Joyce Steven; Mallard TrevorHon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister of Finance): Good afternoon Mr Deputy Speaker. Happy New Year. It is wonderful to see you in the House—wonderful to be back in this incredibly important Chamber for our country's governance. I thought I might start today by telling you a little bit about my summer holidays.Grant Robertson: The veges are good.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I am not referring to the veges but thank you Grant. I thought I would talk about my trip actually down to Hokitika during the summer break where I had the opportunity to check in on how the people of—sorry Kaikōura to check in on how the people are going with the Kaikōura earthquakes and the work that was being done to open the roads to open the harbour and to get Kaikōura back on its feet again. It was great to see the people of Kaikōura bouncing back rapidly from the challenges of late last year. I was very very impressed not just with what they were doing but with the work of all the agencies and the contractors helping them get their town back on its feet.I also went to the West Coast because there was a big announcement on 26 January on ultra-fast broadband where ultra-fast broadband was extended to 151 more towns across New Zealand—151 more small towns. I had a bit to do with setting up the ultra-fast broadband initiative and at the start of setting it up it was almost beyond our dreams that small towns like Reefton Rūnanga and Hokitika would get the opportunity to have fibre to their homes. I had the privilege of being in Westport when we announced to the people of Westport gathered at the Enterprise Precinct and Innovation Campus there that not just some time but very very soon Westport would get ultra-fast broadband and they value that because it is all about their economic future. It was not just broadband that day. I then drove down to Greymouth and visited the site where the Grey Base Hospital is being constructed by this Government supplying medical facilities that are not just modern but are state of the art—state of the art—for the future of the medical support of the West Coasters.I then also drove over the Taramakau Bridge where this Government is committing to a brand new Taramakau Bridge. So the gentleman whom I talked to in Hokitika who had to stop and guide a visitor across the current single-lane road-rail bridge because they were worried that there might be a train coming the other way will not have to do that again because they will have a brand new road bridge on the West Coast. This is happening in regional economies up and down this country because of this Government's investment in regional growth. But that is not it. That is not it at all. This Government is focused on growing the economy. Just last week we saw New Zealand post a record number of people in employment. We have never had 2½ million people in jobs before and just last week we posted that for the first time. We now have the third-largest rate of employment in the developed world—the third-largest rate of employment in the developed world.Of course it is not just about the economy; it is about for example public services. At his state of the nation address we saw an announcement by the Prime Minister of an additional 1125 police staff over the next 4 years—a $503 million investment in public services for a growing country. Then last weekend just before Waitangi Day I was at Waitangi on the Friday for the Iwi Chairs Forum and also for the Northland Regional Growth update where Simon Bridges announced that two new bridges at Matakohe plus Taipā plus Kaeō will be under construction this year—meaning of course that Mr Bridges lives up to his name yet again. That was all before 6 February Waitangi Day—that is just what I have seen before 6 February Waitangi Day of the Government's action in 2017.Then of course we had our new Prime Minister Bill English talking in Auckland yesterday at the Waitangi Day celebrations about the future of the Treaty about the vision for the future of the partnership between Māori and non-Māori and doing it in a way that even impressed some of the more cynical journalists who were along for the ride yesterday.Grant Robertson: Careful—careful!Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Just a few of them—most of them are not cynical Grant. So what was the Opposition doing during this time? Well I had time to keep an eye on them too in between tending the garden and doing all these other things. I did tune in to their state of the nation speech—the all-combined Labour-Greens state of the nation speech on the feed on Facebook. I was one of the 24 people who took time out of their day to tune in to the newsfeed the livestream of the Labour-Greens state of the nation. I listened for the messages and I listened for the vision for not just—actually any announcement whatsoever would have been good. I listened for it and this is what I heard. Broadly it could be summed up across the two speeches as (1) We don't like the Government." Well that is sort of a given. You are the Opposition and that is sort of the job actually. And (2) "You shouldn't like the Government." That was their second point. So "We don't like the Government. You the public shouldn't like the Government." and (3) "Can we have a turn please?" That was it. That was the whole afternoon: (1) "We don't like the Government."; (2) "You shouldn't like the Government."; and (3) "We want a turn please."It is no policy. There were no ideas. It was unbelievable. At the start of election year the two biggest Opposition parties came together to say nothing except that they could work together which is sort of news. To be fair that is news. The idea of Labour and the Greens actually working together is news and I think pretty exciting in its own wee way. So maybe that is an opportunity. Maybe that is what they achieved out of that. However I do have news for them: the ability to work together is a necessary but not sufficient ground for people to vote for you. It is generally seen as necessary but insufficient. Saying "We can talk to each other." is generally not enough. I do appreciate it is a big step forward but it is not enough.And then sadly out of the victory of sorts that was their ability to work together and talk to each other we had an unfortunate breakdown of communication.Tim Macindoe: Oh no! Tell us.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Yes we had a couple of captain's calls I think they are called which did not work out for "Captain Little". Firstly we had what is known as the Greg O'Connor call and suddenly—and it is completely unrelated. It is completely unrelated. The Greg O'Connor call happened and then suddenly there are no electorate deals between Labour and the Greens. There has been talk of electorate deals for months and then suddenly Greg O'Connor is a Labour Party candidate and weirdly there will be no electorate deals. There will be no electorate deals.That was the first captain's call. The second one which I thought was inspired was bringing back Willie Jackson—bringing back Willie Jackson. The future of the Labour Party is the Alliance party. Labour brought back Willie Jackson to show that it was all coming back into a broad tent except nobody told Poto Williams. Nobody told Poto Williams. So the Greg O'Connor captain's call managed to upset the Green Party and then the Willie Jackson call upset the Labour Party and it has not even had the Laila Harré call yet. Well she has made the call. She has rejoined the Labour Party. She has seen the future of the Labour Party which is the Alliance party.All I can say to that is I was talking to some of our campaign people the other day and I thought to myself: "The Labour-Greens boat has come back. It has to come back. We have to bring back the boat with the red people and the green people all rowing against each other because 3 years on nothing has changed." Despite the fact that they devoted their whole state of the nation—not just speeches but an extravaganza I am reliably informed—extravaganza to saying "We could work together." within a few days they could not work together.2017 has started and I have got to say it looks a little like Groundhog Day at this point. We have—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! The member's time has expired."