Hughes Darren: Third Readings 
Hughes Darren: Third Readings 
[Volume:632;Page:3876] 
DARREN HUGHES (Labour—Otaki) 
: 
 Well has this legislation not shown the true colours of the National Party? Whenever the tough issues come before it and whenever the pressure becomes a little too much National wimps out. There are many different parts to this local government law reform legislation—now split into many different bills—as we have seen throughout the process of debating it that show us exactly what National is really like. We have talked a lot about microchipping and I will come to that shortly. But let us take one of the matters that has not received a lot of attention in the House. 
We are to pass the third reading of the Land Transport Amendment Bill which amends the Land Transport Act of 1998. That bill brings in some provisions around transit lanes. On the North Shore of Auckland there has been a bus transit lane for 23 years. It has been a way of ensuring that public transport is promoted and that those who take public transport to work or to their place of study are given priority in the traffic flows. The council quite sensibly tried to enforce that provision—to make sure that people who were not entitled to be in the lane did not use it. There are other areas around New Zealand where such lanes are used as well and where a driver with two or more passengers in the car can use a priority lane in order to encourage people to car-pool. 
The National members of Parliament from the North Shore went to the Mayor of North Shore City and can members guess what they told him? 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: What? 
DARREN HUGHES 
: They said they would support that bill in Parliament. They said they would support priority being given to transit lanes and would make sure that they got their fair share of funding in Parliament. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: Did Maurice say that? 
DARREN HUGHES 
: Oh no—not Maurice Williamson! My colleague asked whether that came from Maurice Williamson a member of Parliament who has been here for some time—the old warhorse of the National Party whose shameful conduct around Paraparaumu Airport was under the spotlight again in question time today. No it was the big flash North Shore MPs—Dr Wayne Mapp the Hon Murray McCully and Dr Jonathan Coleman—who were all tough at home to the Mayor of North Shore City telling him not to worry and saying they were good local MPs. They said they would go to Wellington and support the legislation. 
But what happened? Maurice Williamson got hold of those members and said: “No no chaps. There’s room for politics here. There’s a bit of pressure on here. Let’s do the old National Party wimp-out routine and when the bill comes before Parliament we will vote against it—we will vote against the transit lanes.” There is a word for that; I ask Mr Okeroa what that word is. 
Hon Mahara Okeroa 
: The truth. 
DARREN HUGHES 
: That is right. That is the way those North Shore National MPs behaved—and boy will they have some explaining to do to the Mayor of North Shore City George Wood! 
Then we come to the microchipping issue where National conveniently forgot it had joined with 109 members of Parliament in 2003 to support not just one measure on dog control but many measures on dog control—many many measures; a whole suite a whole package of things we could do to try to give the community reassurance that we were taking the issue seriously. Why did we have to do that? We had to do that because when there were all those dog attacks against children the National MPs could not wait—they were falling over themselves—to get to the meeting we had at Bowen House with some of the families of the victims of those attacks to show how concerned they were about dog attacks. Some of the National members can burst into tears at the drop of a hat and sure enough at the meeting that is what they did. I was at the meeting and I saw National MPs ingratiate themselves and say they would join together with other parties and get tough on dog attacks. Do members know that at that meeting the National members said we had to get the politics out of the issue? I mean do some things not make one sick? Now as soon as a bit of time has elapsed and there is some wiggle room those members cannot wait for the politics. 
The National members try to paint the situation as being one where one measure by itself would stop dog attacks. How ridiculous is that? No one has ever argued that. If we took just one measure on its own out of the whole suite of measures we had we would find none of them would do that. This Parliament has voted to ban some people from owning dogs if they are proven to be irresponsible dog owners. That is one of the measures we took. Will that on its own stop dog attacks? Of course it will not. But we did that because we were building things together to make sure we had a sensible approach to the issue. 
How many times in the last Parliament did over 100 MPs vote together on the third reading of a bill? Only on a handful of issues—only a handful of times—and dog control was one of them. But when the pressure came on the National Party members they wimped out. They could not stand and hold together a decent argument. If they cannot do that in Opposition how on earth could they ever stand the pressure if they were in Government? Every time someone came to them and said he or she was a bit unhappy about something they would buckle under the pressure and say they would unpick everything. They do that while they are in Opposition but how could they do that in Government? 
Sandra Goudie 
: Oh rubbish! 
DARREN HUGHES 
: The fact that it is only Sandra Goudie who says “rubbish” tells me a lot about the point I am trying to make. 
If we sadly—and I hope it does not happen—have another spate of attacks by dogs on children there had better not be one Tory MP who gets up and says the Government has to address the issue. When the pressure was on back in 2003 the National MPs were full of bravado when the problem was there. They had part of the solution: we were all going to hold hands together and do something about dog control. Now that we have gone through a period where thank goodness children have not been attacked in large numbers by dogs so the pressure is not on in that regard the National Party members bow to other pressure they are under from outside this Parliament and that tells people a huge amount about them. 
The most important part of this legislation—I will get to John Carter later on—was hardly talked about by the National Party members throughout the debate. They spent 3½ hours talking about one part of the dog control legislation: microchipping which is just one part of our suite of measures. But how long did they talk on the most important part: the rates rebate scheme? They spoke for 20 minutes about 300000 low-income people receiving a rates rebate and for 3½ hours on one part of the dog control measures. As Sandra Goudie yaps away it becomes clearer to me why those members sit over there on the Opposition benches. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: She must be in pain! 
DARREN HUGHES 
: I do not know about that and I do not think any of our measures could assist in that regard. But the most important thing we are doing is to increase for the first time in 30 years the threshold around the rates rebate—a fantastic measure for people who live in this country. Can members guess who opposes that? The New Zealand National Party. The National Party opposes us helping 300000 low-income New Zealanders. 
John Carter is presently National’s spokesperson on local government and interestingly enough Sandra Goudie has just had to check with John Carter as to whether National is supporting the rates rebate scheme. That is how informed she is about the process. Despite the fact that she sits on the Local Government and Environment Committee and did so during the previous Parliament she did not even know what the National Party’s position was. That just sums up those people. Anyway John Carter got up last night and told us one of his long rambling stories. He said the reason National had to oppose the rates rebate being increased from $200 to $500 a year was that it would impose costs on local government. I ask Mr Carter: who imposed the costs on local government caused by the microchipping changes that the National Party made on Wednesday night? Which party made sure that councils throughout New Zealand will have to go around their areas to find out which dogs are working dogs? What costs for local government could there be from what John Carter has done in that regard? 
The second point John Carter made in his very thoughtful contribution was that there was a cost in administrating the rates rebate scheme and that that was why the National Party had to vote against it. This of course is the rates rebate scheme that has been going for 30 years 18 years of which the National Party was in Government. Throughout the majority of those 18 years did National say it should abandon the rates rebate scheme because it was too much of a cost on councils? Oh no no. Those members are grasping at straws in looking for reasons to oppose a policy that will help 300000 people. 
On our commitment card at the last election we put down as one of our top priorities being able to increase the rebate from $200 to $500 a year. That will help lots of pensioners in our country and people on a fixed income who are trying to make their dollars go as far as they can—and not many people in the National Party would know about that. We are proud to support that policy; we are proud to have campaigned on it. That policy will make a difference for lots of nanas and poppas across New Zealand and for those on low incomes as well. It is to the eternal shame of the National Party that it will vote against this legislation which will help out all those people whom it claims to be so concerned about. It really is typical of National that it focuses on the trivial is juvenile and spends time on things that will make us giggle a bit. But when it comes to really substantial issues such as putting 500 bucks a year in the hands of poor pensioners the National Party does not know its position—that was pretty clear—and then spends 20 minutes debating it before coming up with the most pathetic reasons for opposing it that there could possibly be. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: What did National do for the pensioners when it was in Government? 
DARREN HUGHES 
: Well National had a close relationship with pensioners when it was in Government. One has to have that when one is booting people in the guts like that. National cut the pension three times on people when it was in Government. We came to Parliament with a proposal to put 500 bucks a year in the pockets of those people in order to help them to pay their rates and the National Party said no that should all be hoovered up so that it could give tax cuts to its rich mates. That is an absolute disgrace. 
This debate has been about rates rebates and there is a website where people can check out their eligibility for them. It is www.ratesrebates.govt.nz and it is far more important than a lot of the puerile nonsense we have had to put up with from the National Party these last few hours.