General Debate

I move, That the House take note of miscellaneous business. I begin by congratulating the Prime Minister on the initiative that she announced this morning in identifying common ground within this House on the issue of the appropriate disciplining of children. I would also like to acknowledge other party leaders in the House for their role in that process. I believe that the solution the Prime Minister has put forward is a sensible one that provides clarity of purpose around which I hope most members can now agree.

In this debate, however, I want to address different issues—the issues of policy, of leadership, and of a fair taxation system. We have been waiting in this House for 18 months, since the last election, for the National Party to come up with a single policy. The country has been waiting, and the country has been showing increasing cynicism about whether the new Leader of the Opposition is all style and no substance, and whether the National Party has any idea of policy direction or where it wants to take the country.

Obviously, the message has got through, because this week we have heard a couple of policy announcements, albeit tentative ones, from the co-leaders—or is it the competing leaders—of the Opposition, John Key and Bill English. But both of them have messed it up, and I doubt that we will hear any more policy from the National Party until shortly before the next election. What was John Key’s policy? John Key’s policy was to make a direct attack on the very popular Working for Families package. He said he would take that policy back to where it was before the enhancements made by Labour. That is, if any family is receiving over $70,000—joint incomes—it will get nothing, and family support tax credits will start abating from $27,000, at a sharp rate.

What would that policy do to the ordinary working family in this country? I will tell members what it would do. For a typical working family, on a low income—let us say $40,000 a year, between mum and dad with two kids—the policy would cut their income by $50 a week. That is $50 a week off a low-income family that earns $40,000 between the two parents. Let us take a slightly higher but still relatively modest income—a family earning $50,000 a week between the couple, who also have two children. That policy would deplete that family’s income by up to $80 a week. That is the promise from John Key that the country can really believe. What John Key wants to do is to take the ordinary battler, the family facing the costs of raising their kids, at their most expensive age—the family faced with a mortgage at its peak—and he wants to rob them of that sum of money.

What does John Key want to do with that money? I guess he would do one of two things with it. The typical thing that National would do is to take that money off the people who need it most and give it to those who need it least—that is, the supporters of the National Party. The other alternative he raised was that he would take the money and redistribute it. Do members know how much money that policy would give to each family in the country?

💬 Hon Ruth Dyson: How much?

It would give them $5 a week. That would not make any difference to the wealthy, and it certainly would not make any difference to those ordinary, battling Kiwi families out there.

But that is John Key. That is the John Key who professes concern for the disadvantaged. The first attack he makes is on the policy that will bring 70,000 kids in this country out of poverty. John Key is recommending that those kids be thrust back into poverty by disbanding the Working for Families policy.

💬 Hon Bill English: That’s wrong.

Bill English chips in. I can forgive John Key for his inexperience. He had not done the figures. He had not thought it through. It was a half-baked idea. But Bill English, on the other hand, has a lot of experience. Bill English was chairman of the select committee that put through the benefit cuts in the 1990s under Ruth Richardson’s policy of squeezing the poor. That is Bill English. That same Bill English was a Cabinet Minister in 1998 when the National Government cut superannuation from 65 percent of the average wage to 60 percent. That is the Bill English who now says he supports the OECD report that wants to raise the eligibility age for superannuation and put up GST. I think members can believe Bill English on both promises.

It is a very uncommon week in Parliament and in political life in this country when one hears some good news from the Labour Party. Last week taxpayers had the good news from the Labour Party that it would finally pay back the $800,000 it managed to steal from the taxpayers of this country. Of course, one has to wonder why the Labour Party would pay the money back, because it never conceded for one moment that it had stolen the money. It paid back $400,000 - plus for the pledge card—the pledge card that promised to deal with burglars but has not dealt with burglars, and that promised to deal with youth offending but has not dealt with youth offending, plus another $400,000 on top of that. Labour does not know where it is going on this issue, and it does not know where it is going on several other matters within this Parliament.

I have to talk—as did the member who has just resumed his seat, Phil Goff—about the debacle of Labour’s position on the smacking bill. Of course, it has been said time and time again over the last couple of years that it is not a smacking bill. But here I have a press release put out by the author of the bill, Sue Bradford, dated 6 October 2003 and entitled “Greens draw up their own anti-smacking bill”. When people tried to confront the Green Party and say that the bill was exactly that, the Green Party said it was definitely not an anti-smacking bill. The threats and the words we had from the Prime Minister that this was a totally new position and that the bill as it is at the moment was not a smacking bill runs totally against everything that Sue Bradford had said it was.

Labour was forced into a position, and it becomes clear now that there was an agenda all the way to ensure that this legislation would pass. In this press release from 2003 we have Sue Bradford saying: “I can’t understand why the Government is delaying doing anything about Section 59 until the next election year. The safety and welfare of our children is too important to put on hold.” Sue Bradford knew—and no doubt the Green Party knew—that all the time the Prime Minister would back her legislation, in spite of the fact that only a couple of weeks before the last election the Prime Minister said on television in Canterbury and on Radio Rhema in Auckland with Bob McCroskie that she would never vote for any legislation that criminalised parents for smacking their children.

All the way through we have had the debate around the mechanics of the bill and how it would continue with the issue of defence. On this side of the House, we have always argued that a defence for parents who smack their children should be written into the law. Members on the other side of the House have always said that we can rely on the police and on Child, Youth and Family, and that that they will not enforce the law as it will be written. When one looks back through Hansard one finds a quote from the previous Minister of Justice, Phil Goff, who said: “Maintaining a law that we do not intend to enforce brings the law into contempt and, frankly, is an exercise in hypocrisy.” Well, he is bang on the nail there. What has happened in the last couple of weeks, though, is that the leader of the National Party approached other leaders of parties within this House to, in effect, reach a compromise. The Minister for Social Development treated that with complete disdain and arrogance. What a surprise! He did his best to shove a tennis ball down the throat and stuff it. But the situation was that when his leader was confronted with some reason and common sense on this legislation, she actually pulled his leash and he stepped back into line.

The fact is that the amendment that has been offered today is something that falls far short of where the National Party stood on this issue, but the National Party leader has used his role as statesman and has offered a compromise, which I am pleased to say Labour has accepted.

It will be a huge step today. It is a win for the parents of New Zealand, because the legislation will state that they can smack their children for the purpose of correction and that the Government and this Parliament do not want them to be prosecuted for it. That is where the guts and the mechanics of this amendment will take this law. It is a huge step down for the Labour Government and a huge step down for the Green Party, but no doubt they will have to live with that.

The Green Party has been supporting this Government all the way through. It has been the party that has allowed the Government to move on the bill and to make the bill its own. The Government would not do that earlier on in order to shut the bill down, because it realised it was taking the flak from the public on this issue. The Government moved to take over the bill, but it did not get the support to do that. Then the Government wanted to debate the bill under urgency, but it did not get the support to do that. The Government is left today swallowing the rat while we claim the victory on behalf of New Zealand parents.

Every week, sitting across the Chamber from National, Government members see increasing tension between the co-leadership of John Key and Bill English. Every week that tension is increasing. The public of New Zealand expect the leadership of a party to provide direction. The leadership team of the National Party is providing direction, but there are two different directions—one is going in one direction, and one is going in the other. Did members notice how many press statements Bill English put out while John Key was overseas? Did members notice how those press statements suddenly all dried up the minute he came back?

💬 Hon Phil Goff: Like a pig in muck.

Absolutely! Like a pig in muck—as if John Key was not following what was going on in the country. But he did not seem to do much about it. That is very bad news for the National Party.

Actually, there is worse news for every working family in New Zealand, because both John Key and Bill English want to get rid of the Working for Families package and replace it with tax cuts for high-income earners. We have heard this recipe before, it is not new, but now it is finally being confirmed. National would start off by winding back the Working for Families package. My colleague Phil Goff gave some examples of what that would do to hard-working New Zealand families, with a mortgage and with children, who are trying hard to make their best contribution. They could see that $80 to $100 of the money they receive under the Working for Families package would be taken away by National so that people on high incomes would get more money in their pockets. It does not make sense.

I have to acknowledge the decency of John Key, who is now on public record as saying that middle-income New Zealanders who are eligible for Working for Families money would get less, if anything, under National’s tax cut package. That is a direct quote from John Key. At least he has had the decency to front up to middle-income New Zealanders and say: “Here’s the truth. You will lose money under National’s policy.” I want to give members another example because there are many such families in my electorate and in the electorates of my colleagues. Currently a family with a total family income of $52,000 a year, three children, and a mortgage gets $246 a week under Working for Families. That is good money. Under National that family would lose $80 a week.

In my home region of Canterbury, nearly 30,000 families are getting assistance through Working for Families. Over 10,000 of those families receive an average of $75 a week from the accommodation supplement, and nearly 4,000 of them receive an average of $72 a week in childcare assistance. Today in this House I challenge John Key and Bill English to come to Christchurch. I want them to meet a family in that position—earning $52,000 a year, with a mortgage and three children. I do not care where that family lives. It could live in Ōpawa, Halswell, Hornby, or Papanui. I want John Key and Bill English to go to that family with three children and a mortgage and say: “You deserve to lose $80 a week and I”—and I am speaking on behalf of Mr Key and Mr English—“should get an increase of over $100 a week.”

I want those members to front up to good New Zealand families and explain why that is fair. Why is it fair that a member of Parliament earning over $120,000 a year would get extra money from the National Party’s tax cuts while that family would lose $80? Why is that fair? How can we explain that to a family? How would anyone explain it? I have issued the challenge and I look forward to Mr English and Mr Key being on that plane to Christchurch. I am sure that many members of the media would be very interested in their explanation of why their tax cuts are so good and why the Working for Families package, which is helping hard-working New Zealand families with children and a mortgage, needs to go.

But if one thinks that is bad enough—that a middle-income family would lose $80 a week and money would go into the pockets of backbench National list MPs—it is not actually bad enough, because National has more in store. It also wants to cut health, it wants to cut education, and it wants to cut social services. It wants to cut the number of nurses, teachers, and social workers, and it wants to cut the pay in those professions. That is the only way to reduce expenditure in the way that Bill English says he wants to do in order to fund tax cuts for those on high incomes. I challenge the member opposite, whose name totally escapes me, to go back to her electorate and explain to her families why they should lose money under her party’s policies in order to put money in her pocket.

I wish to talk about leadership. Under the tax-and-spend Labour Government in the year designated as Export Year, New Zealand jobs are the only things that are being exported overseas. The economy is not the only victim under Dr Michael Cullen’s hands-on management style. The Minister for Tertiary Education is doing little to tackle the list of endless scandals and scams happening under the watch of the Tertiary Education Commission. Singalong courses, hip-hop tours, twilight golf, and COOL IT are all flourishing under the Tertiary Education Commission.

The latest scam to join the long list of scandals is the alleged scam of cash kickbacks to entice older-age students to enrol and draw down students loans. Those students have little prospect of joining the workforce to earn wages. Therefore, they do not have to worry about repaying student loans. I raised this problem in the House last March. The Tertiary Education Commission conducted an inquiry that comprised writing only two letters to the 13 institutions alleged to provide cash kickbacks, and paying them a day visit. The Tertiary Education Commission further satisfied itself by getting those institutions to sign a declaration that they were innocent and not involved in a kickback scam. Why then does the Minister for Tertiary Education not recommend the practice of accepting declarations from alleged offenders as proof of innocence to the Minister of Police, as a cost-cutting measure to disband the police investigation function? In fact, the chief executive officer of the Tertiary Education Commission was so delighted with the inquiry that she said in an August 2006 report that the providers had stopped the scholarship arrangement as a result of the Tertiary Education Commission’s initial visit.

I will shortly table documents in the House to show that cash scholarships were paid to older-age students upon their enrolment at the St George Institute of Learning before, during, and after the Tertiary Education Commission’s visit. The principal of the St George Institute of Learning, Mr Kevin Moncur, signed a declaration of innocence, which was taken as read by the Tertiary Education Commission. But the Ben Chase report showed that some scholarships were paid from Sincerity Consulting Group Ltd, where Mr Kevin Chui is a director. At the same time he is a director of the St George Institute of Learning. Right now the chief executives of the Tertiary Education Commission, the New Zealand Qualifications Authority, and StudyLink are holding a meeting, apparently to form a plan of action after my writing to the Tertiary Education Commission with documents that I will shortly seek leave to table in this House, and after the totally unsatisfactory inquiry conducted last year by the Tertiary Education Commission.

The public deserves answers as to why this Opposition MP, with very limited resources, has had to do the work for a Government department such as the Tertiary Education Commission. The Minister for Tertiary Education needs to reassure the public that there will be no more whitewash inquiries or investigations. He has to show leadership and tell the Tertiary Education Commission that it has failed in its job as the custodian of taxpayer money. This is not the only time that National has had to do the job of the Government and Government departments while funding and staff numbers of Government departments are bloated.

Where is the value for money? We have heard from our shadow Minister of Finance and incoming Deputy Prime Minister, Bill English, about the tax-and-spend habits of Dr Michael Cullen. Dr Cullen preaches about saving, but we see very little value from this tax-and-spend Government. I am going to stay on the case of the Tertiary Education Commission to make sure there is no more whitewashing.

I seek the indulgence of the House to table some documents.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): What are they?

The first one is a Tertiary Education Commission chief executive report claiming that those cash payments have stopped. The second one is a declaration by Mr Kevin Moncur, the principal of the St George Institute of Learning, stating that the institute did not offer any scholarships or other awards to students. The third one is an English translation, from student X, of a declaration in Chinese stating that in July 2005, June 2006, October 2006, and December 2006, he and his spouse received $2,200, $2,000, $2,000, and $1,000 scholarships as a result of enrolling in senior English classes at the St George Institute of Learning. The fourth document is a company search record showing that Mr Kevin Chui is a director of Sincerity Consulting Group Ltd, and the fifth one is another company search record showing that Mr Kevin Chui is a director of the St George international group of learning. The last document is an English translation of student Y’s declaration in Chinese that the person received in December 2006 a $1,000 scholarship from the St George Institute of Learning.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): Is there any objection to that course of action being taken? There is.

It is a pleasure to have the opportunity to rise in this discussion today because it has been an instructive couple of days in politics, not just with the achievement that my colleague Mr Goff mentioned earlier on in this debate but also in that we have seen the return of some of the really bad old days of what National did in cutting and burning the social support that was available, and remains available, to the community—the sorts of things that have been reinstated by this Government. To top it all off, after Mr Key’s revelations yesterday about his intention for the future of the Working for Families package, today we had the sad spectacle of Judith Collins rolling about in laughter in this House at the misfortune of those people who are supported by sickness and invalids benefits. I have to say that that was one of the more despicable displays I have seen from National members in this House in recent times.

I remind members of the public, and members of the House, that it was none other than Bill English who actually chaired the select committee of this Parliament that gave the community benefit cuts in 1990 and 1991. That was at a time when there were a quarter of a million jobless people in this country. So to see National’s performance today in criticising this Government for providing the necessary support for people who are sick in this country, was just astonishing. But it was instructive, and it is exactly what the country needs to see. It is exactly the sort of thing that voters out there in New Zealand need to be reminded of, because the National Party, whose members sit on those benches opposite, has not changed one iota in the last 10 or 15 years.

The sort of policies—and the sort of damage—National inflicted on New Zealanders who most needed support—not criticism, and not sanction—in those days is exactly what is in the minds of National members right now. The suggestion is that $500 million will be ripped out of the Working for Families package just as it gets to its operating total of $1.6 billion per annum, ongoing. Actually, no, it will be more than that, because it is indexed—unlike the sorts of things the National Government did—but at least $1.6 billion per year will immediately be reduced by a third.

To top it all off, we had from Mr Key yesterday the statement “Oh, there are going to be no losers.” Well, I am sorry to say to Mr Key that it does not work like that. He cannot take $500 million out of a package that is operating to support people—mostly through tax credits—in this country and provide the same with a tax cut. As Dr Cullen made clear to the House at question time earlier today, the size of that tax cut would have to be enormous, and even then it would produce only $5. So if one takes $50 off a Working for Families family—and I will give the House some examples in a moment—and gives that family $5 back, one cannot say there will be no losers.

But do not National members hate Working for Families! Actually, they hate working families; they cannot stand low or middle-income people. Let us cast our minds back to the election. Let us remember the fundamental choice between Labour, with its Working for Families policy, and National, with an across-the-board tax cut. The community now knows only too well what the real meaning of those policies is. Working for Families targets money into families with middle and lower incomes. How does it work? Well, if one earns less, one gets more support. That seems logical, which is always a preference of this Government but not a preference of members on that side of the House. Across-the-board tax cuts are what they like. Under their preferred system New Zealanders who earn a low or middle income would get $10—or was it an extraordinary $20 under some calculations—each, while people like the National members who sit in this Chamber would get upwards of $150, or in some cases $200, a week—is that fair? Well, the Government does not think so.

What would be the effects of the policy revelations we heard from National yesterday? Of the targeted 360,000 families receiving tax credit support through the Working for Families package, about 160,000 New Zealand families would lose, on average, $50 a week—that is, every family getting tax credits with a household income of over $27,500. Gee, I say to Mr Key, they are big earners, are they not? What would yesterday’s revelations mean? They would mean that around 60,000 families would lose entitlements to tax credits altogether, and it is estimated that around 50,000 of those families currently earn only between $27,500 and $45,000.

On behalf of New Zealand First I am pleased to take a call in this debate. This week there has been bad news and good news for the elderly in New Zealand. The bad news is that an Auckland University study has found that up to 70 percent of the medication histories of elderly patients admitted to Auckland City Hospital are incorrect, a statistic that definitely does not give anyone much confidence. Seventy percent is far too high a figure. This study follows a report by the Health and Disability Commissioner into the death of an Auckland man after the hospital confused a fax from his general practitioner with someone else’s records. What did the confusion do? It resulted in the administration of a fatal combination of incorrect drugs. That was reported in the papers yesterday.

As a group, the elderly are particularly at risk from that sort of carelessness, as they are often taking several medicines at once. We know that there are other groups that do this, as well. If this one small study reflects the situation in Auckland, then what is happening in the rest of the country? Systems must be improved, or new ones developed, to reduce the possibility of fatal human error. We were pleased to hear yesterday that the Minister of Health has indicated that Budget funds will be made available to develop an improved barcode system. That should be a small step in the right direction, and we look forward to seeing that initiative implemented. We all know that being admitted to hospital is stressful enough for the elderly, without them having the extra concern that they may fall victim to unintentional negligence on the part of the medical staff.

The good news for the elderly this week is yesterday’s pre-announcement of funding for elder care that will be in this year’s Budget. In New Zealand First we are absolutely delighted there will be this huge investment into the elder care sector. We made an increase in the funding of this sector one of the priorities in our confidence and supply agreement with the Government, and we have been working with the Government to secure this increase, the second in successive Budgets. One hundred and fifty million dollars over 4 years will be invested in residential care, and another $81.2 million will be available to help people to stay in their homes if they wish to do so. This is the largest-ever investment in the care and support of the elderly, and in New Zealand First we are absolutely delighted to have played a part in this achievement.

After years and years of shameful neglect, the level of pay for those who work with the elderly is to be increased. This recognition is very long overdue but is absolutely essential if we are to retain the services of those who provide these vital support services for seniors. The turnover rates in this area have been too high for far too long. Everyone in this House is very aware that this money will actually provide a tremendous boost for workers in the sector for wages and for training, which is absolutely critical. It has been a really sad reflection on the workers in this particular industry that in previous years they could actually earn more by going out and picking fruit than they could by staying within the industry. We know that looking after our elderly is hard work, heavy work, and very demanding work. The staff turnover is far higher than it should ever have been, and the standards of care have often been lower than they should have been.

Both Minister Hodgson and New Zealand First will be looking to see that a significant proportion of the increased funds is actually used to bolster wages, and is not diverted anywhere else by district health boards. We definitely do not want to see that happen. We want the structural problems that plague this sector to be addressed, and this vital investment will do just that. We want there to be a general improvement in the provision of services, and we are absolutely committed to ensuring that the improvements are sustainable over the long term, not just in 2007.

This Government is in trouble. It has lost its ability to make the tough decisions to lead this country and it is increasingly losing its parliamentary majority. It is out of touch with the people of this country. My colleagues have already touched on the numerous areas in which this Government has been totally out of touch with this country since the election. It has been out of touch on smacking, on the pledge card, on the Taito Phillip Field inquiry, on the Auckland stadium, and on art royalties.

No more so is this Labour Government out of touch than in the area of the economic situation that currently strangles our exporters. Many of our valued businesses are being crippled by the current climate, and it is this situation that I wish to speak about today. This situation is having a real impact across New Zealand, across our provinces, and certainly in my own electorate of Napier.

On 17 April, last month, my Napier electorate office received a press release It did not receive much pick-up in the national media, because it did not rate with the Fisher and Paykel story or the other recent big stories that were hitting the news, such as the announcement from Skellerup. It was overshadowed by those larger announcements, but it is typical of what is happening in heartland New Zealand. Design Spun Ltd, located in Onekawa, Napier, announced the need for a further restructuring that will regrettably lead to approximately 25 job losses—certainly not the 350-odd announced by Fisher and Paykel.

The General Manager of Design Spun, Brendan Jackson, said market and trading conditions had continued to deteriorate over the last 2 years, and at the same time increasing costs had eaten into margins, with the exchange rate causing lost export orders and providing the final straw. Mr Jackson said most of these adverse factors were beyond the control of his business or New Zealand businesses. Government policy had continued to add to the substantial cost of compliance and direct cash costs, and the Government appeared oblivious—that is what he said, “they appear oblivious”—as to the effect. He said the reduced scale of the business will realise long-term sustainability goals in a more focused, high-end market sector. It was extremely disappointing to see external factors adversely affecting the business to such a degree. His company questioned the Government’s labelling of 2007 as the year of the exporter. The company will do whatever it can to assist affected staff through this difficult time. That was the end of the press release.

Brendan went on to say to me in another email that he and his company were not quitters but it was just too tough and they have had enough. He said: “Watch this space. There’s a hell of a lot of us out there that feel the same way. Every way you turn these days there’s a barrier of some description.”

We all know the scenario that our exporters currently face—the ones at the sharp end. House prices are out of control, domestic inflation is raging outside the 1 to 3 percent band, the official cash rate is rising to 7.75 percent, floating mortgage rates are going through the roof, the exchange rate is at US75c, and the economy is at full capacity with negative multi-factor productivity growth. It is a tough position to be in, and it is a position that requires immediate action. It requires leadership and strong action, and it is the responsibility of this Government to make those tough calls now.

So what are Helen Clark and Michael Cullen doing about it? They are sidestepping the issue. They are giving a big, fat sidestep hospital pass to the Finance and Expenditure Committee. Despite the urgency of the situation, they are not prepared to make the tough calls and the tough decisions. This Government has lost control, despite an army of advisers in both Treasury and the Reserve Bank providing all manner of advice to the Minister of Finance—over many, many months now—that could help to resolve these issues. These advisers are far more highly paid than any politician in this Chamber and have spent their entire lives rolling in this monetary policy strategy. But the Government says: “No, there’s no need to listen to their advice. Let’s just give a sidestep pass to the Finance and Expenditure Committee and hope that it all goes away.” I can tell you, Mr Assistant Speaker, that it will not go away. This is an issue that we have to face right now.

I refer to a comment made by the member for Whanganui, Chester Borrows. Chester Borrows is a former police detective and, as far as I know, a qualified lawyer. Given his background, I wonder what his definition of the truth is, and what his definition of “stolen” is. I feel blest, along with my colleague Hone Harawira, that when I was at the other end of the baton, or the tohutohu, I did not encounter someone who had such a definition of “stolen”, which then automatically assumes a guilty verdict.

I listened at length to the previous speaker, the member for Napier, Chris Tremain. I remember being in this House when that member made an impassioned presentation, using a very famous Māori proverb that goes something like this: “He aha te mea nui o te ao? He tangata, he tangata.”

[What is the most important thing in the world? It is people, it is people.]

If that member actually believed what he said, and in the meaning of the proverb, rather than merely uttering it, hoping everyone would get the deeper symbolism from it—which he did not—then I cannot understand why he is supporting his leader’s stance on the debate about Working for Families.

When he uttered the proverb, there was some kind of understanding, or perhaps belief, that he knew what he was talking about. But it is obvious that he did not have the faintest clue of the deeper symbolism. [Interruption] That member from Westland would not know, either.

There is a strong rumour suggesting that Māori were better off, or would be better off, under a National Government in coalition. That kind of rumour, in my view, deserves, or requires, an informed analysis. Having done that, all I can say is that such a notion is absolutely politically fraudulent—nothing more, nothing less. It is fraud.

When we take into consideration the Leader of the Opposition’s latest move to scrap the Working for Families package in favour of tax cuts for his rich mates, we see that this could only mean serious damage in our communities—across the political sector as well as the cultural sector. It is estimated that there would be 160,000 New Zealand whānau, including Māori, who would lose about $50 per week. As another example, currently a Māori whānau earning $52,000 per year, with three tamariki and a mortgage, is eligible for around $246 per week under the Working for Families scheme. Under a National Government that family would face a loss of some $80 per week.

I need, therefore, to ask a question. That question is whether we are here in this House as elected or mandated MPs to think about the “we” or to think about the “me”. If we think about the “me”, we are talking about having a developed social consciousness about what we do and about our concern for others.

In rising to contribute to the general debate, I can report that much has changed in the few months since I last spoke in this debate. A sense of unease has beset New Zealanders, and a sense of failure has gripped the Government benches. New Zealanders are uneasy because they have had a dawning realisation that their country is succumbing to a tyranny of mismanagement and misjudgment by the Labour-led Government. The Government has got a number of things wrong. In fact the list is endless, but I will name just a few things.

New Zealanders do not want to have their lives ruled by big Government. I say to the Labour Government that it is wrong. Helen Clark and company got it wrong when they attempted to sweep Taito Phillip Field’s dodgy dealings with illegal immigrants under the carpet. They were wrong to think we would not notice that, and wrong to think the issue would go away—very wrong. Helen Clark and company got it wrong when they thought New Zealanders would like to pay for their election campaigns in the future. State funding of elections? Wrong again. Helen Clark and company got it wrong when they thought New Zealanders would believe that Sue Bradford’s bill was not an anti-smacking bill. Having finally realised that New Zealanders believed neither her nor Sue Bradford, the Prime Minister has now agreed with John Key’s efforts to amend the bill in order to protect New Zealand parents. It was wrong to think that New Zealanders would be taken in, and it was wrong to try to criminalise good parents in an attempt to stop child abuse—wrong; wrong again.

Helen Clark and company have mismanaged their diversions, as well. What is the evidence of that? The Auckland maimai stunt of Trevor Mallard. One billion dollars to be spent on a stadium? I do not think so. New Zealanders said: “No, wrong again.”

In the health sector, Pete Hodgson and company have got it wrong as well. You see, the Minister of Health thought that New Zealanders were OK with the huge increases in health spending that are occurring without significant health gains or productivity gains—wrong, wrong, wrong. New Zealanders are sick of reading disaster stories on the front pages of the dailies, sick of basic health care failures, and sick of descriptions from the Health and Disability Commissioner of deadly communication lapses, such as that concerning an acutely ill woman who was discharged from hospital three times without her general practitioner being notified even once. So of course he did not know that she was at home when she died there—the day after her last discharge.

There are lapses that see patients with pneumonia failing to get the drugs they need, because the X-rays were not read. Well, when I started out as a nurse many years ago, that was basic procedure. People with serious illnesses have been turned away at the emergency department to either die or have their condition worsen and become life-threatening. There is the case of the elderly man for whom a communication lapse saw him get the wrong medication and die—I think the description was “hastened to his death”. Are New Zealanders happy about that? Are New Zealanders heralding the changes that are being made and the money that is being spent in the health system? I do not think so, Mr Hodgson. I think Mr Hodgson is wrong.

Helen Clark and company have been wrong on many fronts. They have been making decisions for New Zealanders as if they have no minds of their own. They have been wrong to interfere in the lives of good parents, and wrong to think that New Zealanders want to be dependent on the State. They demean New Zealanders when they say it is OK for the Government to give New Zealanders the Working for Families benefit, when in fact one could leave them with the hard-earned money they had earned in the first place.

The Prime Minister is also wrong if she thinks that it is a very big issue to have royalties paid to artists. If the Prime Minister ever paints her own painting, she and Judith Tizard would like to see that Helen Clark gets the royalties for that painting if it is ever sold in the future. You see, this Government has run out of good ideas. It thought that that particular one would be a winner, when, in fact, it is not. I wonder what happens when one gives a painting away, and whether that means it is worth nothing and there are no royalties there at all in the future.

This Labour Government has been wrong on many fronts: the pledge card, Taito Phillip Field, smacking, overspending, the Auckland stadium, art royalties, and its health spending—wrong, wrong, wrong. New Zealanders have had enough of this Government. That is why they come into my office, stop me on the street, and say they cannot wait to get rid of Labour and are fed up to the back teeth with being told what to think. New Zealanders are fed up to the back teeth, full stop.

Yesterday the Minister of Health announced the largest ever investment in the aged residential care and home support sectors. This most significant of announcements builds on multiple injections of funding into aged care by this Labour-led Government. Pete Hodgson’s announcement of a very large boost of $405 million over 4 years into the sector has been met with accolades from Grey Power, unions, aged-care workers, and providers. I wonder whether the member who spoke previously, Jo Goodhew, thinks that this is wrong too, given that she has made comments about National wanting to work with the aged-care sector and other stakeholders to address the situation, to fund a trained and skilled workforce, and so on. This sort of announcement makes me very proud to be a Labour MP. It confirms our commitment towards securing a safe environment for our older adults so that they can live in dignity, and it confirms our commitment to decent work and respect for the workers who provide that care.

I acknowledge the Minister of Health and the Minister for Disability Issues, Ruth Dyson, for the work they have done on this sector over many years, as well as our support partner, New Zealand First, which shares the Government’s concern about the poor wages and conditions for carers in the aged-care industry. Over several years this Labour-led Government has injected funding into this sector—in fact, in several Budgets in a row. By the end of the 1990s the sector was in such a mess that it was always going to take significant amounts of money to fix the problem. It has also been a great concern to the Government that, although it has increased the funding to the sector, the caregivers who provide the care have not been on the receiving end of much of that funding. Caregivers today in many cases are still not being paid much more than the minimum wage. If it were not for this Government’s commitment to increasing the minimum wage, caregivers would still be on the $8.50 or so per hour they were on at the end of the 1990s.

So why was the sector in such a mess? Well, I know the Opposition does not want to hear about the old days but it does have to take some responsibility. Prior to 1990 and the election of a National Government, aged residential care was doing well and workers were making good progress. Workers won their first award in the mid-1980s setting minimum pay and conditions. Pay doubled between 1985 and 1990, the National Certificate in Rest Home Care was introduced, and we had a new funding system with yearly adjustments. But the election of National changed that. The weapons of the Employment Contracts Act were embraced with vigour by many rest home employers and used to slash wages and conditions. Judging by the question from Kate Wilkinson today, I do not have any confidence that National will own up to that being a bad idea.

The national rest home award was among the first of the national awards to be targeted for destruction, and by the end of the 1990s aged-care workers were earning less than they had 10 years before. Training courses were moved to a basis of user-pays, aged-care funding became competitive, and prices for the care of older adults were driven downwards, along with workers’ pay and conditions. I remember some workers being grateful for receiving a nil pay increase in their bargaining round, because it meant that something else would not be cut that year. Meanwhile, throughout that period increases in dependency exacerbated the situation as the industry increasingly catered for high-needs, high-demand residents. Being a caregiver is not a matter of giving cups of tea to nice grannies; it means dealing with dementia, with residents who are sometimes violent, and with very disabled people who need lifting, toileting, medicating, and a range of therapies. It became a highly skilled job, but the pay did not match.

I often wonder whether some of the National members who were there during that period—and they are still sitting on the front bench over there—ever feel guilty about what they did to this industry and to the caregivers involved. Mr Bill English was the Minister of Health during that period and presided over a funding freeze in the industry from 1997 until National was thrown out of Government. Despite years of effort by unions in the aged-care industry, and multi-year funding by this Government, an experienced caregiver today is most likely to earn less than $12 an hour.

Employers in the industry have resisted passing on Government increases to workers, and it is even worse in the home support sector. That is why this funding must come with mechanisms to ensure that workers are paid properly. Provider contracts with district health boards and collective agreements with unions are the most effective means of ensuring not only that caregivers and nurses receive better pay but that pay rates can be effectively enforced. The concentration of mainly women workers in low-paid jobs in the caring industries contributes to the gender pay gap and low wages. Our agenda as the Government is to promote opportunities for women and men to attain decent and productive work in conditions of equity, security, and dignity. Thank you.

It is a pleasure to rise and speak in this general debate. I wish to make some points in the short period of time I have. This Government gloats over and glorifies the fact that it creates dependency. All we have heard from speakers on the other side of the House is that there are these poor hard-up people who are most vulnerable. I can tell you from where I am standing that you are responsible—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): The member is bringing the Speaker into the debate.

My apologies! The members across the House are responsible for that. We acknowledge that people are hard-working; however, they aspire to be self-sufficient. Many New Zealanders understand the sickening debility of having to live on handouts. Unfortunately, this Government has created dependency but it has not created a solution.

I turn to the issues of tax and Government spend. Labour’s mismanagement and misjudgment in its tenure as Government is at a stage never before seen by New Zealanders. This Government wants to focus on everybody else’s problems because it is very aware of its own. This Government is presently backed into a corner, when it should be celebrating its achievement. It knows it is responsible for a runaway situation, where our year of the exporter is something not to be celebrated.

I would like to go through some of the issues of judgment that are coming to the fore at the moment. Misjudgments are associated with the pledge card, Taito Phillip Field, the smacking situation, overspending, a lot of spending on low-quality, non-productive education, and Michael Cullen’s idea of how to solve the problem. The Auckland stadium is another distraction from the situation—the maimai in Auckland Harbour. The only person who was stuck in the water was Trevor Mallard, and there was nobody there to pull him out. Now there is the matter of art royalties—who did the artwork?

Over the last 8 years it has been remarkable. We have seen a reckless growth in low-quality tertiary courses—total wastefulness. We are now confronted with reforms, but the reforms are also wasting money. We have a health situation. What a disaster! Huge amounts of money are being spent with no improvement shown. What is happening? Waiting lists are shorter—because people have just been sent back to the doctor. In respect of law and order in my very own home town of Blenheim, where I live, I have seen it quoted in the local paper that in actual fact there could be an incentive to start up crime in our community because of stays of proceedings. It is absolutely outrageous that the court system cannot deal with that. We have such a problem with youth crime, the rate of which is up. The violent crime rate is up, and we also have the terrible problem of dependency, the rate of which is up. We want people in this country to stand on their own two feet and to aspire to be self-sufficient. If we do not do that, we will end up having a Third World economy.

💬 Hon Phil Goff: An 80 percent reduction in unemployment, and you say it’s dependency?

Around deforestation and climate change, may I remind the member across the floor there that we on this side of the House were accused of burning a $200,000 cheque—which has now turned into the well-known situation of the billion-dollar bungle. Those members did not listen; they did not heed. We now have a deficit of some 40,000 hectares of deforestation. Labour’s absence of policies has destroyed investment in the forestry industry. In actual fact, it has been written in the papers and widely circulated that we are currently operating in a vacuum of policy around climate change. The Government does not know. This is a Government of mismanagement and poor judgment.

Let us have a think about 15 to 19-year-olds. There was a long time there when the Minister who is now Minister of Education was espousing the idea of making sure that by 2007, all children or young adults between the ages of 15 and 19 would be in either education, employment, or training. Unfortunately, when we ask questions about that, officials do not know. What we get back in answer from Ministry of Social Development officials is a promise to get back to us soon. Unfortunately, this Labour Government has turned into a Government of mismanagement and misjudgment. Going on, for instance, to a pet subject of mine, the Modern Apprenticeship programme, I ask how many Modern Apprentices have completed training.

Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. Before I briefly discuss the issue of wind farms, I want first to acknowledge today’s announcement by John Key and Helen Clark as a very significant step towards the kind of consensus politics that we would like to see much more of—and that I think the public would like to see much more of—from this House. I think they have taken a very important step, and we certainly appreciate it. I think it is also a victory for the role of the smaller parties in this House—the Greens, for bringing forward a very controversial issue, the Māori Party and New Zealand First, for their work on managing those issues themselves and with their own constituencies, and, of course, United Future and Peter Dunne, for his work in trying to find the key to unlock some of the issues between people. This is a very controversial issue, and it has been very emotional. Some have suffered quite seriously from abuse around this issue, and it is good to see Parliament making real attempts to try to work through it sensibly. We congratulate Parliament on that; we think this really raises the esteem of Parliament in the eyes of the public.

The Central Otago District Council is hearing submissions at the moment on the Lammermoor wind farm, the Project Hayes wind farm proposed by Meridian Energy. It is a very controversial project. The Lammermoor Range is a beautiful landscape—I have been there and seen it myself—so people are very concerned about the landscape values that will be disrupted by the wind farm. The transportation of the turbines will cause serious disruption for the residents of Dunedin, in particular, and for those in other areas around Mosgiel and Otago. The Lammermoor area is also a very historical area. The Dunstan track is part of the goldmining history of that part of the country, and it is very significant. So there are real issues for the community about this wind farm project.

It is also true to say that no major ecological or fragile areas will be disrupted by the wind farm, and we have information about that from very experienced people involved in the environmental movement in Dunedin. It is also grazed land, currently used to feed various animals, including cows. It is private land—not conservation land and not reserve land, but privately owned land.

The real issue here, in my view, is that this is a choice not between a wind farm and the landscape values of the Lammermoors but between the unfettered demand for energy by the community, including business, and the destruction of our natural environment, of New Zealand species, of our fisheries, and of other areas. The Green Party is a strong proponent of wind farms and renewable energy. We must stop burning coal for energy. It is accelerating the climate change that we see happening around us. Climate change threatens our oceans. It threatens our fish species. Acidification and a temperature rise in the oceans will damage our fishing industry. Climate change threatens forests. There are trees that are flowering and producing fruit earlier than in the past, and that then also threatens the native species that depend on those trees for their food source. Climate change threatens communities, through erratic weather patterns. The floods that we are seeing in our country, and the droughts that we will continue to see in areas like Canterbury—those are the environmental impacts of doing nothing and simply continuing with the way that we have been doing things.

The Greens want to see small energy generation where it is possible—community based, and close to the source or to the demand. Small hydro generation still remains an option in many areas, and we need to diversify our energy capacity. The South Island—this may come as a surprise to some—has been a net importer of energy over the last few years, as well as the North Island. There is an issue for the generation of electricity locally.

Yes, we need to have a national strategy for wind farms. Yes, they should be smaller rather than larger. Yes, they must avoid damage to fragile environments. The Project Hayes wind farm will have an impact on the landscape of the Lammermoors—absolutely it will. I hope Meridian Energy will look at reducing the size of the farm and reconsider the transportation options that it has put forward, in order to reduce the impact on the community. But we must reduce our energy demand as a community and our pursuit of unlimited economic growth. We must reduce our carbon dioxide emissions and obtain energy from renewable resources. The cost to our environment, communities, and economy will be severe if we do not. Wind farms are our only choice, in the absence of community support that chooses this beautiful landscape over our increasing energy demand.

The debate having concluded, the motion lapsed.