McClay Todd; Mallard TrevorHon TODD McCLAY (National—Rotorua): Mr Speaker thank you very much. As we sit here considering the headwinds of a slowing economy; as business confidence is at levels almost as low as we saw during the global financial crisis; when the Prime Minister has said that she doesn't pay a lot of attention to business confidence she looks more closely at consumer confidence—we've also seen consumer confidence start to fall in New Zealand—and when respected commentators analysts and economists are talking about concern around the economy the Government just does not have a plan. The New Zealand Institute of Economic Research today have come out and said that actually businesses are finding it almost impossible to pass on costs in the economy; these costs have been generated by Government policy over the last two years. We have ANZ coming out and talking about lower growth rates in our economy and the many many challenges that we start to face. With all of those things going on as Kiwi businesses are doing it tough—they're having to go to work and work out how they continue to employ people how they find the workers they need to make sure their businesses can grow when there are opportunities to grow—the Government does not have a plan. Indeed the questions today from my colleague Stuart Smith to the Minister of Immigration about how visas are being processed so that tourists can visit New Zealand in a timely fashion or so that workers can be employed by businesses that need their skills and otherwise were rarely met with any understanding from the Government of the great hardship and problems that their lack of policies and lack of a plan is causing for New Zealand businesses. On Monday the National Party launched our economic discussion document—more than 40 pages looking at the New Zealand economy and looking at areas that we can make changes in that will support New Zealand business will help New Zealanders into work and those working to earn more and to help grow the economy. The reason that we need to grow the economy is so that more can be provided by the Government for New Zealanders—the things that they demand and they deserve. Of course we've heard a lot from the Government about wellbeing. Wellbeing is important to the degree that it makes people feel better but unless we have a strong economy and growing GDP it's not possible for the Government to spend money on the things that New Zealanders demand and deserve. In a number of areas in this document we have laid out areas of commitments—for example to legislate to index tax thresholds to the cost of living. The reason we've said that is Kiwis work very very hard. They deserve to keep more of the money that they earn than the Government would get. Legislating the index of the tax thresholds to the cost of living means that New Zealanders will get to keep much more of what they earn. We will progress work on the overhaul of the Resource Management Act—an area of policy that holds back so many Kiwis and businesses and just ramps up cost. Actually what New Zealand needs at the moment is a Government that is looking for ways to reduce costs and bring them down not to increase costs on them. One of the things we've committed to is to light a regulations bonfire—to go out and to find regulations that are not needed that actually are not working that are putting costs upon New Zealand businesses and everyday New Zealanders and to get rid of them. We've said that in the first six months in office we would get rid of a hundred. At the same time we would look to change across the public sector their view of regulations. Actually when there's a problem more rules and more regulations won't necessarily fix that. Until that culture has changed we have said for every new regulation that's brought forward two need to be taken away. Here's an example of a few that actually make no sense—the owners of a bus depot structure that has no walls are forced to install four exit signs just in case people can't find their way out of that bus stop. Well there you have it—a regulation that costs a lot more and that actually is not needed. The owner of a rural property had to spend $30000 putting in a driveway and a water tank to meet fire requirements. The tank was at the back of the house when the house caught fire the fire chief would not drive his truck past the house to the tank in case it caught fire. There are many reasons to have regulations—to make sure people are safe and to make sure laws that are adopted by Parliament work. But there are so very many regulations that are unneeded. In fact it's not possible to be told exactly how many regulations there are in New Zealand. We have said that to help businesses large and small we will focus on regulation. We want less regulation not more. We want better regulation not just more regulation and we will light a regulations bonfire. SPEAKER: Order! The member's time has expired.