Shirley Ken: Taxation (Annual Rates Venture Capital and Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill — In Committee 
Shirley Ken: Taxation (Annual Rates Venture Capital and Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:621;Page:16506] 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY (ACT) 
: 
 The ACT party certainly will not be reaffirming these higher tax rates that this tax-and-spend Labour Government is promoting in Parliament tonight. There has been no justification for them. It has already been clearly mentioned in this debate that New Zealand needs a competitive environment if we are to succeed internationally. We do not just need tax rates that are as low as those of other countries; we need them to be lower. We have significant geographic disadvantages being at the end of transport routes. As a trading nation we need to have an environment that attracts investors if we are to have vigorous growth and prosperity in this country. 
This Labour Government inherited incredible economic conditions. I do not think that at any time in the last three or four decades New Zealand has enjoyed such favourable conditions. The point is that not one of them has anything to do with the policies of this Government; they are largely the low fruits of the hard yards done by previous Governments in making tough decisions and bringing reforms to the economy. This Government is squandering that opportunity as it plucks the low fruits of those courageous reforms of the past. 
Not only is the Government laying back and plucking the fruits; it is actually messing up the fundamentals increasing taxation rates when it should be reducing them and bringing in unnecessary regulations all of which— 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: But they haven’t been paying tax. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: My colleague points out the other point. The Government loves imposing higher taxes on the productive workers of New Zealand while it tries to excuse its own Ministers for it would appear avoiding tax. 
Rodney Hide 
: How does that work? 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: I do not know how it works quite frankly. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: Call it a koha. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: Call it koha. There are all sorts of excuses but— 
Rodney Hide 
: What’s the tax rate now for a Minister? 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: We would have to say it is zero. What is the tax rate for a Labour Minister? It would have to be zero yet that Cabinet has the audacity to keep pumping taxes up and up. Let us go back to Labour’s wonderful airbrushed election pamphlet of 1999. It took us months to recognise who the dolled-up woman on the front page was; it was Helen Clark. She said: “I pledge I promise to the country.” One of those pledges was that only 5 percent of the population would have a tax increase and it would be those earning over $60000. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: And 0.1 percent would have to pay no taxes at all. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: That is right. Aside from that the Government then conveniently enjoyed the benefits of fiscal drag and inflation and now significantly more than 5 percent of New Zealanders are in that higher tax bracket. It is another broken promise. So we have avoidance dishonesty and broken promises. That is what we are getting from this Government. 
Rodney Hide 
: Do we have a ministerial rate in this bill? 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: I should ask members to look at schedule 1. Perhaps we could have a Supplementary Order Paper to put in a ministerial rate and make it retrospective. 
Rodney Hide 
: A Harry Duynhoven clause. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: Yes the “Save Harry” clause. Labour members were quite happy to abuse the constitution of this country to save one of their own Harry Duynhoven who unfortunately should have been expelled from Parliament. That is the point. He breached the law. So I say to that Minister— 
Lianne Dalziel 
: Bye-bye. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: Former Minister—I forgot. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: And she paid her tax. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: And she paid her tax. 
Rodney Hide 
: She didn’t tell the truth. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: She did not tell the truth but she did pay her tax. Well maybe she did not. My question is where in schedule 1 is this special ministerial rate. We have a schedule 1— 
Rodney Hide 
: It needs amending. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: Shall we draft a Supplementary Order Paper or shall we leave it to the Government? 
Rodney Hide 
: No they’d make it retrospective for John. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: They would make it retrospective for John Tamihere. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: It’s outrageous. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: It is an outrage But what we do know is that taxation on employment is a penalty— 
Lianne Dalziel 
: That was the biggest load of fiction I have heard in my life on TV on Saturday night. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: I am sorry but I cannot hear the member. 
Lianne Dalziel 
: Richard Prebble’s kitchen—the place for writing David Lange’s selection speech! What a load of nonsense! 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: Clearly the former Labour Minister is trying to create a distraction in this debate— 
Rodney Hide 
: Should we be surprised? 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: Exactly. In fact it is extraordinary that the Labour Government has actually allowed this bill to be on the Order Paper.