Kanongata'a AnahilaANAHILA KANONGATA'A (Labour): Fa'afetai e te Mana Wakawā. It is an honour and a privilege to stand to contribute in this Budget debate. The Wellbeing Budget is a balanced Budget with support for today and building for tomorrow. I want to acknowledge the leadership of Grant Robertson as the Minister of Finance. I've heard a lot of talk thrown around this House and I feel that I need to remind this House that in 2019 Grant Robertson led the Wellbeing Budget—the Wellbeing Budget which was incorporated from advice from experts like the Government's Chief Science Advisor. I want to say it again: this Budget is a balanced Budget. It is about support for today and it is about building for tomorrow. The cost of living: I spoke to Ramona Durie. She's a budgeter in Papakura and I asked her what she thinks of the $5 co-payment. She said—and I quote—that not only would it help me with her medication or her with her medication—I'll just get my English correct. It's Samoan Language Week so I might flip-flop around that—just like the National Party leader flip-flop. Anyway she said to me that it will benefit her as a person who receives medicine and the people who come to her for budget advice. That's the $5 co-payment. What she also said to me was Do you realise that the free public transport for under-13s and the half-price for under-25s is going to add more money into families' grocery budgets?" I said "Is that right?" and she said "Yes that is right." She said that that was what she liked about this Budget because it speaks to the people she sees every day for budgeting. I was also out in Ōtaki and there was a person there—and I'm still talking about the leadership of Grant Robertson which brings me to the winter energy payment. I was at Ōtaki and a pensioner there said to me "Thank you for the winter energy payment. It's doing a lot but can we have that all the time"—so listen up that's something that we might do—"because it makes a huge lot of difference?" For the leadership of Grant Robertson throughout the country we were in Mana with the Minister for Pacific Peoples the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance where he delivered a speech on the Budget to share with the Pacific people of Mana. When he finished talking about the Budget one of those people said "Actually I had a lot of questions to ask but you have answered them all." That tells me that our Minister of Finance is correct in what he talks about with regard to our Budget priorities where he talks about lifting opportunities for Māori and Pacific people. I want to move now to the Prime Minister the Rt Hon Chris Hipkins. I want to move to him to share with you what I experienced in Beachlands. Beachlands is part of Papakura. I went along with the Minister of Education the Hon Jan Tinetti where they have opened up this school wing that houses a lot of students who told me about that. What they said was that they wanted to acknowledge the Prime Minister now who was then the Minister of Education because under his leadership these schoolchildren were so proud to talk to us about their school. I was honoured to be there. There was a whaea there. Her name was Zaelene Maxwell Butler from the local iwi Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki. She named that school block—which under the leadership of our Prime Minister who was then the Minister of Education—Kāpia which is the kauri gum. She named it after that and then she talked about the history of kauri and Beachlands and she talked about that. Our investment in teaching Māori local history in our schools—from that moment the penny dropped for me. Those students who will be using that classroom will learn about the history of their school and will learn about the local Māori of their school. Leadership is about judging people on what they did in the past. Past behaviour is an indicator of future behaviour and we see what we see in just over a hundred days with the Prime Minister the Rt Hon Chris Hipkins leadership that we can rely on in tough times unlike the other side who are flip-flopping away."