Moroney Sue: General Debate 
Moroney Sue: General Debate 
[Volume:641;Page:11589] 
SUE MORONEY (Labour) 
: 
 “… those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” So said Maurice Williamson only 15 minutes ago. I remind National members about some of National’s most recent history—history not so far back that even they could pretend to forget it. I quote from  
The Hollow Men 
 which is a very instructive document. This is very relevant and members will notice some of the key players; they are still all on National’s front bench. I have a quote from page 124: “The National Party team’s next priority was to neutralise issues that would lose them votes.” Does that not sound familiar? I think that is what they are doing at the moment as well. It continues: “Murray McCully expressed this in his 8 November paper when he advised that they needed to ‘fairly urgently make the decisions about those issues on which we intend to pick our fights and those we intend to inoculate’.” 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I am sorry to interrupt the member but I say to members on my left that the practice of members engaging in a constant barrage of interjections amounts to heckling and it is entirely intolerable in a debating chamber. 
SUE MORONEY 
: The key words in that quote—I use “key” advisedly—are “inoculate” and “neutralise”. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The member does not have a small voice. I am trying very hard to listen to the speech. You made a ruling and immediately two members—one who has been here for sometime from up the Coromandel somewhere and the other “Mr Auchin-something”—started heckling again but before the member had even started speaking. Are they allowed to defy your ruling like that? 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: No they are not allowed to defy my ruling but— 
Ron Mark 
: Can I please add to that? I know that Mr Mallard is a member of the same party as the member on her feet but from New Zealand First’s position—and it may well be that my soldier’s ears do not help me and I accept that—I am sitting with my head leaning towards my speaker trying desperately to hear the member who is only about six or seven seats from me. I know you have given a ruling but seriously I cannot hear when Mr Auchinvole who knows better than he is currently showing and Ms Goudie who often does not continue their barrage. I ask you to consider allowing the speech to be heard in silence because I simply cannot hear it. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Thank you Mr Mark. 
Sandra Goudie 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I asked a question of the member and from my understanding of the Standing Orders one can ask a question from one’s seat when one is involved in a debate. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: It is not possible to ask a question relating to the member’s speech when the member had not said anything following a point of order. It is absolutely impossible to ask a question in response when the speaker had not said a word before that member interjected. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I just say that politics as we all know it is the art of the possible and the possible we will explore today is good order. Members are asked to desist. 
Ron Mark 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. In view of the fact that I have not heard half of what the member has said I ask that her speech be started from the beginning and the time reset. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: That is something the Speaker decides. 
SUE MORONEY 
: National members do not like to hear from their most recent history because this sort of thing is still going on. That is why I am quoting from  
The Hollow Men 
. It talks about Dr Nick Smith and Murray McCully and their view that the National Party should work to neutralise and inoculate its policies. 
We saw a very good example of that today in the House during question time. National members flip-flopped over what National might or might not have to say on the issue of paid parental leave which shows that exactly the same strategy is still in place. National thinks the New Zealand public is dumb enough to believe that if National just makes gentle quiet noises about perhaps enjoying paid parental leave then that is National’s policy. 
What is National’s policy on paid parental leave? It is impossible to work out. Last week when the Families Commission released a report into paid parental leave and recommended an extension the National Party spokesperson welcomed that report and made it sound as though the National Party might perhaps consider extending paid parental leave. That was despite National having voted consistently in this House against any extension to paid parental leave and despite the fact that just 2 weeks ago in the Health Committee National had declared its hand by saying that it would oppose any move to extend paid parental leave. 
That sends a message to New Zealanders that they cannot ask the National Party about its policy because it will not tell them. National knows that it would be absolutely unelectable if New Zealanders understood what policy platform it wanted to bring in in this country. National’s plan is: “Whatever you do don’t mention policy don’t tell anyone what we stand for.” But I say to people to check National’s voting record because that is all that is left for people to look at. If National will not front up and say what its policy is on an important issue to New Zealand women like paid parental leave then the only thing we can go on is firstly National’s voting record and secondly what it does and says in select committee reports. Those are the things that are on the record; those are the only things that we are able to trust. 
When National members are talking about the issue of paid parental leave they are all over the place. These are recent quotes. Judith Collins said: “I would much rather have had a tax cut than paid parental leave.” but then just last week she said: “As a working woman myself I could seriously have done with paid parental leave when I had a little child.” I ask the member why she has changed her stance; I would like to know. Is that an inoculation or a neutralising of National’s policy platform? I believe it is. All I can say to the New Zealand public is that they should check the voting record because that is the only thing that will be able to tell them. 
National members know that the policy platform they fundamentally believe in would render them absolutely unelectable so they are busy stealing others’ policies. They want to take over Labour policy—policy they have vehemently argued against year after year. The real problem is that even if the New Zealand public did believe did take National at its word and thought perhaps that a National Government would keep Labour’s policies in place—even if they did believe that—the problem is that National does not believe in those policies. It fundamentally does not believe in those policies. It would not know how to extend them and it would not know how to improve on them so it would be in charge of a policy programme that it fundamentally did not believe in. What sort of country would we become if such a party were allowed to become the Government and tried to put forward policies and programmes that it fundamentally did not believe in? 
Jill Pettis 
: Like defence. 
SUE MORONEY 
: Yes the defence policy is another one. How could National vehemently oppose it and then say: “Gosh we like it.”?