Hughes Darren: General Debate 
Hughes Darren: General Debate 
[Volume:640;Page:10483] 
DARREN HUGHES (Labour—Otaki) 
: 
 That speech was sponsored by the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. That speech was from a political dinosaur a man whom thank goodness the National Party made the transport spokesperson. I say that because when he was Minister of Transport in the 1990s not a single new highway was built in New Zealand. 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: Yes there was. 
DARREN HUGHES 
: Oh no no. I look around my electorate of Otaki and I see that in the time Labour has been the Government we have had a new overbridge at Mackays Crossing—and Paul Swain was very influential in that. There is a 90 percent subsidy on the Western Link Road. I see that the electrification of the railway line is coming through to Waikanae—and it needs to be pushed further up than that. And I see that just today the contracts for the final stage of the preliminary designs for Transmission Gully have been awarded. The Labour-led Government is making progress on transport issues. 
I say to my constituent Mr Guy that if he has Maurice Williamson up at home today giving him political advice I am fantastically grateful for that. Maurice Williamson and detail Maurice Williamson and policy and Maurice Williamson and progress are not words that go together but there he sits on the front bench. I am glad that he is there because there is nothing better than what is happening in politics at the moment with the National Party sleepwalking its way to defeat. National Party members believe they have a ginormous opinion poll lead and they are watching it ebb away through their own arrogance through their conceit and through dividing up the spoils of victory 18 months before a general election. Watching the National Party perform in this way is political gold for the Labour Party. 
The new National Party MPs are the worst because they cannot believe their luck. They watched old Don Brash fumble his way through Parliament. Now all of a sudden they think they are on an enormous wave the election is this Saturday and soon they will be brought into office. 
Jacqui Dean 
: Not us! 
DARREN HUGHES 
: Jacqui Dean should get an economics job because she says that National would not borrow the money and that it would just get it from overseas. That is the sort of fantastic policy development we are seeing from people who 18 months before a general election have a born-to-rule arrogance that is just absolutely extraordinary. 
The National Party members’ speeches so far say they believe they can win office if every member of the Labour Party front bench retires or resigns. That is their strategy so they say: “Please Dr Cullen move on; please Mr Maharey go to Massey University.” Gerry Brownlee is very keen on that as the only way he would get into the extramural programme at Massey University would be if his old mate Mr Maharey enrolled him at mates’ rates. They want Mrs King to go. They want Mr Mallard to go. If all the front bench of the Labour Party left National members would be very happy. Well I am sorry. Dreams are free but around here we have to deal in facts. 
The only dream I have heard of recently is that of Mr English saying that his leader goes from cloud to cloud making pronouncements about policy while he is left grinding away doing the work. We totally agree with that. We hear from over there talk of the wasteful spending of the Government. I ask members opposite which area of wasteful spending should be cut first: health education law and order or transport. 
Craig Foss 
: Cullen Mallard Goff. 
DARREN HUGHES 
: Mr Foss says that if we sack three Cabinet Ministers that will be enough to bring down interest rates. If we sack three Cabinet Ministers we will save about a million dollars a year and that will be enough to lower interest rates lower the exchange rate of the dollar and bring about an economic revival in New Zealand. That is the level of intelligence and integrity of those people over there. 
Last night it was my privilege to host here at Parliament a pre-screening of a movie called  
Amazing Grace 
 which is based around the work William Wilberforce did to end slavery over many many years in Great Britain. He was a man who stood up for his principles years and years before they were popular. He did not bounce from cloud to cloud; he stood firmly and said what he believed in. We were pleased to watch that movie. 
Meanwhile on the other side of the House National Party members are not interested in firm principles that are stuck to in good times and bad. They have been busy watching the new movie  
Transformers 
 because that is about the only thing the National Party stands for now—transforming what its political policies are. I was amazed to see that the bad guys in  
Transformers 
 are called the Decepticons. There is no bigger bunch of Decepticons in New Zealand politics right now than those guys over there. “Mega-John” is their leader and if we look at the National Party we find there is more there than meets the eye just like the Transformers in that regard. They will do anything they will say anything and they stand for absolutely nothing. 
When we ask National members questions such as “OK the Government is spending too much. Where should we cut spending?” we hear nothing. Mr Foss says we could cut the ministerial services budget by a million bucks. I do not think that will get us very far. Mrs Dean says that maybe we could get the money from overseas because that is not really borrowing. That will not go very far either. So I ask National members to tell us what their policy will be. Are we going to can Transmission Gully to bring down interest rates? There is silence from National members of Parliament on that. Are we going to stop building hospitals like the one in Dunstan in order to bring down Government spending? Mrs Dean is screeching about that in a Decepticons kind of way but I am not sure what she means. 
It does not matter where people look; they will see that on 1 July we brought in new policies that represent good spending for people: KiwiSaver lower fees for doctors’ visits and 20 hours free for our children in early childhood education. The National Party members are complaining about all those policies but are they going to keep them or jettison them? How can there be so many windbags and no noise? Vote Labour!