Maharey Steve: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Maharey Steve: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
[Volume:637;Page:7423] 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Minister of Education) 
: 
 I welcome all members back to the House. It is good to be back. It is good to hear young Simon Power rested and able to scream for a whole 7 or 8 minutes. He obviously had a good rest over the holidays running around the beach with the kids. Members can do that in the Rangitikei and Manawatu by the way. On behalf of my comrade I can say if anybody is looking for a great holiday next year Simon is an example. He is able to come back here refreshed having been in the Rangitikei and Manawatu. So he is a good example of where members might go for their holidays. 
It was good to hear the Prime Minister. She was totally relaxed she gave a fantastic speech she set out a whole new vision of where we might go as a country as we take on the whole sustainability - climate change agenda. She talked about economic transformation families young and old and national identity. She outlined that the country over the last 7 years has been on a consistent roll of growth and opportunity. On the international stage we are well respected. It was fantastic to watch the Prime Minister resplendent in red in this packed House talking about our country which has a great great future in front of it because of the Labour leadership. 
It is great to see up close the National Party co-leadership the English-Key team here in the House. There is something like a bit of an uncivil union about it though I have to say. We have something old—Bill English retreaded through the whole system again. We have something new—Mr Key who has been here for only a few years and has rocketed through the ranks of the National Party. There was so little talent in front of them after all these years that he was able to come through in only 4 years. Is it not amazing that currency trading is somehow a qualification for being Prime Minister of the country? The party is so talentless that the others who have been here for a long time were not lined up for the job and he came through just like that. The leader before him—who was so talentless as well—rocketed through the ranks in about 3 years. 
Anyway we have the co-leadership of the two of them and I have to mention something blue—Gerry Brownlee. Gerry Brownlee looks so sad. He looks a bit like a deflated balloon over there at the present time I have to say. He has been muscled off the position he once held dominating the Chamber with his large booming voice and his “Langeesque” presence. He used to rise frequently brushing aside the old leader as we were asking who was the leader of the House. Gerry would rise brushing Don aside so he could champion the cause of the National Party. What an uncivil union! 
What I have to say though is that we are asked to believe that this little mess is somehow a new start for the National Party. Don Brash has gone pink shirts are in tiki T-shirts are OK climate change has been discovered nuclear ships are not too good and poverty—poor people—have been suddenly discovered by the National Party as well. But I say to the country that actually nothing has changed. Mr Key is as hollow a man now as he was before he was a leader of the National Party. He is surrounded by right-wing policies. He is surrounded by the same backers outside Parliament. He is surrounded by the same old tired faces of the National Party. Has anybody seen anyone look as tired as Nick Smith? I have to say that if that is youth it is wasted on the National Party if one ends up looking like that. I think what I am going to have to do is take Mr Smith out for a few runs at half past 6 in the morning. For goodness’ sake he needs to liven up and look a little bit like he is a youthful man full of the future and full of the rising sap of life. 
National members are surrounded by the same old religious affiliations. Mr Key likes to say he is Brethren-neutral. But remember they loved his presentation. They sent him the emails. He cannot remember the emails. He is a little like Don Brash who was a little fuzzy on the old memory. John Key cannot remember the emails just as he cannot remember his position on the Springbok Tour. This is a man who in 1981 was a young man who played rugby at the local club but when he—an active rugby-playing young bloke in Christchurch the site of some of the biggest most violent protests in the history of this country—was asked on radio what his view was he said: “I can’t remember. I can’t quite think of what I thought at that particular time.” He sounded like Brash—not much change there. 
The fact that National has not changed is illustrated by the Unicef report. That report tells us about the National legacy from the 1990s. The data is from 1997 to 2003. It captures the impact of Richardson and Shipley. Key says he has changed things. He says the old days are irrelevant. But let us look at the style offensive—because that is all it was—on poverty by John Key. He started off with a speech about people who are poor but then he got in the limo and went with the posse to visit the hood as he probably understands it McGehan Close. He was hoping to see people in a seething mass of poverty but he found for example that the young woman he took to Waitangi had just come back from participating in the I Have a Dream programme—she had gone off from her school to live out that particular dream. 
Mr Key then went round to Wesley School and offered it muesli bars it neither wanted nor needed. It asked him to go away and stop making it a political football. The programme fell over he blamed the Government and he cancelled the policy. This is a pattern that happened with the silver fern in Los Angeles with the discussions about the mortgage levy and with the whole thing about school breakfasts. Every time he gets it wrong he blames the Government cancels the policy and withdraws. This is inexperience. This is a man not ready. This is a man living on the edge. This is a man pushing the envelope. This is a man with nothing to say so he just keeps moving and keeps the pictures rolling. He keeps hoping that people will not notice he has nothing to say. 
John Key was asked why he would not do something real about poverty. What policy was National’s biggest single contribution on poverty? Does Mrs Wong know? Does anybody on the National benches know? National paid no attention to poverty in the 1990s. The Salvation Army told us that the single biggest contributor to poverty in New Zealand was market-related rents. Mr Key the muesli bar kid who went round with muesli bars to Wesley School which did not want them and did not need them—a few muesli bars are Mr Key’s answer to poverty—was asked by Duncan Garner what he would do about market rents. Mr Key answered that they are still National Party policy. 
If the National Party comes back we will get the single biggest contributor to poverty with it. This is like the dark days of the 1990s. This is the same recipe from the hollow men who destroyed this country. If they come back we will have tax cuts and cuts to services the community will be on its own and we will be back down the same dark tunnel. No doubt it will be done with more charm no doubt it will be done with more style no doubt it will be done with a pink shirt no doubt it will be done with a tiki no doubt it will be done with people getting free rides to places like Waitangi and no doubt it will be done with a charming face but we will be in the same dark tunnel that National took us down before. 
We are lucky therefore that we have a Labour Government. What a record. Since 2000 we have undertaken a programme relating to income-related rents State houses Working for Families primary health organisations minimum wages and jobs. The programme has been huge. The difference has been huge. That is why we can say that the Unicef document is a historical marker of what National did to this country. Thank goodness for Labour because we can now tell the country that new statistics are here. Under the previous National Government we were 23rd out of 25 in the poverty stakes. Now under this Government we are fourth in the OECD. Does anybody see any mystery about that? Is anybody not able to understand what the difference is? 
I go back to the Prime Minister’s statement. That is the record. The Prime Minister outlined the future. This country under a Labour-led Government has a bright real optimistic aspirational future suited to the kinds of young lively forward-looking real New Zealanders who make up the Labour-led coalition and the parties that enable it to stay in power. We are New Zealand—look at Labour the Progressives New Zealand First United Future the Greens and the Maori Party. Then wham when we look at the members opposite we move into non - New Zealand. That is the past; Labour is the future. Thank goodness we are here.