O'Connor Damien: Budget Debate 
O'Connor Damien: Budget Debate 
[Volume:673;Page:19204] 
Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR (Labour) 
: 
 I have some admiration for that member Shane Ardern but I know that he is really concerned about his mates. He knows that when National has finished selling off the State-owned enterprises Fonterra will be next and he feels very uncomfortable about that. 
Many many words have been said about the Budget and I will use my own. But first I make reference to well-known commentator Jane Clifton. Her description of the Budget is that “a library might struggle to assign an ISBN:”—that is an international standard book number—“fact or fiction? Romance even? There are so many variables around those figures”. That is a very good summary of what is basically a dishonest and unfair Budget. 
There is a $4 billion gap between what the Inland Revenue Department says can be produced from this economy for Government expenditure and what Treasury says can be produced. That is an irresponsible gap in my view and none of the members on the other side of the House have attempted to get up and explain it not even the Minister who is going to sell off power companies to build her prisons. She could not explain that $4 billion gap. 
Is the Budget fair? Does it make New Zealand a fairer place? No on both counts. I came into this Parliament as most of my colleagues did to try to make New Zealand a better and fairer society. This Budget has failed. That Government failed for the third time to make a fairer New Zealand. The first Budget was the greatest inequity of all. It gave huge tax cuts to the people on the highest incomes and it gave a pittance to people on lower incomes. This Budget continues down that unfair inequitable immoral path—that is to give the money to the top and hope it trickles down to the people at the bottom. National tried that through the 1990s. It does not work; it does not work around the world. The reality is that this country is one of the worst countries in the OECD for disparities of wealth and for inequality. Those are the facts. 
Let us see what this Budget does. Many things have been said about it but the Budget is based on the objective to sell State assets. Most of the initiatives in the Budget depend upon the Prime Minister says a mandate at the next election to sell down the State assets. Why would we do that? Why would we sell an asset that delivers a 15 percent return to pay down debt that we get for 4 or 5 percent? It is just dumb economics. The only reason National is doing it is to offer opportunities for its mates. Mark Weldon has a stock exchange that is almost a joke because the major assets keep getting sold off to large overseas investors. Lion Nathan is one of the last. It is a big player in Australia and is on the Australian stock exchange. It has gone from New Zealand. It was one of the companies that this country proudly developed and the NZX continues to allow that sell-off of our assets. 
We need a fair balanced capital market but there are no toys to play with. So John Key as a money trader and National as the recipient of large amounts of corporate funding have promised those people that we will deliver them an opportunity to buy blue-chip gilt-edged State-owned assets. The member over there looks very uncomfortable and so he should. He knows that that is the truth. Here we have assets owned by every mum and dad in this country and John Key says we are going to sell them to mum and dad investors. We own them now! So whom will they be sold to? Those who are lucky enough to be the beneficiaries of the large tax cuts will be able to afford the shares and they will as they did with Contact Energy flick them off for a healthy profit to overseas investors. Sure as day follows night that is what will happen and that is why it is outrageous. 
The next thing the Government intends to do to pay back its mates is to privatise ACC. We saw this in 1998 when the National Government had to deliver to the people who were funding and supporting it. It said to the insurance companies that it would deliver them a big chunk of a very big healthy profitable market in New Zealand—that is the area of accident compensation. We have seen reports identifying time and time again that ACC is the best system in the world bar none for no-fault accident cover. It is the cheapest; it is half the rate of Australia’s scheme. I confess that our accident rate in the workplace is not right. If the Government had properly funded the Department of Labour we hopefully would have had a few more mines inspectors we would have had a few more work inspectors and we would have saved lives up and down this country. The area of ACC and accident prevention needs some work but it is the best system. It gets lawyers and their grubby hands off litigation— 
Charles Chauvel 
: Excuse me. 
Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR 
: —with all due respect to a couple of lawyers around of course. But my colleague knows full well that offered the opportunity lawyers will take it and get their grubby hands on all that money. They will not deliver it to the people who have accidents and who need it. 
It is scandalous that we sit back. New Zealanders might be apathetic we might be comfortable and we might be a bit slack but we are not stupid. As I go around the workplaces in my electorate people shake their heads at the idea that State-owned assets will be privatised and they shake their heads about ACC being privatised. I spoke to someone the other day who had been covered by an accredited employer under the old scheme under the 1998 initiatives. He had tried to get cover and had had a hell of a battle. He had been unable to get what he expected to get under the ACC system prior to 1998. If people think that is bad just wait. Let every New Zealander wait and see what happens if National ever gets the opportunity to privatise ACC. 
The third thing of concern coming out of the Budget is the same criminal act— 
Hon Member 
: Criminal? 
Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR 
: —well immoral act that Robert Muldoon committed on superannuation and savings in the 1970s—that is he destroyed the growing confidence in superannuation and savings across New Zealand. Although the changes are portrayed as being rather minor they undermine confidence. I have met people old and young right across the West Coast - Tasman electorate and elsewhere who are sick and tired of the Government playing around with superannuation. This latest move on KiwiSaver has ripped the confidence from people who were just starting to believe in saving for their future. 
Hon Member 
: Rubbish. 
Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR 
: It is not rubbish. If those members got off their chuffs and went out and spoke to real people instead of having the corporates come in they would hear those messages too. 
This is an unfair Budget. It continues the philosophy and policy that the National Government will look after its wealthy mates and squeeze every other poor New Zealander. Those New Zealanders do not have many options. There are 170000 jobs in the Budget and a $4 billion gap in revenue projections. That is the fiction that this House was delivered with the last Budget. We have said we will not sell State assets. We have said we will renationalise ACC. Let that be a warning for all the private companies that are sniffing around now. We have said the first $100 a week of income will be tax-free and we have said that GST on fruit and vegetables will come off because we understand the pressure on the average working family in this country. It is about time a Labour Government gave those people a fair go. 
This Budget is outrageous. It entrenches the privilege and the position of the wealthy in this country at the expense of all the others.