Cullen Michael: General Debates 
Cullen Michael: General Debates 
[Volume:612;Page:8976] 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Deputy Prime Minister) 
: 
 The member mentioned Mr Blair being in some trouble although I gather he would love Mr Blair’s poll ratings at the present time. Mr Blair is in trouble for going to war in Iraq not staying away from the war in Iraq as this Government did. Yet again Mr English tells us that he supported us going to war but he does not support us going to the peace. He always gets it back to front on every issue in terms of both what is right and what New Zealanders believe. 
The other thing I have to say is that I think he is right and has a point. Why we are paying people to lobby the National Party on sensible issues such as with regard to smoking I have no idea because we will never change the minds of people over there on anything sensible and not a single cent should go in that direction any further in my view as Minister of Finance. 
This week the Government celebrates a major anniversary for it—a profound part of our success as a Government. Tomorrow is the second anniversary of the election of Bill English as the leader of the National Party. When he was elected Jenny Shipley was at 14 percent in the polls and when he was first elected he was at 21 percent. He is now down to 7 percent—half of what Jenny Shipley was. When he was elected the National Party was at 40 percent in the polls; it is now down to 29 percent. This man is sort of like Moses in reverse—he is leading the people out of the Promised Land back into captivity. 
Dr Brash starts musing again. For Mr English it is: “To be or not to be”; for Dr Brash it is: “To ‘ACT’ or not to ‘ACT’ ”. Let us recognise some things about Dr Brash. He is the ACT mole in the National Party. I am told on very reliable information that last week he addressed a Greenslades business function in Christchurch; Chatham House Rules but sometimes somebody does not understand what they are. Dr Brash mused on what his tax policy is and he was very specific about his policy. His tax policy is to put GST up to 20 percent to pay for— 
Hon Member 
: Just daft! 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: It is just daft the member is quite right. However it is Dr Brash’s policy to pay for massive tax cuts at the top end of the scale; so people on low incomes will get tax increases so that people on high incomes can get tax decreases. This is the new National Party approach. Dr Brash has made it clear many times that that is his view of what a tax system should be. It should lower taxes for those who are rich— 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: When? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: He said it last week in Christchurch at a Greenslades function. I challenge Dr Brash to come down to this House and say that he does not believe in a GST increase accompanied by big cuts in the top tax rate; and of course he will not. He also gave that wonderful performance at the ACT party conference and that led to Gerry Brownlee getting just a wee bit upset. If Dr Brash is the mole of ACT in the National Party then of course Mr Brownlee has pretensions to be the Toad of Toad Hall as far as that particular institution is concerned. Mr Brownlee burst out and said: “The ACT party is a smorgasbord party.” 
We have to be clear: Mr Brownlee probably knows more about smorgasbords than does any other member of the National Party. So when he said that the ACT party is a smorgasbord party he is probably right. By that he means that the National Party does not have a clue whether it is Arthur or Martha. Is it trying to cuddle up to the ACT party is it moving to the right is it going back to its roots as they always like to say in the National Party or is it trying to get into Government? Is it actually trying to get on to this side of the House and be the Government at which point it has to push the Labour Party out of the centre of politics? 
I have to tell members opposite that it is the centre that decides elections. They are not actually decided on the sort of flaky fringe on the right-hand end of politics the bit where the ACT party is mired at the present time. If a party starts to get its policies written for it by Stephen Franks then it will soon get down to the point where it will have about the same level of support as the National Party. 
Dr Brash says: “With three times the support of ACT we should adopt its policies and this will somehow increase our level of support.” Mr Brownlee says: “Somehow from 20-odd percent we can get enough votes to govern by ourselves.” That is equally ridiculous. So what will National do? Yesterday it could not even have a caucus if the leader was not there. Even the Labour Party can have caucuses when the Prime Minister is away.