Coleman Jonathan: General Debate 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Coleman Jonathan: General Debate 
[Sitting date: 17 June 2009. Volume:655;Page:4373. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Immigration) 
: 
 Well was not that a laughable contribution from the man who thinks he is the leader of the Labour Party! What did we learn from the Mt Albert by-election? All the public learnt from the Mt Albert by-election was that if Labour tries really really hard and has front-benchers out there standing on traffic islands and grinning like fools it can actually hang on to the second-safest seat it has in the country. Phil Goff has plenty of time to wander around the country trying to find people who actually want to talk to him when in fact he has had only two things out of that by-election. The by-election has been a Trojan Horse for Phil Goff because it has brought into Parliament the next leader of the Labour Party. I can tell members that David Cunliffe and Maryan Street are not too happy that Phil Goff has brought in the man who will take over from him. 
The other problem he has now is that he has an albatross around his neck as a result of that: Phil Goff’s man has gone around Auckland saying that he would build a $3 billion tunnel through the middle of Mt Albert and how that will be paid for at the next election is now something that Phil Goff has to explain. All the members have their heads down over there on the Labour side but they know that that is a big big problem for them. There is $3 billion totally promised of unfunded spending to add to the $2 billion a year they are putting into the Cullen fund. 
I tell members that the public of New Zealand want sound economic management. They do not want someone like Phil Goff who will say absolutely anything to get elected; they want someone who will actually get this country back on track. That is why one million New Zealanders voted for John Key at the 2008 election. They had completely lost faith in the Labour Party. They know that that party over there will not be on the Treasury benches for a long time—not until it focuses on what is wrong with the economy in New Zealand. 
The Budget we have just had was a sensible prudent response to one heck of a hospital pass that the Labour Government handed the incoming Government. Quite frankly when one looks at the Pre-election Economic and Fiscal Update one can see that we were looking at a billion-dollar deficit. In December a month after the election it was $4 billion. It has gone absolutely bonkers and quite frankly if we did not have the prudent measures that were put in place in the Budget our international credit rating would have slipped completely. 
These guys opposite would spend spend spend but they have no plan to get us out of economic difficulty and the public do not trust them. Phil Goff can crow all he likes but he has lost his credibility with the public and with his party. The public and the press do not think he is up to it at all. Labour members all sideshows aside can wallow in the gutter and talk about irrelevancies but the bottom line is that the public of New Zealand want sound economic management and that is why they are backing John Key. That is why John Key is the most popular Prime Minister in decades—in fact probably in living memory. The public trusts John Key to get this country right. He is the man with the mandate for change and he is making the hard decisions that will get the country back on the economic track. 
When we look at Labour’s record in health care and education it had lost the way. In health care there was no plan to get New Zealanders greater access to services. In education one in five kids was coming out of school not being able to read or write. It is all very well for Phil Goff to grasp at any photo opportunity he can possibly get but the fact is that Phil Goff’s future as the Labour leader is a complete joke. He will not be there. He will never be a Labour Prime Minister. 
Maryan Street can shake her head but she is pretty happy. What she is really worried about is how she and her party can come up with that $3 billion. The public does not like politicians who lie to them and when they find at the next election that Labour has no way of providing that $3 billion those guys will pay for it big time at the polls. 
Mr Shearer is a man of integrity but until Mr Shearer is in that front seat on the front bench Labour will really struggle. Mr Cunliffe is very very unhappy to see Mr Shearer come into Parliament because he knows that he will take the position that he covets. That is the fact of things. That is absolutely what will happen. These guys on the backbench are waiting for Mr Shearer to come in because they have had enough of Phil Goff. He has not proved to be up to it. If all that Labour can take out of these things is the fact that it can hang on to a safe seat the future of the Labour Party is very dismal indeed.