Parker DavidHon DAVID PARKER (Minister of Revenue): Thank you Madam Speaker. Can I begin by acknowledging the trauma the distress the damage suffered by New Zealanders—and visitors to our shores actually but mainly New Zealanders—whether it's from Cyclone Gabrielle or the recent storm events that preceded it; my condolences to those who have suffered losses of family or friends or property or businesses.Can I thank the acknowledgment from the Hon James Shaw of the sure-footed start by the new Prime Minister the Rt Hon Chris Hipkins. It's an interesting thing I think that historians will look at the transition from Jacinda Ardern to Chris Hipkins and I think there will be considerable credit given to the way in which as a political party the New Zealand Labour Party has put the interests of the country first and not our own. As a consequence a few days after the announcement of Jacinda Ardern's retirement the Government was able under the leadership of Chris Hipkins to in a sure-footed way address the challenges that have been thrown at him.Before moving to some of the other parts of the Government programme can I as my colleague Damien O'Connor has already said acknowledge the role of Jacinda Ardern: lowest death rate in the OECD under COVID. She had three main priorities: child poverty improvement on all nine measures of child poverty; addressing housing doubling the number of houses that are built in New Zealand every year and made a huge dent in that housing deficit and in public housing as Megan Woods has just addressed; and turning the corner on climate. Obviously we're doing well on electricity but with Michael Wood's efforts in transport we're also turning the corner for the electrification of the transport fleet and also addressing industrial heat causes of climate change emissions and for the benefit of some members of this House climate change is caused by the burning of fossil fuels. Those fossil fuels don't burn themselves; people do and people who think otherwise are really the fossils.Before moving to our forward programme I think one of the proudest moments for me as a member of the Labour Party was when our then leader Jacinda Ardern said They are us." Who could not be moved by that phrase? It really turned the mood of the nation and brought enormous respect to New Zealand around the world in a very very difficult situation. So thank you Jacinda Ardern and I look forward to your valedictory soon.In respect of the events we've heard the stats that more than 90 percent of the houses that have lost power have got it back on; similar progress being made with the re-establishment of telecommunications cellphone towers and the like—obviously traumatic for those people who are left unconnected and it will get worse. It'll get worse by the day and we wish them well in the meantime acknowledging that everyone's doing their utmost to get the supports that are needed to those people. I haven't got much time to talk about the forward programme but I will mention a couple of things. Yes cost of living pressures are pressing in New Zealand. Ninety central banks around the world have lifted interest rates; we're one of them as we try to combat inflation. New Zealand's growth rates are higher than most of our comparative countries—Australia Japan the European area USA Great Britain—our debt levels are lower and we are well positioned. We've got some big programmes under way as a Government. We're not only supporting trades training—that's one of the reasons why we've got such low unemployment and we're able to get cracking with the house building and other repair work that is now necessary—but we're also making progress reforming the resource management system. We will land that this year.We've got more than 1700 additional doctors more than 4200 additional nurses—a 20 percent increase in both professions—so we're delivering on the health front. We pay our nurses and doctors more than we used to. Those people have done relatively well compared with what they did under the prior Government.There's a lot to do this year. Obviously there are some financial challenges caused by the recent events but I'm sure that the Budget that's produced by this Government the Hon Grant Robertson this year will be worthy of support."