Hodgson Pete: Financial Review Debate — In Committee 
Hodgson Pete: Financial Review Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:630;Page:2446] 
Hon PETE HODGSON (Minister of Health) 
: 
 I would like to thank Barbara Stewart for her contribution. I freely acknowledge that in its confidence and supply agreement New Zealand First states its interest in both ends of life in terms of the availability and affordability of health care and it hopes this would be free for children under 6. I acknowledge the member’s ongoing attention to the health of older people to the roll-out of the positive-ageing strategy and to what we need to do to improve home-based support services and so on. I thank her for her interest in those matters. Embraced in that is her interest in maternity services and the Government enjoys her support as it seeks to improve linkages between midwives and primary health organisations and as it seeks to improve data sets still further and introduce a mentoring system for new midwives and so on. 
I give a quick little reminder to the member that my predecessor the Hon Annette King indicated in the election campaign a bunch of moves we will be making in the area of child health and she will have some familiarity with those. They include a newborn hearing screening programme to be rolled out in the course of this term of Government; improved child and adolescent oral health-care especially a bunch of capital investments to be made there; improved child and adolescent mental health services where often there is a shortage of adequate health workers; the preschool wellness check and so on. I enjoyed the contribution from the member and thank her for her support. 
All of the other speakers came from the National Party and it was a bit strange. Mr Ryall who is the nominal health spokesperson began more as a sort of master of ceremonies than delivering a speech. He talked about what would follow about what this person would say what another colleague would say and that verily they would have yet another colleague who would get up and make his or her contribution. Mr Ryall gave us an idea of what we would hear in the future then sat down having said only one other thing and I took significant exception to what that was. It was his assertion that fewer New Zealanders are receiving surgery and elective surgery. Such assertions are wrong. They are simply at variance with the facts. I enjoin the member to try to pay attention to his own credibility and to his own reputation by making sure that he sticks to the facts at least on occasion because from time to time facts ought to get in the way of a good story. It is not OK to say that fewer New Zealanders overall are receiving surgery than was the case 5 years ago. That simply is not true. 
The rest of it seemed like a sort of sixth-form cabaret actually. It was a sort of sing-songy roll-out of some pre-arranged positioning that had been carefully rehearsed in the lobby complete with graphs that could not be seen on radio and complete with what were clearly some well-worked-out lines about the “5½ out of 10” theme. “We’ll play that one at the Minister!” they said to themselves excitedly and breathlessly before they came into the Chamber. I say to members of the National Party health team that they should put in some more practice during their lunchtime because it was not an auspicious beginning. They need to try harder. Let us hear what my view is of Annette King because one of those cabaret players asked me to say what it was. [ 
Interruption 
] 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: The member cannot do that; he knows he cannot barrage like that. 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: I would say uncomplicatedly that Annette King was a hugely successful Minister of Health. She held the health portfolio for 6 years. I do not know of another person who has held that portfolio for 6 years in my adult life; it certainly did not happen in the 1990s. The National Government managed to get through five Ministers of Health in that time. A quarter of its caucus was at one time the Minister of Health and another third of its members were Associate Ministers of Health. We had Ministers Upton Shipley Creech Birch and English and Associate Ministers of Health all over the place since when members opposite have quickened their pace. They have had more health spokespeople in 6 years in Opposition than I can name. They have about five now. 
That is what the National Party is like on health. Its members keep passing the parcel because they cannot get a grip on it and the reason they cannot get a grip on it is that they do not think as strongly as we do on public health. They do not think of the importance of primary health care. They did not mention the following areas. In all of the time they took did we hear anything about mental health? Not a word! Did we hear anything about Maori health? Not a word! Did we hear anything about the Pacific Island communities? Did we hear anything about the determinants of health? We heard nothing. All we got was niggle and scratch about pharmaceutical numbers versus Australia. As if it matters! What matters about that debate is that the Australians spend twice as much as us per head so even if they are doing a little more than us or a little less—Pharmac versus the Researched Medicines Industry Association debate—they are paying twice the amount. We did not hear about that from the National Party. There was an awful lot we did not hear. 
One thing came from Dr Coleman that I would strongly endorse and I thank him for it. He said that obesity is an epidemic and I say to that gentleman: “Right on!”. For the 20 or 30 minutes members opposite had to put their finger on something that matters in health only one of their members did so. That was a rare moment. The next time we have a financial review those members should practise more during the lunch hour. 
Report noted. 
Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.