Joyce StevenGENERAL DEBATEHon STEVEN JOYCE (National): I move That the House take note of miscellaneous business. I thought today it might be useful to reflect on the words of our new Prime Minister. Our new Prime Minister three days before the election uttered the prophetic phrase: When you're leading the charge intention is reality." That's what she told New Zealand—when you're leading the charge it's all about the intention. The intention is reality. And as this Government is now fast working out the intention is not reality at all. You actually have to do some work and if the deeds don't match the words then intention is simply not sufficient. We have some examples of that. We have the first example of this Government's admirable intention to lift people's wages. They think that people should earn more. There is probably no one in this House that doesn't think that people should earn more and that's great. So what's their first action to meet this intention? It's to actually remove $1060 from people who work and earn the median wage on 1 April next year. Money that was coming to them is—[Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: Order! I will ask the member to resume his seat. The Hon Nikki Kaye Julie Anne Genter Nathan Guy and a couple of members on my right have been talking as they've been wandering around. I was specifically asked at the beginning of question time today to try and tidy this up. I expected the whips to help me. They're not but I would ask that they do. Now Steven Joyce resume your call. Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Thank you Mr Speaker. So we have this situation where a Government that says it wants to lift wages—the first thing it does effectively is reduce the spending power of New Zealanders from 1 April next year. And how long will it take for them to earn that $1060 back? Well under this Government quite a long time. But that's OK because they might be using it for some great initiative—some great initiative that is going to expand the skill base of New Zealand. That's another of their intentions—to expand the skill base of this country. So they have dedicated $2.8 billion to tertiary students to expand the skill base in this country. The only thing is they're not actually going to lift the number of students in tertiary education. This $2.8 billion is not going to add at all to the number of students studying this year next year—it's just not going to happen. So they've just thrown $2.8 billion against the wall which happens to be incidentally more than the $2.4 billion they're saving by cancelling the tax package that would have given that income to New Zealanders. They also claim to support older New Zealanders and they want to encourage older New Zealanders. Well then why are they removing the increase in super that came with that tax package? They're doing it tomorrow and New Zealand First is enabling it. That party apparently cares so much about superannuation and veterans that it is actually going to remove the additional superannuation payment that's going to happen on 1 April next year. So the deeds don't match the words. But that's all right—that's only one example. There are other examples. We have of course the example that they were going to be very fiscally responsible and that all their Budget plans and their big spending promises were fully funded and fully costed. That's what we were hearing about it except now they are so tight that they can't even afford to give $350000 to KidsCan to keep an admirable programme going because they have so tightly spent the money that they have absolutely no capacity to spend any more. And they're fighting over a whole range of things. The Ministry of Primary Industries (MPI) is being reformed—MPI is being reformed. It's costing $17 million to indulge New Zealand First's snitch on MPI—$17 million—and the Government that cares about lifting the quality and value of primary sector exports is taking this money from the research and development programme to lift the value and quality of primary sector exports. The $17 million to enhance paper-shuffling in Wellington—enhance paper-shuffling in Wellington—is taken from the R & D plan for the primary sector and that is another example where their intentions are simply not meeting the realities. It's doesn't stop there. There's the billion trees that are only half a billion trees. There's the immigration cull that Winston Peters was on about but is now very quiet about. It is also the houses that were going to be built and now we don't know. And then there's the 1800 police and God knows when they're turning up. This is a Government that's fast learning that intentions have to be matched—Mr SPEAKER: Order! The member's time has expired."