Smith Nick: General Debate 
Smith Nick: General Debate 
[Volume:639;Page:9850] 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 The bit the Government has simply not got in this debate is that the reason it is on the ropes is that in almost every area of Government policy we see major failures. Over the period of the adjournment in corrections our economy the performance of our State-owned enterprises and climate-change education—in one area after another—we have Kiwi dreams being killed off because of failed policy from the Government. My colleague Simon Power has done an extraordinary job of identifying the failures in the Department of Corrections. The reason the National Opposition is angry and will continue to pursue the Government is that there is absolutely no confidence that those problems will be fixed. 
We have seen the tragedy of Karl Kuchenbecker and we have seen the failure in relation to the death of Liam Ashley. Yet still we get excuses after excuses from this Government. We saw over the adjournment the failure of Government State-owned enterprises. We had Solid Energy New Zealand a Government State-owned enterprise spying on ordinary New Zealanders. We saw the awful tragedy of another State-owned enterprise Mighty River Power with totally inappropriate systems for cutting off the power of New Zealanders and we saw another State-owned enterprise Landcorp being prosecuted and found guilty of breaches of basic environmental standards. 
Then we saw what I thought was really a summary of one aspect of this Government’s failure. We saw tax freedom day. This is the day on which New Zealanders could finally start working for themselves. For the first time in New Zealand history tax freedom day made it into the month of June—6 June was the day this year when finally New Zealanders were able to work for themselves. That was 7 days worse than a year ago 27 days worse than when Labour came to Government 4 days worse than the United Kingdom and 30 days worse than it is in Australia. But what this Government does not understand is that hard-working New Zealanders want to keep the efforts of their own work and they do not want to see tax freedom day continuously getting later. 
We also saw over the adjournment interest rates rise to the highest level of any country in the OECD. Why that matters is that ordinary New Zealanders are out there struggling with the dream of owning their own home but under this Government that dream is getting so much worse. 
Let me take an area that I am passionate about which is climate change. We have heard so much rhetoric from the Prime Minister in talking about carbon neutrality. Over the adjournment we had the most recent forestry data. It showed that in the last year we have lost 14000 hectares of forest. That is over 2 million trees. It is not surprising that we did not have a single Minister this year doing a photo opportunity on Arbour Day because it was a day of shame. What is going on out there in New Zealand is a chainsaw massacre—7 million trees lost in just 3 years. Why does that matter? Those 7 million trees represent 25 million tonnes of carbon. How can the Prime Minister have the audacity to talk about carbon neutrality when we have that sort of chainsaw massacre going on in New Zealand? 
 I asked a simple straight question of the Minister: will he let New Zealanders who plant trees this year get the credits from those so we might change those appalling trends? We heard all sorts of weasel words such as: “Well if they’re permanent forests they might.” But the Government is continuing to deny credits for people who plant commercial forests this year. That means we have vacant land. It is bad for forestry and it is bad for the environment and that is why we are seeing this Government on the ropes. 
The Government just does not get it. We do not want more spin. We do not want more distractions. New Zealanders just want good solid policy. They want to be able to keep their money which they work so hard for. They want to see tax freedom day coming earlier in the year not continuously later. They do not want the highest interest rates in the world; they want real progress on those issues that are so important to New Zealanders.