Woods MeganGENERAL DEBATEHon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Labour—Wigram): I move That the House take note of miscellaneous business.The countdown is on—the 100-day finish line is nearing. And when we look back what has our new Government achieved over the last 100 days? A whole lot of going backwards—going backwards as far as they can. Repealing this chucking that doing that all the way through with no sense that if you're going to repeal you're meant to replace as well. And what we have not heard in these 100 days is a positive agenda from the new Government. We have not heard what they are going to do. All we've heard is what they're not going to do.So much of that is because of the promises that were made in the election campaign—promises that do not stack up when it comes to paying for the unfunded tax cuts that this Government have cobbled together. We are seeing broken promises laid bare everywhere. What we are seeing is the fact that the Minister of Finance has made promises that she cannot bank. And we're hearing from some of our agencies what the 7.5 percent cost savings that are being asked for are meaning. I did note in question time today though that David Seymour must have got so excited when he heard about 7.5 percent cost cuts he read that as 75 percent at the Ministry of Education. It was like every Christmas morning for David Seymour rolled into one.But what are we seeing from Defence? We're seeing Air Marshal Short saying that the 6.5 percent cuts from Defence would mean they had to divest themselves of capability. We're seeing from Police that the budget starving would see front-line services being cut. We are seeing from education—and I think this is a particularly telling one given what we've heard over the last few days from the Secretary for Education that if they had to find these savings then it's possible there'd be further delay or stopping of capital works. And what have we heard from the Minister of Education this week? An inquiry to cover up the fact that they simply do not have the money to pay for what has already been promised to schools around this country.I was reflecting on a news article that appeared only a couple of weeks ago and it was an article that was entitled Lobbyists are back at Parliament - with a new privacy measure hiding their identities"—this was from 12 February. Well I'll tell you what it's called. That new privacy measure hiding their identity is called a crowd because you cannot move around the Beehive without stumbling over lobbyists. We've got the tobacco lobby the oil and gas lobby the fishing lobby the forestry lobby the mining lobby the gun lobby. They're all in the building and they are the ones setting the agenda of this Government.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Can I please just call a comment with that statement. It's OK to say that lobbyists are influencing and speaking with the Government it's not OK to say they're dictating—you didn't say the word "dictating"?Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Far be it from me to say dictating Madam Speaker.DEPUTY SPEAKER: No but it's not—and I'll find the correct Speakers' rulings shortly but you can't say that they're doing the job of the Government.Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: OK. They are in the building and they are active. They are doing the rounds and they've got their swipe cards and they're active. But what we have seen is just how active and in the building this group are and the kinds of powers they have. They have powers to magically make papers apparate into Minister's offices. They have this power that a Minister can walk in one day and find some apparated papers sitting on her desk with very very clear suggestions of the kinds of measures that should be put into place. So I guess there are some ways of achieving cost-cutting measures. Cut out the middle person—we used to call them officials—and just look to other places for where your policy advice is coming from and who is telling what the Government should do.I think one of the things that we have seen this week is just how serious this is. We have seen this week the repeal of a policy that was going to do real and meaningful work around saving the lives of New Zealanders—the work around the smoke-free legislation that was world leading. And what did we see? We saw a Government that repealed it under urgency at a point where lives will be lost. That is not the New Zealand we want."