SpeechHon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (National—Northcote): It's great to be back here for the 52nd Parliament. I admit it could have been greater to be back here but here we are and every question time I think it's just getting better and better and more enjoyable.I just want to congratulate you on your assent to the deputy speakership Madam Deputy Speaker. You were an excellent ministerial colleague and you achieved a lot over your nine years of service as a Minister and I'd ask you also to pass on our congratulations to the new Speaker. We're enjoying his firm rulings and his simple punishments and I think it is going to be a very—Chris Penk: And his mild deafness.Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: And his mild deafness actually in the left ear—considering we are to his left here.But I was having a flashback actually during question time today because it took me back to 30 years ago when believe it or not Kelvin Davis and I for two years played in the same rugby team. I was the hooker and the Acting Prime Minister was the blindside flanker. But it soon became apparent that Kelvin wasn't going to be able to remember the lineout calls so by year two we were moving him up to prop and that was really where his forte was: head down bum up not thinking too much and just pushing. When you saw Kelvin today—Mr Davis—Hon Tracey Martin: I raise a point of order Madam Deputy Speaker. It's been a longstanding tradition in this House that you have to address members by their full names and this is the Acting Prime Minister.Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Well I called him Mr Davis.Hon Tracey Martin: You called him Kelvin".Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Well I said "Kelvin—Mr Davis". Come on Tracey. Anyway I will do that. When I saw Mr Kelvin Davis there today having Grant—Mr Grant Robertson—whisper into his ear what was going on it just reminded me that nothing changes. And I can tell you the Acting Prime Minister can try answering questions in Māori but rubbish is still rubbish whether you're speaking it in English or Māori and I think he's going to be thoroughly lambasted in the papers tomorrow. He's probably getting a thrashing on Twitter right now. It was a descent into some sort of absurdist theatre: "Waiting for Kelvin"—waiting for Kelvin to answer. Hon Tracey Martin: Long name—full name.Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: If you don't get that reference it's—"Waiting for Mr Kelvin Davis" to answer. I don't think an answer is going to come because you know in the end all he was being asked was a simple question: will this new Government trust New Zealanders to make up their minds about what's best for them and their families. All Mr Davis—Mr Kelvin Davis—had to say was "No".But it got actually even more absurd. We had a run around the front bench there and then the new education Minister Mr Hipkins was telling us that actually you can abolish national standards but you can use them if you like. So what does that mean? That is incredible. That is completely absurd. What I can tell you is that at my local school Northcote Primary School which my kids attend I've been very grateful to be able to receive twice a year that very clear description of the progress my kids are making. What I can say is that New Zealand parents have appreciated that and Mr Hipkins is now saying he's abolishing that but he doesn't know what he's going to put in its place. He is going to remove that certainty that parents wanted and that's because the education and teacher unions have a big say in what's going on in education. They'll have a hotline straight into Mr Hipkins' office just like the health unions—[Bell rung]—will have a hotline straight into—Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: I do apologise. Wrong bell.Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: That's all right. Withdraw and apologise Madam Deputy Speaker. Just like the education unions every sort of union will have a hotline into every Minister's office on that side.Then we had Mr Twyford. Well he's telling us he can build 100000 houses but the BNZ is actually saying it's going to be a net of 50000 houses. So you can see these guys have put pretty big targets on their backs. We had Mr Robertson before. He was up there telling us about all the things he is going to do. And like the Speech from the Throne Mr Robertson's speech was just dripping with good intentions. But there's no detail there about how any of this is going to be achieved.And I will refer you—and this is the one bit I'm going to read out here Madam Deputy Speaker—to the Leader of the Opposition's amendment to the Prime Minister's address the opening speech by National in the Address in Reply debate. Bill English moved that this be added to the address: "that in the context of the new Government inheriting a strong economy and strong Government books it account for its progress based on the improvements it delivers for New Zealanders beyond the impressive achievements of New Zealand in the last decade;". And we don't want to live in the past but I can tell you it's without question that this Government has been handed a very impressive set of books.We've got unemployment down to its lowest rate in years—4.6 percent. The average wage has grown to $60000 from $46000 nine years ago. Wages are growing ahead of inflation. New Zealand is in an excellent position. And what I'm really concerned about is that the new Government will blow it because they don't have any idea of how the New Zealand economy got to this point. How we got there—it was the sum of a whole lot of small decisions across Government backed up by hard-working New Zealanders who went out each day and did their best to earn a dollar to support their family and make something of their lives.And what I'm really concerned about is that the new Government seems to be under the illusion that it all just grows on trees and it's all there to fritter away. Their policies are very confused. I mean if you look at this free tertiary education that is going to see Kiwi labourers—their hard taxes—paying the tertiary fees of Aussie accountants. And I can tell you what—if you were in Australia and your kids were facing the prospect of high student fees in Australia or free tertiary over here in New Zealand what would you do?Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: I wouldn't do anything OK?Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: You'd send them over here and that—the Deputy Speaker wouldn't do anything but you know what would one do? And exactly: one would take advantage of the largesse of the New Zealand taxpayer. So it's extremely confused.And then the new health Minister—and I congratulate him on his new position. You know he's on the front page of the Herald saying that the new Government is now going to take responsibility for the suicide rate and that he agrees with the Prime Minister that they are going to get suicide down to zero. Now I don't want to make you know too much of this in that this is a very serious and difficult subject but these people are going to find that actually you can talk big in Opposition but you've got to deliver.The new Government has to deliver a whole lot of stuff. They've got to live within their means. They've got to balance the books. They've got to get debt down to 20 percent of GDP. They've got to get the suicide rate down because they've said they will do that. They've got to start building Dunedin Hospital by the end of this term because they've promised to do that.They're also going to cancel charter schools and I think that's a huge shame and I would encourage Labour members to take a break from the union meetings and the local committee meetings and actually go and visit a charter school. That'd be a really good idea. Go to Vanguard Military School in Albany and see the benefits that that delivers for children who weren't having a very good time in conventional schools. I would urge those members to rethink things and go to a charter school and actually consider whether they might find it in themselves—[Interruption]Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! I'm sorry to interrupt the member but I will ask Fletcher Tabuteau that you stand withdraw and apologise. You cannot impute that on another member in the House.Fletcher Tabuteau: I do withdraw and I apologise.Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Well thank you very much. Charter schools—that'll be a very very interesting debate and I would like to be a fly on the wall in the Labour caucus when Willie Jackson gets up and makes the argument for charter schools. It's going to be pretty important I think if we're going to get those young New Zealanders the education opportunities that they deserve.But talking about more confusion what about the Trans-Pacific Partnership? I mean what are they calling it now? "CTTTP" or something like that. I mean it's something. How different is it to the agreement that the Hon Todd McClay through a lot of hard work and negotiation managed to secure for New Zealand? Actually out of 5000 pages there's two pages that are different and they're saying it's substantively different. But I don't know how Labour is going to keep in the Greens and New Zealand First and actually support "CTTPP" or whatever it's called. It's going to be very very interesting.So there are interesting times ahead for this Government. They're full of big talk. I wish them well actually because it's important that New Zealand succeeds. They've been left the books in a great state. New Zealand is making fantastic progress and I tell you what I really hope they don't make a mess of it because from what I've seen so far in question time you'd have to be very very fearful of the track that New Zealand is going to go down over the next three years.But what I want the public to be assured about is that this Opposition—we know those portfolios inside out. And we will be holding the big talkers to account. So it's going to be really really interesting. So I'm looking forward to the next three years and making these guys deliver the outcomes they've promised. It'll be interesting.I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. So I didn't want to you know break my own flow; it was broken enough by various interjections. But look the Hon Tracey Martin—you know it's just a persistent stream of non-witty barrage. And actually I think it's a good time to be able to raise the tone of Parliament. The new Speaker is very keen to do that. I don't mind witty and occasional interjections but frankly that continual spewing out of invective at a high pitch and volume—it just doesn't help debate.Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: I do understand the member's point of order and I would point out to the Hon Tracey Martin first of all that she has changed her seat but secondly there's a very good Speaker's ruling from Deputy Speaker Braybrooke that says that interjections should be rare reasonable and if possible witty. I think it's something like that. So just keep that in mind.Hon TRACEY MARTIN (Minister for Children): I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. Sorry—just about the changing of the seat. Can I clarify—so if I'm on duty do I need to stay in the same seat that I was—Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Well you need to think about your interjections."