Smith Nick: Non-bank Deposit Takers Bill — Second Reading 
Text is subject to correction 
Smith Nick: Non-bank Deposit Takers Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 02 August 2012. Volume:682;Page:4258. Text is subject to correction.] 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 The Non-bank Deposit Takers Bill is part of National’s sensible agenda for restoring public confidence in our financial markets. It is an essential component of the Government’s broader programme around improving regulation investing in infrastructure developing our natural resources investing in skills and opening up new markets—a whole packet of measures that can provide the brighter future for this country. It gives the Reserve Bank considerably tougher powers to be able to deal with finance companies building societies and credit unions that are long overdue. I want to make only a brief contribution given the wide consensus around the importance of this legislation but I am very happy to also engage in the broader debate about financial regulation.  
I did think it was with gall that the former Associate Minister of Finance Clayton Cosgrove had the audacity to challenge Bill English over being derelict in his duties. Let us put the record very straight. During the term of the previous Government when Clayton Cosgrove was an Association Minister of Finance ordinary New Zealanders lost over $7 billion in savings as a consequence of a lack of oversight and regulation of the financial sector. My simple challenge for Mr Cosgrove and his colleagues is to say whether they passed a single piece of legislation to deal with that massive debacle. And the answer is: not one.  
Before members opposite get on their high horses and give the sorts of speeches they give I have a simple challenge for them: please get to your feet and do the honourable thing and apologise to New Zealanders to those tens of thousands who lost their lifetime savings. I have not heard in over 3½ years that they have been in Opposition any acceptance of responsibility for the financial mess that they left which has had a disastrous impact on the lives of so many New Zealanders. 
The reality is that this Government since 2008 has gone about very responsibly addressing the deficiencies in our financial regulations with the establishment of the Financial Markets Authority and with bills of this sort. So I just simply say to the next Labour speaker: “Where is the apology?”. I ask Labour members to please say sorry because in my view they have absolutely no financial credibility or economic policy credibility until they accept the responsibility for their poor economic policy.  
My worry is this. In the last 2 weeks of parliamentary debate Labour’s answer to New Zealand’s financial woes has been to tax more and to spend more. We have a bill from a Labour member to double paid parental leave—a “nice-to-have” but when Governments are running deficits of $8 billion and when you have got developed economies around the world teetering on the edge of bankruptcy I simply say to Labour members: “Get real. Get real.”  
More spending more holidays and sideshows on issues like gay marriage are not the issues that this Government should be focused on in these difficult financial times. It is a National Government that is doing the things that are required in these challenging times. We are getting our regulatory environment right balancing the books growing our natural resources and opening up export markets. That is the agenda that is the right one for New Zealand at this time. This bill is an important part of it and we need to get on with the business of ensuring we build that brighter future for New Zealand.