McClay ToddHon TODD McCLAY (National—Rotorua): When the Prime Minister stood somewhere in New Zealand and announced that this would be the year of delivery few New Zealanders would have thought the Prime Minister's definition of delivery was in her very next breath to drop all targets around KiwiBuild except that there will be 100000 houses—and I'm sure she whispered We hope"—and then the very next day to also drop all health targets as well. So if delivery means not being held to account not being accountable and actually not doing the things you've said that you will then I think there will be many many more Kiwis who are concerned by this. It's easy for a Prime Minister to stand up and make great headlines but for the people who voted for Labour in the last election because they believed in this KiwiBuild dream who are now told there won't be any houses for them any time soon—but even if there are a few we're not going to count them and tell you about them—well actually they will be disillusioned because the Government is not delivering upon their promises. Simon Bridges our leader went through a very very long list of all of the things they have been promising and talking about that just aren't quite working out. You know we hear about the Provincial Growth Fund and all of the jobs it's going to create—actually they've done one job a day and after 54 days decided to sit down and have a rest sit on the couch because it's created 54 jobs only at a cost of more than $400 million a job. When we have a closer look at where these suggested jobs that the Minister has been talking about are to come from well they're just not going to arrive. They're just not going to arrive because not only is it wishful thinking but you just need to dig into some of the advice Treasury is giving around the Provincial Growth Fund before you realise just how very much trouble it is in. It's very very easy for a Government to spend taxpayers' money—very difficult for a taxpayer to work hard and to earn it—but here's the thing that the Government is going to find: you can't spend that billion dollars twice. They owe it to hard-working New Zealanders to spend it well and that's not happening anywhere at all at this moment. A slush fund—well it's one heck of a slush fund but I guess that's the price the Prime Minister was willing to pay to become Prime Minister. You know when it comes to these things we need to look outward. We're a small country that must trade with the rest of the world. We must trade with the rest of the world. We produce too much to be able to consume here and our economy demands that we are outward-looking and that we are putting our best foot forward. The Prime Minister in her speech mentioned giving up a bipartisan approach to an independent foreign policy and I take absolute issue with that. The Prime Minister's memory is not as short as she is suggesting to New Zealanders it is. Where was their independence through the whole discussion and negotiation of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) when they were out holding up their signs against the best interests of New Zealand? And lo and behold as soon as the election was over they adopted the work that had been done. They said it was so very very different. Well I'm yet to meet anybody apart from the odd troll on Willie Jackson's Facebook page—and you know it's not him writing because the spelling's correct—that actually believes that they went in there and after a moment they changed it all and it's a different agreement.What about the deployment of our troops to Iraq when they came out and said they were against it on that side of the Government and to a man and to woman they were opposed to it? They didn't back our forces. Where was the bipartisanship then? Well I say to the Prime Minister the definition of bipartisanship in an independent foreign policy is not "just go along with anything that the Government says and does". The reason for that is our foreign policy and our trade policy are too important just to leave it up to a whole lot of people that don't like to travel and are becoming amateurs in their approach to our relationship with important countries around the world.I want to just give a few examples of the things that are going on with some of our partners around the world in countries we're close to and the Prime Minister's involvement. Of course she's just been overseas to the United Kingdom. We heard that when there she signed a deal with the UK—negotiated on the spot and signed a deal that the week before Australia had signed. Now it's very important in as far as Brexit's concerned that what the Prime Minister signed said there will be recognition of standards for our exports from New Zealand to the UK in the case of Brexit. But we didn't hear a single thing from her about market access nothing about tariff rates nothing about quotas going into the UK nothing about actually what type of access she is demanding for our exporters in the UK market in a post-Brexit trade negotiation. What we heard were soothing words about something that was going to happen anyway. I guarantee as with much of the TPP that the agreement she signed is exactly the same word for word as the one Australia signed the week earlier. Not so much going on and the important issues to New Zealanders were not dealt with.She then went on to the European Union the EU and announced that there would be a deal of high quality that would make us feel better—comprehensive and progressive—in 12 months. Well I hope she's correct but what we didn't hear from her is one word about market access and what the Government would demand and how they would stand up for New Zealand exporters in the EU market to make sure that we are treated fairly. A deal with the European Union will only be of value to New Zealand if this Government and the Prime Minister can deliver the same that Canada got which is virtually open access for agricultural products to that market.The moment that she returned to New Zealand the European Parliament passed a resolution saying that New Zealand will lose its preferential access for butter and lamb that we've relied upon for 45 years—taken away the moment she left. We didn't hear from her anything at all when she was there about the special tariff rate quotas about lamb about butter—nothing at all—but it sounded good when she was there.As for our so-called very good friends the US the Government should do everything they can to make sure we keep a positive relationship. It is important to us. It's a big trading nation. But the challenge that we've got is that when TPP came in at the end of last year and this Government stood up proudly to claim the work of the last National Government—this is the agreement they protested against—and I called on behalf of the National Party for the Government to do everything they could to get a trade deal with the US or bring them back to TPP the duty Minister at the time Andrew Little angrily scoffed and said "We need to realise how small we are and be a bit realistic. It's all a little bit too hard." Well that type of thinking would never have got the original TPP. It certainly would not have got the revised TPP. But the one thing this Government has delivered with the US is higher punitive tariff rates upon our steel and aluminium exports to the US. The trade Minister said "Well we don't export them very much." but it didn't happen to Australia.Then we come to the important relationship that we have with China. The Prime Minister has been trying to get there for the whole of last year. She is the first elected Prime Minister not to visit China in the first 12 months of her Government since before Robert Muldoon and when the media asked her last year why it was that she wasn't going she said "Scheduling issues are a bit busy around Christmas." Well two things Prime Minister: the Chinese don't celebrate Christmas and I would call it scheduling issues too if I couldn't get a visa. What we've heard this week is that over the last two years the New Zealand Government—both Governments—and the tourism sector have been planning for the China-New Zealand Year of Tourism. Just last year the tourism Minister Kelvin Davis was proudly saying how much it would do to enhance the relationship. Secretly a few weeks ago they took his announcement down from the website—that the Chinese would come to New Zealand to open that year on the 20th of this month. And now we find out it's because China are not able to find a Minister to send here.This is a $30 billion relationship we have with China. It's one of our most important trading relationships. It's as important as any other relationship we have anywhere else in the world and this Government is not working hard to fix it to maintain it and to make sure it works for us. Mark my words: if the Prime Minister doesn't get there as her office has been telling the media in the first quarter of this year—the first quarter of this year—it will be a very strong signal that is being sent about how little attention they pay to that relationship and the failure of this tourism meeting and all the other things we're starting to see will not only be laid at the feet of the Government but at the feet of the Prime Minister. Words are very easy and as the Deputy Prime Minister said "Words are important." The words we need to hear are their commitment to international affairs to make sure that we're putting our best foot forward and that they will deliver for Kiwi exporters."