Tabuteau Fletcher: Appropriation (2015/16 Estimates) Bill — Third Reading Imprest Supply DebateText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTabuteau Fletcher: Appropriation (2015/16 Estimates) Bill — Third Reading Imprest Supply Debate[Sitting date: 18 August 2015. Volume:707;Page:5883. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]FLETCHER TABUTEAU (NZ First): I would just like to start by saying that these Budget and appropriations are based on principles coming straight out of “Planet Key”. The Budget has no bearing on reality; the appropriations were assigned based on assumptions made when National was wearing those rose-tinted glasses. The Budget claimed at the time—actually quite wisely Mr English did not claim that this Budget would do anything in particular; its byline was simply “Aplan that’s working”. There was no actual plan but we were told that the “no plan” was working. Without doubt there is nothing in this Budget that will fix this Government’s finances and secure New Zealand’s economic prosperity and security. What was one of the main cornerstones of this Budget? Higher commodity prices. Not stable or slightly decreased commodity prices but higher commodity prices—that is what the Budget was based on. Fonterra has slashed its forecast payout for milksolids for this season to $3.85 a kilo—far below the break-even point for many farmers—and it will continue to decrease. New Zealand First warned this National Government back when the Budget was released that it was living in a dream world. We warned this Government then that milksolids prices would decrease significantly. Back in the original Budget debates New Zealand First said that this Government had its head buried in the sand and had no plan or idea for any other quite plausible eventualities arising here in New Zealand or around the world. We said that there was a real world that needed to be taken account of.Here we are today in the real world quite distinct and quite different from the Budget that was presented to us a while ago with appropriations that now have no bearing in reality. Now because of this Government’s ineptitude this country is suffering with Ministers stumbling along making up policy on the fly. I say that but it actually probably will not pan out to be policy because this Government and its leader are particularly skilled at smiling in sympathy with the people of New Zealand agreeing that there is a problem and then going away and doing absolutely nothing about it. This Government was sent a message from the regions. One of those regions in particular sent a powerful message that the previous speaker Judith Collins has chosen to ignore. It changed the very composition of this Parliament because Government Ministers were not listening to the people of New Zealand—the heartland and the working backbone of this country creating the majority of this country’s wealth. This Government is still not listening. Ministers bob up here and they bob up there telling everyone how wonderful things are. The people have been ignored and now it has been put right in the collective Government’s face. Ministers go around bobbing their heads up in places talking about the regions. It is talk talk talk—managing a media crisis and not dealing with the real crisis facing New Zealand.I do not think that most New Zealanders believe this Government when they are told that Mr English has a plan that is working. Firstly they will ask “What plan was it that you were actually talking about?” and secondly “If you had a plan surely it was a plan to create wealth and boost incomes for all New Zealanders. Was that the plan?”. Mr English everyday New Zealanders cannot see what you are forcing down their throats right now but they are absolutely choking on it. What are the consequences of having “A plan that’s working”? They are $3.85 a kilo for milksolids—far below the break-even point as I said earlier. This puts a huge question mark on New Zealand’s dairy industry and its ability to handle its debt which has trebled to $34.5 billion in the last 10 years and the National Government made it worse.This Government with its support parties such as ACT sent out signals and distorted the market which ACT rails against and now all of us have hell to pay. It will be real farmers though—real men and women—who will be faced with the devastating loss of their farms because the banks will come to collect. We now have mortgagee sales as evidence of that. They have jumped nationwide in the past quarter as lower dairy prices have already hit provincial New Zealand. Support industries are already shutting down. They are shutting up shop and laying off staff in the hope of seeing this cyclical or structural downturn through.The member before spoke about how they saw it coming—that it happens every 10 years. So why are our farmers suffering through it now? Where was the plan? What did this National Government do about it? We were just told that they saw it coming. Now the number of mortgagee sales has jumped nationwide. Experts are warning of more foreclosures outside of Auckland’s surging property market as financially strapped homeowners in regional New Zealand start defaulting on their mortgages. Where are the appropriations and where is the policy to deal with the loss of our New Zealand assets? What will it serve us if reluctant—and they are reluctant; they have told us—cash-strapped farm owners pushed to the wall by their banks sell their farms to cash-rich but asset-poor overseas investors?The National Government has been selling the line about being aspirational supposedly meaning that selling our assets to overseas investors will create jobs—or save them as the case may now be. How is simply having a job aspirational? How is this Government policy to sell our productive assets and all of our productive land to foreigners—not new New Zealanders but foreign investors—aspirational? The National Government is telling the people of New Zealand that National’s definition of “aspirational” is to just be content and consider yourself lucky that you have got a job. How can the Government call the sale of New Zealand assets to foreign investors an investment? It is for the overseas investors but then the profits all go offshore. How can that be an investment for New Zealanders? How is it aspirational to be lowly paid serfs in our land?The Budget denied the facts when it was written. Most of what we are seeing today was a very real probability on the horizon and New Zealand First spoke about it then. National did not account for today’s reality in the Budget and so the estimates for the appropriations are an absolute farce. All the while National Ministers bob their heads up telling New Zealanders how wonderful they have it. All the while unemployment continues to grow in real terms despite protestations from the other side of the House. Real unemployment is increasing and we are seeing it in our regions. Regional economies are going to be shutting up shop if we do not do something about it and more important if this Government does not take ownership of the problem stop living in denial and actually do something meaningful. Get off “Planet Key” with your “plan that is working” and come back to the real world. Start listening to New Zealanders instead of talking at them. After 7 years of doing nothing surely even your media spin doctors are asking you: “Is it not time for you to do your job?”. Thank you.