Maharey Steve: Supplementary Estimates — Imprest Supply Debate 
Maharey Steve: Supplementary Estimates — Imprest Supply Debate 
[Volume:626;Page:21268] 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Minister for Social Development and Employment) 
: 
 Like most members in the House I am pleased to take part in the debate on the Appropriation (2004/05 Supplementary Estimates) Bill and Imprest Supply (First for 2005/06) Bill because if there is one thing that defines why we are here it is this particular debate. It is the debate where we get to talk about how taxpayers’ money will be spent. It means we are charged at this time to say how we have sensibly applied their money to the kinds of issues that make a difference to New Zealanders. After all the whole point of collecting tax is that it is impossible for individual citizens—and perhaps the richest amongst us have learnt that it is even impossible for them—to be able to buy their own hospitals lay down their own roads run their own schools or do all the myriad of things that taxpayers’ money is raised for. 
This is the dividing line between the left and right in politics. On the right people want less and less money because they personally have more and therefore they can do more for themselves. As we move into the “average person” category they realise that if they do not make a contribution through the taxation they will not get the kinds of things that allow them to educate their kids keep them healthy keep them housed keep them fed and get them a job and do all the things that go with a civilised society. 
This election will be very much about that dividing line whereby people come down on the side of how much we will apply to those issues of collective concern and how much we will return to those who already have privilege. “Privilege” as far as the National Party and the ACT party are concerned is its own reward. The more one has the more one will get under the National Party. 
Given that background of why this debate is important I want to applaud Dr Cullen’s Budget. I think it was the kind of Budget that said: “No this intends to be a long-term Government.” It says that we are going to carry on responsibly applying the money we raised from taxpayers to issues that are of concern to them. And what a record! There are 6 years of achievement behind Dr Cullen’s administration of those taxes. He is able to point to growth in every single year above that of the OECD average. He can point to more paid jobs than ever in the history of this country. He can point to having an unemployment rate that is at the head of the OECD—that is 3.9 percent. The only country with a rate lower than ours is Korea at 3.8 percent. Fewer people are now on a benefit by hundreds of thousands than there used to be in this country. I will come back to that point. 
There has been continual investment in issues that matter to New Zealanders and in this Budget Dr Cullen has said that he wants to maintain a strong and credible fiscal stance. In other words he wants to balance the books make sure the chequebook is in good shape and ensure we can pay our way forward so that we do not go back to booming and busting the economy as was done under previous administrations. We will make sure we can pay our own way. Dr Cullen wants to be fair. He wants to include New Zealanders in the good things that are happening. He wants to ensure that every single Kiwi has a stake in this country and that Kiwis know they can get into a house afford their education and have a future here as working New Zealanders and he wants to build the conditions for growth. What a change! 
Dr Cullen wants to build the conditions for growth as opposed to what we saw from 1972 to 1998 when incomes were dropping. People in this country had become so used to things going down they wondered if they could ever go up. Since then they have. The conditions for growth have been set in place and this Budget is about that. There are no bribes no rush of blood to the head and no saying that we will do things that we cannot sustain into the future. This Budget is about carrying on laying the foundations for long-term Government long-term growth long-term prosperity and long-term social justice in this country. That is what this Budget was about. 
Now I have to say that in my portfolios I am delighted at what we are doing. In the social development area I have no doubt that this Budget will do more for people who are on a benefit but it will also make the debate around beneficiaries even more difficult for National Party members. They can fudge and they can change the figures but in the end they will have to face the fact that Dr Brash used to say in his querulous way that the National Party will get the number of people on benefits down from 500000. Then unfortunately for him he discovered the number was not 500000; he was including superannuitants. So he had to stop doing that because he did not want to be caught out on that one. 
Dr Brash then said that National would get the number of people on benefits below 400000. But unfortunately for him we have got it below 400000. So he used to say—and I notice in the newspaper today he is still saying it—that National will get it below 300000. He says it in that querulous baloney-led way of his. I have news for him! There are 298000 beneficiaries now. The number is below 300000. The number of working-age people on a benefit right now is 298000. He says that he will lower that figure in 10 years. He says he will take that figure of 298000—although I am sure it will be lower by the time we have an election because it keeps dropping—and reduce it by 100000 in 10 years. That is 10000 a year. He could do that by doing nothing. Does National have a policy or not? 
What is the point of the National Party policy which is so ambitious that the National Party promises a drop over 10 years whereby in 5 years we have taken the number from a little over 400000 to 298000? Those are the kind of promises one makes when one is 64 years old. Don Brash will be 74 by the time that promise matures—he will be living in Trinidad or somewhere by then on his gains from the Reserve Bank. So that is not a promise at all. 
In the jobs area National tells us that it would get more people into jobs against this Government’s record that shows more people are employed than ever. Don Brash will have more people in employment than ever when we have more than ever in employment. We have fewer people on benefits—we have a 3.9 percent unemployment rate. We have a superb record on this. Who believes anybody else would do better than this Government has after it was left with the deficit of the 1990s? 
Don Brash says he will fire people who are in the public service. Let us put aside nurses and let us put aside teachers whom he might have to get rid of—let us put aside all those people and just talk about core public servants. When I got my job in the tertiary education area I asked the Ministry of Education under the National Government to send me the people who were doing industry training so I could talk about the rebirth of modern apprenticeships with them. Bill Birch had cancelled apprenticeships in 1992 and we had a major problem: we did not have people being trained. So I asked the ministry to send across the people doing the training. One very thin man turned up in my office to inform me that he spent a quarter of his time on industry training. It is no wonder that there was no Modern Apprenticeships scheme. It is no wonder that there was nothing going on in industry training. It is no wonder that we had a deficit in the people trained to do our skills in our factories. It was because there was nobody in the National Government—nobody in its bureaucracy—who was employed to do anything about training. That is why we have a deficit. 
Training cannot be left to the market; if one wants apprentices everybody has to pitch in and do something about it. We do need at least one whole person to get up each day and say: “My job is to do something about training.”—at least one! To have a quarter of a person working on it is a bit low. But that is what National wants to do. It wants to take the public service back to the days when it could do nothing. 
Research science and technology are the driving forces of innovation in this country. Funding has increased by 56 percent since this Government came to power back in 1999. That is the single biggest increase in that budget in the history of funding for science research and technology. Is anybody against that? Does anybody think that is wrong? Does anybody want to say that we should not be driving innovation through science? Does anybody want to have those kinds of things cut—apart from Tariana Turia who does not believe in science anyway? Is anybody against that kind of thing? 
What about housing? The KiwiSaver project and the mortgage insurance scheme are getting first home buyers into homes. What about building State houses lowering the cost of housing and all the innovative partnerships we have running with Abbeyfield and other community groups who are building houses across this country—is anybody against that kind of spending at all? 
I ask members to look at broadcasting. Is anybody against the notion that we should have an independent culture in this country and a strong screen production centre where we are able to produce programmes films and television about ourselves that create jobs and create pride? That is why young people like this country these days. They love the notion that they can get a job have a future and get an education and that they live in the kind of exciting country we get from the cultural policies we have been investing in. Can members imagine Don Brash investing in something that might lead to a CD—if he knows what a CD is? That simply will not happen with someone as boring and as out of date as Dr Brash who would not know Shihad from Pacifier. 
Katherine Rich 
: Neither would Helen Clark! 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: Ms Rich knows who Pacifier is which is good. Helen Clark would know who Pacifier are; actually she knows them personally. This is the debate that divides this House—on this side we will invest in this country; on that side they will not.