Moroney Sue: Financial Review Debate — In Committee 
Moroney Sue: Financial Review Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:671;Page:17481] 
SUE MORONEY (Labour) 
: 
 If one issue in the last financial year has personified this Government’s lack of a plan for the future it has to be its funding cuts to early childhood education. I know that the National backbenchers have all been told that they must deny that there have been funding cuts to early childhood education but I invite every National backbench and front-bench member to visit any one of their local kindergartens and find out from them why they have $50000 less of Government funding this year than last year—or $20000 or $60000 or whatever it may be. I want those National members to look the people at those kindergartens in the eye and tell them that they are making it up. 
Paul Quinn 
: Kohanga reo—9000. 
SUE MORONEY 
: Paul Quinn should look them in the eye and tell them that they are making up their funding cuts. Every time I debate this issue with any National member that member tells me that there are no funding cuts and they do not know what the kindergartens are talking about. 
It is even worse than that. Not only are National members in denial about it but also the Prime Minister has demonstrated that he is completely out of touch on this issue—[ 
Interruption 
] 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: Continued barracking across the Chamber is not acceptable. I ask the member to tone it down. You have had a fair go. It is one all. 
SUE MORONEY 
: As I was saying the Prime Minister has absolutely demonstrated that he is so out of touch with ordinary New Zealanders on this issue. He does not understand the cost pressures on families. On more than one occasion he has said that he would be very surprised if fees increased for families. In fact he said on national television that fees would not increase but he is absolutely wrong. 
Has he talked for example to Gemma Greig? She has said that she will pay an extra $60 per week for her two children—Kaydyn who is aged 4 and Kelsy who is aged 21 months—to continue to go to the Redwood Early Childhood Centre. Has he talked to people like Gemma Greig? Has he spoken to Debra Bullock who reports that she has two preschoolers who attend Durie Hill’s Polson Park Kindergarten? Her fees are going up by $35 a week. That is an extra $35 that that family has to try to find from somewhere. Lisa Kingsford’s child Caitlin goes to Newlands Childcare right here in Wellington. It will cost her family an extra $25 a week just to stand still. 
Under this Government those families are paying more but they are getting less. Many of these early childhood education centres have told Labour members in a survey that we did that they are taking a range of measures to deal with the savage funding cuts to early childhood education by this National Government. They are doing things that affect the quality of early childhood education. They are reducing the number of staff. In particular they are reducing the number of qualified staff. They are reducing the children’s access to field trips and a whole range of things. They are also having to put up fees. Because of the short-sightedness of this Government families are being left in the position of paying more and getting less. That is happening in many many neighbourhoods and communities in New Zealand at the moment. 
Has the Prime Minister spoken to Megan Ross who is the manager of the Motu Weka Neighbourhood Early Learning Centre? She was reported as saying that that centre is putting its fees up by 50c per hour for every child. She said that for some families that will mean an additional $30 a week per child. I do not know whether the Prime Minister understands this but many people do not have just one preschool child; sometimes they have two or three under-fives because that is the stage of their lives they are at. They are at the stage where they have young children. A fee increase of $30 a week at the Motu Weka Neighbourhood Early Learning Centre will cost some families an extra $60. 
Megan Ross goes on to say that that cost increase is very significant with the price of petrol and food going up. We know that one of the main causes of the price of food going up was the GST increase by this Government. Megan Ross says that everywhere they turn they are getting hit with increases. That is what she said about the families who are using the Motu Weka Neighbourhood Early Learning Centre in Nelson. I think many families from throughout the country in lots of different neighbourhoods and communities will be able to relate to that statement. Under this Government everywhere they turn they are being hit with increases. 
Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman 
: So what answers can you give them? 
SUE MORONEY 
: The member wants to know what Labour would do. I thank him for asking that question. Labour has pledged to put back into early childhood education the funding that his Government has stripped out. We get it. On this side of the Chamber we get that early childhood education is one of the best investments we can make in this country’s future. 
The member asks why that is. He does not seem to have read any of the research regarding this issue. All the research tells us that for every dollar spent in early childhood education this country saves up to $17 in the future. That is a great return on investment. If we spend $1 on early childhood education we save up to $17 in the future. It is a perfect investment in the future. But it requires a Government that actually has a plan for the future a Government that thinks further than the end of its own nose and a Government that understands about investing in small children and what that means for the future. It requires a Government that understands that if we get it right in early childhood education then we do not have extra remedial costs in our education system and we do not have to keep building the prisons that Judith Collins was so proud of before. We do not have to keep spending money in that area if we get it right in this area. 
It is no mistake that in the Budget the Government announced last year it cut funding to early childhood education and it increased the money being spent on building prisons. New Zealanders will get used to that style of Budget if they want to keep this National Government in power because that is exactly what the future will look like for this country if we have such a short-sighted Government. 
National members claim that they had no choice. They say they had no choice but to cut the funding to early childhood education—that is when they admit they have made cuts—because of the recession. Next they will start blaming the earthquake. We will wait for that one! It is utter rubbish that they had to cut funding because of the recession. We know that as the Government cut $400 million out of early childhood education it also gave $9 billion away in tax cuts to just the top 10 percent of income earners in New Zealand over that same period of time. Does that not expose the lack of truth in the statement—[ 
Interruption 
] 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: I say sorry to the member. Speaker’s ruling 43/1 states that members cannot use the phrase: “Tell the truth.” I do not know where it came from but I am warning members not to use that phrase. It is unparliamentary and it leads to disorder. I do not know where it came from but I did hear it. 
SUE MORONEY 
: I am absolutely prepared to tell the truth because this is from the Budget documents. The Budget documents tell us that the Government cut $400 million worth of funding to early childhood education at the same time as it gave away $9.1 billion of taxpayer funding to the top 10 percent of income earners in tax cuts. That is where the money for early childhood education has gone. 
Government members would have us believe that they have taken the money out of some centres and put it into creating participation in some other areas. Let us just explore that for a moment because the numbers do not add up. Government backbenchers need to understand that they are being fed a line by their Minister. The Ministry of Education website will tell them that $400 million of funding has been cut out of early childhood education in the last financial year and $93 million as opposed to $400 million is planned to be used to boost participation in early childhood education. There is a discrepancy: $400 million is being taken out and $93 million is being used to fund increasing participation. 
Where has the rest of it gone? I can tell members that it has gone into helping to fund the $9.1 billion of tax cuts given away—frittered away—to the top 10 percent of wage earners in this country. Those tax cuts did nothing to stimulate economic growth. Government members said that they were giving that money to the wealthy because it would stimulate economic growth. We now know that that stimulation never happened. Before the Christchurch earthquake even happened the Government was already admitting that there had been no growth in the economy.