O'Connor Damien: Taxation (Annual Rates Trans-Tasman Savings Portability KiwiSaver and Remedial Matters) Bill — In Committee 
O'Connor Damien: Taxation (Annual Rates Trans-Tasman Savings Portability KiwiSaver and Remedial Matters) Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:666;Page:13457] 
Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR (Labour) 
: 
 I have great pleasure in taking a call on this bill. I have come into the Chamber and been astounded really that we have the bill here supported by the National Government. In fact it is National’s bill. There is some sweet irony here I guess. I have written a new title for the bill and it is the “Save Bill’s Butt Bill” because Bill English and the National Government in their first Budget slashed savings and any attempt to have savings in this country. Now we have a bill that quite rightly—and Labour will support it—facilitates superannuation payments made in Australia being brought back into this country. The Government now realises that there is value in having superannuation funds available to invest in this country to develop it. Well it is a bit late I say to Bill English the Minister of Finance because he—and Gerry Brownlee and John Carter his fellow Ministers—have been asleep. 
In fact I heard a question from Mr Brownlee before: “What did Labour do?”. Well we set up Kiwibank. We set up KiwiSaver. We set up a superannuation fund. That is what we did to develop higher levels of savings in this country. As the previous speaker said we understand the value of investing in ourselves and utilising savings made by us. The Australians—although we might criticise them and their rugby and their netball from time to time—have been so smart for so long. Eight percent of their income is invested in superannuation. That is smart. Now Bill English—the same Minister who destroyed our attempts to get savings up and running in this country destroyed Labour’s initiatives parked up the contributions to the superannuation fund and to KiwiSaver and undermined the superannuation fund—realises that if we are not doing it ourselves maybe we should get access to the $16 billion that has been accumulated in Australia by New Zealanders through a compulsory scheme that says that 8 percent of one’s salary should go into superannuation. That is smart. 
Labour started out with a rate of 4 percent and was moving in that direction. In fact the ACT Party now through its Supplementary Order Paper is saying that people should be able to contribute more. The ACT Party with all its ignorance on most issues I have to say now realises that superannuation is very smart. Thank God ACT members have learnt something in this House over these years! The National Party has too. Rather than continue with the savings initiatives put in place by the Labour Government the National Government slashed that gutted it undermined it in its first Budget and now to make up for that says it wants some of that Aussie money—that it wants to get its hands on that $16 billion. So we have the “Save Bill’s Butt Bill” so that Bill English can stand up in a year’s time and say that savings are up and running and we have an inflow of money into the country so we can look at investing in ourselves. 
Noises have been coming from National on that issue just recently. National members are saying that we should start thinking about our savings because they have not been quite good enough and that we cannot invest and control our own destiny. I say “Wake up!” to Mr Brownlee and Mr Carter. That truth has been there for a long time and the Labour Government moved on it. We moved on it through the superannuation fund. We moved on it through KiwiSaver and National slashed and gutted those two key initiatives. Now they are talking about reinventing something and they are saying through this bill that the money accumulated in Australia the $16 billion should be able to come back to New Zealand. That is great. It is smart. It is exactly why the Labour Opposition is supporting the bill but it is a bit sad to know that the same Ministers who gutted our savings regime are now attempting in a piecemeal way to get a savings task force or think tank or chat room back up and running. Well if they had just taken a little bit of advice from the previous Labour Government and continued on with our commitment to superannuation and KiwiSaver we would all be a lot better off and we would not have to rely on the $16 billion that this bill will help bring back into the country.