Leary IngridINGRID LEARY (Labour—Taieri): We can see how the other side of the House think when you have people like David Seymour talking about bringing in immigrants so that we can pay them lower wages to get our economy moving. Or people like Michael Woodhouse who fail to recognise—Toni Severin: It wasn't low wages; it was—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Order! Order! The member will not interject when she is not in her chair.INGRID LEARY: Or people like Michael Woodhouse who fail to recognise that actually—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Ingrid Leary.INGRID LEARY: Thank you Madam Speaker. In my view the hardest-working New Zealanders—amongst them are the parents the people who do unpaid work and many many of those are women. So let's not forget about those people who work in casual employment who work in unpaid labour who work as volunteers who raise children. They are amongst the hardest-working New Zealanders. But that side of the House fails to see that because all they want to see are those people that are contributing to GDP. That is how they view the world.I wanted to talk about the economic context but just to apologise to people at home if you're feeling depressed because it is really depressing listening to the speeches from the other side of the House painting such a terrible picture of New Zealand. Now that of course is going to happen. That's their job as the Opposition—to try to make things look bad. But they know that we've been doing a good job because the facts speak for themselves. Let's remember that we have been through COVID through a pandemic that has affected 617 million people. There have been 653 million deaths. Any Government worth its salt would spend money trying to ensure that it would save lives and save livelihoods and that's exactly what this Government has done. And it has balanced the Budget to make sure that there is stability after the economic shock that there is leeway for the cost of living pressures that have come about from this economic shock but also from the nine years of neglect under National. There was neglect despite what Mr Woodhouse says: neglect of schools housing social housing and water infrastructure. It has been said in the Productivity Commission report that there is an infrastructure gap and that occurred under the National Government. We are not just looking at COVID and at the cost of living pressures. We still want New Zealand to move forward. We still want to move to a higher-wage low-emission economy. And that is why the Budget also looks at the health reforms planning infrastructure apprenticeships Resource Management Act reform three waters and yes as Julie Anne Genter pointed out a really transformational climate change element to this Budget. We are seeing that because the facts speak for themselves. It's in the inflation numbers GDP employment figures and that is enabling us to target support to those hardest hit by these tough times. It is the right sort of Budget for tough times. It is a Budget that anticipated difficult times. And thank goodness that happened because I don't think any of us here really anticipated that Russia was going to invade Ukraine. That has had a knock-on effect and it is this Budget that has enabled New Zealand to come through that in such a good way with such good credit ratings from international agencies with such a low unemployment and now with a general mood of optimism as we head into summer and we have let go of the traffic light system we are letting go of all those restrictions that we needed to save lives and save livelihoods. New Zealand has every reason to be optimistic but you wouldn't think so listening to the people on the other benches. But that doesn't diminish the tough times that we have been through. COVID has caused illness anxiety and lockdowns. We've had disrupted supply chains. We've had the war in Ukraine. We have had inflation and that inflation is being felt all around the world. I've just been to the US where it is palpable—their rate at the moment is 8.26 percent versus our 4.9 percent and they are really feeling it there. But do you know what? I don't hear them blaming their Government. They are looking at the war in Ukraine they are looking at COVID they are looking at what's happening to gas supplies in Europe and they know that this is a global phenomenon. And for us to be at 4.9 percent compared to their 8.9 or the UK's 9.1 percent the Netherlands' 12 percent or get this Turkey's 80.21 percent inflation in Turkey—we have got it pretty good despite the tough times. That is thanks to hard-working New Zealanders. And when I say hard-working New Zealanders" it's those who are working for wages and it is those who are doing the mahi bringing up children volunteering working in the not-for-profit sector. It is all New Zealanders that have pulled together to do this. Now our inflation rate as we've heard has peaked and we are actually seeing a wage-growth market correction. So we've heard our official unemployment rate is around 3.2 to 3.3 percent; GDP is bouncing back. In the last quarter our growth rate of 1.7 percent was the best of most comparable economies. Australia and Japan had 0.9 percent the average of the OECD countries had 0.4 percent and the US and the UK actually contracted slightly. So Chris Bishop is wrong when he says that the wage growth and inflation don't make for a good picture because wage growth is at 8.8 percent and that's the largest annual percentage change since records began in 1998. So what we are seeing is actually a labour market correction after years of wage gaps and we are heading into a period where inflation will stabilise or fall and wages will continue to trend upwards. All of that is because of astute financial management. And that is why we have been able to deliver the targeted support that so many of my colleagues in this House today have referred to: things like the cost of living payment half-price transport for community service card users winter energy payments breaking up the supermarket duopoly free lunches in schools and so on. Our economy is really well positioned to weather these storms. And let us remember that our debt ratio is amongst the lowest in the world despite what the Opposition would have you say. If we look at the alternative what is the alternative plan? Well David Seymour said his party was the only one to have a plan. I tend to agree because I haven't heard anything from National except for tax cuts for the rich tax cuts that would give Christopher Luxon—should he become Prime Minister—an $18000 annual rebate compared to say a cafe worker on the minimum wage who would get around $2 per week more. They don't have a plan. They're basically a bunch of sad sacks who want to jam tight the public purse and go back to austerity. They want to forget about the infrastructure gap because to them who cares if people get sick from bad water or from pollution spewing into Wellington's harbour? Who cares about inter-generational social scarring? Everything for them is about money for money's sake. It's not about wellbeing and it's not because they care. I support the remarks by my colleague David Parker around trade diversification. Every significant trade agreement that has occurred in the last decade has been signed under Labour and we have seen a $53 billion record in our agricultural exports. That happened under a Labour Government. So we do care about money but we care about money for the wellbeing that it brings to our families and our communities. We care about having infrastructure that works because it's no use having a family in a house if the house is falling down. And that was the house that we inherited when we became Government. So I also just want to say that those trade relationships that David Parker talked about are so critical not only because we are getting good income from them but they are helping with our regional peace and security. For the first time we are diversifying our relationships to make sure that we can maintain a truly independent foreign policy. And as somebody who's just come back from a meeting about global geopolitics I think that's a really important thing for New Zealand to keep its eyes on. So things are looking up. We're moving forward with certainty. We're going into summer with no traffic light system. We've got the freedoms that we had pre-COVID times. We've removed restrictions that we had to have to save lives to save livelihoods. We have had tough times but we had a Budget that was able to futureproof us for a very unexpected war on the other side of the world that did have implications for fuel supplies and for supply chains and that exacerbated what had happened through COVID. We have had a prudent balanced forward-looking targeted and fair Budget and it has taken some of the sting out of the tail of various shocks for those who are doing it the hardest. Our Budget is also empowering people to get ahead. We haven't forgotten about health. We haven't forgotten about education. We are making sure that not only is this Budget looking after those who need help now but that it is futureproofing us into the future so that New Zealand can remain the best fantastic optimistic little country at the bottom of the world. Thank you."