Lees-Galloway Iain: Address in Reply — Presentation to Governor-General 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Lees-Galloway Iain: Address in Reply — Presentation to Governor-General 
[Sitting date: 28 February 2012. Volume:677;Page:587. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North) 
: 
 I just have to start where Tony Ryall left off. It is a bit rich hearing the National Party talking about tobacco-control initiatives when every step of the way when Labour was in Government National voted against every single measure that Labour introduced to curb tobacco smoking in New Zealand. Whether it was the Smoke-free Environments Act whether it was the excise tax or whatever Labour put up National voted against it every single time. I can say I am pleased they have finally—finally—put their guns down. They have decided that the fight is not worth fighting and they are going to get on the winning team; they are going to join the team that is fighting the harm caused by tobacco. They are a bit late to the game but we welcome them. But I have to say it is a bit rich hearing Tony Ryall talking about tobacco control and the initiatives the Government has introduced when he said himself that there was no evidence to support getting rid of tobacco displays. It was only thanks to the work of Tariana Turia and a number of people from the Opposition that finally got the Government to see sense on that one. But let us hope that that consensus will continue into the future.  
It is a pleasure to speak in the Address in Reply debate. Sometimes I have to say—and I have listened to quite a few of the contributions from members in this debate—you would forget that this was the Address in Reply debate. This is the debate—this is how it works—when the Government is supposed to get up and talk about their plan. The Government members the National Party members are supposed to get up and say what an excellent Speech from the Throne it was and how that plan is going to take New Zealand forward. Then of course we in the Opposition especially us Labour members we will support the amendment put forward by our leader David Shearer to add the words: “and the National-led Government will sell New Zealand’s assets against the will of the public; the Government has no ideas to create jobs or a clean or innovative New Zealand; that the Government is widening the gap between the very rich and the rest and therefore this House has no confidence in the National-led government.”  
That is the way it is supposed to work. But the vast majority of National MPs have talked about anything anything else except for the Speech from the Throne and anything else except for whatever plan it is that the Government has to get this economy moving again and to get New Zealanders back to work. They would talk about the Labour Party they would talk about what the Labour Party did when we were last in Government and they would talk about our new leader David Shearer. He is a top bloke and I am pleased to hear people talking about him but I really think the National Party members ought to be focused on supporting their leader and their plan. But they want to avoid it at all costs because we all know that there is no plan. There was no plan for the last 3 years and there is no plan for the next 3 years from this Government. The National MPs have avoided talking about what they are going to do like the plague.  
Sometimes a few members manage to offer a few platitudes about what it is the Government wants to do; they want to make New Zealand a better place to work and to raise our children; they want to get debt under control; and they want to build a brighter future—that old chestnut. That has been their campaign slogan for the last two elections: “Build a brighter future”. But it is always in the future; it is always some time further down the track. It is never now. The future will never get here under this Government because they have no plan. They want to create more jobs they want to back business they want people to be successful and they want New Zealanders to be entrepreneurial and innovative. They want to remove roadblocks and obstacles and encourage and develop all the opportunities New Zealand has to offer—don’t we all. But my question to the Government is: how? Where is the plan? How are you going to do that? It is wonderful to have all these platitudes; not a single member of this House would disagree with any of those statements from those National Party members but what the Government does not have is a plan. That is what New Zealand needs to see—a real plan.  
The nearest thing I have seen to a plan—the actual action that they want to undertake—is to sell it all; sell off all our assets sell them off to foreign owners. Oh yes New Zealanders might be at the front of the queue but we know what is going to happen to those shares they are going to end up in foreign hands—we lose control. All that stuff about how we were going to keep 51 percent but do not worry that will still mean that New Zealanders will still be in control that the Government will still be in control well that has turned out to be untrue as well.  
They reckon they have got a mandate. They reckon New Zealanders voted to sell off our assets. Well here is the truth. There are 121 MPs in Parliament this term. Sixty of those MPs represent parties that went out and said “Yes we want to sell those assets off.” But 60 the same number of MPs in this Parliament went out and said “We don’t want to sell off those assets.” And then there is the one. Then there is that one guy Peter Dunne—the one who goes whichever way the wind is blowing. Whoever wants to give him a ministerial portfolio those are the people he will vote with. It is only because Peter Dunne cannot make up his mind and is prepared to sell his vote to the highest bidder that New Zealand and this Government will be selling off assets this term. The people did not vote for asset sales they will not stand for asset sales and I think the Government is going to see itself in a lot of trouble as this year rolls on and people realise that those asset sales are upon us and they start to revolt against what this Government is doing.  
As I said I listened to a lot of National Party members. I listened particularly to Jonathan Coleman the Minister of Defence because I wanted to hear what his plan is. I wanted to hear what his plan is to cut the $400 million that has to be cut from the annual budget of the defence forces by 2015 just so that they can stand still. The Government has said: “No new money for the defence forces. You have to find that money from within the defence forces’ budgets and that means $400 million worth of cuts.” I wanted to know how that was going to happen. I wanted to know whether he thought that cutting the military bands was the answer. It is going to save less than $1 million—$1 million down $399 million to go. Where is the rest of the plan Minister Coleman? That is what I want to know. What about cutting down the territorials? Will that get us there?  
There are a few things that the Government has decided it is going to do. The Defence Force and the defence ministry have been working their backsides off to try to find those cuts and do you know what they have found so far? They have found $97.5 million worth of savings and good on them. They have worked hard to meet the Minister’s expectations but do you know what $97.5 million still leaves over $300 million to be saved. Where are the rest of those cuts going to come from? How much is going to have to be cut from the front-line forces? How is our deployable force overseas going to be affected by this? How many jobs are going to be lost as a result of those savings that have to be made? Where is the plan? It is just like everything with this Government—they have got their goals they have got their platitudes they have got their aspirations but as usual there is absolutely no plan. 
 Jonathan Coleman did not talk about defence once in his contribution to the Address in Reply debate. I think it is because he is embarrassed about what is happening to the Defence Force under the National Government. I will tell you the big question he is going to have to deal with and that is what to do about morale in the Defence Force. People are now lining up to leave the Defence Force because of the appalling way the Government has treated those personnel and the appalling job it has done of leading the Defence Force through this period of change. So not only are we losing the people that the Government has cut but also we are losing the people that it wants to keep. They do not want to have a bar of staying in the Defence Force any more; they are out of here. We are losing those skills and we are losing those people and there is no opportunity for people to get in there and develop their skills and grow the Defence Force. And I tell you what: as we see more and more jobs being cut there are going to be more and more people put on the scrap heap and more and more people on the unemployment benefit thanks to this Government. This Government has no plan. This Government wants to build a brighter future but it is a future that will never come because it cannot tell us how it is going to get there.