Goldsmith Paul; Robertson GrantHon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National): Thank you Madam Chair. So we're going to start a wide-ranging and detailed debate on the financial policies of this Government and the country and what needs to happen at a time of great peril for New Zealand—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): Or the Estimates.Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH: Focused on the Estimates. When we look at the Estimates there are billions and billions of dollars being spent by this Government. Three areas that I want to focus on today: jobs around debt and tax policy and in infrastructure.So we start with jobs. We've seen—what are we up to?—$13 billion set aside for wage subsidies in an attempt to tide people over. So the question of the day is: who's got the best policies to create those jobs to get New Zealanders back to work at a time when we're losing more jobs than ever in our history? We've got on the one side a Government which seems to believe that the best approach to get jobs is for the Government to borrow money and buy them. So we've seen various schemes—$1.1 billion to hunt possums and plant flax bushes build pools in Gisborne and various other projects.Now some of that may be well-justified but our view is that the primary creator of jobs is actually private sector investment. We trust New Zealanders—owners of businesses large and small around the country—to make the judgment that they're going to risk their money to hire a new person to expand their business to take a chance to start a new enterprise. The best thing Government can do is create an environment where they feel confident to do that. The recipe for that hasn't changed particularly—it's about keeping taxes low it's about pushing back the tide of regulation not adding to it and not changing the rules all the time and allowing investment to flow. So I'd be interested in getting a sense from the Minister about getting his policies around jobs.Secondly in the tax and the debt area the Budget and the Estimates are proposing that we'll end up borrowing up to $200 billion over the next four years. To put that into context for people tuning into this debate we know that New Zealand spends about a billion dollars every year on Pharmac to keep us all alive in terms of cancer drugs and all the pharmaceuticals that we need to survive. In the last four months of the financial year we were borrowing that sum—a billion dollars—roughly every four days. So $1.6 billion a week is how you got to the $28 billion over the last four months of the financial year. It'd be interesting to know how rapidly we're borrowing right now and what this Government's plan is to get on top of that debt. It seems to just be spiralling and a very gradual approach.So one of the questions is now that we know that members of this Government or supporters of this Government—coalition supporters of this Government—believe that tax is love and presumably they want more love and they want more tax we want to have a clear idea where the Government stands on that.Thirdly in the area of infrastructure—tens of billions of dollars set aside in this Budget $12 billion at the start of the year for various infrastructure projects and there's been a lot of announcements a lot of press conferences. Shane Jones has got his high-vis on on a number of occasions. Grant Robertson has got his high-vis on on a number of occasions—he's put his hard hat—Rt Hon David Carter: Big jacket.Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH: Big jacket. Well yes it may be large but I'm not making any comment on that. But they've got their high-vis on they've got their helmets on and they've announced a whole lot of stuff. But I go back to the first announcement of an infrastructure project right back at the start in February 2018 when Shane Jones went along and said The first big announcement for infrastructure is going to be the roundabout down the road from my house in Waipapa."—that was going to be the first thing. When we asked him why all this money was being spent in Northland under the Provincial Growth Fund he said "To the victor goes the spoils." Surprise surprise people were a little bit cynical about the nature of that spending. That cynicism has been compounded in the last couple of months when this Government's announced all these shovel-ready projects are ready to go but we're going to dribble them out as it suits the timing of this Government for the photo opportunities and the high-vis. No doubt I'd like to just hear whether Grant Robertson the Minister of Finance shares the view that when it comes to announcing infrastructure projects the moto should be "To the victor goes the spoils and we will use this in a nakedly political way" and I'd hope that he would be able to disabuse us of that view.Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): I thank the member for his laser-like focus on the report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee on the Estimates for Vote Finance Fiscal Strategy Report and the Budget Economic and Fiscal Update. To answer the member's questions—and in fact I'll start at the infrastructure point and work my way backwards.No I don't support that particular phrasing from Minister Jones. He would be the first to say that on occasions some florid phrases come from him but I do want to at this time acknowledge his work in the infrastructure space. During this term of Government and funded in this Budget is the Infrastructure Commission which finally is responding to the requests of the business community to have some certainty via a pipeline of work. Similarly that is what the infrastructure reference group work that's funded in the Budget was about. It comes on top of the significant investment in infrastructure including the New Zealand Upgrade Programme and the $12 billion adding this $3 billion to it taking in total I believe the expenditure over the five-year period that infrastructure and capital gets funded through the Budget to around $50 billion—so significant investments there in infrastructure. I think the member would concede that for New Zealand we have an infrastructure deficit and we do as a country need to do better than we have over many decades. Looking ahead that's what this Government has tried to do and continues to do with that investment.In terms of the question around tax and debt and borrowing yes like any Minister of Finance I would rather not be borrowing the sums of money that we are today but I think the member will also recognise we are facing a one-in-100-year shock to the New Zealand and global economy and therefore the response to that needs to be proportionate. New Zealand is in a very very strong position going into this situation because our levels of public debt are so low and the cost of borrowing in the world is incredibly low. As the member will be aware from other exchanges that we've had in actual fact as a percentage of GDP the cost of borrowing for New Zealand is about the same in this financial year than it was in 2016-17 when we were borrowing at a considerably lower rate than we are today.Hon Michael Woodhouse: How long are the rates locked in for?Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: So those interest rates are predicted Mr Woodhouse by most economists to be low for a relatively long time putting us in the very strong position to be able to manage that.When it comes to what we do though—and obviously we in this Budget Economic and Fiscal Update have the COVID Response and Recovery Fund a $50 billion envelope of funding and the Government's been very clear that we will spend that as is necessary. We won't borrow it if we don't need to. We have said that there is $14 billion left on the table from that $50 billion fund. I note that the member has chosen to be a part of a party that is spending that money now on projects that aren't actually going to deliver jobs for many years to come. I would say to him that if he is concerned about levels of debt then he should actually be a little bit more careful and perhaps have a word with one or two of his colleagues around not using that as some kind of slush fund for their projects but seeing it as actually our COVID Response and Recovery Fund.On the member's first point around jobs I don't think it reflects well on the member to talk about the Jobs for Nature Fund in the way that he does. Actually right around New Zealand communities are welcoming the fact that actually there is an opportunity to not only create jobs but also do some of the really important work in protecting our waterways in making sure that we get rid of pests in our environment. The member knows because I'm sure he's been down there in the Mackenzie Country and elsewhere hearing from people about the importance of getting rid of wallabies. Finally we have actually an opportunity now to get down there and do that work create jobs. As the economist Joseph Stiglitz had put it this is the kind of policy that's doing double duty. It's doing something good for the environment and it is creating jobs—up to 11000 jobs from that package.I agree with one thing that the member said though and that is that it is a partnership between the private sector the public sector local government iwi and others all putting our shoulder to the wheel and making sure that we're working together to create jobs and create the environment where those jobs will happen. This is not going to be an easy time. We know that for many New Zealanders they are doing it tough. What this Budget does and what the report here shows is the Government is doing everything it can to cushion the blow of a one-in-100-year shock."