King Colin: General Debate 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
King Colin: General Debate 
[Sitting date: 18 July 2012. Volume:681;Page:3640. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
COLIN KING (National—Kaikoura) 
: 
 I must reply to the Green member and say that when it comes to economic rationale it is a frightening thought for all New Zealanders to consider the economic stupidity that would result from a Greens-Labour Government. It is very illogical to be able to stand in the House here when you just talk about some of the things that the Opposition would do to this country’s economy. It would bring in place a capital gains tax it would charge people for water it would increase the emissions trading scheme it would increase the personal tax rate and it would cap the number of dairy farmers. We have heard from the other side of the House that those members would reverse the Crown pastoral lease laws and they would use the tenure review to force farmers to pay more than their good share of what is fair and reasonable.  
But on this side of the House I want to concentrate for my remaining time in this debate on the five positive things that this Government is going to do the targets that it has set. One of them is reducing long-term welfare dependency. When we stop and think about that that is going to be a very positive step because the sooner we can get people off living on handouts the more positive they will be and the more potential they will realise. It is very important that we have to reverse the mentality that was instilled into the population of New Zealand over the 9 years of a Labour Government.  
We will do more to support vulnerable children. We will make sure that 98 percent—an aspirational target but a positive one—of children go to early childhood education. When you stop and think of that it will set them up to realise their potential get into the compulsory education system and be very successful. Those are just two very positive thoughts that we are going to be working towards.  
By 2017 we aim to have 95 percent of our children fully immunised by the age of 8 months old. You hear a lot about reverting back to Third World health conditions but the standard of immunisation under Labour was as low as 67 percent. A really worthwhile goal on this side of the House is to ensure that we do everything to prevent those preventable diseases.  
We are going to make sure that we reduce the incidence of child abuse by more than 1000 from 4000 down to 3000. That is a very admirable aim to have. There is so much discussion on the other side of the House about why there is not more being done because really nothing was done over their 9 years. There was a lot of talk; very very little action. We are very pleased on this side of the House that we have got a Minister for Social Development who has commenced the white paper process. We have come to a stage now where there are many thousands of submissions to be heard. They will all be read individually and what will come out at the other end is a very unified thought about how we approach this very difficult situation.  
But what is more we are talking about boosting skills and employment. The rest of the OECD is troubled with the levels of unemployment for those between 18 years old and 25 years old. One of the major aims on this side of the House is to ensure that those at the age of 18 leave with the necessary level of education—National Certificate of Educational Achievement level 2—so that they can realise their potential. That has been identified because on the very fundamental basis of it if you want to be able to realise your potential and to be able to move across various fields whether it be trades or university you need that independent ability to be able to learn extramurally. I see that as a very important aim to have. We want 55 percent of our 25 to 34-year-olds to be achieving at level 4 and above. That is very important too because we are in a world today competing with all the other people in the many other countries.  
We are doing remarkably well but this Government is determined to do better. So it is a wonderful privilege to be on this side of the House with a Prime Minister of the nature and calibre of John Key.