Clarkson Bob: Address in Reply 
Clarkson Bob: Address in Reply 
[Volume:628;Page:200] 
BOB CLARKSON (National—Tauranga) 
: 
 Madam Speaker instead of my congratulations may I give you my commiserations on your being re-elected to your position. The first speech I heard in this place was Helen Clark’s Speech from the Throne. We were roped into the aisles and the doors were locked. We could not leave. I have deep sympathy for your position. 
I wish to speak on several subjects but before I do I want to tell members a bit about myself. I was born in 1939 as a male and I have stayed that way all my life. At the age of 8 I did my first business deal. I bought some chocolate bars for 20 pence broke them in half sold half a bar for 20 pence and made 100 percent profit. The trouble was that I ate the profits. 
At the age of 15 I left high school after 2 years and did an apprenticeship as a fitter and turner. At the age of 19 I played hockey for Poverty Bay. At the age of 22 I left Gisborne for Matamata and ended up selling and fixing tractors and farm machinery. When I was 24 I played hockey for Waikato. When I was 26 I started stock car racing. I love this sport because it is one the whole family can enjoy. 
When I was 30 I got married. I was married for 11 years. I have two lovely daughters Caprice and Megan. After 11 years of marriage I asked my wife what she wanted for Christmas and she said: “A divorce.” I said that I was not thinking of something quite so expensive. 
At age 35 I played hockey for New Zealand’s second team against the team that went to the Olympics in 1976 and won gold. At the age of 36 I worked in the Kaimai tunnel and got sacked because the boss would not do as he was told—take note. 
When I was 38 I started importing V8 motors and parts from the United States. It was a very successful business. I got into dragster racing with my mate Lewis Wymer from Tirau and we were very successful. We held three New Zealand titles and the New Zealand - Australia record for 7 years. 
At the age of 40 I started buying and building flats and houses to rent. I had a dream. I believe that one must have a dream. One must have a go. My aim in life is to have good memories. I do not intend to die wishing I had done something. I wish to lie straight in my coffin when I die. My dream was to have 100 units rented out. I got to 52 units and realised I was not making any money out of it so I sold the lot. I attracted the attention of the Inland Revenue Department too by the way—but we will not mention that. At age 44 I started to build and lease industrial buildings. I ended up with 58 tenants in Matamata. 
At the age of 46 I got married again. It looks like it might stick this time. My wife Martha has been my helper and best mate for 20 years. It is actually our anniversary today. She has made great sacrifices for our business and will make more for my being in this House. In my early business years I was very shy when I walked into a room full of people. Martha told me: “When you walk into a room nobody is better than you.” 
At age 52 I had trouble with the Matamata Council. It would not do what I told it to—take note again. So I left town for Mount Maunganui. I have been very successful in the Mount and in Tauranga building industrial buildings for tenants. 
At the age of 61 I had another dream. I wanted to do something different. My love was speedway. I wanted to build a stadium that could be used for both speedway and rugby. The local speedway club had tried to get a resource consent and that took all its money. It spent all its money on paperwork and still had no track. I offered to do the job. I too had enormous trouble getting resource consents and permits but I got the job done. 
The Baypark Stadium is a landmark in the Bay of Plenty. Members are welcome at any time to visit the place. National Party members can visit for free Labour Party and New Zealand First members have to pay. By the way the Hon Bill English has actually driven a stock car at my stadium and I believe he truly enjoyed it. 
I would like to mention that the resource consents and permits on that building alone—it is a big stadium—cost 985000 wasted dollars. That is ridiculous. 
When I was 65—which nearly puts me at being the oldest member on this side of the House—I had another dream. I wanted to do something bigger. I considered that New Zealand was on a slippery slope and heading downhill fast. I had breakfast with the Hon Nick Smith and the Hon Tony Ryall who persuaded me to throw my hat in the ring and stand as the National candidate for Tauranga. I thought: “This should be easy.” I only had to beat Winston Peters who had done nothing for Tauranga in 21 years. 
I was wrong about the campaign being easy. It got dirty. It was muck sludge and sewage every day of the campaign. But my honesty and morals carried me through. Even after all the muckraking and scandal-mongering Winston Peters lost. Winston was the loser. “I am perfectly happy being the member for Tauranga.”—an interesting remark. 
My big worries for this country are roading student loans and law and order. Let us take roading. Roading is totally underfunded. Why do we pinch $646 million from fuel tax and so on and put into the consolidated account. This is morally wrong. It should be spent on new roads. If we build better roads fewer deaths will occur on the roads. 
I have just read a story about Ireland where $5 billion has been spent on roads. The number of deaths and the injury rate from road accidents have dropped substantially. Ireland is going to continue to build new roads and it looks forward to having an even lower accident rate. 
 Forget speed—that is not the killer on the roads. The Rt Hon Helen Clark will confirm that speed does not kill. It is the lack of speed that is killing people. Frustration is the problem. Long queues of cars frustrate people and they take chances. I believe that the average New Zealander is quite happy to cruise at 80 to 105 kilometres an hour as long as he or she is not held up by other cars and trucks. We need more divided four-lane dual carriage roads. 
In New Zealand we have killer roads and the Government of the day is responsible. I believe that if the roads are not improved the Government should be charged with manslaughter. 
Twenty percent of our tertiary students are incurring student loans while studying what I call “hobby” courses. They have no hope of getting a job in the field of those subjects. They will end up with $20000-plus loans that they will never be able to repay and their lives will be put on hold forever. I strongly suggest that the Government deals with that problem and stops students from getting loans where they have no hope of getting a job in their chosen field and no hope of repaying the loan. 
We will never have law and order fixed until we fix the problem. The problem is that our prisons are like motels in the prairie. Let us toughen up our prisons so that people will not want to go there. Let us get prisoners out of bed at 6.30 in the morning and get them outside marching and running until noon. After a short lunch they should get into another 2 hours of marching and running and then have a 2-hour break. They should get 1 hour to recover and 1 hour to think about whether the crime was worth the time. Then they should do the same thing again the next day the day after and every day of their sentence. We would not have to build any more prisons; people would not want to be there and would not do the crime. 
Let me finish by saying that I live in Tauranga and do all my business there. I am passionate about Tauranga and Mount Maunganui. I want to do all I can to promote and stimulate the area. Mount Maunganui has some of the best beaches in New Zealand and Tauranga is the largest export port in New Zealand—it exports 70 to 90 million trays of kiwifruit alone. The place is growing. The Tauranga City Council is having trouble keeping up with the infrastructure required to keep up with the progress. 
Tauranga has a great future ahead of it. The city’s problems are mainly to do with roading and resource consent issues. The appalling state of our roads is limiting our growth. When we have a cost-benefit ratio in our area of $5.50 gained for every dollar spent on roading my business brain asks why we are not building roads. 
I have a lot of practical experience. I know how to get jobs done fast on time and within budget and built to the highest standards. I want to use my knowledge and ability in Government to get those jobs done. 
I want more apprenticeships given in the trades which would help to fix the leaky house problem. I want State house tenants to be given the option to buy the house they occupy. The money recovered from those sales could build more houses for people who need them—for example young married couples. I see that 6000 affordable houses are being built a year by the Housing New Zealand Corporation. That would solve the housing problem faced by young people today. It would cost the Government nothing to do that project. It would save the taxpayer the high cost of running State houses. 
I repeat that New Zealand is going downhill fast. When I look across the Chamber at the members of this Government I say: “God help us! God help New Zealand!”. 
Let us get this country humming. Let us make decisions. We should let New Zealanders have a go; we should not tie them up in red tape. New Zealand’s future is at stake. We should let young and old New Zealanders have a dream. With a chance they could make it come true. I will not die with a dream—I want the rest of New Zealand to dream and achieve with me.