Seymour DavidDAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you Madam Chair Williams. And now for something completely different from the ideas factory of the fifth National-led Government. I want to bring to the Minister of Finance's attention the question of indexation of some of the tax changes and the benefit changes because I note that the Best Start credit has provision to be changed simply by Order in Council whenever there is a change in inflation. That means that your benefits under Best Start are inflation-proofed. They are protected from increases in money supply reducing what you can buy at the shop. If that happens the Government's going to give you more.I can actually see why that's not such a bad thing. We shouldn't have inflation changing the real benefits that people get because inflation is something that is completely outside the control of people in this House and of most New Zealanders. So what I'd like to ask the Minister is how did he see fit to inflation-proof the benefits that New Zealanders will receive under this bill but he didn't think to inflation-proof the tax thresholds that people will be moving to a higher rate of taxing? Because you see people have been paying approximately $500 a year extra in tax every year for the last few years due to the previous Government's failure to index tax brackets to inflation.Michael Wood: I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. Questions around the indexation of tax rates had been raised 2½ hours ago in this debate.The CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): That's not a point of order.DAVID SEYMOUR: I apologise to the member for making a slightly abstract argument but if he keeps on listening it might become clear to him. It is a travesty that the so-called tax cuts that are being repealed in Part 1 were not tax cuts at all. They were a change in tax brackets that merely caught up with the way that people had been pushed into higher tax brackets by inflation. More and more people were paying the top tax rate simply because of inflation. If you look at these changes—at $48000 you are paying 30 percent. It won't be long—in fact it may be within the term of this Government—that someone working full time on the minimum wage will be paying 30c nearly the top tax rate.If we're going to have a debate about how much money we're going to give back to people from Treasury if we're going to have a debate about protecting that income—as they like to call it—from inflation through indexation which is done in this part on the Best Start package then who is standing up for the taxpayers who actually pay the bills to make this whole show possible? Who is giving them protection against inflation being pushed into higher and higher tax brackets each and every year being pushed into those tax brackets that most people never thought they would be in—with so many people now in the top tax bracket with people on the minimum wage working full time nudging a 30c tax rate—simply because the previous Government did not index tax brackets to inflation and this Government in this bill has now discovered that indexation is a good thing when they are giving away money but are not prepared to protect the taxpayer by indexing tax thresholds?They are very conscious of tax thresholds. In fact one of the points of this part is to adjust the tax thresholds but they're not prepared to index it to inflation. They're very conscious of inflation indexation because they're prepared to do that with the Best Start credit but they're not prepared to put these two concepts together and give the taxpayer a break and some surety about their tax bill and the effects of inflation pushing them into higher tax brackets. So I'll conclude with a question for the Minister and it's this: will the Minister consider adopting an amendment that would attach an adjustment to tax thresholds in line with inflation as he has for the Best Start tax credit? Why does he protect beneficiaries of this bill from inflation but not the people who pay the bill for this bill and that is the hard-working taxpayers who show up and make it all possible?