Mark Ron: Adjournment — Sittings of the HouseText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMark Ron: Adjournment — Sittings of the House[Sitting date: 09 December 2015. Volume:710;Page:8734. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First): Firstly I would like to pass on New Zealand First’s thanks and gratitude to all parliamentary staff and I will not attempt to list all of the departments—although the ones that we tend to bump into most frequently tend to be the messengers tend to be the security tend to be those people in the Parliamentary Library and such—but it is a full team in behind the scenes we know that make it possible for us to do the work that we do here in Parliament hopefully for the betterment of the nation. I want to pass on my thanks in particular to all the select committee staff and my Christmas greetings to the Local Government and Environment Committee. Scott Simpson you have done a very good job over this last year or so. I have thoroughly enjoyed working in there with you.I want to acknowledge you Mr Speaker to say that if you notice that maybe I have been a little less inflammatory over the last few days or so it is probably because I have found less to be inflamed about. And I just trust that in the new year things may progress in that way because I actually find that more enjoyable.When I came back to Parliament after a 6-year sabbatical—I like to look upon it as that—I have to say there is that movie you know Back to the Future but I get this horrible sense that we have come forward to the past. Why do I say that? I say it because some things do not seem to have changed.Hon Jo Goodhew: The beard.RON MARK: That is right. I look at the topics that are being debated today and excuse me if this resonates a little. In IT the Labour Government had INCIS and Land Information New Zealand. Oh the National Government had Novopay and the police budget on their IT project blowout. Do you get something in the picture? If not let us talk about this. Labour on defence: light armoured vehicles Steyr Mannlicher rifles and NH90s—disaster. National: trying to convince the country that we need to buy two C17s at a cost of $1 billion for a strategic airlift that we do not need. It sort of harks back to the Charles Upham and you tend to get the sense that National just like Labour when it comes to defence is all at sea and it is totally giving us all seasickness quite frankly just watching its actions. Corrections—day after day we see this play out on corrections.I look back at the time that I was in Parliament previously. What did we have? Labour—“goon squad”. Well the difference under National is it is not the corrections officers beating up the inmates; it is the inmates beating up each other in fight clubs. Home detention under Labour—what an absolute debacle that was. We sadly had a field day taking it to task on that. Incompetence in corrections under Labour and what do we see today? Incompetence under National with Serco.The flag—Labour runs up its policy on its pole to change the New Zealand flag. National grabs it with both hands kisses it with glee and runs it straight up its pole and here we have a referendum that is going to be an absolute—Darroch Ball: Disaster.RON MARK: —disaster. A public relations disaster. And if I could give the National Government a Christmas present right now it would be this suggestion on the back of what our leader Winston Peters has said: pull the pin. Pull the pin and get out while you can Government because you are on a hiding to nothing on that one.The lead balloon comment of the year—not made in the House and not made publicly. It was given to me by a soldier in a special force unit that the Prime Minister and his officials visited in Australia. This is what not to say when you are looking at a group of special force soldiers who are wearing balaclavas and gloves. This is what not to say: “Do these boys think they are special? They could at least remove their masks.” That goes down like a cup of cold sick let me assure you of that.There is a lot more I could say but I want to say this. My team New Zealand First—congratulations to them. To the parliamentary staff in the New Zealand First team and the New Zealand First caucus who held the fort back here and allowed the leader to campaign full time—and what a moment that was in Northland. Northland is National’s Stalingrad. That is where it came to a grinding halt and from here on it is all backward-pedalling for the National Government going forward. 2016—you know do your homework guys. Start building some friends around the place.I want to finish on this note. To all of the people who will be out there working in emergency services—police hospitals the fire service and emergency service NGOs like Victim Support and the Salvation Army—merry Christmas and we wish you luck to you and your families. To Defence Force people deployed all over the world we wish you a very merry Christmas. We know you are separated from your loved ones; we are thinking of you at this moment. We may not agree with all the deployments but we certainly support unequivocally all of our men and women in the New Zealand Defence Force wherever they may be. Merry Christmas Mr Speaker and merry Christmas to all parties.