Barclay ToddTODD BARCLAY (National—Clutha-Southland): It is a pleasure to pick up on a point just raised by the previous speaker Rino Tirikatene about battlers. I thought it was a bit rich for the Opposition to be talking about the Māori Party not supporting battlers in the Māori community when the real battlers are sitting right over there on the other side of the House.I want to acknowledge the Māori Party and Te Ururoa Flavell in particular for the work that he does in his economic development roles right across the country actually—even right down in Southland in the role that he has played as part of the Southland Regional Development Strategy alongside the Minister for Economic Development Simon Bridges and the former Minister for Economic Development Steven Joyce. I think we have hit rock bottom when the Opposition members spend their whole time shuffling around talking about the criticisms they have of the Māori Party and other support parties of the Government and offer no solutions themselves about what they would do. On this side of the House we are talking about the positive growth attributes of each of our regions as a direct and indirect result of Government assistance. But not just monetary handouts which the Labour Party seems to think are the answer to these issues facing aspects of regional New Zealand; it is actually what the Government is doing to help communities help themselves.One particular initiative that I want to spend a bit of time talking about today is the Southland Regional Development Strategy which was one of the major regional growth plans that was announced by Steven Joyce at the end of last year—and Te Ururoa Flavell and Nathan Guy. What they were talking about was actually the contribution that the region of Southland has done itself to try to look at what we do well what we could do better what our opportunities into the future are to diversify our economy and what role the Government can play. So quite uniquely a bunch of about 90 Southland business people got together and developed nine streams of priorities for what Southland's growth priorities should look like over the next decade.The overarching goal is to grow our population by 10000 and to diversify and strengthen our already existing regional development initiatives. What the Government did was come along and say: This is fantastic. You guys are doing a really good job. How can we help? Is there anything we can do to assist you?". The business people of Southland said: "Yep that would be fantastic. We've got a couple of key areas where we can't do it ourselves and we need Government assistance." The first is around aquaculture. So the Government has put in about $900000 over the next couple of years to assist with the research and development of the aquaculture prospects in the southern part of the South Island and that is absolutely fantastic. Sarah Dowie the MP for Invercargill has played a strong role in advocating for that and she is doing a fine role in continuing to drive that project as well.The second is how we can strengthen our growing tourism industry. What the Government has done there is put in about $500000—$250000 of which has gone into supporting the Milford Opportunities Project which is a project that I established alongside the Southland District Council and the Department of Conservation to look at how we can make tourism growth into Milford Sound more sustainable. Last year there were 600000 visitors into Milford Sound 95 buses a day on average not to mention the hundreds if not thousands of free and independent travellers going in and out of Milford to visit the picturesque scenery there. How can we keep that picturesque scenery the way it is for future generations to come and future generations of visitors? So there is a lot of work going on to preserve that and to manage the sustainable growth into Milford Sound.The third area—and I want to acknowledge Penny Simmonds who is the chief executive officer of the Southern Institute of Technology—is how we can continue to grow our international education. Southern Institute of Technology is quite unique in the respect that the average age of its students is much older than many of our other international student providers across the country: usually in their late 20s or early 30s. The unique characteristic is that they do not just come themselves to stay; they usually bring a partner who has opportunities of employment in the district and also children who are supporting the roll growth in our schools.So a couple of those attributes that the Government has decided to focus on in supporting Southland to grow and develop as part of its growth study are going to pay off and are going to have strong dividends. It is down to the vision and the tenacity and the perseverance of a large number of Southland business people and the support of this Government. So thank you very much."