Chadwick Steve: Budget Debate 
Chadwick Steve: Budget Debate 
[Volume:608;Page:5887] 
STEVE CHADWICK (NZ Labour—Rotorua) 
: 
 After listening to Opposition members with their rather quaint stance of clinging to the wreckage of the past with the Privy Council and not embracing new change that New Zealanders are looking forward to I want to come back to the world of the Budget. I am proud of this certain and solid Budget and I am very proud of the Labour-led coalition Government that supports the way that we as a team—a team with great leadership—will make it happen. I do not believe that over the last week United Future has felt very compromised in being associated with us as a coalition partner that is on a pathway paved with support for education and health while demonstrating that we can also very soundly manage the country’s finances—and the country’s finances are in a very sound position. 
I went into politics to promote the focus on the family as the cornerstone of communities—communities that are built up to feel proud of their achievements that care for each other both locally and nationally and that stand tall on the world stage. This rebuilding cannot take place without healthy children and parents a sense of hope and certainty a vision for the future armed with skills education and training and a tolerance to participating in growing civil society. 
The Opposition labels this Budget as socialist rhetoric. It has not twigged that this is a 10-year journey that the country embarked upon 4 years ago—three Budgets ago—and that this Budget is the stuff of a long-term Government. It is about staying on course and maintaining our strong position in times certainly of great uncertainty. This is not a Budget of soft and pappy throwaways that gladden the hearts of a select few. There is something in this Budget for every individual family voluntary organisation local authority small business and company. Overseas investors and visitors are eyeing us up as a place in which they wish to invest and contribute. 
Rotorua as an electorate has responded very positively in the media from a principal in a very high achieving boys high school saying that the targeted funding for keeping kids fit and engaged in sport is absolutely great to the chair of our chamber of commerce commending the support and focus on small business development and also the extra funding that has been very cleverly put in this Budget for finding overseas markets. Even the chair of the New Zealand Medical Association who resides in Rotorua liked the further funding to support the primary health strategy implementation—and that association had not been that enthusiastic about that future. The chair of our district health board Stewart Edward welcomed the certainty in the package. The population-based funding increase of $36 million puts us on track to deliver deficit elimination by 2004. The local police even went to the newspaper to say that they support the $6.6 million funding for the team approach to crack down on local methamphetamine laboratories. We in Rotorua are ashamed to say that we are well aware of laboratories in our community. We found out about one on Friday because we noticed a massive increase in the power bill of one of our local houses in the community. So we are probably contributing to our power target as well now that that has been found and will be dealt with. 
I was very positively received at the jewel in our crown in Rotorua when last Friday the New Zealand Forest Research Institute Ltd launched its biomaterials vision. This is a futures glimpse on what science and research can deliver from wood products in the next 25 years. It will advance the widespread utilisation of renewable materials and products from plants for economic environmental and social returns. It is great to hear a Crown research institute talking about social returns. This will be a world supported by energy producing cells from pulp production instead of fossil fuel biodegradable plastics that can be made from the waste stream an environmentally sustainable world of building materials and cosmetics and products that we have not even dreamed of all developed from biomaterials. The New Zealand Forest Research Institute Ltd a Crown research institute has grabbed the collaborative model and attracted partners from the international field of research industry Industry New Zealand the Foundation for Research Science and Technology and venture capital funders. It thanked us on Friday for the $140 million Government support for research and development over the next 4 years. This will go some way towards helping it to achieve its vision. That was the response from our local leaders. 
I have noted other areas that underpin my key areas of interest. Vote Health emerges as the big winner with 20 percent of the funding cake. The vote increases to $9.6 billion this year. This is unprecedented support. This is the sort of cake—more like a carrot cake than a spongy pud—that nurtures the sector. It is logical. If we are to avoid burgeoning hospital costs we have to go along this route. It targets healthy lifestyles and wellness. This is a vision we set out to achieve with our primary health strategy 2 years ago. This strategy receives a further $165 million this year. The ingredients of our healthy cake are bound together by population-based funding to boards that will ensure a redistribution and a fair share of funding will go to communities based on health need and it is generous toward product development. Funding support this year was announced for 40 more doctors in training and increased support for the rural sector is a solid start towards workforce rebuilding—something that the Opposition took no care of for 9 years and now we are having to catch up. 
Access to affordable care will see low doctors’ fees for patients who are less than 18 years old enrolment in interim public health organisations from October of this year and a reduction in prescription fees to a maximum of $3 for all children in these schemes and there are 40 of them. Access schemes which are those primary health organisations in the areas of highest need will ensure that patients of all ages pay a limit on prescription fees. This is supported by another new initiative called Care Plus. It is being piloted from January in 2004 and will cater for many older people with very poor health as well as those people who are under 65 years and require very high levels of coordination in terms of their care. We will see projects being developed such as the Bumps and Falls Prevention project in Rotorua. This is a combined project with the Accident Compensation Corporation Merck Sharp and Dohme the senior citizens unit within the Department of Social Services and Employment and general practitioners all working together such as they have never done before. 
 All health workers will applaud the $22.1 million funding going towards accident prevention and treatment and focusing on rehabilitation and district health boards. Boards will see some major bricks-and-mortar capital projects advanced with $656 million going towards hospital buildings across the land. There will be new hospitals in Wellington Kenepuru Nelson-Marlborough and Southland; the hospital in Auckland will be completed along with ambulatory services; and there are a number of smaller projects. A national capital committee is being established to ensure that we spend wisely on buildings in the health sector in order to get the very best for our money. 
Richard Worth 
: This is capital? 
STEVE CHADWICK 
: That is in the Budget this year. Young people are at last recognised as needing funding to support their resilience and to develop services around them. We are getting more money for a residential health unit in Christchurch focusing on drug and alcohol rehabilitation and $13.2 million will be used to combat youth suicide and drug and alcohol abuse. This is a wonderful Budget for the young people in our country.