Hayes John: Debate on Budget Policy Statement 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Hayes John: Debate on Budget Policy Statement 
[Sitting date: 13 March 2013. Volume:688;Page:8490. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
JOHN HAYES (National—Wairarapa) 
: 
 Twenty-six years ago that last speaker’s leader was part of a Government led by one R D Muldoon who took this country to the top of a financial cliff. If we listen to what he said this afternoon in this House it is clear he wants to take us back to the days of a command economy: “We’re going to run railways. We’re going to put plastic on wires. This is what we are going to do.” Well I am really sorry but since you have come down from Auckland you seem to have— 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Order! 
JOHN HAYES 
: Since the member has travelled down to Wellington from Auckland he seems to have lost touch with the fact that in this economy the Government sets the rules for everybody to operate under equally. The Government is not meddling in the business community; it will not do that. 
Let us go back to 2008 when this party the party led by John Key came to power. At that point New Zealand was struggling out of a recession because we discovered when we got into power that actually the recession had been going on for 2 years before that. Guess how it was camouflaged? The then Government which that member’s leader was a party to was busy employing more and more civil servants using borrowed money to do it and camouflaging what it was up to. We did not know it at the time back in 2008 but we were soon to be hit by the devastating Christchurch earthquakes. That member says: “Oh yes but if it wasn’t for the earthquakes your economy wouldn’t be moving forward.” I have to say to you that that is nonsense. Where does the $30 billion come from that is repairing the damage from those earthquakes? It is substantially from taxes. This was absolutely unexpected expenditure. 
Although the global economic situation remains uncertain at best—and I make that judgment having been to Europe late last year and I could see what was going on there—here in New Zealand we are making really good progress. The economy is growing and we are on track to surplus by 2014-15. Business confidence is improving and our companies are becoming more competitive. [ 
Interruption 
] Come to Metalform in Dannevirke. I have told you about them before. Metalform exports locally produced wheelchairs that sell in the States for US$25000 each. It is selling wind-generator motors into Turkey and doing all sorts of interesting things. 
Wages are growing and inflation is low. Net household disposable income is around 20 percent higher than it was 4 years ago. Compared with mid-2009 over 60000 more Kiwis have more jobs although I agree that the unemployment rate is still too high. Interest rates are at 50-year lows and I am old enough to know that and households are saving more. In Christchurch there is $30 billion on the rebuild which is well under way. Over the past 4 years the Government has embarked on a huge range of sensible economic and fiscal management options like investment in infrastructure like rebuilding the Rimutaka hill road. 
 We have identified the ingredients needed to attract the productive investment required to support jobs and higher incomes and help families get ahead. Your command economy Mr Williams will not do that. We have chosen a moderate but a persistent pace of change that has allowed us to take the community with us. Furthermore this year the Government is going to move to make significant changes to the Resource Management Act it is going to introduce new housing policies and it will implement a new framework for water management. 
There has been criticism of the Government in the House this afternoon. What I can say is that it has come from people who were not at the Central Districts Fieldays because if they had been there they would have found amazing resilience amongst our farming communities despite the drought. If you talk to any of the businesses that were selling there you will find that they came away by and large with record sales. 
The drought is going to have an impact in my electorate. It is probably going to knock incomes by about 20 percent. About $60 million of that will be from the Tararua district about $60 million of it will be from the north in Central Hawke’s Bay and about $60 million of it will be from the south around Masterton. 
Andrew Williams 
: A resilient economy would be growing anyway. 
JOHN HAYES 
: I know that the New Zealand First Party has no support or contacts there so I am bringing this to the House for your information so that you know a little bit about some parts of New Zealand other than Auckland. 
I am really impressed by the resilience of businesses in my electorate. I was in Oringi on Monday—you would remember the freezing works there closed. There are now more people employed at the old Oringi works than there were in the days of the freezing works. There are more people employed because they have set up a whole lot of businesses there. Look at Fonterra. It is about to expand its operation in Pahiatua creating 300 new jobs. There are brilliant things happening in my electorate. There is forestry. On Monday night I was driving down here from Dannevirke and what did I pass? A huge train carrying logs from my electorate through to Napier. These things—getting our logs on to rail and off roads—are very good. Yes it would make a lot of sense to have more forest being processed in my area but we are up against the Greater Wellington Regional Council which is busy trying to sell off forest-cutting rights because it is broke. When it took the South Wairarapa forests it had no debt and now it has a $16 million debt. That is an absolutely terrible outcome for a facility that was given to it without any debt at all. We need to keep those assets in our communities. We need to attract foreign investment to grow jobs. It is important to point out that the labour market is very dynamic. Every year in New Zealand there are around 250000 jobs created and 250000 lost. There are a number of indicators as to what is currently happening in the New Zealand labour market. All the surveys point to job growth. 
This is a very good Budget. I congratulate the Minister of Finance and John Key on leading us through these very difficult economic circumstances very sensibly and very stably into new calmer water. I can tell you that we are doing better than any country in Europe— 
Andrew Williams 
: It’s called a stagnant pond. 
JOHN HAYES 
: —as we go forward with this economy. We are doing better than Japan and we are doing better than the US. I am just disappointed that the member from New Zealand First does not have the intellectual capacity to understand how well this economy is growing. Thank you.