Bishop Chris: Appropriation (2015/16 Estimates) Bill — Third Reading Imprest Supply DebateText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBishop Chris: Appropriation (2015/16 Estimates) Bill — Third Reading Imprest Supply Debate[Sitting date: 18 August 2015. Volume:707;Page:5885. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]CHRIS BISHOP (National): I am not sure I will be taking economics advice from “the Professor” any time soon. I am just going to throw that one out there for the House. This Budget that we are debating this afternoon coming to the final stages of the debate was a confident Budget delivered by a confident Government in charge of an increasingly confident country.In my contribution to the debate I want to focus on the three major themes that I see coming through from the Budget: firstly the continuation of a sustainable economic plan that is working; secondly the continuation of the Government’s focus on creating an outward-looking confident country that is connected to international markets and is welcoming and accepting of migrants both foreign capital and labour; and thirdly the thing that the Opposition does not want to talk about which is the social investment approach at the heart of this Budget.On this first theme the sustainable economic plan that is working this Budget builds on the hard work of previous years. It locks in and continues to lock in a sustainable programme that is growing the New Zealand economy creating wages that are rising faster than inflation and creating jobs. It locks in things like ACC levies falling by $1.5 billion a year overseen by my good colleague Nikki Kaye—[Interruption] That is right. It locks in extending ultra-fast broadband to over 80 percent of Kiwis. It locks in building skills for industry—things like the ICT Graduate Schools which I know are going to be very important for our very fast-growing information and communications technology sector. It locks in increased innovation funding through Callaghan Innovation based in my neck of the woods in the Hutt Valley which I am very pleased about.In short this is a confident Budget that does all the things that New Zealand needs to grow and get ahead in the 21st century. Also it locks in things like a fast-growing economy wages rising faster than inflation and over 200000 jobs created since 2011. As my good colleague Judith Collins pointed out just a few moments ago we have positive household savings in New Zealand. We have had those for 5 years now and the last time we had a rate like that was in 1995.So what has been the response of the Labour Party and members opposite to this very good Budget? Well the first response which came right at the start of the Budget debate all those months ago was Andrew Little’s pitiful response speech. I know it was a long time ago but it really was absolutely pitiful. It was just hilarious to sit there on this side of the House and see Labour members opposite. They realised I reckon about 5½ minutes into the speech that it was going to be probably the worst Budget reply speech since David Shearer’s speech 2 years before. I reckon they realised about 5½ minutes in. I think he realised it too actually to be honest. I reckon Andrew realised it was going to go pretty badly and that is when we got the references to Gene Simmons the constituent—you know the terrible joke that annoyed Young Labour and everybody else about “fiscal gender-reassignment” surgery and all of those lame attempts at humour. So that was the first response from the Labour Party.Then in the weeks afterwards we had the obsession with the surplus. You will note that members opposite stopped talking about the surplus but for the initial weeks following the Budget there was this obsession with the surplus and that the previous Budget in 2014 had forecast a very small surplus and then Budget 2015 comes along and it forecasts a slightly small deficit. That is absolutely hilarious because the Labour Party has spent 7 years opposing every piece of fiscal restraint that this Government has enacted. It opposed every cut even of things like Moroccan cooking courses and subsidised macramé classes—all of those very sensible and prudent things that the National Government has done. Sue Moroney tweets away about how it is a human rights violation to stop somebody from having a $3-a-week macramé class or a Moroccan cooking class. Members opposite have opposed every single cut and then they turn up and say “Oh well you should have got back into surplus. I mean tut tut tut! Naughty you National Government. You really should have got there sooner.” Right?Also members opposite spent the first year after the 2008 election calling for fiscal stimulus. David Cunliffe used to issue very serious press releases about the global financial crisis that was happening in the world and that the National Government must respond in a resolute and forthright manner and immediately massively increase deficit spending. If we had followed that path—and we did run a deficit; we have run a deficit for a number of years—and massively increased spending we would be in far more of a hole.Of course we should never forget that it was the Labour Party’s reckless fiscal mismanagement of the economy that caused us to go into recession before the rest of the world before the global financial crisis. Its mismanagement pushed up Government spending pushed up interest rates and pushed up inflation and caused us to go into a recession before the rest of the world caused us to have 11 percent mortgage interest rates and 5 percent inflation in 2008 and caused the tradable sector of the economy to be in recession for 5 years. Having caused the problem in the first place the Labour Party then has the temerity to turn round and complain about the measures we put in place to try to tackle that deficit. Then it has the temerity to turn round and complain that we should have got there sooner. So I think that was a pretty silly response. But it quickly realised that was not a good idea.Then we moved on to the diversification argument. Labour became obsessed with diversification ignoring the fact that this Budget like Budgets previously has been precisely about diversifying the New Zealand economy. That is why we have been investing in things like research and development—and those members often complain about that. This panacea of the New Zealand economy is research and development tax credits. Well there is more spending on research and development and science and innovation by the Government than ever before. It has increased at a rapid rate under this Government—a 70 percent increase since 2008. So we are doing that and that is why things like the kiwifruit industry are doing well. That is why things like the information and communications technology sector are doing well. That is why the red meat sector is doing well. That is why tourism is doing very well. This economy is diversified.Then we have the argument that it is all about dairy. So along come some price shocks in the dairy industry and then the Labour Party goes: “Well you’ve gotta do something—you’ve gotta do something. We don’t know what—we don’t know exactly what but you must do something.” This is the classic response of social democrats everywhere of socialists and of left-wing parties: “The Government must do something. You have to do something. We don’t know what. We need a plan B. We don’t know what that plan B might be but you must do something.” So now the Labour Party is obsessed with dairy and forgetting about the diversification argument.Then we get Andrew Little saying that we need foreign investment in New Zealand literally an hour after railing against foreigners investing in New Zealand. I mean these guys seriously do not know what they believe any more. They really do not. So the Labour Party has not very much to say about one of the central themes of the Budget. That brings me very nicely to the second theme which is about an open and confident New Zealand. This Budget increases support for New Zealand Trade and Enterprise. It increases support for our international education industry. It increases support for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade to negotiate things like free-trade deals.I want to make a very serious point about the Trans-Pacific Partnership here because there is a very serious question for the Labour Party in the next few weeks and months I hope with the conclusion of the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks which I hope will happen. It actually is almost an existential question to the history and reality of what the Labour Party is. It is almost a crisis inside the Labour Party.The question for the Labour Party is this: is it going to be a responsible party of Government that continues the bipartisan consensus actually started by its own party in 1984 which is that New Zealand’s future is one that is connected to the world that is connected to the global economy and that does not try to insulate itself from global competition and market forces? Is it going to be that responsible party or is it going to be a party that harks back to the worst excesses of 1970s orthodoxy of big government of repressive insularity of a Government that tries to shield New Zealand away from the rest of the world? This is “Jane Kelsey-onomics”. Jane Kelsey has never seen a free-trade deal that she thinks we should sign. She was opposed to CER she was opposed to the China free-trade agreement she is opposed to the Trans-Pacific Partnership and she is almost certainly opposed to the Korean free-trade deal.This is the big question that confronts the Labour Party and the question for the Labour Party is this: are Phil Goff and Clayton Cosgrove and all of the moderate people who know that that is in New Zealand’s interests—and who in the case of Phil Goff actually helped start the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations back in 2008—going to win the battle inside the Labour Party? Or is the hard left the Jeremy Corbyn - supporting Clare Curran and her acolytes—in so far as Clare Curran could have acolytes—going to win the battle inside the Labour Party? This actually goes to the heart and soul of the Labour Party and of New Zealand’s future.Kelvin Davis: Sorry can you just clarify what you’re talking about?CHRIS BISHOP: My point is we need bipartisanship on the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal. We would like the Labour Party to support this very important deal for New Zealand’s future. Sadly it seems like the hard left is going to win this battle inside the Labour Party and that will be to the detriment of New Zealand’s future.This is a Budget that locks in an open and confident New Zealand that is welcoming of foreign investment is welcoming of foreign migration and does not seek to demonise Chinese people like the Labour Party opposite seeks to do. Because of that I am very strongly in support of this Budget.