1. Question No. 1—Prime MinisterCHRISTOPHER LUXON (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime MinisterORAL QUESTIONSQUESTIONS TO MINISTERSQuestion No. 1—Prime Minister1. CHRISTOPHER LUXON (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime Minister: Does she have confidence in all of her Ministers?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Mr Speaker I should start by warning you that the answer will be a little longer than usual. Yes I am proud of Ministers' efforts to support New Zealanders through global economic uncertainty and disruption and extreme weather events while continuing to tackle New Zealand's long-term challenges. Education Ministers celebrated two years of the Government's Healthy School Lunches programme; 220000 kids at 950 schools receive 1 million lunches a week. The Minister for Emergency Management the Hon Kieran McAnulty; and Minister for Rural Communities the Hon Damien O'Connor have been overseeing our response to flooding in the West Coast Nelson Tasman and Marlborough regions. The Minister of Foreign Affairs the Hon Nanaia Mahuta; and Minister of Defence the Hon Peeni Henare announced significant deployments of 120 New Zealand Defence Force personnel to the United Kingdom to help train Ukraine soldiers as part of an international effort to help Ukraine to continue to defend itself against Russia's illegal—Hon Member: What about the outcomes? What about the outcomes?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I hear the Opposition member calling for outcomes; unfortunately we have not yet been able to end the war by Russia but we continue to do our part. The Minister of Finance has ensured Kiwibank remains 100 percent Kiwi-owned. The Minister of Immigration announced further measures to help relieve workforce shortages. The Hon Peeni Henare spoke for the Government at Koroneihana outlining our commitment to Māori and our strong progress on health on education and on housing. The Minister of Agriculture celebrated a record year for food and fibre sectors. New Zealand is in a strong position to support households and businesses. Unemployment is low exports are growing and Government debt is substantially below other nations. We remain focused on supporting New Zealanders through these challenging times.Christopher Luxon: How can she have confidence in her finance Minister when inflation is at its highest rate in three decades and more than two years have passed since wages last rose faster than inflation?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I retain confidence in the Minister of Finance because he has navigated us through one of the most significant economic crises of a generation and he has done so with record-low unemployment. I directly attribute that to interventions like the wage subsidy which I note the Opposition at the time supported. I also have confidence in him because of the interventions he made to ensure that businesses were able to remain open throughout the pandemic and continue to keep people connected to work. I have confidence because he has kept debt low; relative to other countries within the OECD we have come out with much lower rates of debt than those we would compare ourselves to. I have confidence that even though we are seeing inflation increase as a result of many of the global issues around us even then relative to other countries we have not seen the levels that others have reached. I am proud of this Minister of Finance and I know many other New Zealanders are too.Christopher Luxon: How can she have confidence in her housing Minister when both the State house waitlist and the number of children living in cars have quadrupled?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Of the State houses we now have in New Zealand in total 10 percent were built by this Government. No other Government since the 1970s has built as many houses as this Government. If you want to talk about shame the shame sits with the previous Government on the Opposition benches who not only did not grow housing but sold them. Had they built at the rate that we are building now we would have almost cleared the waiting lists we have. That is shameful.Christopher Luxon: Is she aware that 100000 Kiwi school kids are chronically truant and if so when will she be calling the Minister of Education into her office for a performance review?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I'm not going to performance review a Minister over COVID-19 and the impact that it has had on attendance nor will I performance review an education Minister on changes to truancy services in 2015 that have led to an ongoing decline in attendance—or at least contributed to it. We do have an issue in New Zealand; I should also add that one of those issues has been exacerbated by illness but even then we are doing work to make sure that we rebuild those truancy services and turn around attendance. I have great faith in our education Ministers to do that.Christopher Luxon: How can she have any confidence in her justice Minister when violent crime is up 21 percent and gang membership is up over 40 percent?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I have confidence in that Minister because across our justice portfolios we have for instance seen an increase in the number of front-line police officers. We have dedicated retail units; organised crime units. Three significant operations leading to multiple—hundreds—of charges arrests and confiscation of firearms. I would also challenge some of the member's numbers. Of course for us on this side though the reason we don't get into the numbers debate is because we don't want any victims in this country—even if that member's numbers are wrong.Christopher Luxon: Does she have confidence in her environment Minister when New Zealand imported a record 1.8 million tonnes of coal last year nearly four times more than in 2017?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I see that the member that he refers to is a man of great intellect but even he can't make it rain. Even though New Zealand has one of the highest levels of renewable electricity generation in roughly 85 percent if we have a dry hydrological year it will have an impact on fossil fuels. One of the reasons I maintain absolute confidence in this Cabinet is unlike on that side where no work was done to find how we can substitute the gap on this side of the House we have set the target of getting to 100 percent renewable and we have business case studies under way to see how we can get there.Christopher Luxon: Is she confident her revenue Minister won't send any more taxpayer money to French backpackers expats in London or dead people?Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: What I can guarantee you that our revenue Minister will not do is give a tax cut to those on $180000 or more thus growing inequality in this country and going against the will of the majority of New Zealanders who do not believe that that is a good use of revenue.