Bakshi Kanwaljit Singh: Debate on Crown Entities Public Organisations and State Enterprises — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBakshi Kanwaljit Singh: Debate on Crown Entities Public Organisations and State Enterprises — In Committee[Sitting date: 14 May 2013. Volume:690;Page:9899. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]KANWALJIT SINGH BAKSHI (National):The Commerce Committee reviewed the annual report of Mighty River Power. Mighty River Power had a total revenue of $1.5 billion in the year 2011-12 with an after-tax profit of $67 million. The Office of the Auditor-General issued an unmodified audit opinion which was very good and no improvement was required.I would like to share a quote from Baroness Margaret Thatcher: “The trouble with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.” This Government does not believe that it should keep on borrowing money from overseas volatile markets and persist in adding debt to our future generations. We are doing better than other countries but even in New Zealand over the next 3 years the Government’s net debt will be about $70 billion up from $10 billion 4 years ago. The debt is growing and we cannot afford for that to continue to happen. This is the formula of the Opposition parties towards growth but not for this Government.In 2011 when the National Party went out to campaign for the general election it was made clear that we would sell minority shares in some of the State-owned entities. We also made it clear that the Government would hold the majority shareholding and would not lose the control of these entities. Every 3 years at the election the public gives a mandate to the policies of the party that they think is in favour of the country and such a mandate was given to the Prime Minister John Key to form a Government to govern this country and implement this policy.What this Government is doing is rearranging its assets. It is investing the rearranged money in hospitals schools and infrastructure.Let us talk about the Mighty River Power share float. One hundred and thirteen thousand investors secured the opportunity to invest in Mighty River Power making this the largest share registry on the New Zealand Exchange. Over the weekend I met a young entrepreneur who was very excited that his family went together for their applications which were all accepted. He told me that his family had invested about $40000 as they felt it was safe to invest in that company in comparison with the private finance companies.Another interesting fact I would like to share with this House is that apparently 77000 investors did not have a common shareholder number which indicates that they all were first-time investors. This Government has given an opportunity to small investors who have small savings and want to invest but do not feel it is safe to invest anywhere else. This is one of the opportunities for such small investors to invest in companies that have track records.The Government has banked $1.7 billion which will be invested in a Future Investment Fund and we do not have to borrow this money. Let me reiterate: the Opposition does not have any plan for economic growth. The National Government led by the Prime Minister is focused on attracting new investments and that will benefit this country whereas Labour and the Greens have plans exactly opposite to this.