Hide Rodney: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Hide Rodney: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
[Volume:623;Page:18168] 
RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) 
: 
 Members should remember Winston Peters’ big guffaw when someone from the National Party forgot to move his or her motion. We have just seen the same thing from Winston Peters today. He forgot to move his motion as part of his speech. We have had 20 minutes of speech from Winston Peters and we had one policy. Yes Bob the builder has discovered mum. New Zealand First will be campaigning on motherhood at the start of the election year and as we close into the election it will add in some apple pie. That is the motherhood and apple-pie party of New Zealand politics. 
The ACT party rises to support the motion put by Don Brash. We have no confidence in this Government and neither do New Zealanders. They are sick of Helen Clark and her nanny State approach to New Zealand. 
Let us just deal with some of the things that Helen Clark forgot to mention in her speech. She mentioned the tsunami and the huge efforts of New Zealanders but Prime Minister Helen Clark is so anti-American that she could not even through clenched teeth acknowledge the huge relief contribution made by the Americans in Indonesia and the other Asian countries. It is all very well for Helen Clark to say: “We stand ready to enter into negotiations with the United States.” Helen Clark will be standing ready until hell freezes over to enter into negotiations with the United States. Why? Because she does not like the Americans. Any leader worth his or her salt would acknowledge the huge contribution of the United States—and indeed the Australian forces—in relief efforts. 
Members should think of this. A nuclear-propelled aircraft carrier is a handy thing to have on stand-by when there is a disaster like the one we saw on Boxing Day. The USS  
Abraham Lincoln 
 moved 3 miles offshore and was able to ferry in 20000 gallons of fresh water medical supplies food and help. No other nation on earth could have done that. What was Helen Clark’s response if—God forbid—we have a disaster here? 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: The ship would be banned. 
RODNEY HIDE 
: Helen Clark said that our nuclear ship policy was to ban nuclear-powered ships and that it would not be gone by lunchtime. However I guarantee that if the New Zealand people needed a nuclear-powered ship she would change the policy. Well what sort of friendship is that? We will be with the Americans if we need them but we will be agin them if we do not. 
Here is something else that Helen Clark neglected to mention. I do not think that she picked it up. There were elections in Iraq last weekend Iraqi time. But in her speech there was not one mention of the brave Iraqi people—8 million of them—voting for the first time in my lifetime who were under the threat of having their heads cut off by suicide bombers and terrorists who would stop at nothing to prevent the Iraqi people being free and democratic. The voters were putting blue paint on their fingers and marking themselves out for death. Eight million voted. They defied the terrorists and those who would destroy and they voted in the first free elections in Iraq in 50 years. Helen Clark did not mention that because she would have had to acknowledge the huge achievement of the coalition forces. Yes there is a long way to go but what a start. Why can Helen Clark not be big enough to acknowledge what happened in Iraq on the weekend? 
Then we return to New Zealand and realise that this Helen Clark Government is all about spin but no facts. We heard in Helen Clark’s speech that crime was down. Try telling that to New Zealanders. Reported burglaries are down but we know why. Why would any New Zealander report a burglary to the New Zealand Police? What would happen? Violent crime is up over the last 5 years. It is hard to believe but in New Zealand during the 1950s a murder would be front-page news for days. The number of murders in a year was in single figures. In the year that I was born there were nine murders. It is 1 February and there have already been nine murders this year including the murder of an 83-year-old woman—a grandmother and great-grandmother—in a little town in New Zealand. She was brutally assaulted tortured and murdered. Where did Helen Clark deal with that in her speech? Every grandmother in the country is scared while at home. There is nowhere safe. Every son daughter granddaughter and grandson is scared. 
The No. 1 duty of any Government is to keep us safe in our homes on the streets and in our places of work so that our nanas and mothers can be safe. What has been Helen Clark’s response? If she was serious about crime she would not have George Hawkins as the Minister of Police. Any MP—even those in the useless rabble of the Labour Party—would make a better deal of it than George Hawkins. Under George Hawkins as Minister of Police one in five police officers are traffic cops. George Hawkins responded to a constituent who wrote to him to say: “I’m worried about crime.” by saying that the constituent should not be worried because quite often criminals were bad drivers and would be picked up. That is what George Hawkins said. [ 
Interruption 
] As Don Brash says we will catch them as they speed away from the place of burglary. Helen Clark had the temerity to say that the Government is getting tough on crime. My God! 
There was the case of Daniel Hedgri a 19-year-old Middle Eastern immigrant to New Zealand with previous form. The police through hours and hours and hours of work nailed that criminal. He had no option but to plead guilty to 12 counts of burglary each of which was for over $5000 worth of goods. Imagine the police work that went into that! And what did he get? He was sentenced to 200 hours of community service. Crime pays in New Zealand. Do any members believe that he committed only 12 crimes? Of course not! He has committed hundreds of crimes and has tens of thousands probably hundreds of thousands of dollars but when he was caught he was ordered to pay it back by doing 200 hours of community service. The message is loud and clear—crime pays in New Zealand. Those are the policies of Helen Clark. 
Why in her statement today did Helen Clark not say that we will keep our nanas safe at home? Why did she not say that we will send a message to the young people of New Zealand that if they commit a crime they will be caught and when they are caught they will pay the price proportionate to the crime? We used to be one of the safest countries in the world. We were proud of that and we can be again. We could be the safest place in the world. We are a peace-loving people who are a long way away from the world’s trouble spots. But we require a Government that does its job and realises what its job is. 
People pay their taxes so that there are police to keep them safe a justice system to dispense justice and a prison system to punish. Helen Clark says she cannot afford tax cuts. There is a $6 billion surplus but she cannot afford tax cuts. I have a message for Helen Clark: working New Zealanders cannot afford to pay the tax. That is the truth of it. It is all very well for Helen Clark to say that New Zealanders are incompetent at saving and need help to save. No they do not. They need the money to save and whose money is it? 
Katherine Rich 
: Theirs! 
RODNEY HIDE 
: That is whose money it is. They do not need help. They just need to keep what they earn. 
Helen Clark says our economy is not going very well so we need to get more mothers into the workforce. Well mothers have to work because of high taxes. A lot of mothers now in the workplace would like to be home with their kids but that choice is denied them. Why? Because of our “pernacious” tax system they are working simply to pay taxes to Helen Clark so that she can have her great surplus and crow about it. 
Hon Jim Anderton 
: “Pernicious” not “pernacious”. 
RODNEY HIDE 
: It is pernicious as Jim Anderton just piped up. He knows where the taxes go—$183000 to Hubbard Foods. That is why New Zealanders are paying so much tax. A total of $300000 went to the cronies of the Labour Party. That is what happens in New Zealand now. Hubbard Foods said that it did not need the money that it could have done its project anyway but the Government was shovelling the money towards it so it took the money. And so New Zealanders struggle. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Who got the photo? 
RODNEY HIDE 
: That is when Jim Anderton turns up but he is not so good at turning up when the trouble hits the fan. He disappears then. 
What has happened in New Zealand? The average New Zealand household is $8000 gross better off than it was 5 years ago. If we take away taxes and allow for inflation—and these are Michael Cullen’s numbers—that household is no better off. In 5 years of Labour which have been 5 years of the best economic conditions in my lifetime the average household is no better off. Helen Clark had the temerity to stand in the House today and crow about the fact that she has $6 billion—“Look how good I am!”. That is a disgrace and it is obscene. Labour is just looking after its mates. 
Helen Clark has totally abandoned working New Zealanders. It is not the workers that Jim Anderton is sitting there smirking about because the workers in New Zealand are the business owners of this country. They are the small-business people who work longer hours for lower pay than any other New Zealanders and who carry all the risk. They are the professional people whom Helen Clark declares to be rich. They are the truck drivers electricians and plumbers of New Zealand who get up and do a day’s work and they produce. What has this Government done for them? It has done nothing—just more taxes. Those people want the Government off their backs and out of their pockets. They do not need Helen Clark lecturing them about how to save run their businesses or run their lives. They need the Government off their backs. They need the Government out of their pockets—and then they will succeed. 
Helen Clark brags about the Working for Families package. Where is the “working” in that? Where is the “family” in that? It has nothing to do with families or with working. Someone with a couple of kids who goes from $35000 a year to $55000—maybe as Helen Clark says the mother goes out to work to earn the extra $20000—is $2500 better off. People earn an extra $20000 to be $2500 better off. The effective tax rate is 90 percent. Likewise someone who goes from $55000 down to $35000 is only $2500 worse off. Where is the incentive to work invest and be entrepreneurial? Is this not a perfect socialist heaven for Helen Clark? If people are stuck at a certain income level they cannot work and get ahead. They are stuck at that income level and are dependent on the Government for some of their money back. They cannot get ahead or go down. They are static. 
Do people know that some 240000 families of the 525000 families that have children will face effective tax rates of 60 percent or more under the Working for Families package? Helen Clark stood up and said that she will promote prosperity and enterprise. Do people remember 1999? Helen Clark said that all those earning over $60000 were rich and needed to be taxed hard because “we” needed the money—“we” being the Labour Party. 
Opposition Member 
: Not the Government. 
RODNEY HIDE 
: Not the Government; the Labour Party. Now if a person is on $70000 and has children he or she qualifies under the Working for Families package as needy and is able to get a handout. Those families are not needy. What they need is simply to keep more of the money they earn. 
That is why we say that the $6 billion surplus should be returned to New Zealanders. We should reduce our tax rates to just two rates: 15c all the way up to $38000 and then drop the rate to 25c above that level of income. If we did that we would have a stronger economy people could pay off their mortgages and own their own houses and students could pay off their loans. If we did that there would be an incentive to put a bit of effort in and to save and invest. If we did that we could have a more prosperous nation. 
I will quote an exact sentence from Helen Clark—the lady who wanted to close the gaps between Maori and Pakeha. So open did she rend them that there is now a Maori Party which will win all the Maori seats. She was going to reduce university fees yet student debt is higher than it has ever been. Waiting lists are up not down despite an extra “40 percent money”. She will put us in the top half of the OECD. Here is an exact full sentence from Helen Clark’s speech today: “The future of our dreams will provide better wages and salaries.” That is what this Government is about. We heard a lot about dreams in Helen Clark’s speech but the Prime Minister is dreaming if she thinks that the programme she has will make us a prosperous and more independent nation. 
We live in a great country but we can make it a much better place. We can let people keep more of their money so that they can be more independent proud and able to prosper for themselves and their country. We look across to Helen Clark and her Government and we realise this: Helen Clark is taking this Government on the completely wrong road for New Zealand. That is why ACT supports Don Brash’s motion and why we are looking forward to this election—so that New Zealanders can make a choice about the country they want to live in.