Hague Kevin: Taxation (Budget Tax Measures) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
Hague Kevin: Taxation (Budget Tax Measures) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
[Volume:654;Page:3987] 
KEVIN HAGUE (Green) 
: 
 My colleague Jeanette Fitzsimons spoke in the first reading debate of the Taxation (Budget Tax Measures) Bill. She indicated that the Green Party intended to support it but that we had not yet made up our minds about Part 2 of the bill. That is still the case: I rise to support the bill but to express reservations on Part 2. 
It is a pleasure to be able to support this bill in an environment where apparently everyone in the House including our colleagues from the ACT Party are now opposed to these future tax cuts and will be voting in favour of the bill. I intend to speak not to beat up the Government for changing its mind but to praise the Government for changing its mind. It takes a certain amount of maturity and bravery to indicate that one was wrong in the first place so I think the Government deserves the House’s praise for saying that it was wrong to introduce the legislation to provide for the tax cuts the Taxation (Urgent Measures and Annual Rates) Bill and that is why it is repealing them today. 
This legislation is not the only area in which the Government has shown bravery in its performance today. In the House prior to Christmas one of the lines of questioning that the Green Party had for the Minister of Finance was in relation to the number of green-collar jobs that the rolling maul of measures to deal with the recession would create. I think it is fair to say that the response we had indicated a fair amount of ridicule towards the idea of green-collar jobs. There was a sense that they did not really matter because a job was a job and a green-collar job was no better than any other kind of job. It was with a sense of pleasure that I heard the Minister of Finance in his Budget speech today refer to green jobs being created by one of the Budget measures. 
The third area the Government has today fessed up to having been wrong on prior to Christmas is the Green Homes Fund. The Green Homes Fund was a $1 billion fund over 15 years that had been created through the Green Party liaising with the then Labour Government. One of the first actions of this National Government was to scrap the Green Homes Fund. We said at the time that that was the wrong thing to do and it is with an enormous sense of pride that I am able to stand here today and acknowledge the particular contribution of the outgoing co-leader of the Green Party Jeanette Fitzsimons who has championed the issue of home insulation and energy efficiency over more than a decade in this House. She has the single greatest responsibility for having wrought the multilateral consensus that home insulation and energy efficiency are sensible and prudent measures for any New Zealand Government to take. I salute Jeanette Fitzsimons and I also thank the Government. I thank the Government for admitting that it was wrong to scrap the measure before Christmas and I thank the Government for having the courage to come back to the measure and to reinstate home insulation. 
That particular new policy has been brought about through the Green Party’s memorandum of understanding with National. I note that our two parties will be working together on further areas of energy efficiency in the future. I look forward to further gains we can make because all of this learning the Government has done over the past several months moving on from decisions made before Christmas that turned out to be wrong has the potential to be transferred to other areas. 
I have just returned from the Green New Deal listening tour on which I spoke at five public meetings over the last week about the Green Party’s Green Stimulus Package. Home insulation is certainly one of the measures we advocated. We were saying it is possible to address simultaneously the economic crisis facing this country and the environmental crisis that also besets us. If it is possible to address both crises simultaneously then why on earth would we not do so? We advocated measures not only in home insulation and energy efficiency but also in transport efficiency. It is possible to create 40 percent more jobs by investing in public transport walking and cycling initiatives and traffic demand management than by investing in motorways which is this Government’s choice. We advocated measures to protect waterways in rural areas and thereby protect New Zealand’s “clean green” “100% Pure New Zealand” brand which is at severe risk but has huge economic benefit to this country. We advocated building 6000 State houses to a high energy-efficiency standard. We also advocated a variety of community-based employment opportunities including more housing and waste minimisation schemes. 
All those schemes would have created assets and jobs for New Zealand. It is $3.3 billion worth of spending and at least 43000 green-collar jobs. The Green Party’s fervent hope is that it will be possible for us to take the learning the Government has done over these three measures—repealing the tax measures understanding the importance of green-collar jobs and the Government’s new commitment to home insulation and energy efficiency—and transfer it to some of those other areas. This is the kind of green new deal that New Zealand so desperately needs. It is a green new deal that solves our economic problems and addresses our environmental problems at the same time. The Green New Deal should include taking some effective action on climate change. I look forward to the day when it is possible for all members of this House to support effective measures on climate change just as we are all supporting the repeal of these taxation measures today. 
I also note that one of the other causes we have been championing on the Green New Deal listening tour is innovation. The answer to New Zealand’s need to increase productivity is not everyone working harder; it is actually using innovation and thinking about how to do things in different ways—changing the goalposts and changing the ways we reach them. This Government can also do some learning around innovation. Research and development tax credits have been scrapped. The Fast Forward fund has been scrapped and replaced by an anaemic copy. I spent a day this week with the Sustainable Business Network. It is a fantastic organisation that actually has the answers to improving New Zealand’s productivity and has just had its funding slashed by this Government. So there is an awful lot of potential for transfer of learning. 
I will conclude with a couple of comments about urgency. When the Government took urgency for its 2 weeks of shock and awe before Christmas the Green Party objected to urgency at that time. We said it was not necessary and would lead to bad decision-making. We were right on both counts. As Jeanette Fitzsimons said in her first reading speech today we are also right in saying that urgency is not required at this time. Urgency has been taken today because the Government is embarrassed about changing its mind. We say that the Government does not need to be embarrassed because it is doing the right thing and it should be proud of the fact that it is prepared to learn from its mistakes. In respect of Part 2 of the bill we see the exact reason why urgency is a bad idea. We have yet to hear an argument in favour of Part 2 of the bill. If the bill had been referred to a select committee then maybe we would have heard an argument in favour of Part 2 and we would be able to vote for it. We will support the bill but oppose Part 2.