Mitchell Clayton: KiwiSaver Budget Measures Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMitchell Clayton: KiwiSaver Budget Measures Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading[Sitting date: 21 May 2015. Volume:705;Page:3819. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First):Just on the point of order that was just mentioned before by Mr Woodhouse I think I will start with the naming of this bill. I think this Government loves to use acronyms that confuse most of us out there in the real world who understand what the real world is about. I have got an acronym here that I think sums up this piece of legislation: the “OMG YOLO #nofuture Bill”. I know everybody back home the younger ones particularly will totally get what I mean because this bill gives no future to our New Zealanders who need this future the most.I have many times stood up in this Chamber and said that New Zealand First is not in the game of opposing bills that the Government puts forward if they make sense. If there is any sense to a piece of legislation New Zealand First will support it.Matt Doocey: Sit down then. Sit down.CLAYTON MITCHELL: Just to that Matt Doocey let me say that we supported the Telecommunications (Development Levy) Amendment Bill yesterday because that makes sense. On this bill however we could not even get a furthest widest-ranging view to conclude that this is good for the future of New Zealand. This bill is absolutely against what this country should be standing up for—the people’s future.In 2006 the Labour Government came up with the KiwiSaver legislation which gave Kiwis a $1000 kick-start incentive to get them thinking about their future. I took advantage of that and I am sure everybody on the other side of the House took advantage of that even if they were not in politics because it made sense to. It does not matter what compounding interest rate you are going to be using there Mr Bayly. Whatever that is whether you want to make it 5 percent under your calculations and say it is going to be only $24000 or whether we are going to be using 10 percent—and let me remind you 10 percent is conservative at the moment when the AMP KiwiSaver investment scheme is averaging out at 16.8 percent at the moment.I know this because I have just changed mine into a bit more of a dynamic fund. It is getting 10 percent so it is going to give you a heck of a lot more even if it is $100000—that is $145000. You are taking money away from Kiwis. It is short-sighted for the future of New Zealand. I have to say Mr Bayly that you justify it by saying that even $23000 is not enough. I dare say that when you retire at 65 years old $23000 will go a long long way.We have heard from people emailing and calling us over the last few days. I would love to say I had got some faxes but we do not have fax machines anymore. We have actually moved into the 21st century.Iain Lees-Galloway: Really?CLAYTON MITCHELL: I do not do the fax thing no Mr Iain Lees-Galloway. My father does and if he could he would send me smoke screens. He does not even text. The point is that we have had Grey Power come and speak to us with some serious serious concerns. This population that we are currently living in is like an hourglass population. There is a very very bulbous population of ageing people at the top a very very skinny working class of people—those who are of the age to work—and a very very large bulbous group of young people coming into the workforce.The point is that we should be thinking long term now. I know Mr Matt Doocey that you are trying to create your perfect life there but this is a very serious curve that we are talking about—[Interruption]—and I apologise to the people at home who just got an earful of me hitting the microphone. But seriously if we do not start thinking about the future and get this Government to rethink this legislation and the way that it votes we are going to have this population who are now currently working starving on the streets with very very little money to support them. I am sure Mr Chair that you have got some investments that would make—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Do not bring me into this.CLAYTON MITCHELL: I apologise. The point is that if we do not think about the future of our New Zealanders now and bring this legislation back into the fold then we are going to have some grave concerns for the future. I had a phone call from a gentleman who is a constituent in Tauranga. He has also contacted the local Minister from Tauranga to put his concerns forward. He was right in the very stages of signing up his three children aged 4 6 and 9 years old to the KiwiSaver programme—we are talking about filling out the forms to get them sent in. But this retrospective piece of legislation which takes effect going back to Thursday of this week stops his ability to get his children signed up. In fact just last week my wife and I were talking about the same thing for our three young children—that we should be thinking about getting them signed up.How many New Zealanders are missing out because of this quick fire from the hip? The Government is shooting down the legislation pulling the carpet from underneath their legs and not giving them the time they require to ensure that they have the means to put that into place. Two years would not be unreasonable. When you look at all the legislation that is coming through now and the 2 to 4 year time period for the implementation of the legislation that would not be unfair. In fact there is an amendment on the Table in the name of Mr Fletcher Tabuteau that actually if it could get support might be a little more palatable than cutting the legs off before we have got the chance to actually speak to it. We strongly hope that this Government reconsiders this motion. To that end we understand the fiscal constraints of any Government. This Government with its bad budgeting over the past 7 years is clearly having some issues with getting the books to balance up so we understand that some cuts need to be made. But it is a zero-sum gain. When you are giving $25 a week to the people who need it the most—and hey look at the end of the day a little bit helps; I do not think it helps enough I think GST off food would help far more of our poor starving and impoverished people than giving them a $25 a week handout. Taxing food to me is just obscene. But at the end of the day the Government has given that and well done for that but taking away from their future is absolutely crazy thinking.I would like Government members to reconsider what they are doing there because if they even thought about looking after the fiscal constraints and reducing the $1000 kick-start to even $500 in 2 years’ time we could probably understand that—decisions need to be made. But what about the uncollected taxes? Again I will give credit to the Government where credit is due: in the latest Budget it has just put $74 million to increasing its ability to actually go out and get the tax that needs to be collected. Twenty-nine million dollars 40 percent of that $74 million is going to specifically target those people who are using their housing schemes their residential properties and that will increase the tax collected.The rest of that money should be going into corporate tax evasion. The very wealthy in this country—we are talking about people who have got hundreds of millions of dollars—are gloating that they pay only 12 to 15 percent tax when the rest of us are paying more than our fair share. And why should we not pay our taxes? We owe it to society. The money that at the moment is sitting in the red is about $7 billion—$7000 million in uncollected taxes and if this Government spent some of that money to go and collect we could actually afford to do both—$25 a week as well as a KiwiSaver kick-start. It makes good economic sense for the now and it makes good economic sense for the future.We do not support this bill in its current form and we would like to see this Government change the way it is thinking about the future of New Zealanders. Thank you.