labour” and have the parliamentary crest on them showing that they are paid for by the taxpayer. So any people out there in taxpayer land who are wondering why they cannot have a tax cut should come and ask Labour members because they have been taking $20 billion extra out of tax every year out of taxpayers’ pockets and they have not been spending it where they should. In other words they have not been giving it back to the taxpayers. They have been spending it on that sort of nonsense and on buying votes. 
We saw it with the lolly example. We now have lolly politics—lolly elections. That is what it is all about. Helen Clark has made it very clear. She calls it “putting the money in the kitty” which is code for “buying elections”. 
Chris Auchinvole 
: Kitty? 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: Yes kitty. Labour members did it last time. They brought out their policies a couple of weeks before the election. They are always after us to put out our policies. Well hang on where are theirs? The fact is that they put out their policies a few weeks before the election except of course their major welfare policy the single core benefit. That has gone now—just gone. It is gone because we had a change of Minister. Oh we had another change of Minister—back to the previous one because the other one could not really tell the truth and that was a bit of a problem. Finally after three goes the Government has worked out that yes some of us were right and some on the other side were wrong. 
Basically people want to know what is in it for them. They want to know that their children will want to live in New Zealand and that if they go away they will want to come back and raise their own children here. They want a leader who is positive who wants to move ahead and who never refers back 30 years and asks: “What were you doing?”. Frankly who cares? Actually what people do want is a leader who believes in his country who is positive and who is totally dedicated to getting every New Zealander to be absolutely part of our society. People want a positive contributing person and that person is John Key. 
Frankly they are not interested in the current Budget from the current Government because that Government will not be around for long. People want a John Key - led Budget. They want a Budget that is there for them. They want a Budget that is there for their future and they want a Budget that deals with the issues they care about. I tell you what Mr Assistant Speaker they want a Government that pays more than lip-service to the people who are the most vulnerable in this country. They want a leader who will deal with the issues relating to those people whom we term as being the underclass. They also want people who will deal with child abuse and we are going to deal with that. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Associate Minister of Finance) 
: 
 As Associate Minister of Finance and a member of the Government I am very proud to stand in the concluding stages of this debate to speak about the Appropriation (2007/08 Estimates) Bill. The member who preceded me made a very interesting couple of points. She said that the Government keeps challenging the Opposition to put out its policy. It is interesting to note that a couple of polls one of which I think was on television last night said that 67 percent of the people wanted John Key to put out his policy now. Ms Collins asked in her speech why the Government does not put out its policy. Well I have news for Ms Collins: a Budget is part of a policy platform and we have written eight Budgets. Our policies are out there. We are in the process of implementing our policies—policies like KiwiSaver like superannuation like removing the cap on charitable donations like halving prescriptions down to $3 and like halving doctors’ fees. All those policies are out there in every Budget. Working for Families as my colleague says means that 350000-plus families are now getting on average around $110 a week. That is our policy and we have implemented it. Those families are winning. So our policies are all out there. 
We write a Budget—I say through you Mr Assistant Speaker to Ms Collins—every year and our policy is around of course 3.6 percent unemployment compared with 6.5 percent unemployment when we took office. Our policy for the edification of Ms Collins is 362000 new jobs created since 1999. The number of new jobs created since 1999 when we took office is 362000. Maori unemployment is down from 19.5 percent when we took over—inherited from that crew opposite—to 5 percent which I am advised is the lowest unemployment count for Maori since the time the figures were first surveyed. That is our policy. 
We have just heard a good old-fashioned rant from the other side. I watch  
Facelift 
 which is not a bad little production although I am more a McPhail and Gadsby type of bloke. The comedians back then were so good they did not need masks; they expressed it through their own character and own expertise. I do not know whether Judith Collins was actually auditioning to get a mask on  
Facelift 
. We know that Tim Groser has taken a starring role this week. 
Darren Hughes 
: He would love that. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: He was on the programme; puffing away—like a good steam train! What we heard was the traditional Opposition rant. An Opposition rants when it is hollowed out it has no ideas and it has no policy. Judith Collins made a couple of very interesting points though. She said she had a leader in John Key and he was an aspirational leader. She may have wanted to say “inspirational” leader but I saw her think about it before she used that word aspirational. She knew that “inspirational” would simply not wash out in the real world. She talked of an aspirational leader—one who “aspires” to be a leader and by definition that means no “true-born ingrained natural leadership qualities”. That indeed is the difference between the Opposition’s aspirational leader and our natural leader. I make the point that John Key is so aspirational that the truth wobbles around like a jelly on a hotplate. It just wobbles from one extreme to the other. 
Ms Collins made a very interesting point in her speech which I invite all those in the House and all those in the communities to reflect upon. She said something akin to: “We’re not interested in what John Key said 20 years ago. We’ve moved on.” I say to Ms Collins that the communities do not think of the truth in terms of a jelly on a hotplate—spewing in every different direction. They like consistency. The National Party hates it loathes it when the Government reels out the inconsistent statements that Mr Key has made whether they be on the Iraq war whether they be on therapeutics— 
Chris Auchinvole 
: Talking about John Key again! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: —and that member is obviously on the wrong therapeutics but he need not worry because we will be banning benzylpiperazine; he will be able to get off it—and all the other things that John Key has been inconsistent about. 
Let us look at Working for Families. John Key’s old story was in the  
Otago Daily Times 
 of 5 April where he said: “I actually want to go and have a really good look at Working for Families and the whole structure of welfare in New Zealand.” We know what that is code for. Yet in May 2007 on  
Campbell Live  
he said: “I would like to only change the top end of where it’s cutting—in very high-income levels—and replace that with tax cuts.” So in May he says one thing and in April he says another. We know what the coded message is because that is what National did last time. We know that the coded message means that for the 160000 families out of the 350000 Working for Families on that programme that are getting their own money back in tax credits the Leader of the Opposition’s cuts will rip out $50 to $80 per week. That is a fact. Dr Mapp agrees with me. He knows the inconsistency. 
Then we had John Key talking on national superannuation. In July this year he said: “There will be no change to New Zealand’s super or the New Zealand super fund under the National Government.” What was the old story in November 2003? At that time he said: “I don’t think there is any doubt”—I invite every Grey Power member to listen to this—“that the single biggest way to reduce that liability”—that is superannuation—“is to raise the age of eligibility.” People might say that he said that in 2003 and he is allowed to change his mind; he is allowed to flip-flop. Well we recall what Bill English said earlier this year in the  
New Zealand Herald 
. Firstly he said that superannuation was too generous; secondly he raised the spectre of lifting the age; and thirdly he raised the spectre of means testing the pension—once again. That is a fact. 
Hon Members 
: Oh! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: If they do not believe me then they should believe the independent media. They should have a look and see what the media said. We know that when a microphone is stuck in front of John Key anything can happen. Audrey Young and her colleagues proved that over the therapeutics bill. 
Dr Wayne Mapp 
: Mike Moore would be ashamed of you. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: They do not like it. I say to Ms Collins when she asks what our policy is that our policy is record low unemployment. It means 350000 families getting their own taxes back in tax credits or $110-odd on average a week; it means $3 prescriptions halving prescription charges; it means Government debt has gone down; and it means the reinstatement of apprenticeships. I forget which person on the other side waxed eloquent about apprenticeships. In 1995 the National Government abolished the Apprenticeship Act— 
Hon Harry Duynhoven 
: 1992. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: My colleague says it was 1992. Today over 10000 young people are in trade training and that figure will be 14000-plus next year. Yet members opposite puff out their chests like little bantam hens proud of the fact— 
Dr Wayne Mapp 
: That member is a battery hen. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Mr Mapp says he is a battery hen. I could say something but it would not be parliamentary. I think he needs to get energised because it has gone flat—the battery I mean. Those members sit there and gloat every time we mention trade training. They seem proud that in 1992 National killed off the apprenticeship scheme. That is what they gloat about. 
In conclusion we have a policy and a Budget and the implementation of said Budget yet we look across the Chamber and we see the hollow men and women one of whom is about to get up to speak. They are hollowed out. They are bereft of ideas. They think that if they wait till the last couple of weeks of the election campaign they can pull off what they tried to pull off last time which was the biggest almost hoodwink in this nation’s history. 
Hon Dover Samuels 
: Good speech! 
Dr WAYNE MAPP (National—North Shore) 
: 
 If Mr Dover Samuels thinks that last speech was good he has to be dreaming. Members on the other side are dreaming. It has been an extraordinary spectacle over the last 2 weeks in the House to see the desperate flailing around of Labour members. They know they are in decline. I have to be honest and say that National went through a similar experience from 1996 to 1999 so we know the signs of terminal decay in a party. And the Labour Party is showing every image of precisely that. The real indication is when those members give Opposition speeches from the Government benches. That is what they have been giving in the last few days. 
I saw an extraordinary spectacle last week. Mr Phil Goff a senior Minister in the Government gave the most bizarre speech. It was not just a vein-popper; we thought his head was literally going to explode. It was a classic example of an Opposition speech. Those members know that is exactly where they are going to end up—in Opposition. I have to say to the previous speaker Mr Clayton Cosgrove that I am sure he will make an excellent Opposition member of Parliament. I am pleased to see he is in training for that task already. 
At this point I say this country is ready for the new generation of leadership. New Zealanders are asking the simple question as to what kind of country they want New Zealand to be over the next decade. The public have seen Labour and they are saying that this country can do better. To quote Judith Collins: “The Labour Government is so boring.” It is just extraordinary. 
I want to indicate to Labour Party members how they wasted their years in office. The highest growth rates New Zealand has experienced were from 1994—and actually included some part of Labour’s time in Government—to around 2003. We were gaining on the OECD ladder so when people said we would be in the top half of the OECD in 10 years that was a credible proposition. We have only to go at around 0.7 percent of GDP better than the average and we would get there. I have to say that Labour lost its opportunity. 
Back in 1999 this country was crying out for leadership. That is why the growth and innovation conferences were held. I went to those conferences I listened to the debates and I heard the focus. One of the themes of those debates put together by the vice-chancellor of Auckland University Dr Hood was to try to energise the Government—to make it seize the opportunity that it could see was ahead of it. I saw the Prime Minister give her negative speech during those conferences. She gave negative press conferences and basically poured cold water on the idea that this country could drive ahead. Do members know what has happened? Those people have left this country. Professor Hood left Auckland University for greener pastures. I am prepared to say he would still be in this country if the right decisions had been made and this country had seized the opportunity to drive ahead. 
Countries get critical opportunities. This country has had a huge opportunity around commodity prices tourism and globalisation over the last decade. This Government has rejected those opportunities. They are only little things but cumulatively they add up. Why did the Government pass for instance the second part of the employment relations reforms in 2004? That was guaranteed to slow up reform. Why did it do nothing about the Resource Management Act when it is a critical blockage to growth? Why has it loaded on compliance costs through the Transport Act? It is all of those creeping— 
Chris Auchinvole 
: Because it is Labour socialism. 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: It is socialism. It is the control freak mentality of the Government that stultifies the potential of New Zealanders. 
One of the people whom the Government could be listening to is Mr David Skilling. He wants this country to do better. He has been talking about a prescription—so that this country can do better. It needs to be looking more outward. It needs to be providing more investment into research education—particularly higher education—and driving out towards exports. There needs to be a clear focus on economic growth and doing the right things for that. Individually those might not be much by themselves but cumulatively they add up. 
The Government has to ask itself this critical question: “Why has productivity declined so much in the last 2 years?”. There was a period when we were actually getting ahead in productivity—above the OECD. Now we have slipped behind again. Does the Government want to know why it cannot fund Pharmac demands why it cannot deal with the waiting lists in the hospitals why it cannot get energy around broadband and why the country is just slipping behind as a nation? I know that the Government will say the country is not slipping behind but the proof is in the fact that we have declined from 20th in the OECD ranking 5 years ago to 22nd today. Some people might say that that is not a huge decline. But the point is that it is a decline and this Government is responsible. Members of the Government will wash their hands of it and say: “That was not us we did not do that. It is because we do not have the right mix of industries and so forth.” But they have done the things that have stultified initiative. 
I want to draw the Government’s attention to this particular point. Why is it that the number of young New Zealanders going to Australia has increased by 25 percent? Why is it that so many young New Zealanders have decided that the pastures are greener elsewhere? Why is it that they have decided this country does not offer enough hope and opportunity for them? Why is it that the numbers of people leaving have gone from 625 a week to 750 a week in the space of just 12 months? Those people are mostly young people. They are mostly qualified people. It is because they do not have enough hope in this country to be able to better themselves. They see better opportunities elsewhere. 
It might be true that the Government is now starting to hang its head in shame. Its members know they were in office when these things happened. They cannot avoid the accountability around that. That is why New Zealanders do not care what Mr Key might have said about the Iraq war 2 years ago. It is simply not important to people’s lives aspirations or hopes. They want to know what the next agenda is for the country. They want to know whether there is a Government that will make the right decisions that will give incentive and opportunity and will drive ahead to reach the potential that this country has. We have had a decade of wasted opportunities as seen by Dr Hood back in 2000. 
I can say to the Government that the National Party here is ready with policies with ideas and more important with a sense of direction because that is what this Government lacks—a sense of direction. It would sooner muddle around in some pathetic scandals as it calls them about events that occurred years ago when what the public actually want is a sense of hope and aspiration and this Government has completely failed them on that. National will deliver. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Minister of Commerce 
 I find it incredibly hard to believe that the Leader of the Opposition had no idea that one day somebody would ask National members what their policy actually was on any particular subject. What surprised him even further which has become obvious after hearing some of the comments he has made was that when he had answered someone would go back and check to see whether those answers compare with comments he had made earlier on the same subject. Of course someone doing that would find that there was in fact some conflict between the two. 
I ask whether the Leader of the Opposition really thought that the honeymoon would last all the way to the next general election. It certainly seems so from the Government side of the House. He thought that no one would take notice of the subtle but very real undermining that he is receiving from members on his own side of the House going by some of their comments. 
Let us look at Bill English. I just note my comment and throw that name into the ring. I think we should look at Bill English. He is a very disappointed and angry man who wakes up every morning and asks: “Why not me?”. He has not really got over the fact that he chose Nick Smith to be his numbers man which was probably not the wisest thing for somebody wanting to win to do. But anyway let us look at what he says about his mate John Key—the person he is the deputy to. Gosh I would not want someone this close to me with these views. 
Mr English says: “I’m a stayer he’s a sprinter. I grind away John just bounces from one cloud to another.” What on earth does he mean by that? Cloud-hopping—how ridiculous! Then we have another comment: “John articulates a confident and aspirational view about the future I focus on putting together the numbers and the programme”. Well he is not very good at numbers; we have already noticed that. The last comment is: “The other reason [the Key-English team] works is that we complement each other. John is a terrific marketer … and I’ve got the experience of government and policy.” That is what Bill English thinks about his leader. The bottom line is that John Key is rewriting history he is rewriting his own position and he is rewriting the positions of his party as well. 
 I actually knew that John Key would find the top job difficult when he could not remember what his position was on the 1981 Springbok Tour. Who else cannot remember what his or her position was on that tour? This is absolutely galling. What people do not understand is which constituency John Key is trying not to offend. That is the one that I have not worked out. Is he trying to avoid offending the pro-tour lobby because he was anti-tour or is he in fact trying not to offend the anti-tour lobby because he was pro-tour? 
I guess we will never know because of course John Key cannot remember. And this is the man who can remember what emails he did not read. I think that that is utterly extraordinary. This would require one to know that an email has been received and who it has come from so that one knows that one has not read it. It seems pretty extraordinary to me that this man can remember what emails he did not read but he cannot remember his position on the Springbok Tour. 
What we do know is that John Key has taken—I think I am allowed to say so—seriously diverging opinions on matters of interest to the people of New Zealand. I guess the focus has been on the Iraq war. The National Party’s position on it is that we go back to the Boer War World War II and the Viet Nam War because National members think that the Iraq war is so long ago that the differing opinions that John Key has expressed on the issue are somehow of no relevance to the people of New Zealand. There are people dying in Iraq today. 
I think the people of New Zealand have a right to know that National would have sent troops to Iraq. That is one of the reasons why Labour still sits on the Government benches. We have a leader who had the courage to stand up for her convictions and to express a view that was very strongly welcomed by the people of New Zealand—that we would not send troops to Iraq. 
Let us look at the differing positions of John Key. In July 2007 he said: “We have made it quite clear we will not be going to Iraq. We would not have sent troops to Iraq.” In February 2003 he said that he would be prepared to commit any support requested by the United States for a war against Iraq including SAS and combat troops. 
Let us look at John Key’s position on therapeutics. On 1 August he said: “Today’s  
New Zealand Herald  
story misrepresents our position. The story correctly quotes me as saying: ‘If they came to us now with that proposal we will sign it.’ ” The previous morning he said: “If they came to us now with that proposal we will sign it. We sat there waiting for it to turn up.” So we have two different positions on therapeutics. 
John Key said on climate change in November 2006: “I firmly believe in climate change and always have.” In May 2005 he said “this is a complete and utter hoax if I may say so. The impact of the Kyoto Protocol even if one believes in global warming—and I am somewhat suspicious of it—”. One just cannot hold all of these different positions. 
But the one that I particularly want to focus on because it is one that is near and dear to my own heart given the electorate I represent is John Key’s position on housing. He told the 2007 National Party conference that he supports the homeownership aspirations of everyday New Zealanders. He then described what is happening in Hobsonville as economic vandalism. Hobsonville is an electorate that he represents in Parliament but will not even live in. He lives in Parnell does he not? I do not know Auckland as well as he does obviously but I do not think one can even see Hobsonville from Parnell. 
So it is quite interesting that John Key has taken the position of describing Hobsonville as economic vandalism. It is where 15 percent of the 3000 new homes being built will be reserved for first home owners. I think that that is a good Government policy and that it ought to be supported by the member who represents that area. 
I think the real reason John Key has taken this position on State housing is that he likes to run off the back of his own State house background. He is on the record as saying that he looks at his State house background as a great marketing ploy. That is what it is for him. It is a great marketing ploy. He can pretend that he is one of the good old guys that he is one of the real people and that he can really look after their interests. Well I wonder whether that is how he felt about New Zealand when he was out there speculating on the New Zealand dollar. 
I bet John Key was speculating on the New Zealand dollar when he was a money market trader. That would be a very good question for him to answer. Maybe he could answer whether that is just something one criticises after the event when one is a long way away from him. Did he or did he not do that? I think the people of New Zealand have a right to know whether somebody who is criticising people for their actions actually lived up to that criticism himself before he came to Parliament. It would be very interesting to see whether he ever finally answers that question. 
I will talk a little about State housing because as I say it does mean a lot to my electorate. I reflect on the history of the last time National was in Government. It has a sad and sorry track record on State housing: market-related rents with no market incomes to match. We saw the desperate poverty levels that people were driven to in different parts of Christchurch. It was not the part that John Key grew up in I have to say. Bryndwr did not suffer like Aranui. I went to primary school in Bryndwr; I know the difference between the two suburbs.  
National sold thousands of State houses. How many State houses did it sell? 
Darren Hughes 
: 13000. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: It sold 13000 State houses. How many of them did National sell to one of their own MPs Arthur Anae? I remember that. I remember that he bought a significant chunk of South Auckland at the time. 
The previous National Government made no investment in the State houses it retained. When I look at Aranui today and compare it with the Aranui that I inherited as an MP in 1999 all I can say is that it has been a transformation in reality under this Government. Despite the massive hurdles that the people of Aranui faced they have been able to build a community they are proud of. That is a good thing for the country because they are able to take real pride in the place where they live and are able to make a real contribution. 
But the biggest thing that has happened for Aranui has been that unemployment is at the lowest level we have seen in over a generation and that has made a huge difference. People are earning money and are able to support their households in a real way and they can contribute to the nation’s well-being as a result. 
This Government has built this country up. The experience of National in Government is that it brought New Zealand to its knees. This Government has invested in the future of all New Zealanders. We do not distinguish between those who are rich or poor in that regard; National certainly does. It wants to take it from those who have the least and give it to those who have the most. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the Appropriation (2007/08 Estimates) Bill be now read a third time. 
Ayes 61 
New Zealand Labour 49; New Zealand First 7; United Future 2; Progressive 1; Independents: Copeland Field. 
Noes 50 
New Zealand National 48; ACT New Zealand 2. 
Abstentions 9 
Green Party 6; Maori Party 3. 
Bill read a third time. 
Imprest Supply (Second for 2007/08) Bill read a second time.