Jackson WillieHon WILLIE JACKSON (Labour): I just was going to translate for some of the crew on the other side. What the Hon Willow-Jean Prime was saying was this was a rotten useless Budget for Māori. So I just thought I'd do that for you because I see some of you looking up in the air. It is probably the worst Budget for Māori in my lifetime. And I'm looking on the other side and I'm thinking Now which Māori are responsible for this on the other side?" You know there's one or two there not quite sure if they are Māori—I've heard them waffling on. Mr Meager doesn't know what day of the week it is when he's a Māori even though he's the "great brown hope" according to some of his mates in the media but he's not quite sure of himself. He's like Seymour who accidentally sort of found out about his Māori side according to Winston Peters—bit like Abel Tasman I think Winston said didn't he? But really this is a shameful shameful Budget. We were doing the numbers Madam Speaker—it's good to see you there Madam Speaker. DEPUTY SPEAKER: It's good to hear you talking about the numbers Mr Jackson.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Oh I'm absolutely talking about the tax bill—absolutely this is all about the tax bill Madam Speaker. Totally reject this tax bill because we know what they've done in terms of financing everything. They've looked after their rich friends with $2.9 billion and they've kicked all the Māori people in their guts all around the country. Now I'm looking over there I look at the Hon Mark Mitchell. Now Māori had some hope for him but now he just wants to lock us all up and do his hard-on-crime thing. I'm looking across I can't see any hope. Tama Potaka should hang his head in shame after this pathetic—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hey hey—how about we don't do too much personal stuff?Hon WILLIE JACKSON: I can't help it Madam Speaker—DEPUTY SPEAKER: I know but I'm going to have to sit you down if you get too personal.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Oh I'll get off that then Madam Speaker. But I was going through how they funded this in terms of tax and I saw a cut of $40 million in terms of Māori housing—$40 million. By Māori for Māori solutions has been a huge success—we had Minister Potaka up there on the East Coast. Sadly that's been cut. Also a cut of $20 million in terms of rangatahi—young people—transitional housing; massive cuts in terms of the homeless action plan; Māori development budget cut by $9 million. And this other side are very proud of this—$43 million of increased funding for core services. Basically the Government is robbing Hōne to give to Peter and Paul—that's very very clear. They're giving a pitiful tax cut with one hand and mugging you with the other hand. See what's the point of a $12-a-week tax cut—see I'm coming on to the tax cuts—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Yep.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: —if you're having to—yes I'm doing that for you Madam Speaker. What's the point of a $12-a-week tax cut if you have to pay $13-a-week in terms of transport for your kids? That's all we're talking about here. [Interruption] Yeah that's right. Then the changes will leave beneficiaries behind; almost 30000 more job losses—that's not particularly successful; more kids into poverty; the Prime Minister is getting twice the tax cut that the minimum-wage earner gets. And they're calling this a success. But it upsets me that when I look at the you know the "pride and joy of Māoridom" over there Mr Meager you should have done a lot better on this. You know we've got a lot of hope for you and the media puts you up there as a "great brown hope" and you should have done a lot better for us here but you've done nothing. Māori trades training—Māori trades training has been a huge success. You know Mr Mitchell knows about that; he's about around that age group when it first came out he knows all about it. Mr Mitchell knows all about Māori trades training—huge success. Gone gone everything gone so they can look after their rich mates. Now a disabled person will be up to $256 per fortnight—or $5742 a year—worse off because of the Government's changes to disability support public transport subsidies benefit injection the minimum wage and promised prescription charges.Hon Jo Luxton: Shameful.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: That is shameful. And they're all patting themselves on the back today clapping their leader. How can you be so proud of something that has been so unsuccessful? They don't have money for the environment renters and beneficiaries but they do have money for their rich landlords. This is a landlords landlords landlords Budget. Shame on a lot of them. Now on the three official child poverty measures: for the first there's no forecast of future numbers; on the second the numbers will stay the same; and on the third they will rise. So child poverty will stagnate or worsen—we already know that.Cameron Luxton: Did it get worse under your watch Willie?Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Pardon?Cameron Luxton: Did it get worse under your watch?Hon WILLIE JACKSON: I couldn't quite pick that up. But all I know is that is the ACT Party whose priority are their rich mates not the workers out there not the Māori nation certainly not the struggling. Now the Budget Economic and Fiscal Update 2024 projects the economy to come out of recession and then growth to drop downwards 3.2 percent in 2026 2.9 percent in 2027 2.7 percent in 2028. So where's the rise in the growth? Where's the vision from a Government that cares beyond their donors and rich-landlord mates? That's the question. They seem to think that a $12 tax cut for minimum-wage earners and 40 bucks for median-wage earners will make the electorate forget about the Government's climate-destroying bashing agenda because we know where it's all at.Things are not going well for this Government. I mean they're even down on the Roy Morgan poll. Madam Speaker. This is a poll—DEPUTY SPEAKER: That's a different set of numbers Mr Jackson.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Oh is that a different set of numbers?SPEAKER: Yeah.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Right come back to it. But really this is a tax bribe; not one cent—see when I talk about funding when we were looking at the Budget today we found in Minister Potaka's budget that he was $90 million down in terms of Māori development—$90 million down. That's terrible for the Māori development budget when you have Māori development funded at around about $600 million a year. So he's $90 million down but they've said to him "Oh well we're giving you a bit of extra money for those haka people Tama. So you should be happy now. And so those dancing Māoris have got a few more dollars and so Tama's really happy with that. Meanwhile funding's been cut right across the spectrum. I like Tama very much but shame on him and shame on the other Māori members across the House when you're down $90 million in the Māori affairs portfolio. But then when we did the numbers right across the spectrum—former Minister Megan Woods did some wonderful work in the housing area. Very very happy with what she did. [Interruption] These idiots can laugh but we know we've built more houses—more houses—than anyone else.Stuart Smith: Point of order.DEPUTY SPEAKER: I've got a point of order from Stuart Smith.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Sit down Stuart Smith.DEPUTY SPEAKER: No no. I've got a point of order from Stuart Smith.Stuart Smith: Madam Speaker he's using irony in the House—is that allowed?DEPUTY SPEAKER: I think actually we might all just calm down a little bit because there was a lot of shouting going on backwards and forwards. And if you want me to hear Mr Jackson using irony we'll just take the tone down a little bit.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: OK well I mean Stuart Smith is the irony if we really want to be clear about it.DEPUTY SPEAKER: No no no that's personal—Hon WILLIE JACKSON: He's quite a—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Keep going with—Hon WILLIE JACKSON: I want it to be personal Madam Speaker. He is irony.Stuart Smith: Point of order. It's "Mr Irony" thank you.DEPUTY SPEAKER: OK.Camilla Belich: Point of order. Madam Speaker. I know that there's banter in the House but this is a serious matter. I don't think that that member's use of a point of order is appropriate in this debate and I would prefer you to be able to rule on the appropriateness. DEPUTY SPEAKER: That's relevant thank you. We'll have no more points of order on that matter. And we'll have everything in the space of the numbers regarding the Budget from Mr Jackson for the next 1½ minutes.Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Thank you Madam Speaker. Well it's very I suppose disappointing for us. As I said $90 million has been lost in the in the name of tax cuts in terms of Māori development but actually $300 million lost in terms of Māori funding right across the spectrum. This was picked up in the media conference today by Claudette Hauiti rejected by the Minister of Finance but never have we seen in a Budget Māori funding go back so much—$300 million. We will get the story out there—they can reject it all they like and confuse the silly Māoris in their party and say "Oh you got the kapa haka money." but we actually know how to read Budgets and $300 million is a kick in the guts for Māori. You saw the level of protests today: thousands and thousands of Māori—thousands of them—are hitting the streets because they see these sell-outs on the other side and they've had enough. This is going to be a very very short term for this useless race-baiting right-wing Government who don't care about Māori who don't care about workers who are just focused on their rich mates and we're looking forward to the next poll. Kia ora Madam Speaker."