Barry Maggie; Mallard TrevorHon MAGGIE BARRY (National—North Shore): Thank you Mr Speaker. You may remember the song the old song Another Day Over and Deeper in Debt". Well it's been 365-odd days—a very long year—and we have gone deeper and deeper into debt. We left them awash with cash. What have they done? They have taxed and spent and borrowed. This is typical of core Labour values. When we look at the roll call of dubious achievements in that year it makes for very chilling reading so we are spoilt for choice as to what is the worst. I've been looking through the archives trying to figure out is it the falling dollar? Is it the rising fuel prices and the ill-thought-through policies? They're all driving up the cost of living for hard-working Kiwi families. These things are all bad enough. But let's try and be fair to the Government just for a moment. There have been a number of dramatic increases under their watch. The cost of living is rising much faster than wages in the last quarter. Rents are higher rising around $20 each week on average. And there's been a 9000 increase in the number of people on benefits. Aren't these remarkable achievements and isn't that typical core Labour—cradle to the grave dependency? Keep them on the benefit keep them dependent take away their mana and their self-respect and they'll keep voting for you. I think that's the old logic—used to be back in the day—and it doesn't seem to have changed the refrain of this Government.Working groups galore—it's hard to keep track. I did look it up though: 185 to date.Simon O'Connor: How many?Hon MAGGIE BARRY: 185 and at around a million dollars each that's $185 million that could be better spent on making life better for New Zealanders—creating work making jobs making the economy more stable—but instead of that they continue to spend. I guess when you look at the number of people on strike that is another thing that's really biting hard. In Auckland there was chaos yesterday and in Hamilton; tomorrow is Wellington's turn. So the bus drivers are out on strike. The transport unions are having a lovely old time of it again harking back to the day when there were wage rounds. In the mid-1980s when I was a presenter on Morning Report Geoff Robinson and I would toss a coin as to who was the lucky one to get the wage round industrial union strife interview done for that day and the cycle is repeating itself again. The same old problems are emerging with a Government—as we heard Iain Lees-Galloway bellowing today—very happy that people are going on strike because at last they're being listened to and paid attention to. Teachers nurses—people who are feeling now that the opportunities are there for them and if they're there for one group why not for the other. So there is a growing momentum around all of this.Apparently we New Zealanders just need to get used to it. The reality is that more people are going on strikes this year than at any other time in the last 30 years. You have to go back to 1989 to find a bumper selection of strikes like the ones we have been experiencing. So the unions are clearly running the show over there. It's payback time and they're gearing up for a bumper year next year.We are spoilt for choice but which one of the very many taxes and the very many increases that this Government has brought in should we highlight the most? Well for my part of the world in the North Shore it has to be the fuel tax. We've seen petrol prices up 19 percent in the past year. In most parts of the country petrol has gone up 10 percent a litre; in Auckland that's 20 cents a litre and climbing. People come in to my Takapuna electorate office and they say "How are we going to do business? How are we going to manage to keep our trucks on the road?" How are the people who are doing the trading the building all of these things—these are very difficult times. You could ask them to catch a bus but oh dear—that's right the buses are on strike. No use for that—and the seniors who are carpooling who could not afford to fill their tanks to go away at Labour Day weekend to visit their families because of the additional charges.The regions are feeling the pain as well. I was in Taranaki and New Plymouth last Monday and they were absolutely astonished. We talked about evidence-based decisions that are made. We know from our Official Information Act requests that there were no Cabinet papers there was no advice on this Taranaki oil and gas ban—they just did it. It was a nice soundbite overseas. Who knows about the motivation? What I know is the reality of what's happening in the regions and what people are saying to us. All of our National MPs are hearing the same refrain: they cannot afford to do business and to keep their local regional and community economies working. It's just too hard under this Government.When we look at job creation which we did very well at—up to 10000 a month; it's now down to 4000 and decreasing. These are dark days for New Zealand. One year on we are deeper in debt more despondent than ever and there needs to be hope. That Government on the other side of the House is not giving it to anybody.SPEAKER: Order! The member's time has expired."