Cosgrove Clayton: Taxation (Budget Tax Measures) Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Cosgrove Clayton: Taxation (Budget Tax Measures) Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:654;Page:4035] 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 That speech was from the member Judith Collins who thinks she has a monopoly on sympathy and empathy with vulnerable people. She appears to be a very generous member who oozes sincerity and sympathy for the downtrodden—yeah right! That will be the next Tui billboard. 
I say to that member that during her speech my colleague Maryan Street interjected a number of times that the difference between us and them is that we did not promise the unaffordable. We did not promise the inequitable. That member says that in 9 years we did not deliver any money back to the folks in the street; well she conveniently forgets about the tax credit for Working for Families. As she slopes off now back to the crypt where she belongs she conveniently forgets about that. 
The great crime in this debate today is not the cancelling of the tax cuts; the great crime is the grand deception that every member on the other side of the House perpetrated against the New Zealand people. It comes down to a simple word: “lies”. Those people opposite went into the election saying that there would be tax cuts. John Key signed a pledge card saying that. 
It was even said by the ghost-like figure sitting in the Government front row at the moment Kate Wilkinson who stood against me at the election. On the stump she attacked me and called me a liar when I said that National would not deliver the tax cuts. And I was called a liar by that member on the stump in Waimakariri when I said that National would hack into superannuation. Today it has done that. I ask who the liar is. Whom will the people of Waimakariri see as a liar? That member and her ilk pledged almost in blood that the tax cuts would go ahead. 
National members’ only alibi now is to perpetrate the typical Tory trick that those folk have perpetrated yea unto the generations and that is to say every time they come into office: “Oh we didn’t know.” They say that they did not know what the economic conditions were and that they inherited a global meltdown. Well I say to the ghost-like figure in the front row who pops up in Waimakariri and who purports to be a lawyer and someone of intelligence that she should have known of the conditions. Could she not read  
Time 
 magazine? Could she not read  
The Economist 
? Could she not read the IMF report of September last year that Brian Rudman referred to? Did she not know that the previous Labour Government and our Australian counterpart had instituted bank guarantees before our respective elections because the global economic climate was very rough and we wanted to ensure that there was not a run on the banks and that depositors’ funds in Australasia were not put in jeopardy? Did John Key that self-made man who worships his creator—a great saying; it is not my saying—not know that even though he was a foreign exchange dealer? Did Bill English not know that? Could he not read those international reports? Maurice Williamson that loyal member of the National Party is trying to interject; could he not read the newspapers either domestic or international? 
It is not credible for that crew in Government to say that after they had been sworn in they suddenly realised at that point that their tax cuts were unaffordable. 
Craig Foss 
: That member is the only man in the world who knew the conditions! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Even that alibi is not credible because a month after they had been elected after they had opened the books— 
Aaron Gilmore 
: The only one who knew was that member. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: That genius in the back row interjects on me as does that other member the chair of the Finance and Expenditure Committee. He knows about tax; he knows about personal tax returns of course but we will not go there. If he would like us to work him over on the barbecue spit we will have a go. 
Even a month after National members had been elected even a month after they had opened the books and had cruised through them line by line they still said that the tax cuts were cast in stone. The great lie the great crime is not the cancelling of the tax cuts; it is the deception. Labour supports cancelling them. We consistently said they were unaffordable and were inequitable. The proof of that is in the first tranche of tax cuts that those great empathisers with the community delivered whereby the top 3 percent of income earners in this country got a tax cut of a third and families on $40000 a year or less in Waimakariri in every Maori seat in every seat in this country got nothing! 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: Is that fair? 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I do not think it was fair. My colleague knows that it was not fair. We knew that it was not fair. That is why we did not support that tax cut. And we have been consistent. 
Then we come of course to superannuation. Well I say that National has pulled it off again. The ironic thing is that when that crew were in Government last time Mr English cut the pension three times. When I kept reminding the ghost-like figure in the front row of that in the election campaign she called me a liar. When I said to her that she would do what her Government had done last time—tinker with superannuation—she said I was a liar. Well we are racking them up; the notches are being racked up. 
Members opposite come into the House almost in a self-congratulatory mood demanding that the people congratulate them on holding the pension at the same level of entitlement. They believe they deserve congratulations from Grey Power and Age Concern. Well yes they have held the pension at the same level of entitlement but the great debate that we thought had been put to bed and that Grey Power thought there was consensus on has now re-erupted. It goes like this: if this Government suspends payments to the Cullen fund for 10 years I predict that if National is still in office at the next election its members will say: “Look after 3 years of deferred payments in order to put that huge amount of money—billions of dollars—back into the New Zealand Superannuation Fund we have to raise your taxes.” National will try to sell it to people in that way. 
People in their 50s now will remember the spectre of Don Brash. It was said that this would never happen. More specifically people who have 15 years to go before retirement will now be in the situation they were in before Labour became the Government in 1999. They will be uncertain they will be worried about their superannuation they will not know what they should do about their retirement and worse still they will have only 15 years in which to recalibrate their arrangements. We know that that is not enough time for a mum or a dad who at 50 years of age has paid the mortgage off done all the right things and looked after the family. The Government told those people what the rules would be told them what the entitlement would be and by the way it said it would guarantee it because it had put money aside. 
That is what all Kiwis do when they do their household budget. When they know they have a big expense coming up they put money aside because they are smart people. We know when everybody is going to retire we know when that will happen and there is absolute certainty about that—we know the age of everybody. We know what the bill is going to be henceforth. So what did Dr Cullen do? He was as smart as New Zealanders are every day in respect of their household budgets. He put money aside. The great betrayal will not occur today; the great betrayal will happen tomorrow as we go forward because every New Zealander now is worried and does not know whether he or she will have a superannuation entitlement. 
I will be 40 this year. Maybe I have time on my side—I am sure I have. Someone in his or her 40s has a few more years to go and is able to recalibrate his or her arrangements. But people in their 50s will not have time to do that. They have set their course they have set their savings and they have set their plan for their retirement and now the spectre of uncertainty comes forth. As my colleague has said when it gets really tough in a few years’ time in 10 years’ time when the money will have been carved out of the Superannuation Fund if ever the Tories are in Government again they will say: “Oh well maybe we have to move on the age of entitlement”—as they did before—“or maybe we have to cut the rate of superannuation.” 
What National has done is the typical Tory trick that the ghost in the front row was adamant would never happen under a National Government. But National has not only tinkered with superannuation; it has taken an axe to it. Six months ago when Labour was in office people were certain of the retirement age certain of the entitlement and certain that when they retired they would get superannuation that they could live on because Labour had said we would put money aside for it. As one of my colleagues said an economic downturn when shares and investments go down is the time when we can use our money to buy good-quality investments on the cheap—we can do it on the cheap—so that we can gain from them when they appreciate. We know that the Superannuation Fund actually made money last month as one of my colleagues alluded to. I look forward to the genius in the back row opposite going to the constituents going to the Grey Power meetings and telling them why National has pulled the rug out from under them. 
This measure is a traditional National trick; it did it 20 years ago it is doing it today and it will pay a price for it.