McClay ToddHon TODD McCLAY (National—Rotorua): Madam Speaker thank you very much. I'd like to say it gives me pleasure to speak in this debate but it's hard to do so when one considers the ramifications of what this Government is trying to push through again one assumes in a very short-fashioned way. New Zealand is a country that relies upon foreign direct investment. Without it our economy cannot grow. There are few parts of New Zealand that haven't benefited or don't benefit from the investments that come from overseas. It is right that we have rules around how this money comes into the country the conditions with which it can be invested and rights and obligations on all sides and every Government for periods of time have grappled with how to get this balance right. However for this Government now under the guise of a Budget with the considerable economic harm that's being done to the country through COVID-19 to bring this bill forward and say that they believe it's in the best interests of the country having delivered it to us only just now—and again we find a chance where they rush things through and haven't we seen over the last two weeks how wrong they can get things when they rush things through? The wrong tax bill was passed into law in two hours but the Prime Minister couldn't meet her promise to New Zealanders of almost a month ago and bring forward a bill to reduce her and colleagues' salaries by 20 percent in say one hour. We now have this bill that may have considerable effect upon the view of people overseas who are responsible legitimate investors that have an interest in New Zealand to come here and to invest to do so. The reason I say that is when we get investment from overseas if it's done in the right way it creates jobs and what we've heard is that the country needs jobs at this time more than anything else. The Government needs to be focusing on saving jobs sustainably and focusing on creating sustainable jobs. I think that what we will see with the announcement of the extension of the wage subsidy for eight weeks for some companies is an ongoing masking of what's really happening in the economy and the degree to which unemployment is going to increase. The reason for that—Hon Tracey Martin: Would the member stop that subsidy? Hon TODD McCLAY: Well it's one thing to sit there and chirp a little bit—it's one thing to chirp a little bit when you've just spoken—but the great thing about this Parliament is it is an opportunity to have a debate. You've had your chance and how about someone else has a chance now? So the point here is that that subsidy has been welcomed by the National Party and it has helped New Zealanders in their time of need. What it will now do is allow a number of companies to keep those New Zealanders on their books as they try to see what will happen to them in the coming period of time. It's a good thing for those individuals. However that is not enough unfortunately to keep New Zealanders in work and what it is likely to do is mask the level of unemployment that is coming. It puts it off for a period of time for those people that get to keep their jobs during that period of time. That's an important thing but what I'm actually talking about is every time we get a responsible foreign direct investment in New Zealand jobs are created and they're not created by the Government and they're not created by the taxpayer. The Government and the taxpayer then has taxes to spend on other things that can be better used in the economy—health and in education—and in this case what we're seeing is legislation before the House that is not likely to create more jobs. It's likely to restrict the private sector creating jobs at a time when the Government are also using taxes to support jobs directly. That's the reason that we need to take some time to really understand this and have a very good close look at it because again it's another piece of legislation that is just dumped upon us. But we've had every speaker in this debate in the Parliament earlier stand up and talk about what we need to do for New Zealand to get it back on its feet. Well actually backward-looking legislation—restrictive legislation when it comes to making things more difficult for business in New Zealand—is not about moving forward; it's actually about going backwards. We've also heard that there is funding available in the Budget for exports. The thing about exports is it is also about attracting investment to the country. So on the one hand the Government is spending hundreds of millions of dollars to help New Zealand companies do better overseas and to be able to find ways to diversify and sell more in markets overseas and in fact it's no different than every other Budget we've seen from any other Government. We did it when we were in Government. We made sure that there was support for an export economy because we are an export nation. But at the same time we then have this legislation brought forward which creates more restriction not less. It's not about actually opening the economy up in a way responsibly that creates jobs and gets the economy growing; it's about making it more difficult more cumbersome and more costly to be involved in the New Zealand economy and to invest in the New Zealand economy and I just wonder why. I just can't understand or comprehend why the Government would do that at this time when every single business person in New Zealand and every single employee in New Zealand wants to go back to work wants to look for more markets and wants to find more investment but doesn't want more debt and doesn't want more borrowing. They want more customers. They want to partner and they want to have people invest in the productive parts of New Zealand and this bill makes that more difficult. In particular it's because it creates rules that the Government get to use themselves that we will find as this debate goes forward will make no sense at all and they're not likely to make a lot of difference to the investment regime in as far as actually what is allowed and is not allowed I suppose but it will create great complication and great cost for those in New Zealand who find investment and for those overseas who want to responsibly invest in New Zealand. I think what the last speaker in this debate needs to do if she takes another call is to explain very carefully why they don't like foreign direct investment because that's very much the message that is sent. Is it just about the foreigners? If we just called it direct investment would they be in favour of it? If they just called it direct investment would they be in favour of it because what we've heard time and time again is the reasons why they don't like people investing in our economy. That's the big problem that we have from this Government: the signals that they send around the world about whether or not New Zealand is open to the right type of investment that will grow the economy that will produce things that we might not otherwise and that at the same time will create jobs for New Zealanders and the signal that's being sent by this legislation and that last speech and almost every other speech that we've heard from the Government is No we don't want to be a welcoming economy. We don't want people to feel that they can come here and investment." and at the same time that means they don't want the private sector in partnership with others to create the jobs. I think they believe it is the Government's job and sole job to control that and to do that. We will have more opportunities to talk about this in the coming period of time but I ask the Government to take their time and to reflect and not to rush because they think that when a Government passes legislation quickly they are seen to be a hard-working or responsive Government. That's certainly not what we've seen over the past weeks when they introduced the wrong legislation to the House and passed it in short order in two hours and then went out and announced it as if it was actually meant to have happened and it wasn't a problem. That's the reason that this House should take the time that sits in the Standing Orders to get things right. When there is a need for urgency we should do things urgently. Often when things need to be done urgently two sides of the House join together to do that but we shouldn't be using urgency for the sake of rushing things through just so we can be seen to be doing something and this legislation should take its time. Hon Gerry Brownlee: A $140 billion Budget and this is it. Hon TODD McCLAY: That's right. Well there you go: a $140 billion Budget and the first thing they do is say that we don't want to create jobs through foreign direct investment. If you get that wrong it'll have to be a $141 billion - debt Budget—Hon Gerry Brownlee: Where are they borrowing the money from? Hon TODD McCLAY: —because actually Mr Brownlee it has to come from somewhere else. That's a good point and a final point: when it comes to foreign direct investment the $140 billion—that's $80000 per household in New Zealand. That's one heck of a second mortgage that this Government has to borrow—Hon Tracey Martin: Run out of material. Hon TODD McCLAY: I ask the Hon Tracey Martin where will that come from? Where will that come from? Will it come from overseas? Will it come from foreigners? Will it come from people overseas who through their banks decide that they will invest in the Government of New Zealand or will it come from actually hard-working New Zealanders? The one thing I do know of that $80000 per household additional debt is it will be paid back through higher tax rates on the part of hard-working New Zealanders. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): I understand this is a split call."