Barker Rick: General Debates 
Barker Rick: General Debates 
[Volume:615;Page:11098] 
Hon RICK BARKER (Minister for Courts) 
: 
 That was a typically vacuous speech by Mr Brownlee. He has overlooked a number of facts. The first fact is that the New Zealand economy is in the best shape it has been for 30 years. There is greater opportunity to get jobs. I remember being a young person in the 1970s when jobs could be got very easily. If one did not like a job one left it at morning tea and had two jobs by lunchtime. For 30 years we have not experienced that but today we are. There are record levels of employment and record lows of people registered on the unemployment benefit. 
The only issue that is a blot on the landscape is the racial tension being stirred up by the National Party. Mr Brownlee talked about the leadership qualities of Dr Brash. If telling people things such as “I wouldn’t employ a Maori because Maori have unlimited tangi leave” is leadership then that is the most disgraceful sort of leadership that this country—and I am sure it will never stand for it—could ever have. 
The most important thing about leadership is to be honest and tell the truth. Telling the New Zealand public that Maori have unlimited tangi leave is a canard. It is nothing short of that and it is disgraceful. If Don Brash had any gumption or leadership he would have issued an unreserved apology for that but he did not. He did not because he knows like the National Party knows that there is only one area in New Zealand where there is discontent and that is around race. 
Steve Maharey correctly pointed out to this House that the National Party does not talk about race relations with Pacific Island people. No it dare not go there because one National Party leader made quips about Pacific Islanders climbing in people’s back windows to commit theft. That is the truth of the National Party’s position. National does not refer to that. It does not refer to race relations with Asians or other races. It makes reference only to Maori and it does it on the basis that Maori have privilege. 
As has been said many times before if living 10 years less than the rest of the population is a privilege then I do not want that. It is a national disgrace that Maori men and women die 10 years younger than the rest of us. It is such a disgrace that we should do something about it. Dr Brash’s policy would do nothing about that at all. According to him everybody would be treated the same. I have to say that New Zealanders are better than that. It is also a disgrace that for a long time we have had high levels of Maori unemployment. Maori unemployment was at 17.4 percent at one stage when the rest of the population never got to 10 percent on average. As New Zealanders we should be concerned about that and want to do something. 
Basically New Zealanders are good people. If a person’s next-door neighbour has run out of sugar or his or her lawnmower has broken down we help. That is who we are. We help in our sports clubs schools and all of those things. The good part of the New Zealand nature is that we help those who are less fortunate than us and do not have the same opportunities and advantages. That is why New Zealanders support programmes that help raise levels of Maori employment and reduce Maori levels of unemployment—just as we support programmes to reduce the level of Pacific Island unemployment. 
Opportunity is not what the National Party is all about. It is against opportunity. Let us look at its history. The National Party shoved up State house rents by virtue of the market rent simply to cut people’s wages. It cut superannuation for our superannuitants from 65 percent to 60 percent of the average wage. The only opportunity the National Party likes is opportunity for its mates. Its mates are starting to circle because they want to see the National Party privatise the last remaining State assets and sell them off. They are all coming home because they are waiting for the National Party to have a big sell-up. 
I have bad news for the National Party’s mates. This Government will carry on for a long long time. We have policies that are of benefit to all New Zealanders. We have lowered the levels of unemployment. We have given young people the opportunity to get jobs. We have increased participation rates for Pacific Island people in employment programmes. Maori unemployment has fallen. More people are going to university. There is a lot more hope and opportunity around in New Zealand. I feel that for the first time in 30 years that New Zealand is in the state it was when I left school and went to work in the 1970s. Then I had hope and opportunity.