Power Simon: Sittings of the House 
Power Simon: Sittings of the House 
[Volume:628;Page:230] 
SIMON POWER (National—Rangitikei) 
: 
 The National Party in Opposition will be opposing this motion because what it tells the New Zealand public and the rest of the members of this Parliament is that this is a do-nothing Government. Dr Cullen has just indicated that if this motion is passed the House is to sit for 87 days in the entire 2006 year. The question that we on the Opposition side of the House ask is: what does the Government intend to do for the other 9 months of the year when it is required to be here for only 87 days during that time? 
This is a soft programme. It is a soft programme because this Government has run out of legislative ideas. It has no programme. It is just reheating the corned beef as it were. This Government knows that its time is limited. It does not want to be subjected to question time. It does not want its legislative programme to be subjected to debate. It does not want any aspect of its programme questioned or queried by the large number of National MPs sitting on the Opposition side of the House. I say to the new National MPs from the last intake that this is the shortest sitting programme we have seen in the years I have been here. 
This is a soft programme from a soft Government that has run out of ideas and cannot confidently—and this is the crucial point—pass legislation through the House. The easiest way to deal with that is not to have the House meet because every time Government members will have to crawl on their bellies to New Zealand First or United Future. Every piece of legislation will be up for negotiation and debate and the Government knows that will not suit its programme at all. Dr Cullen has been on National Radio and said that most of the major changes will be done by way of regulation or policy change and that the Government envisages a very light legislative programme during 2006. That is because the deal has not been stitched up properly. It is because the New Zealand First arrangement is brittle at best. 
We now have so many foreign Ministers we do not know who will stand up to answer a question in question time. We do not know whether Dr Cullen will be answering on behalf of Mr Peters or Mr Goff who is sort of the Minister of Trade but is really doing foreign affairs. We have an Acting Minister of Foreign Affairs who is not answering on behalf of the other Minister of Foreign Affairs. In the meantime that does not matter because Mr Peters is busy wandering around the world and saying he is not bound by collective ministerial responsibility. This Government knows that it cannot get its programme through in any reliable way so it has produced the softest sitting programme for next year that we have seen in this Parliament in the last 7 years. 
Even tonight at 5 o’clock the New Zealand Press Association is reporting just how brittle the nature of the relationship between Labour and New Zealand First is. According to the New Zealand Press Association Phil Goff has chosen tonight to “take a side swipe at Foreign Minister Winston Peters over his comments on Chinese students in relation to New Zealand’s trade deficit with China.” It is reported that Mr Peters did not raise his concerns about the deficit with the Chinese when he met with them yesterday. They were not raised and let us assume for one moment that he was the Minister of Foreign Affairs for that short space in time and that it was not someone else on the Government side of the House at that particular moment in time. It was interesting because Mr Goff also said: “It was also not right for a Foreign Minister to ‘browbeat’ another country about a trade deficit.” 
Whilst Mr Peters is out there representing the Government on all issues except those he disagrees with—which is everything except the portfolio he holds so he has no collective responsibility for anything other than that— 
Hon Bill English 
: I bet he disagrees with it on that. 
SIMON POWER 
: Mr English’s point is right because now there is a disagreement in the area where he does have collective ministerial responsibility. That is so much so that the New Zealand Press Association reported at 5 o’clock tonight: “In another meeting Mr Goff was asked by the Australian Government for an explanation of Mr Peters’ role in Government.” Well we would quite like to know the answer to that too. We are very confused about that at the moment. In fact Mr Goff goes on to say this—and it is not a bad line actually—“Alexander Downer was very keen to know what the new Government arrangement meant.” So are we. We would like to know what the new Government arrangement means as well. So would Darren Hughes and Ruth Dyson; they do not have a clue. I noticed the look of surprise when Dr Cullen rose today in question time and said that he would not be answering on behalf of Mr Peters and that he was in fact the Acting Minister of Foreign Affairs. The Labour back-benchers all looked at each other and said: “Gosh that’s interesting. When did that happen?”. That is exactly what is going on. Mr Peters is operating in a little world of his own while all the conventions around collective ministerial responsibility are left behind. 
But better still Mr Goff has explained: “The situation can be made to work and will work. I think Winston Peters will want to make his third endeavour of performing the role of a Cabinet Minister a success.” So another Minister is saying that Winston Peters’ first two times as a Minister were not a success and he is sure he would like to make his third crack at it a success. So we have a former foreign Minister now a trade Minister overseas with Mr Peters mopping up the mess and bagging him at the same time. 
This Government is brittle. This Government has no confidence in the arrangements it has made with New Zealand First. It will not test a wider legislative agenda in this House and for that reason we are seeing the softest sitting schedule for 2006 in the last 6 or 7 years. This is a do-nothing Government that is not prepared to front in this House and answer the hard questions. It is not prepared to front for more than 87 days in the entire 2006 calendar year—[ 
Interruption 
] Darren Hughes is chipping in. That is a surprise. What is the definition of a marginal seat? A safe seat held by Darren Hughes. So let us just remember that this is a soft programme from a do-nothing Government that does not have the courage of its convictions or the belief that its arrangement with New Zealand First will be able to take the legislative test that this House offers. We will be voting against a Government that has decided in this term to do very little in this Chamber.