Joyce Steven: Budget DebateText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeJoyce Steven: Budget Debate[Sitting date: 29 May 2013. Volume:690;Page:10495. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister for Economic Development): I think we have just had a demonstration of why these guys have been on the Opposition benches for so long. Just under 2 weeks ago this Government delivered its fifth Budget and in fact Bill English delivered his fifth Budget. The verdict is in. Budget 2013 has been received by the public as Bill English’s best Budget yet.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! Just one moment Minister. Order! Those who are leaving the Chamber please do so so that we can continue the debate. I would like to hear what the Minister is saying.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Like I said the jury is in and its determination is that it was a resoundingly positive Budget for New Zealand. Actually there have been a number of polls in the last few days that have indeed confirmed that the public have given a resounding endorsement of this Government’s approach to economicmanagement. New Zealanders understand that the Government has performed well in tight economic times.Members on the other side of the House are still road-testing their slogans as to what they believe that they should be saying about the New Zealand economy. I see that their latest one which is being road-tested at the moment after the failure of “all the crises in the manufacturing sector” and so on is apparently the “two-speed economy”—the two-speed economy. Well there is nothing two-speed about the New Zealand economy. The New Zealand economy is doing better than just about most economies in the Western World. The only thing two-speed around here is the Opposition and it has got only two speeds: we have got go-slow on the Labour side and we have got absolutely no-go on the Greens side. That is exactly correct.We are living in a time of two very fundamental changes in the world. The global financial crisis continues to cast a very large shadow over much of the Western World. We see that regularly on our TV screens. We also have another fundamental change and that is a massive transfer of consumer power from West to East. This Government is focused on making the most of that for New Zealand. China of course was our largest export destination in the March quarter of this year and that makes Mr Peters’ latest attempts to grab some publicity even more inexplicable than normal. Over that time—the global financial crisis as well as what is going on between Europe and Asia—New Zealand has also had to deal with the Christchurch earthquakes which are now a $40 billion series of events. The Government’s share of that cost is now $15 billion.Through those challenges the public have seen that we have steered a sensible moderate path between the austerity that we have seen in some countries in the world and the profligacy frankly that we have seen in other countries of the world. In this country there are those on the left who have spent much of the time saying that we should spend more money. Over the last 4½ years we have seen so many examples where they have said: “No you should not cut that. You shouldn’t change that. You should spend more money.” Of course now they are telling us that they would have got back to surplus at the same time. That is probably one of the best Tui billboards that I have ever heard. On the right of course there are those—most of them outside this House—who say that we should have spent less. But in actual fact Bill English has got it exactly right.We are now one of the few OECD countries that will be in surplus next year. Even our friends in Australia are looking at a A$20 billion deficit at the same time. We now have a situation in which New Zealand is currently one of the most successful economies in the OECD. We have had 3 percent economic growth in the last 12 months; the UK 0.3 percent; the eurozone minus 0.9 percent; Japan 0.4 percent; and the US 1.6 percent. And there is good news for New Zealand households because we have confirmed the lowest cost of living increases in this country over the last three quarters since 1999—the last time we had a decent Government in this country.We also have the lowest mortgage interest rates in this country since March of 1965—1965. We have a low cost of living low mortgage rate increases and after-tax wages are continuing to rise faster than the cost of living. And then we come to employment. One of the members over there—I cannot remember his name because I do not think he has stood up since he has had a job—was saying “What about employment?”. Well job numbers are up. The quarterly employment survey says there were 54000 new jobs over the last 2 years. Unemployment is coming down—6.2 percent as against an OECD average of 8 percent.Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga: How much?Hon STEVEN JOYCE: An OECD average of 8 percent. Unemployment benefit numbers are down 13000 from their peak in December 2010. And compared with Australia yes we do still have—Dr David Clark: December 2010 was it?