Auchinvole Chris: General Debate 
Auchinvole Chris: General Debate 
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CHRIS AUCHINVOLE (National—West Coast - Tasman) 
: 
 As a well-known political catchphrase goes “It’s the economy stupid.” and I say that it is. Indeed no amount of emotion such as we have just heard expressed on the other side of the House will make a difference to the hard facts. I am delighted to speak in today’s general debate on the economy. The economy is the most fundamental part of Government and the economy influences the standard of living of our population. The economy determines what we can afford to spend in the crucial areas of health welfare and education and the economy is crucial for creating jobs and realising higher incomes. 
Let us reflect for a moment and go back over some of our economic history through the Holyoake years the Kirk years the Rowling years the Muldoon years the Lange Palmer and Moore years the Bolger years the Clark years and now at a time of economic renaissance the Key years. I know from my own experience in business and from listening to others which of those periods was best for hard-working New Zealanders and their families and it was not is not and never will be the years during Labour’s tenure; Labour likes a welfare-dependent constituency. 
Today I will talk about the progress we have made in resurrecting the economy after 9 years—9 long years—of economic mismanagement. I will talk about the steps we have undertaken to ensure that the edge has been taken off the recession—because it has been. I will talk about the policy direction in which we are moving forward in order to maximise our economic growth and productivity. We in National look to reward resourcefulness to encourage enterprise and to salute and celebrate success and that is reflected in the economic decision-making of our team. First of all I ask what kind of economy we inherited from the previous Labour Government. When we the National-led Government came into office New Zealand had already been in recession for most of the year. By the December 2008 fiscal update net debt was soaring to be about 50 percent of GDP by 2023 and there were permanent deficits. It was obvious that this country needed some serious economic salvaging from the mess that Labour policies were largely responsible for. 
We have acted quickly to cap the numbers in our core bureaucracy with $2 billion being moved to front-line services. Another $1.8 billion will be redirected to Budget 2010. We have invested billions of dollars in critical infrastructure such as high-speed broadband and we have implemented a $500 million relief package to make life simpler for small businesses. We have also simplified and streamlined the Resource Management Act. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Who wrote this rubbish? 
CHRIS AUCHINVOLE 
: That Act is perhaps the most important legislation to date—and Mr Mallard knows that. The Local Government and Environment Committee of which I am the chair worked diligently and hard to ensure that the amendments would achieve the intentions of making it easier for businesses to grow and of investing in and creating jobs while protecting our environment. This and the other changes we are embarking on will be a great boon for our economy. 
Let us think for a moment of the rural areas that we so much depend on for the revenue-earning capacity of our country. Let us look at West Coast-Tasman an electorate of resilient resourceful and hard-working people and an electorate that I am very very proud to represent. The recession has been cushioned by the increase of jobs in mining the very industry that Labour—mining is its own origins—now wishes to dismantle and to suffocate. The tourism industry under the guidance of the Minister of Tourism Prime Minister John Key in the West Coast has actually increased during the recession and it has increased substantially. 
We have seen a stabilisation of agriculture and horticulture within the electorate. We are starting to see interesting changes. For example I was doing a shop-by-shop visit the other day in Motueka where the majority of retail businesses are doing very nicely and where they are reporting that people are now coming over from Nelson to Motueka to shop for a greater range of goods and for price competitiveness.