Cullen Michael: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Cullen Michael: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
[Volume:623;Page:18183] 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Deputy Prime Minister) 
: 
 I think that what we have seen today is a very clear contrast between the two major parties in this House. From the Government and from the Prime Minister we saw a broad vision for the future—a Government moving forward with renewed vigour. From the Opposition we saw a repeat in essence of that state of the nation speech at Orewa—the same old same old tired story from a National Party that is narrow divisive crabbed picky and dealing with one part of one issue in terms of the Orewa speech. Nor is it better today.  
Dr Brash spoke in code but the code is easily translated for those of us who have been around for more than a couple of years or so: asset sales social spending cuts tax cuts for the better off and a return to the welfare policies of the 1990s. Those are the policies he remembers from the years when he was middle-aged.  
Members will remember that last year we had Orewa I. Orewa I of course was followed by the loss of his spokesperson on Maori affairs Georgina te Heuheu. Then this year with great fanfare from the  
New Zealand Herald 
 with 
a build-up of at least a week and an almost Oscars presentation - type of approach we had Orewa II. Then within days National’s spokesperson on social welfare Katherine Rich resigned. So there have been two speeches two topics and two spokespeople down the tube. The irony of course is that this year’s speech was a speech about forcing women back into jobs and its immediate result was that one woman lost her job as a consequence of it.  
I have to say to Dr Brash—and I am raiding Oscar Wilde shamelessly—that to lose one female spokesperson may be regarded as unfortunate but to lose two does look like carelessness. And it is. In both cases the policies were formed without proper consultation with the spokespeople. Why? There is a simple answer to that. It is because they were women. Dr Brash gave away in his speech today that fundamentally he does not believe that women are equal to men. Of course—and adding to Oscar Wilde—for National to lose “power” is one thing but to lose “rich” will prove to be another. 
We now have a major Opposition party—the alternative Government it assures us—with no women on the front bench. National is now the “boys’ own” party. It is back to the days when Jim McLay had to be the Minister of Women’s Affairs because it did not have any women to be the Minister of Women’s Affairs. Let us look at what has happened to two of the biggest portfolios. The Opposition spokesperson on social welfare has moved from the front bench to the second row and the Opposition spokesperson on health has moved from the second row to the dimmest recesses of the third row with Dr Hutchison. When Dr Hutchison takes one step to the left he falls out into the division lobby. That is how far back health is in terms of National’s priorities. 
I want to congratulate John Key on his long overdue promotion—at least that is his view of what it is. I want to tell him that he should not settle in. He should keep most of the pens and stationery in his office because the chances of his staying there are not very large. The life expectancy of Opposition front-bench people in the National Party is very very low. There are seven of them there now but behind them there are eight of them who have been on the front bench—out of a caucus of 27—and seven of those eight within the last 18 months. On the Labour Party side six members of our front bench have been here for over 10 years and I am very very confident that some of us will be here a lot longer yet. 
What caused the latest National disaster? What was Dr Brash’s great and stirring message? He said: “We must reduce the numbers of people on benefits.” This Government has reduced them by 100000 in 5 years. His bold target was: “We should aim to reduce them by 100000 in 10 years.” We have done it in 5 years. It is a bit hard to work out what the criticism was at that particular point. He then said: “We must get beneficiaries into jobs.” We have got more than 200000 extra people into jobs under this Labour-Progressive coalition Government. He then told people that when their youngest child reaches the age of 5 they would have to do community work or get a job—be forced into it. If they tried to have another child to stop that happening they would have to get a job even earlier—so presumably they would have to take their child along to the job with them. It has all been tried before. 
Why did he state the latter? When National did this previously some women did have another child when the youngest child reached about 4 in order to avoid being forced into paid employment. Now they have been threatened with being forced into a job when the youngest child is 1 or 2 or whatever it may be. It is an expensive useless counterproductive proposal—lots of money creating non-jobs to pretend something is being done about the social welfare system. 
I have to say to Dr Brash—and this is probably the unkindest insult I could give him—that even Rob Muldoon used to give a better speech at Orewa about the state of the nation than Dr Brash has managed over the last 2 years. We heard some extraordinary things in the former Reserve Bank Governor’s speech today—the cracklingly dry Reserve Bank Governor. He said that he now supports homeownership. When he was the Governor of the Reserve Bank he was notorious for bursting out into a hot flush every 3 months while attacking New Zealanders’ obsession with homeownership and saying that we should not have so many people owning their own homes. He now says that he is in favour of homeownership. 
He also said today that he is in favour of inflationary wage growth. He said today that wages are not growing fast enough. My God when Dr Brash was Governor of the Reserve Bank scarcely a week went by without him saying: “You put those wages up I’ll put your interest rates up my boys—don’t you dare move in terms of wages.” He then said that he wants a loose fiscal policy. He said the Government has been operating too tight a fiscal policy and that we should loosen up. Imagine that from a former Governor of the Reserve Bank! Only 2 weeks ago Mr Key put out a press statement saying that I was operating too loose a fiscal policy and putting too much pressure on interest rates. 
Nevertheless National would cut taxes. If fiscal policy is too loose and National is to cut taxes there is only one bit of the equation left—there would have to be savage cuts in expenditure at that point. But do we hear from the National Party what the expenditure cuts should be? No. National say that the nanny State is too big but which bits of nanny will be chopped off—her legs her arms her head or whatever it may be—is not explained to us because of course it is politically bad to tell people that that would mean cutting health education pensions police and all the major areas of Government expenditure because we cannot nickel-and-dime our way to big expenditure cuts by abolishing the Ministry of Women’s Affairs. I have to tell Mr Key that that just does not add up to a real tightening of fiscal policy. 
It is now only a matter of time until Bill English does a John Howard or a Kim Beazley. He must be looking across the Tasman. I see Wayne Mapp rolling his eyes but he might get back on the front bench for another 3 months if Bill English came back. All the soufflés may keep rising again and again and again on the Opposition benches one after the other. My advice to Bill English is to wait breathe deeply and this time wait until after the election. Dr Brash deserves to lose it. Bill English should not take the blame this time round as he did last time. 
I will contrast that with the Government’s record. In the last year growth has been the second best in the OECD and one of the very best over the last 4 or 5 years. We have been catching up on the pack although one would not think that from Dr Brash’s many speeches. Unemployment is down to its lowest level for 18 years and crime is down to its lowest level for 21 years. There is a connection between those two which the National Party may not understand. Get people into jobs and off the streets get them feeling part of society and crime rates will come down. It is a more positive thing than just keeping on locking everybody up for as long as we possibly can. 
We have seen health waiting lists come down. We have seen the expansion and development of the primary health organisations. The fact is that health as an issue of major concern rates quite low on the opinion polling which is remarkable because it is nearly always in the top two or three in most Western countries. 
What is the programme? Members should listen to what has been said today. There are major initiatives on private savings coming up in this year’s Budget. What will National’s answer be to that? “Give them a tax cut!” That will not actually lead to more private savings. The Government has announced changes in taxation to help business. There will be benefit reform in terms of the single benefit and a simplified structure being progressed. 
We have announced initiatives in terms of early intervention programmes to really start to reduce the long-term causes of crime and in forms in tertiary education to ensure that we are getting better value for money and that the money is going in the right direction. What is the answer to that? It is: “Let’s concentrate on those women on the domestic purposes benefit who have four children and somehow or other our growth rates will catch up with those of Australia.” If people believe that they will believe anything.