Barry MaggieHon MAGGIE BARRY (Minister for Seniors): Having heard from Ms Denial" and "Mr Dozy" who are the co-leaders of the Green Party and looking at the intellectual lack of rigour and the absolute paucity of policies from Labour the Greens and the other malcontents I feel certain that they will be destined to occupy the Opposition benches for a long time to come. But rather than dwell on their inadequacies—because that would take far more time than this House has at its disposal—I intend instead to focus in my call today on the excellent leadership and policies that John Key and this National-led Government have delivered to New Zealand.Here on the National benches we are all united behind our leader unlike Labour over there with—what is it—five leaders in the past 8 years; so far anyway. Across the Tasman they have had six Prime Ministers and will possibly have a seventh after this weekend. We really need to understand that strong leadership is at the heart of the stability of any Government. Many countries with far less political stability and poorly performing economies really are struggling to deal with the horrible situations that unfold internationally. Really global economic uncertainty now seems to be the new normal whether it is Brexit the outlook for growth in China interest rates in the United States dairy price fluctuations or even the act of terrorism that unfolded in Turkey today. Things happen internationally; Governments and leadership need to be flexible and need to be able to understand what they need to do to put things right.The lessons that I think New Zealand learnt from the 1973 experience when Britain entered the European Economic Community are ones that still apply today as that country prepares to depart it. We actually have a situation in New Zealand where we know and understand that you cannot just put all your eggs in one basket and trade with only one nation. It is also important to understand that we will not get rich just from selling to ourselves a market of 4 million people. New Zealand under John Key and this National Government understands that very well and we are a far more diversified export economy than we were in the past. National's focus is very much on making New Zealand an open diversified trading nation which means we are better equipped to deal with the global risks that are beyond our control. So although our relationship with the United Kingdom remains important we now have a much more diverse range of trading partners. Australia and China take more of our exports than the European Union. Countries in the Asia-Pacific region make up our most valuable trading partners. These are the realities.In the past 8 years this John Key - led National Government has worked hard to build a resilient economy and we now have a very strong broad foundation for future growth. When we look at tourism for example it has now overtaken dairy with export earnings worth more than $13.5 billion. Our books are back in the black. Treasury is forecasting rising surpluses and falling Crown debt. Our economy is expected to grow at around 3 percent on average over the next few years and wages are continuing to rise. That is the thing that is going to make the difference to New Zealand families and to the New Zealand quality of life. When we look at the situation that we have improved on in the past 3 years there are more than 200000 more jobs. By 2020 the unemployment rate in New Zealand is predicted to drop to about 4.6 percent with another 170000 jobs and the average wage is forecast to rise to $63000—that is per year and that is more than $16000 more than was the case with the average wage when we took power.As the Minister for Seniors I would say I am very proud indeed of the fact that New Zealand superannuation has increased again in April—it went up with the Budget. Overall that means that in the past 8 years it has gone up 38 percent and that is more than double the rate of consumer price inflation over the period. The weekly rate for a married couple on superannuation stands at $591.94 net a week. That is tangible and those are the kinds of things that make a huge difference to the quality of people's lives.Our strong economy puts us in very good shape indeed to deal with the global uncertainty. Our total exports have increased—by almost $2 billion in fact last year and that was on the back of solid performances from tourism as I said the beef sector as well ICT wine and much of the manufacturing sector. Crisis—what crisis? The Opposition benches are wrong again around all of that. The international uncertainty has in fact brought out the best in New Zealanders—the resilience of New Zealand exporters who were forced to become very very strong and they have done that. Since 2008 we have grown and we are equipped—Mr SPEAKER: Order! The member's time has expired."