Doocey MattMATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri): Thank you very much Mr Chair. A very good choice! Thank you very much.We're here tonight to debate the Estimates hearing at the Health Committee. We had the Hon Dr David Clark as the responsible Minister there to answer questions around the announcements for health and I was asking questions specifically on the announcements around mental health. As we've heard tonight from many in the Government parroting the amount of money that has been apparently announced the problem is that—well it is the problem with Labour Governments. I mean first they tell you when they're in Opposition around any issue All you need to do is get us in Government and we'll fix it." The problem is that when they finally roll round to Government they don't have a plan. It's not as simple as just getting into Government; you've got to have the plan. And it's not as simple as just throwing money at it. I'll give you a reason why: the State of the Nation Report in the last year of the former Labour Government said that for all their increased expenditure social progress had not improved 1 percent. What a damning statement by the Salvation Army and this is what we are facing now.The health Minister said he had an aspiration that every person in New Zealand who wanted to access a mental health service could in five years' time. Well we know how much that is because it came back from the inquiry that the level of need we needed to focus on was 20 percent. Currently we spend $1.5 billion on providing access to 3.7 percent of the population. So the question is: if we are going to meet the Minister's own aspirational target what do we need to do to increase that figure from 3.7 percent to 20 percent? The problem is that when you ask the Minister and you ask this Government we don't get an answer. Where is the plan? Where is the modelling that will roll this out—all these programmes—and hit the 20 percent mark? Because that's what we are here to do in Opposition: hold the Government to account and interrogate the policies and the announcements.So we have a lot of money promised but in fact what we heard is that they're actually going out on a roadshow to ask the public how they want the money spent in mental health. You've had a $6.5 million inquiry that kicked the can down the road. We had delayed report-backs on the inquiry reports and now in 2019 around April we get a funding announcement. Well the biggest plank in that funding announcement is a mild to moderate front-level service that's going to be operational in five years' time. Do you know when that service first started? In July 2017. So why have we waited two years for this new big silver bullet front-line service to be resourced when it was operational in July? And that's the problem; we had $100 million earmarked for social investment mental health initiatives. One good example was putting mental health professionals alongside emergency responders. The police and St John were outraged when they heard that had been cut when this Government came in. And that's a problem: they came in they cut programmes and then we wait two years—and then New Zealanders are told "Well it's a great big amount of money but in fact it won't be operational for another five years."Part of the problem is that you can't just announce money; you've got to have done the work in Opposition. Funnily enough this Government talks about nine years of neglect—well they're very close to potentially causing more neglect in 18 months. And here we have 18 months in and no plan. Where is the plan for the service? Where is the plan for the workforce? At the moment you've got front-line services like GP clinics being told "Well they're going to get funding for this new front-line service." Ask one GP what funding stream that will come from—what will be the funding system. They don't know because this Government in Budget 2019 announced a lot of money in mental health but actually has no plan. And now they're out there asking New Zealanders in a roadshow. After a $6.5 million inquiry that went round and had 500 meetings and talked to thousands of New Zealanders we're now having a roadshow."