Bridges SimonHon SIMON BRIDGES (National—Tauranga): Thank you Madam Speaker. It's a great pleasure to speak on this and as is customary really to offer a few thoughts about the Budget—about actually the I suppose you'd call it special" Budget that followed where $52 billion - odd was spent by the Government—and thoughts from me and I'm sure Opposition colleagues about the issues they present. If I can offer a defence of my unsuccessful time as leader: when I gave speeches at both the Budget and on the $52 billion spend following that I made a number of criticisms and critiques of the Government and I think actually they've aged well. Those criticisms have been proven right. Where I made clear that the wage subsidy was defective quite quickly after actually Grant Robertson to his credit made changes to the policies and the Opposition in that regard made what the Government has done stronger better more fit for purpose. If there's a theme for me on what we've seen over these three years and in the appropriations estimates through the Budget process it really is simply this: this Government ultimately after the kind words the good words the decent words are finished doesn't have serious policies and plans that they can implement for New Zealand.We see that very starkly throughout this process. When we think about the economy that Grant Robertson talks about we see a situation where ultimately the Labour Party the New Zealand First Party and the Green Party in Government are going to saddle this country with much more debt than is required. I'm not advocating—no one on this side; it's scaremongering frankly from the Prime Minister to say so—for austerity. We're just not making that point. We know on this side of the House because we did it—the global financial crisis and the earthquakes borrowing some $50 billion more—what is required in these sorts of circumstances. But to borrow as we've seen in the Budget and post-Budget decisions and announcements from this Government $140 billion more is excessive is bad for future generations who will pay the bill and inevitably and I think inevitably in the next term will result in more taxes on ordinary decent hard-working New Zealanders who play by the rules.That debt—I suppose there's at least two points we should make there. The first one is this: if the spending we saw here was basically all or even mostly all good stuff going on real things in the ground that made a difference for productivity that helped Kiwi families we might say "Great." But I have been flabbergasted by the way we've seen announcement after announcement from Minister Jones from Minister Twyford from Minister Woods and from other Ministers on that side of the House—literally every day; $20 million here $47 million there $58 million here $73 million there—with no business cases with no sense of prioritisation with no sense of the value of a dollar that has to be earned by Kiwis and paid in taxes for this Government to spend it. There's just been no sense of that value of taxpayers' hard-earned money through the Budget and the appropriations and so on—lots of spend-ups lazy spend-ups that I don't believe are good for New Zealand or are delivering good value for money. And so we say: you know what on this side of the House we would be more careful with taxpayers' money.It doesn't mean austerity. It means more investment in health more investment in education more investment in infrastructure—Hon Aupito William Sio: Come on!Hon SIMON BRIDGES: And yes William sir more investment in roads maybe even in your electorate because we know the value and the productivity that comes with those things. They haven't delivered any roads in my electorate but I would in theirs—that's all I'm saying. So we haven't seen that.The second point I would make about debt in addition to the laziness of this spend the wastefulness of this spend and the lack of delivery in real terms and real outcomes from this spend is just to dwell once again on that quantity of it: $140 billion. We've seen nothing like that before in the history of this nation and we may never see anything in real terms like that again. I mean Bill English in his best Budgets from that side of the House when he had new additional spending we never got much past a bill' or two and yet here we've got $140 billion over four years. And by the way that works out broadly speaking at $80000 a household. So for a mum and dad or a young couple who don't have a mortgage this gives them one. If they're renting they've already got a mortgage without the property. For that couple that does have a mortgage this Government is giving them a second mortgage and I say that's not good enough. That will result in more taxes and you mark my words Madam Speaker: a year after the election Budget 2021 if there's a Labour-led Government there will be more wealth and other taxes coming on New Zealanders. They say "Well no but this person won't have to pay." Ultimately someone does have to pay and that is ordinary good decent hard-working Kiwis who play by the rules.I don't see a plan for jobs and we know and we'll see later this week the latest job figures. What they will show those employment and unemployment figures is—there's just no question about it—they're going up. By the way we know that at the end of this year it will be much much worse—tens of thousands of Kiwis who were in work who now aren't in work and no plan for that. And that leads me really in the remaining couple of minutes to just this fundamental point—I started on it I alluded to it and I want to come back to it—about the Budget about the plans economically and the appropriations and estimates that we've seen in this House over the last two to three years: there just isn't a sense of policy development or plans for the future. We really don't have in the last days of this Parliament any sense of what another term of a Labour-led Government will look like. It's effectively a Government that is cynically relying on the feel-good factor the health sense of COVID-19 without any real sense of the problems coming. I give credit for where we've got to on health. Look I am deeply grateful that we are not in a COVID19 situation like Victoria Australia but I do say on the future issues: if you go by the track record of the last two to three years Budget 2020 Budget 2019 and so on and the decisions that have been made in spending the debt that's been piled on the taxes that sure as eggs are coming on New Zealanders so far we are very light on real policies and plans for the future of Aotearoa New Zealand. Our country this election deserves that real contest and they haven't seen from the Labour Party benches any sense of what they're bringing to it thus far."