Radhakrishnan PriyancaPRIYANCA RADHAKRISHNAN (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. He aha te mea nui o te ao? He tangata he tangata he tangata.[What is the most important thing in the world? It is people it is people it is people.]It is with pride that I rise today to take my first call and contribute to a general debate and it is indeed with pride that I speak in this week in the lead up to this Labour-led Government's first Budget announcement.Before I begin though I just want to address a point made by the previous speaker Nathan Guy who's just resumed his seat who basically has been quite vocal about the fact that he feels this Government cannot both invest in foreign affairs and also in the health sector. I'd just like to point out to him that we are the Government of and" and "and". We actually can invest in multiple sectors to make sure that all New Zealanders are better off. If he thinks that trade and that foreign affairs are not important to us to New Zealanders he should actually talk to some of his colleagues who were part of the delegation that in fact you led Mr Speaker recently where we went overseas and talked about opportunities for New Zealand many of them trade opportunities from the point of view that we are a small country that we are geographically distant and that we are heavily reliant on trade—and it is important for us.That leads me actually to my next point which is this. During the campaign trail—and we've heard from members opposite what members on this side of the House have been talking about up and down the country on the campaign trail—I'd just like to remind them that their candidates waxed lyrical about the fact that New Zealand has enjoyed a strong economy. I just want to say this: it's true but the problem is that too few New Zealanders have benefited from that strong economy. On this side of the House we do believe in fact that we need a strong economy here in New Zealand because we believe strongly in shared prosperity. We cannot invest in the sectors that have seen nine years of underfunding and neglect if we don't have a strong economy—and we get that. What we want to focus on though and what this Budget will lay the foundation for is an investment in our people—which is the whakataukī that I started with. What's the most important thing in the world? It's our people it's our people it's our people.As I stand here today and I look forward to what our Budget announcements will be I reflect on the stories that people have told me of their lives. I reflect on the young mother I met in Maungakiekie who had moved overseas like many; started a family; came back home to New Zealand with her children; and moved in with her family as a temporary measure thinking you know "This is the suburb I've grown up in. I want to be close to my family. I'll find a house and move into that." A year later when I met her she was still sharing the three-bedroom house with 16 other people. She was afraid to uproot her children again from school and move somewhere else because she couldn't actually find a place to rent that she could afford in a suburb that was one of the most affordable.I think back to the principals of low-decile schools who have told me about their children coming to school hungry who can't concentrate. Where's the learning if a child goes to school without any food? That is what we heard today as I sat through submission after submission on the Child Poverty Reduction Bill. People who work in the sector told us how poverty affects children's cognition ability to function health and every potential indicator—every indicator—of the people that they are and the people that they are going to be.I reflect on the international students who are sold one story come to New Zealand and find that the qualification that they end up with will neither get them a job here nor back home but whose families are so entrenched in debt because they believed that they were sending their kids to New Zealand to get a world-class education. Our export education is actually a brilliant thing but was jeopardised by the actions of the previous Government.I think back to the small-business owners who have been robbed who were assaulted and who live in fear each morning as they open their shops that that will be the day that the offenders come back to finish their jobs. And I reflect on the fact that at a time when crime was actually increasing the previous Government reduced police numbers.I think back to the time that I spent in the family violence sector where as the member Jan Logie pointed out often there were only two of us to work with women who were in incredibly unsafe positions who have lauded this Government's announcement of the first significant funding boost in 10 years. I reflect on the fact that this will be a Government of kindness and investment. Thank you."