Genter Julie AnneHon JULIE ANNE GENTER (Minister for Women): Tēnā koe Madam Deputy Speaker. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. I'm incredibly proud to stand and speak in this Budget debate on behalf of the Green Party and talk about how the Green Party is driving fantastic change through our support through the confidence and supply agreement with this coalition Government. It really starts with understanding what really matters to all of us. I've heard the Opposition say that well you can't have wellbeing without a strong economy. I think they've actually got it quite the opposite of how it works.The economy is one small part of human society. It's the part that measures our commercial transactions. But in order for us to have those commercial transactions and for those to generate productivity and wealth it actually relies on a whole lot of unpaid transactions: the care that parents give to their children the care that they give to elders the ordinary things that we do in our daily life that don't make us money; that supports the paid economy. On top of that human society is reliant on a healthy natural environment. We are reliant on our planet in order to have a functioning economy. So the idea that we could somehow just focus on GDP to the extent of all else and have a functioning economy is actually quite wrong and it didn't really work for the last National Government.What we are doing in this Wellbeing Budget is taking an approach that actually makes a lot more sense and that is understanding that the economy relies on people and natural resources. We have to manage those natural resources responsibly for future generations and we have to ensure that people are receiving decent wages for their work; that they have an affordable safe secure dry and warm place to live; that we've invested in the infrastructure that enable people to get around our towns and cities and around our country; and that we're investing in infrastructure that's going to enable our exports and our goods to get to market efficiently. If we're doing that in a way that increases climate-destabilising pollution well it's not really going to make us better off in the medium term or even in the short term really.So what is at the heart of this Budget that I'm proud of? Well the huge commitment to dealing with our mental health crisis. I think that is truly something that the previous National Government had not dealt with and it was something we heard loud and clear from New Zealanders—that we had to deal with it. Again if we're not looking after people's mental health we're missing out on their productivity; we're missing out on the contribution that they're going to make to our society and to our economy.We have in this Budget real action on climate change and a real commitment to transition our economy to one that is not reliant on climate-destabilising pollution because that does not enrich us. But there are many opportunities for people to be involved in things that make our lives more productive and that is what this transition to a sustainable economy is about; it's about increasing the benefits to humanity while decreasing the cost and the cost of pollution.We have a commitment to sustainable land use and I know this is something that New Zealanders are really passionate about. It's not just because it's great for our economy; it's because New Zealanders love our country. We love the land we love the forest and we want to see it used in a way that doesn't destroy the things that we love about it like our waterways. It is entirely possible for us to have a flourishing economy and clean up our waterways. In fact those two things go hand in hand. If you have your old-fashioned approach to economic development not counting the costs of pollution then you might think that we're doing really well but we're not doing really well if we are poisoning our waterways. That comes to the heart of what New Zealanders care about. Rail—I thought it was really interesting to hear from the National Party transport spokesperson that they don't understand why rail is an important investment for a productive economy in this country. Even if you don't take into account the cost of pollution and the fact that we need to transition away from fossil fuels rail improves the productivity of our existing road network. This isn't rocket science. I mean it's something that I would have thought the National Party would understand well. We have a road network. We need to make better use of it. We need to enable more people and goods to move around the country at lower cost and if we can invest in the complements to improving or maximising the benefit of our existing rail infrastructure that is going to be a direct productivity gain to New Zealand because we import all of the fuel that we use to run our cars and trucks and we import all the cars and trucks that we use to move people and goods. If we can move more people and goods with fewer cars and trucks and less fuel that is a direct productivity gain to New Zealand's economy right there. Of course the experts in logistics understand this and I don't mean you know the political hacks who speak for the Road Transport Forum. I mean Don Braid the CEO of our largest and most successful freight company. Don Braid knows what he's talking about and he says that it makes sense to invest in rail. It's the second corridor. It's all part of having a more efficient transport network. This isn't about ideology and I would think that in 2019 we could move away from this right/left approach to transport where the right is into subsidising cars and trucks and having an inefficient network. It just doesn't make any sense. So rail is going to improve the productivity of our transport network. It's going to reduce pollution. It's going to make our roads safer for people who are travelling by car to have fewer big trucks on some of our rural roads which are being put under enormous pressure from some of the freight that needs to be moved on them. So it's just about finding the sensible balanced approach to investment that enables the network to work better. That's at the heart of the Wellbeing Budget: taking a perspective that can take into account all the different ways in which things impact upon each other. In the case of transport that is how the rail network improves the efficiency of the road network how the rail network improves the safety of the road network how the rail network reduces the cost to businesses and people of moving around New Zealand. Of course it's not just that that I'm proud of. As Minister for Women I'm proud to see one of the largest budget increases for the Ministry for Women which will be very important to meet our commitment to leading the Government's response to the Mana Wahine inquiry. Another huge commitment this Government has made is to pay equity. Now this is something I'd be really interested to hear the Opposition's view on because how does this fit into a successful thriving economy? Well if women aren't underpaid for their work that's beneficial for the economy. It's fair and it's right and this Government is committed to reducing and eliminating the gender pay gap in the core Public Service and ensuring that we have the right support so that that pathway can be followed in the private sector. The economy of course benefits from people who are doing this vitally important caring work being paid the wages that they deserve. That gives them more money to spend on housing shopping groceries—all of those things that help increase the economic transactions within our country. So we start by understanding that people are at the heart of our economy and that people rely on a healthy natural environment. It's simple. It's something that I think speaks to the values of New Zealanders who love their natural environment who believe that people should be paid fair wages and that they should have the means to have decent affordable housing. It is going to take time and I really want to acknowledge this. It's interesting to hear the Opposition claim that we should be spending more money in all of these areas we should be spending more money on infrastructure but we shouldn't be spending more money because somehow that's economically irresponsible. It is a completely incoherent narrative. We should be spending money. We should be ensuring that we're investing in infrastructure that's going to support our population and protect our environment. We should be ensuring that New Zealanders are getting fair wages for their work. And we should be investing in the services that New Zealanders expect in their health system front-line services to help those survivors of domestic violence—another huge Green Party win in this Budget led by my amazing colleague Jan Logie. This Budget is just the beginning and we have a long way to go to make up for the 10 years of neglect under that last National Government.