Parker David: General Debate 
Parker David: General Debate 
[Volume:620;Page:15680] 
DAVID PARKER (Labour—Otago) 
: 
 ACT scraped home with just above 5 percent of the vote in the last election—it got about 6 percent. But its vote has since collapsed. ACT is down to between 1 and 3 percent depending upon the poll and it is likely that it will disappear at the next election. I ask myself why. 
Hon Member:  
Rodney! 
DAVID PARKER 
: No it is because National is now ACT. That is why Mr Franks wants to join National—we all know that. Dr Brash makes his own feelings transparent. He is one of the few New Zealanders who expresses admiration for Mr Hide. They even holiday together. What jolly good times they must have together—not! But it does emphasise what the electorate knows: ACT and National share the same extreme fundamentalist ideology. 
The extreme right-wing views of Dr Brash were most recently highlighted in his reshuffle. Granted a reshuffle of National is a difficult job; if one shuffles the National pack the chances of turning up an ace are lower than the chances of winning first prize in Lotto. If one shuffles the National pack one gets a misère hand—misery. Nothing demonstrates Dr Brash’s ideology better than his choice of spokesperson on health. National has two people with training in the medical sciences and Dr Brash is not one of them. He makes people sick; he does not cure them. But he does have two doctors there. One is Dr Lynda Scott. Did he pick her? No he dumped her. He had an alternative in Dr Paul Hutchison a medical specialist. Did he choose him? No. Why not? Because he is not interested in moderate health policies; he is interested in extreme ideology. 
Who did Dr Brash pick? He picked a lawyer Judith Collins. Judith Collins is not even a moderate lawyer. She is a former chair of the Casino Control Authority which approved two casinos for the little town of Queenstown which is in my electorate. She is not a person of good judgment. She is a right-wing ideologue which suits Dr Brash’s purpose. Her right-wing extremism has been well illustrated this last week. For the last 30 years in New Zealand young women have had confidential relationships with their doctors. When it comes to pregnancy and abortion choices they have had confidential relationships. Those young women have had independent advice from doctors which is privileged communication between them and their doctors. That rule has stood the test of time. It was imposed after an independent inquiry; it was imposed by this Parliament. What would Mrs Collins do? She would scrap it and have us return to the old days of backstreet abortions and unwanted pregnancies for young girls. That is disgraceful. 
What did Dr Brash do after having inflicted that upon us? He shuffled off to Australia which has a higher rate of unemployment lower growth and higher rates of beneficiary dependency. What did he do while he was over there? He bagged New Zealand. He ignored the reality bagged New Zealand and compared us with a failing Pacific State. What balderdash! We have incomes thirty times those of the Pacific States we have strong democratic institutions we have health systems that are the peer of any in the world and we have good educational institutions yet he compared us with those States. He can say things in New Zealand; he can come to Parliament and argue his case and as the Opposition leader he should try to put down the Government but does Dr Brash do that effectively? No he goes to Australia and bags his country there. That is absolutely disgraceful! He bangs on about compliance costs and how difficult it is to do business in New Zealand. What happened? An international survey by the World Bank showed that to be a complete untruth. In reality we were the top country out of the 146 countries surveyed. We were not tenth ninth eighth seventh sixth fifth fourth third or second; we were first and that is absolutely outstanding. 
As Mr Swain said earlier the electorate wonders what the National Party policy is. It wonders because National will not come clean. It is about privatisation and a return to the failed policies of the 1990s.