Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement

Can I start by first acknowledging you, Mr Speaker, in your new, illustrious role. I, like many of your colleagues, wish you well on this journey of leadership. I also want to acknowledge my colleagues who have had promotions in the caucus and Government, and wish you well in your respective roles. I also want to thank my other colleagues the Hon Kate Wilkinson and the Hon Phil Heatley for your fine leadership and service to the Government and, most important, to the people of New Zealand.

New Zealand will be a good place to be in 2050. We might feel we are doing it hard in New Zealand, but not only is it one of the best places in the world to be born in 2013 but we are also well positioned for the mega shifts taking place between now and 2050. These are the words from the executive editor of The Economist, Mr Daniel Franklin, who spoke at a conference last year and ended his speech by saying that with good management and the right policies, New Zealand could come through the current period of turbulent change in good shape. Dr Franklin’s comments about good management and the right policies affirm the inspiring vision of the National Government and the responsible and astute leadership of our Prime Minister, the Rt Hon John Key.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): Order! There is too much background noise. Those who want to have private conversations, please do so outside the Chamber.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. Dr Franklin’s comments about good management and the right policies affirm the inspiring vision of the National Government and the responsible and astute leadership of our Prime Minister, the Rt Hon John Key.

The Government has four key priority areas. Firstly, to responsibly manage the Government’s finances—that means living within our means. Jacqueline Ireland, the chief executive of Colmar Brunton, commented: “I believe that the recession and its aftermath have forced many businesses to look at their costs and rethink their strategy, and those that have made good decisions are now far stronger, leaner, faster, more productive and more agile.” It also means New Zealand earning a living and being sensible with taxpayers’ money. In conversations with people—from the beaches and camping grounds of the far north during the holidays to South Auckland communities and market places—they just want to know that we are being fair and just as a Government. In fact, in my conversation with a leader of the Pasifika community he said to me: “Alfred, we don’t want handouts. All we ask for is opportunity, and we’ll do the rest. We’ll work hard.” They did ask me why the focus on the economy, and making money as a priority, was so important to this Government—a very good question. I simply replied that in our communities, instead of the word “economy”, we use other words that have the same meaning, such as “prosperity”—in other words, the opportunity to provide for your family, to feed and clothe them, and to help them sustain the quality of life we have come to enjoy in this country. Most important, it will help us pay our way in this country and in this world. They got it.

Secondly, another key priority is to push ahead with the wide-ranging programme of reforms to create a more productive and competitive economy. Albert Brantley, chief executive of Genesis Energy, comments: “While the NZ economy has faced significant pressure over the past few years, I am cautiously optimistic that this year we will begin to see an increase in business confidence …”, which confirms Treasury’s Half-year Economic and Fiscal Update of the economy growing at a rate of 2.5 percent over the next 3 years.

The third key strategy is to drive better results and better value for money from public services. Here are just some of the targets. In the justice sector this will mean 45,000 fewer crimes, 7,500 fewer violent crimes, and 600 fewer young people appearing in court each year from 2017, and also 600 extra police on the front line. Education targets—98 percent of all school entrants having participated in early childhood education by 2016, and 85 percent of all 18-year-olds having achieved National Certification of Educational Achievement level 2 or an equivalent qualification by 2017. Targets for social development—we began implementing our reform of the welfare system to bring about an unrelenting focus on work, including greater work obligations for beneficiaries and more support to help people into work through a fairer welfare system. And health targets—more operations now at record levels. Thirty-five thousand more patients get elective treatment a year under National than under Labour. Elective surgery volumes have been increasing, on average, by around 8,000 patients a year over the last few years.

And, lastly, our fourth key strategy is to support the rebuilding of Christchurch. As the Prime Minister said in his speech, out of adversity comes opportunity, and as Christchurch is an area where $30 billion will be spent over the course of the next few years, this is an excellent opportunity for the whole of New Zealand to support its redevelopment. One of those opportunities is our commitment to train more New Zealanders in vocational careers—particularly important as the rebuild of Christchurch pushes forward. Colin James commented that the most important aspect of 2013 will be the importance of jobs and bridging the gap between education and employment. This affects all of us in our families and even in our communities. So what is this Government doing? It is boosting skills and supporting jobs. There is a big opportunity in New Zealand over the next few years, particularly with the rebuilding of Christchurch, to train more New Zealanders in vocational careers that will set them up well for their futures.

A week ago I was privileged to attend a celebration for Pasifika success in education, and the Wellington launch of the Pasifika Education Plan 2013-2017, with the Minister of Education, the Hon Hekia Parata, and my colleague Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga at the Ekalesia Faapotopotoga Kerisiano Samoa Church in Porirua. While I was there, a young Samoan woman got up and said this: “I don’t like being called ‘underprivileged’, because I am privileged to have supportive parents. I am privileged to have great opportunities in this country of New Zealand to be able to succeed.” She went on to say that this year she is going on to Victoria University, and through that, if she gains a B average, then she will be successful in gaining a scholarship to Scotland, to the world-leading university in opera. There were also the Tau brothers, who are twins, who shared their stories of principles of success. Mafutaga, one of the twins, said this: “I want to be fast like Usain Bolt, so my principle for success is ‘Dream, Believe, Achieve’.” In our communities our young people are looking for these opportunities, and what is the opportunity for success? It is their attitude.

So as a Government we are meeting this attitude of success. We have launched five new vocational pathways that clearly signpost the subjects that young people should take to prepare for vocational careers in construction, manufacturing, the primary sector, the service sector, and the social services. There will be over 4,000 places available in trades and services academies, and around 8,700 Youth Guarantee places. We are also revitalising industry training to ensure that people have the right skills and training, and that our system is responsive to trainees and employers. We are particularly focused on increasing opportunities for in-work training for all Kiwis by expanding and improving our apprenticeship training system. In respect of this system around apprenticeships, being a tradesman and having come through apprenticeships myself, I see the importance. I have worked with tertiary organisations like Unitec and the Manukau Institute of Technology, and I see the importance that these schemes and scholarships have to young people in our communities. This is absolutely meeting a need and is relevant for the young people and families whom we experience every day as constituents in our communities.

Our changes also include from 1 January 2014 combining Modern Apprenticeships and other apprenticeship-type training under an expanded and improved scheme called New Zealand Apprenticeships. These new apprenticeships will provide the same level of support and subsidy for all apprentices, regardless of their age. We are boosting overall apprenticeships funding. The current top up for Modern Apprenticeships will be redistributed across all New Zealand apprentices, as an extension to their learning subsidy. In addition, overall subsidy payments will be increased by around $12 million in the first year, rising over time. Increased funding for apprenticeships will allow industry training organisations to invest in quality education for apprentices, lower fees for employers, and encourage apprenticeships with growth. We are boosting the educational content of apprenticeships. At a minimum they will require a programme of 120 credits, resulting in a level 4 qualification. We are setting clearer roles and performance expectations for industry training organisations, and giving employers other options if the industry training organisations do not perform. We are lifting the profile and participation of apprenticeships by giving the first 10,000 new apprentices who enrol after 1 April this year $1,000 towards their tools—and jobs, of course.

In conclusion, just this month The Economist magazine had New Zealand ranked sixth overall on a measure of the health of society, from economic indicators such as innovation to social ones such as inequality and crime. It is clear to say this: the world is full of opportunities for New Zealand over the next few years, and we need to seize those opportunities with both hands. Thank you.

Is it not a pity that Alfred Ngaro was not in the last National Party term in Government, when he might have actually been able to influence it on doing something about apprenticeships, because we had 3 years when nothing happened with apprenticeships. In fact, they went down by 20 percent. So Mr Ngaro can stand up and say to us how important apprenticeships are, but the reality is that this National Government has dropped the ball and let New Zealanders down when it comes to apprenticeship numbers. We have seen a 20 percent drop in Modern Apprenticeships at the very time we should have been seeing a Government invest in the skills and the future of this country.

Just before Christmas, Campbell Live did a programme where a dog took control of a car, and it was quite a big deal. I think it was a promotion for the Royal New Zealand Foundation of the Blind. A dog was put in control of a car and it was able to manoeuvre the car around. I noticed that when the dog was doing this, it actually managed to have its paws on the wheel of the car. It had worked out that the way that you drive the car forward and give it direction is to have your paws, or your hands, on the wheel of the car. So a dog was able to do that on Campbell Live, but this National Government cannot work out that if it is actually going to give New Zealand direction, if it is actually going to take New Zealand forward, it has to have its hands on the wheel. That is what we have seen from this Government. It cannot even keep up with the Campbell Live dog when it comes to actually giving this country direction, because it does not understand that leaving it to the market—saying that the market will resolve everything—actually is a flawed, failed set of policies from another century.

Times have changed and this National Government has simply not kept up with those changes. It is never better exemplified than by the Minister for Tertiary Education, Skills and Employment, Steven Joyce—“Mr Fix-it”, or “Mr Fudge-it”, as we call him over here, because he has been fudging the figures on unemployment right from the time he took over. He is meant to be this genius who can come in and solve the Novopay debacle, but the reality of his record in unemployment is appalling. For him to stand up in the House today and briefly trumpet his excitement at the drop in the unemployment rate to 6.9 percent, and to ignore the fact that the only reason it has dropped is that people have left the labour force and that friends and families whom we all know have gone to Australia, when the reality is that if we put those people back into the equation and if we put back into the equation the people who have given up hope of even getting a job, then the unemployment rate would be 8.3 percent—8.3 percent—the worst unemployment rate we have had since the mid-1990s. That would be the situation if all of those people were in there. So that is no record for Mr Joyce to be proud of. He cannot stand up in this House and claim that he is any kind of “Mr Fix-it” when unemployment is soaring like that.

Every single MP in this House knows about people in their communities who are desperately seeking jobs. The people who line up for those supermarket jobs—in Auckland the other day, 2,500 people were applying for 150 jobs. These are people who want to work, people who want the opportunity to get ahead and to provide for their families, and the complacent Government sits on its hands on the other side, takes its hands off the wheel of Government, and says: “The market will solve it.” Well, it is not, and it is time for Government action.

It is time to invest in people, not condemn people who want to work. It is time to invest in businesses, in new technology, in a new economy. That is what the Labour Party is calling for. That is the plan that we are putting in front of New Zealanders. But this Government has—

💬 Hon Nikki Kaye: What plan?

Nikki Kaye asks: “What plan?”. That is the question she should ask John Key—“What plan?”. The Labour Party has been prepared to stand up and say that we are going to change the settings of this economy. We have recognised that there needs to be a new economy. We have recognised that we need to invest in clean, green technology, that we need to upskill people, and that we cannot afford to leave monetary policy as it is. But this Government sits there with no plan for New Zealand and no plan for the future of New Zealanders.

That was never more starkly put into focus than in those unemployment statistics, where 30 percent of 15 to 19-year-olds are unemployed—30 percent. That is our future. That is New Zealand’s future. And even if the National Government does not want to look at that in economic terms, it needs to look at that in social terms. It needs to think about what it means to have a 30 percent unemployment rate for our future generations. What does that mean for our society? What does that mean for people feeling included and feeling part of New Zealand and our society? This Government is leaving that generation behind. They are part of the forgotten New Zealanders whom this Government does not want to talk about—the people whom it is leaving in the unemployment queue, whom they are not there backing—and the initiatives that could be being undertaken that it ignores.

This Government’s record in employment—Mr Steven Joyce’s, or “Mr Fudge-it’s”, record—is unacceptable, and to put him in charge of Novopay just means that that debacle will go on and on. Just briefly on that point, this National Government’s shame is in Novopay. It is wrong for people in my electorate to have to come to me and say: “I have worked as a teacher aide and I have not been paid since November.” How does that feel? How do people look after their families in that situation? This is a debacle that Hekia Parata, Craig Foss, and Bill English all signed off on when they knew it would not work. It is a shame on this Government, and Mr Joyce does not have the record in employment to indicate that he will be able to solve this.

I want to speak briefly about a couple of areas in my portfolio and, in particular, in tertiary education. Steven Joyce has tried to sell to New Zealanders his brand new, flash employment and apprenticeships scheme. Well, it is all very well to rehash it and rename it and put in place a $1,000 subsidy, but the lack of commitment to actually working with businesses, to saying: “We’ll help you employ people as apprentices.”, is what is missing from this. It is the Labour Party’s policy to say to businesses that we will subsidise 18 and 19-year olds, using the money that this Government seems happy to pay out in dole payments, to actually get people into apprenticeships. Yesterday at the manufacturing inquiry in Christchurch a company came forward and said: “That is exactly what we want. We want a Government that is hands-on, that is prepared to get in and help us make sure that we have the skilled workforce that we need.” So to hear about it now, to hear about it 4 years after this Government had the opportunity to do something about apprenticeships, is a hollow promise from Mr Joyce.

The other thing I want to talk about is, what do we do to ensure that the best and brightest stay in New Zealand? What do we do to ensure we have the people who are going to start the companies that will help create jobs? Well, in the case of this Government, it is to say to postgraduate students: “We’re not going to give you allowances any more.”

Over the summer break I met two people whom I want to mention: Anthony Davidson, who is a student in Dunedin, and Tracy Merson, who wants to be a student here in Wellington. They are two people who bravely put their stories into the public arena to show New Zealanders what we are losing because of the short-sighted policy of this Government to cut away their allowances. Mr Davidson wants to complete his master’s degree in zoology. He is a person with a huge contribution to make, and he has been told by this Government that it does not care about that. He is part-way through his master’s degree, he has 1 year to go, and the Government has cut that allowance away. What did he tell the Otago Daily Times? He is off to Australia. He is gone. He will not be part of the future of New Zealand, because this Government is not prepared to invest in his future and in our future with his education.

We have got Tracy Merson, who wants to become a clinical psychologist. Clinical psychology is on the skills shortage list for New Zealand. We import people into New Zealand to do that job. Here is someone who wants to finish, who has been looking after children, and who has been working and studying part time but wants to finish her master’s degree, which she has to have to practise as a clinical psychologist, and this Government comes along and cuts away her allowance, leaving her at the moment unable to finish that master’s degree—unable to practise as a clinical psychologist.

What New Zealand needs is a Government that is prepared to invest in people, a Government that is prepared to give New Zealanders hope. New Zealanders want to be proud of their country. They want to know that they can have a future in their country. At the moment what New Zealanders see is a future in Australia. They see a future away from here. A Government that can come into office, as Labour will, and say: “We’re going to back New Zealanders. We’re going to fight for the future of New Zealand. We’re going to give New Zealanders hope. We’re going to do it in a compassionate way. We’re going to do it by accepting that the economy must change. It must evolve, but at the same time we must ensure a fairer society.”—that is the Government New Zealanders deserve.

That is the Government Labour will offer in contrast to this National Government, which has no plan and offers no hope and no vision for New Zealand. This Prime Minister’s statement was nothing like a statement. This was the Prime Minister’s whimper.

I am very pleased to speak in response to the Prime Minister’s statement. I want to start off by saying that today I want to speak as an Associate Minister of Education and as the Minister of Youth Affairs, because I want to speak about young people in New Zealand and the policies that will make an actual difference to their lives. What we heard from the deputy leader of the Labour Party was a lot of slogans. He talked about hope and vision. But at the end of the day, when you look at the Prime Minister’s statement, you see that there is a plan for our country that means that young New Zealanders do have a future.

That plan involves getting back to surplus. It involves ensuring that we have welfare reforms so that young people do not grow up in disadvantaged households with very low incomes. It involves ensuring we have the right policies in terms of business to ensure we can actually create jobs. And when we look at what the Labour Party says in these areas, we know that its members oppose everything. They oppose welfare reform. They oppose many small business policies—everything from the 90-day trial period to Resource Management Act reform. The Labour Party opposes everything that helps the 500,000 small businesses in this country actually employ more young people.

I am confident that when New Zealanders actually step aside and read the Prime Minister’s statement, they will see the very strong contrast between a party across the House that talks in slogans and this Government, which has real policies in areas like labour reform, Resource Management Act reform, small business policy, welfare reform, and housing—reforms that are actual and that will do something for the young people of this country.

I really want to start now and address the area of education, because we know that if we want to give some of our most disadvantaged young New Zealanders the best start in life, then we have to improve some things. Our Government has a very strong policy in education. It involves accountability, it involves raising standards, but it also involves helping some of our most disadvantaged learners, and I want to talk about that.

I have recently been given responsibility in the area of digital literacy. We know that as a Government we have spent hundreds of millions of dollars connecting schools to ultra-fast broadband. I want to take a moment in this House to talk about a very personal situation at a place that I recently visited with the Prime Minister. We went to Great Barrier Island, a small isolated community, a community of 800 people. There are children there who have never had the opportunities in education, and this Government has invested in that community to ensure that those children will have the same opportunities as children in Auckland.

That is part of our vision for our education system—wherever you are in New Zealand, whatever community you grow up in, you have the opportunities to have the best resources available. Ultra-fast broadband delivers that, we have put several hundred million dollars into that, and we are very proud of that as a Government.

The other point I want to make is that when we look at education policy, the fact is that our record is clear. We are spending $9.6 billion—that is, successive Government increases in terms of education—and we actually spend more than any other country in the OECD. So our message is very clear when it comes to education: this National Government, under the most difficult financial conditions in a generation—the global financial crisis and a massive fiscal impact in terms of Canterbury—is spending the most in the OECD, and that is something that we are very proud of as a Government.

The other thing we are very focused on is that if we want to have quality of life for all New Zealanders, we actually have to do better in terms of the one in five students who need help in terms of numeracy and literacy. We have, obviously, implemented national standards, but we have also put more money into programmes to assist that. We are also focused on accountability, and that is why we have very clear targets. We have got targets that are ambitious: 85 percent of 18-year-olds will achieve National Certificate in Educational Achievement level 2 or an equivalent qualification in 2016.

What does this actually mean? It means that it is not good enough that there are young people coming through my electorate office, and the offices of many of the other MPs around this House, who have left school not being able to read or write. We are saying that, actually, that is not good enough. I want to make this point. One of the opportunities I have had was to visit many schools in this country. We have some amazing teachers.

We know there is a complex range of factors that we need to focus on in order to bring about change. Some of that is about having accountability, like targets, and some of that is about having rich data and parents being able to know where to help their children, and that is what national standards are about. But it is also about being very clear about expectations, and it is about ensuring that we have the best, world-class infrastructure to ensure that students, wherever they grow up, whether it is Great Barrier Island or Palmerston North, have access to resources.

We know, as the Education and Science Committee demonstrated—and that was cross-party, among MPs—that there are many areas of change that need to happen over our education system. One of the key things in the select committee’s report was that our education system is rapidly changing as a result of technology. That means that rather than sitting in a geographical location, there are so many opportunities for teachers to potentially reach students online in other parts of New Zealand.

Our Government has demonstrated—whether it is through our investment in ultra-fast broadband, whether it is through the fact that we will eventually respond to the select committee report, or whether it is through Network for Learning, which is a major vehicle for the Government to deliver in this area—that we are actually prepared to put in not only the money but the policies to ensure that we have some of the most digitally literate children in the world.

That is something that we are proud of, and that is real vision. That is vision with policies. But when it comes to the Labour Party, all we hear is negativity, slogans, and opposition to policies. The point that I would make to New Zealanders is that they should read the Prime Minister’s statement, and see the detail in terms of policies. They should look at what we are actually doing, whether it is in the economy, where we have actual policies about getting back to surplus, whether it is through small-business policies, where we have implemented the 90-day trial period and we have got a good record on Resource Management Act reform, or whether it is through our education system.

When you look at what we are doing in terms of investment in infrastructure, when you look at what we are doing around Network for Learning, and when you look at the fact that we have invested significantly in Youth Guarantee—this is another area for young New Zealanders. We are focused on delivering those programmes for 16 and 17-year-olds who may otherwise drop out of school. As I have already mentioned, we have implemented national standards. But also we are interested in ensuring that, as has already been mentioned, we boost apprenticeships. We know that although some young people may want to be doctors and lawyers, other young people have many opportunities in the building and construction sector—which brings me on to Canterbury.

I have had the opportunity over the last couple of months to be down in Canterbury and see that we still have a long way to go. But what I am proud of is that in the most difficult fiscal conditions of a generation our Government has put billions into rebuilding Canterbury. There is one area that we have put a significant amount of money into, and that is $1 billion in terms of rebuilding and renewing our education system there. That is incredibly significant. It is difficult and it is challenging, because we have some very damaged schools and we have families that are still recovering from the earthquakes. But again I make the point that we have found that money and we are working very hard on the ground to rebuild that city, and that is something that we are all proud of.

The final point I would like—as the Minister of Youth Affairs—is that there are many people in this House who will stand up and speak about issues that matter to young people. As I have mentioned before, I think we have got some very strong policies, and we have invested. But as the Minister of Youth Affairs I think it is really important that we ask young people for their views, whether that be in designing more modern education policies or whether that be about service and how we can increase the amount that young people give back to the community, because that helps create leadership. I am looking forward to the fact that I will be visiting a number of programmes in my capacity as Minister of Youth Affairs, because I think there are some great community organisations across New Zealand, and there are some great young people who are contributing to this country.

Too often we hear in the paper the negative stories about young people, but whether it is Sam Johnson and the work that he did with the student volunteers in terms of rebuilding Canterbury, there are some amazing young people in New Zealand and we are investing in a number of programmes to help support that. I look forward to hosting the Youth Parliament, which happens every parliamentary term—I was pleased to make the announcement yesterday. But also I think there are a number of areas, such as the Prime Minister’s Youth Mental Health Project and the Youth Crime Action Plan, where we can do more. I am very proud of this Government’s policies in terms of young New Zealanders.

I would be very cautious if I were the member opposite, Nikki Kaye, about using the word “proud” in relation to this Government’s record, and, in particular, about stepping into the fray of listing a group of achievements and groups that should be feeling pleased with the contribution that this Government has made to their area. There were a couple that I just jotted down; I could not even grab all of them as the member spoke. But to list small business as somehow being a group that should feel grateful for the presence of this Government seems farcical to me. Businesses are losing revenue, having to shut their doors and go offshore or even stop existing at all in New Zealand, because of this Government’s inertia on the issue of monetary policy. Government members seem to be the only ones who do not think that there is an issue with manufacturing and the productive sector in New Zealand. If we need just a recent example, they fold their arms and sit back while contractors—builders, plumbers, electricians—all suffer as Mainzeal collapses. They all suffer, and on that side of the House they have no response to that situation.

The second group that is meant to feel grateful for, and proud of, that Government’s list of achievements, apparently, is young people. Yes, that would be the same group of people who are experiencing 30 percent unemployment for 15 to 19-year-olds, yet the Minister of Youth Affairs had nothing to say on that matter. They should all feel pleased that the Youth Parliament is coming to town and that 120 young people have the privileged position of sitting in this place, but what of the 30 percent of young people who cannot even get a job right now? Well, I hope that the young people who come here for Youth Parliament do a better job of speaking on behalf of young people than that youth Minister did in her first contribution as Minister to this House. Thirdly, we are all meant to feel grateful for the Government’s welfare reforms. Well, I have got a bit more to say on that, but if the Minister of Youth Affairs thinks that we should ask young people about their views on policy, why do we not ask the people who are on Government support right now what they think of the welfare reforms and how those reforms are assisting them into work? I have got a bit more to say on that, Mr Goldsmith, because I think we will find that welfare reforms are that in title alone. They do nothing to help those people who are desperately looking for work.

The Prime Minister’s statement in the first session of this House demonstrated that we have a Prime Minister who is willing to allow his Government to recline while we move into decline. We have gone from worse—what we had previously, which was almost a “stand back and wait” option—to actually almost taking a neutral position on some things and almost a dangerous interventionist approach on others. It might have sounded harmless when it came out of the Prime Minister’s mouth, because it almost looked like a comedy routine, but underneath it all, whilst he makes jokes, people like young people, the unemployed, children, Māori, and Pasifika are all suffering. As Grant Robertson pointed out, these are the people who represent our future—the taxpayers who will be paying for my retirement. I care about this issue deeply, not just morally but fiscally.

Let me show you how this hands-off approach is hurting us. There are 270,000 children living in poverty. You can argue, of course, that we have always had a degree of child poverty in New Zealand—that is true. But we have moved from 15 percent of children living in material deprivation to 21 percent. Our social mobility is declining. What do I mean by that? The ability of a child to grow up in a State house and become a Prime Minister is lessening. It has become the area of the privileged few, and when I say the privileged few I mean the baby-boomers, not the children of today. We have a number of children suffering from Third World diseases and preventable hospitalisations. The markers are all there, but the action is absolutely absent from that side of the House. Let us contrast that with the first speech that the Leader of the Opposition made, in which he clearly said that Labour would present its plan on child poverty to the country this year. We will do that and we will do it with pride, because we are willing to be bold. We are willing to address an issue that really speaks to the heart of whether we are a country that supports and looks after the most vulnerable, because that surely is a mark of a society.

There is a reason why we need to do that with urgency. I read an article in Idealog magazine recently, where the writer said: “If the issue of income disparity isn’t addressed in the next few years, our children will inherit a world of ballooning debt, increasing social welfare costs, high unemployment, and rioting youth. Don’t believe it could not happen here.” Yet let us contrast that then with what Mr Key said on child poverty. Well, virtually nothing. In fact, whenever this Government is challenged on the issue of child poverty, it responds by referring to its Ministerial Committee on Poverty. I took a look recently at what progress that committee, which meets quarterly, has made. I could summarise it by saying “absolutely nothing”. If I am more generous, I could say that it has produced a few aides-mémoire, one of which is from the Ministry of Social Development that list its projects that are focused on alleviating poverty. What might those projects be? One was listed as the White Paper for Vulnerable Children, which I can tell you, having read it cover to cover, does absolutely nothing for child poverty. Yes, it addresses some of the issues around identifying vulnerable children who have been abused, but it does nothing to address child poverty.

The No. 2 project that the Ministry of Social Development listed was its welfare reforms. I have read both bills in detail. For both bills, I have sat on the Social Services Committee, which has examined the welfare reforms and their impacts.

With all that, the member should be more informed.

I have looked at the statistics, Mr Ardern, that have come out since those welfare reforms have come into place. Tell me what the measure of success for those reforms should be. What would the measure of success be? Perhaps more people moving into work. Well, on that measure, the Government is an epic fail. Last quarter there was an increase in youth unemployment in every single region—every single region—bar one, and that is with that Government’s first round of welfare reforms. What about invalids benefit numbers? They have gone up. Sickness benefit numbers have gone up too. DPB numbers have also gone up, and that was a special interest of the Minister for Social Development. She focused on increasing work obligations, yet we have seen a decrease in people on the DPB and in part-time work, and an increase in DPB take-up—epic fail.

What has the Minister also done, as part of her welfare reforms? Well, apart from asking people to prove more often that they are looking for work, she has increased her use of sanctions. In fact, sanctions under this Government have almost tripled on families with children. Across that time, has that improved the situation? Well, as I have said, every single benefit bar the unemployment benefit in recent times has gone up. So I would call it a fail, particularly when the unemployment benefit has always been the easiest one to move people in and out of and the others have always been the hardest. This Government, on every measure that you could pick, has failed on welfare, and yet it prides itself on somehow being different and better than Labour. Yet we are the ones who got welfare numbers far below this Government’s numbers, and we did it without harming children nearly to the extent that this Government must be held to account for.

Welfare reforms should be about work first, and by that I mean creating it.

💬 Hon Dr Nick Smith: Then why are you so opposed to jobs?

I have received a letter just today from a man who has applied for 360 jobs, Minister Smith—360 jobs. Our starting point on this side of the House will always be that people want to work. It is up to that Government to get its house in order and do its bit by making sure that the jobs are there. Instead, what do we have? Some of the highest unemployment we have seen in recent times and jobless figures that we should all be ashamed of. Yet that Government sits and waits, and reclines while we decline. Not on this side of the House. We have a plan for employment, we have a plan for poverty, and over the 2 years we will continue to prove to that Government and also to the people of New Zealand that this is a party of hope, rather than that side of the House, which is a party of desperation.

It is a pleasure to rise and speak in the Debate on the Prime Minister’s Statement and to the vote of confidence in the John Key - led National Government. There are a number of reasons why I say that. The first is that the National-led Government is the only political choice for people who want to see a growing, stable economy that will create jobs for Kiwis—those Kiwis who are focused and want to get on in life. That is why our economy remains front and centre for this Government over the next term in Parliament. That is why we have a programme ahead of us to improve the surplus, or the economic circumstances to return us to surplus, in the next term and a bit. It is also why we intend to spend the amount of money that we do to rebuild Christchurch. It is also why we have introduced a number of reforms in our time so far, such as the introduction of the 90-day trial period and the changes to the Resource Management Act system, and also why we have invested so heavily in returning ACC back into financial shape. It is also why we have kick-started the multibillion-dollar programme on infrastructure investment. All through that time we have been dealing with three major challenges: an economy that was left in an unbalanced and poor shape by the previous Government—it is interesting to note the comments of the previous speaker, Jacinda Ardern, in respect of unemployment, when you look at that—the impact of the global financial crisis, and, of course, the Canterbury earthquakes.

New Zealand has to become a magnet for investment by individuals and small businesses—New Zealand and offshore. We have to create business opportunities to create jobs for hard-working New Zealanders. Without more investments that benefit New Zealand, we cannot have jobs and we cannot have growth in the New Zealand economy. What is it about that that our Labour opponents find difficult to understand? One is a prerequisite to the other, and there are no exceptions. The Government is working hard to encourage investment through our Business Growth Agenda by reducing costs and uncertainty for business, and ensuring our people have the right skills to contribute. The Government’s recent announcements on youth training and apprenticeship courses aligned with industry, to best meet the demands to develop work opportunities and training opportunities for young New Zealanders, have been welcomed by all industries, but in particular by the rural farming industries. Our apprenticeship schemes will provide the skills and opportunities, particularly for people in the trades that service the farming sector, but equally so in the farming sector itself. There has been quite a vacuum in this area for some time. So those announcements are very welcome and will have an undoubted effect on the New Zealand economy.

For businesses to invest in plant and facilities in New Zealand, they need to be confident that they will have access to infrastructure, and that there will be support through transport, energy, water, and telecommunications to sustain those businesses. We have rolled out billions of dollars in investment in infrastructure over the past 4 years, which is supporting thousands of jobs and will continue to increase the opportunity for those jobs. But, unlike our opponents, we will not just throw money at the problem. We are committed to fixing roadblocks like the Resource Management Act that are slowing down the process and driving up costs. We want to work cooperatively with local councils to reduce the amount of costly red tape. New Zealand has abundant natural resources. The Government is taking a hard look at how our resources are managed so we can continue to grow our economy and look after our environment. The Government is working on a comprehensive package of reforms to the resource management system, which will be released in the next few months, and will progress with our Better Local Government reforms.

New Zealand is a strong exporting nation. We are committed to increasing the contribution that exports make to our economy by aggressively pursuing more higher-quality trade agreements. The opportunities in Asia and, particularly, the China economies are enormous, and equally so in our Indian trade agreements. It is amazing to know that there are members in this House who would oppose that type of progress, and it defies logic why you might do that. Our primary sector is an important contributor to our export earnings. In fact, there is no other more important contributor—72 percent of our merchandise exports. Access to water and to the primary production structures is essential when you look at developing an economy that is sustainable. We are establishing a company to act as bridging investor for regional water infrastructure development, and we will invest up to $400 million in regional-scale schemes—regional-scale schemes to encourage third-party capital investment. Last week the Government earmarked $80 million for the initial stages of the company’s operations, and that will be set aside in the 2013 Budget. Reliable irrigation presents a major step in unlocking economic potential for New Zealand. Having our tradable sectors grow strongly, delivering on the Government’s economic growth goals, is the No. 1 objective of this Government.

I hope that the rural and provincial New Zealanders who are listening to this debate, and others who may listen in on future debates, take note of what our opponents are saying. For example, the Leader of the Opposition stated in his speech to the nation that “The reality is that we will not create more better paying jobs by simply exporting more milk powder.” How wrong is that! How naive and ignorant is that! How far off course can you be? Some of the very high-end, sophisticated nutraceuticals and pharmaceuticals and high-end food ingredient powders that are now processed in some of the largest manufacturing processing sites in the world here in our dairy industry hold one of the strongest keys to extra growth in this economy. And that can be done in a very sustainable, clean, green way. When you look at what the Leader of the Opposition is proposing, he is proposing an increase in industry. That is not a bad thing. In fact, increases in industry will generally lead to more jobs and more exports. But you are talking about the industrialisation of New Zealand in terms of its economy. What effects would that have on the environment? What sorts of effects do you create in the environment when you surge forward entirely focused on the industrial area, as opposed to agriculture? Measure it credibly and sensibly against the effects of agriculture, and I would suggest that the effects on the environment are far more.

Labour has not changed its ideology since the 1980s, when the then Prime Minister, David Lange, described agriculture as a sunset industry. So 71 percent of our merchandise export earnings are a sunset industry. Well, certainly under Labour they would be, because its vision for the New Zealand economy is a capital gains tax, higher income tax, higher company tax, an emissions trading tax, no support for irrigation systems, higher ACC levies, no more 90-day trial periods for employment, rural New Zealand stuck in a dial-up age, less road construction, more unproductive spending, and more debt. Is there any mix of policies that could be more of a contrast, more backward-looking, and less likely to grow the New Zealand economy than those? And it gets worse, because, for Labour to be in Government, it would have to coalesce with the Greens. Let us just have a look at what the Greens have said. They would go harder than Labour on the emissions trading tax. They would put a restriction on livestock numbers. They would put a restriction on water use. They would put a restriction on nitrogen applications. The comparison is black and white, and clearly it does not favour a Labour, Green, and who-knows-who coalition Government.

If you think that by living in an urban environment in your house in Auckland or Wellington you are safe from these changes, then I would suggest you think again, because if our agricultural sector does not prosper and grow, then nor will our urban areas. It is that simple. Seventy-one percent of our merchandise exports from this sector—

💬 Andrew Williams: Where are the jobs? In the cities.

Well, the agricultural sector is the highest employer, both directly and indirectly in New Zealand. I suggest that a change of Government at this stage would be devastating to the New Zealand economy. Thank you.

First in this reply to the Prime Minister’s statement I would like to extend my congratulations to Mr Speaker on his ascension to that throne. I hope he enjoys the position. If he does not, I understand there is a vacancy coming up in Rome towards the end of the year and he might find that of some interest. But I hope he also takes the opportunity to review conventions and definitions and to make his own imprint on the House. I wish him well.

In reply to the Prime Minister’s speech, I want to spend some time going to the heart of people’s needs, and that is their health and the health of their children. In his speech in this debate 2 weeks ago the Minister of Health, Tony Ryall, trumpeted his Government’s so-called successes in health. He trotted out the things he usually trots out: more doctors and nurses—although those figures have been roundly disputed and comprehensively debunked by the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists, together with the Minister’s own ministry—and he talked about more elective surgical procedures. Those are the things that one gets when one pays the district health boards to provide them. These are the easy wins, which is what this Minister focuses on. But what are the statistics that the Minister of Health hides from? First of all, 3,701 more children were admitted to hospital last year than the year before. Nearly 4,000 more children with preventable respiratory infections, preventable skin infections, and even some vaccine-preventable diseases were admitted to our hospitals around New Zealand last year than in 2011. This is not what success looks like; this is what failure looks like. For every 100 Pākehā children admitted to hospital there were 156 Māori children admitted, and a staggering 251 Pacific Island children admitted. This is not a successful health system; this is a failing health system. Health inequalities, such as those that are demonstrated by the admission of children to hospitals, equal a bleaker future for our children and not National’s much-vaunted brighter one.

Health targets are, by and large, a good idea. We introduced them when we were in Government, and this Government has continued them. But they need constant revision. I want to refer to a particular example that has come to my attention in recent times. An ophthalmologist was to operate on a small boy who had a genetic but surgically correctable sight problem. The boy was booked in for surgery on a Thursday afternoon, I think it was. At the last minute the ophthalmologist had to cancel that boy’s operation because the hospital needed to do two cataract operations in that period in order to meet its elective surgical targets. In other words, the number crunchers came before that specialist’s clinical decision on who was the priority for surgery that afternoon. When we see this kind of thing happening in our hospitals we know that the health targets, which the Minister is trumpeting on a daily basis, are in fact distorting the delivery of health services and not improving them. In that story the specialist told me that he felt demoralised—demoralised by the compulsion to cancel that little boy’s surgery so that he could do two much quicker cataract operations in its place, in order to meet the Minister’s elective surgery targets. These are targets gone mad, if that is what is happening. I understand that this is not an isolated incident. So, although the Minister wants to get up and talk about particularly elective surgical procedure targets, then let him also say to this House what has to be cut in order to allow hospitals to meet those targets.

Let me give another example. At Counties Manukau District Health Board it takes now, depending on who you talk to, somewhere between 2 weeks and 8 weeks to get a hip operation—at Counties Manukau it takes between 2 weeks and 8 weeks to get a hip operation. It has almost got to the stage where it is going out into the highways and byways seeking out the halt, the lame, and the blind—let us throw in some cataract operations as well—and saying “Have you got a dodgy hip? I have got a deal for you.” If that is not skewing the purpose of health targets, I do not know what is. In fact, recently the Government was reported to be eyeing axing some of the elective surgical procedures on the basis of some advice from the National Health Committee, which comprises people for whom I have a great deal of respect. However, the particular procedure that it identified as possibly being one of the ones that could be taken out was the insertion of grommets. The insertion of grommets for children—babies, usually; infants with ear infections—sets them up to be able to hear properly, to get past their glue ear or their otitis media infection, which causes them not to be able to hear, and then paves the way for them to learn at school, to be responsive to their environment, and to not be problematic. This Minister is compelling advice to be brought to him—he is compelling advice that he wants to hear. In other words, whatever you do, do not cut elective surgery to people who can vote. Do not cut elective surgery to the elderly, but go and ahead and sacrifice elective surgical procedures for children, because they do not vote. This cynical approach to the delivery of health care is the hallmark of this Minister and needs to be stopped. It is time to revise these health targets.

Children’s health is our best investment. Nearly 4,000 more admissions to hospital of children with preventable or poverty-related diseases in 2012 than in 2011 is not success in the health system; it is failure. This Government is failing our children. Housing is one of the keys to this, and this Government has done nothing in 4 years, now in its fifth year, to improve health inequalities that stem from poor housing. This Government also has a black hole where its plan for an ageing population should be. This is not success; it is failure. For all of Tony Ryall’s shovelling of negative questions off to other lesser mortals in his caucus, people are now seeing beyond this teflon veneer and the evidence of failure is piling up. Child poverty is something that needs to be addressed. Health intervention can stem the worst impacts of child poverty, but it is not a cure in itself. So the Minister of Health needs to get alongside the Minister of Housing and say “How can we knit our policies together so that they give our children the best chance?”. Opposing a decent living wage and opposing realistic minimum wage increases year on year are the things that will not improve the health of our children in this country. They will only make it worse. The Government is not a success; it is a failure.

Mr Deputy Speaker, it would be churlish of me not to congratulate the new Speaker, so I will congratulate the new Speaker on taking my job. I am sure that the new Speaker will do a fantastic job. He has been in the job really only 1 day and already he is making his mark on the House.

I want to cut to the chase. In 2014 this country goes to a general election. From an article today a member of this House is quoted as saying: “I will not stand by while [his daughters’] rights and freedoms of other New Zealanders and Westerners, are denigrated by a sorry pack of misogynist troglodytes from Wogistan.” That is what one of these MPs said today.

💬 Hon Member: Disgraceful!

It is disgraceful, it is shameful, it is racist, and I have never heard—never ever heard—something worse than that come out of the mouth of one of the MPs in my time in the House. Yes, we have come close to it; I will own up to that. But never ever—never ever—have we come even to the verge of being racist. I want to say this and to put out, I suppose, a challenge to everybody in this House not only that they say they dislike or are ashamed of that sort of talk but also that they would distance their party from being in a coalition—in a coalition—with that member’s party.

I know for a fact that that sort of language would not come out of the mouth of members of New Zealand First, except for one. He has done it before, so it is no surprise. It would have been a surprise if Andrew Williams had said that. It would have been a surprise if somebody else had said that. But it was Richard Prosser, I am sorry to say.

You know, there is a price to pay for living in paradise. But it is not a paradise if the Government is going to be Labour, Green, and New Zealand First. So I call on the Green Party and the Labour Party to distance themselves now from being in a coalition with a member who thinks and actually speaks like that in public.

💬 Shane Ardern: They won’t.

I do not know whether they will or not. You know, in something like 22 months’ time we go to an election, and all we can hear from the pretenders—and in saying this, I will most probably put some of my colleagues off me; well, maybe put more colleagues off me. But at least the Greens actually believe in what they say. They come to this House with a purpose and to see a whole lot of changes, which they talk about incessantly. I know that upsets us, but I kind of like that.

💬 Shane Ardern: They won’t have you, mate.

On the other hand—no, they will not have me! On the other hand we have the New Zealand Labour Party. All we get from the Labour Party, and from Trevor Mallard, is—

💬 Kris Faafoi: Oh! Let it go.

“Oh!”, he says, “Oh!”. Mr Faafoi says “Oh!”. Well, here it is in black and white for Mr Faafoi from Porirua: “Stop thrashing dead horse and work on imaginative tools appropriate for New Zealand.” I have not heard something better than that from Russel Norman. It is about finding the tools that are appropriate for New Zealand. All Mr Mallard can come back and say—well, I do not want to go there. You know, what we are seeing is a party bereft. I mean the New Zealand Labour Party. I am not attacking the Green Party, because it believes in the stuff that it trots out.

I want to talk about housing, just for a minute. The New Zealand Labour Party has promised us 300,000—is it 300,000 homes, or is 100,000 homes—

💬 Jacinda Ardern: 100,000 homes.

—100,000 homes, at under $300,000 each, over 10 years.

💬 Jacinda Ardern: That’s roughly.

Did you hear that? It was very quiet. It was very quiet—“roughly”. It was “roughly” $300,000. Well, here is the thing: I was brought up, born and bred, in Ōtara. For those in Ōtara, and for those in Porirua, Freemans Bay, Kaiti, Tikipunga, all—

💬 Jacinda Ardern: How affordable is Freemans Bay now, Tau?

Well, I do not know. I live on the peninsula. I am not looking for a home in Freemans Bay at the moment. Here is the thing: if you want people to live in houses that are purchased or valued at under $300k a year, then all you are going to do is build more slums, ghettos, and poor neighbourhoods like the one that I was brought up in, because all the houses were the same. They were all the same—little boxes made of ticky-tacky. Although it suited the Labour Party to have those policies, although it suited my mother and father while bringing up four children, and although it suited my neighbours to do the same, all it did was push the problem into one area. And now why do you think that South Auckland is a bit of a mess? Why do you think—

💬 Jacinda Ardern: Why are you selling Housing New Zealand stock?

No, no, sorry, I am not going to listen to it any more. I am not listening to it any more.

Here is the thing: one person—one person—from the Labour members actually comes out of Ōtara, and that is William Sio. In fact, he and I were in the same class. Admittedly, I was a year in front of him, and that was second-year fifth. But here is the rub. Here is the rub. Those people over there talk on behalf of the poor and the downtrodden. What a load of rubbish! What a load of rubbish! They should try to be downtrodden, try to be underprivileged, for a change. All those people across the way have gone to university, and have gone straight from university into a job—oh, that is right—as a member of Parliament. And if they did have a job beforehand, it was with the unions. It was with the unions. I did it differently: I went from the unions to the National Party.

I want to say, in the 2 minutes that I have got left, that I have immense faith in the Hon Dr Nick Smith as the new Minister of Housing, because in his mind there are ways and means to make housing affordable, and I hope that one of my ideas gets a bit of a run. That is, you know in the old days—in the days of my mother and father—it was easy for them to actually put a dwelling on the back of their property, and to have that dwelling for themselves, with no cross-leasing fees, no development fund for a developer, and certainly no Resource Management Act to get in the way. You are not allowed to do that these days. It is at least $100,000 more to cross-lease and to build—

💬 Andrew Williams: It’s called slum, infill housing.

Oh, infill housing. Well, we cannot all have a 10-acre lifestyle block full of lemon trees, Mr Andrew Williams. We cannot have that, but the fact is that there are things that we can do to make it better for young people trying to get their dream home, especially on the Te Atatū peninsula—just like Phil Twyford. Kia ora.

Is some member seeking the call, because I might have to put the question. I understand it is a Green call, but if those members are not taking it—Dr Calder.

As the World Economic Forum came to a close a few days ago in Davos, IMF chief Christine Lagarde enjoined the Governments of the world to remain focused. She counselled countries to adopt the “do not relax” principle. The IMF forecast is for very fragile and timid growth for 2013, based on nations making the right decisions. One could argue that the international system is undergoing a generational transformation. Although some speakers’ minds at Davos seemed to be eased by the US’s stepping back from the fiscal cliff, in my mind the step was more of a soft-shoe shuffle, if not a sidestep.

The US remains on the brink of a chasm. Despite an extension, in a few short months the Department of the Treasury runs out of legal authority to borrow. Failure to raise the so-called debt ceiling would force the US Government to default on its obligations, and force immediate cuts equivalent to almost 6 percent of GDP. This could easily drive the US back into recession. Is there cause for alarm? In the summer of 2011 the Republicans were solipsistic and cavalier in using the threat of default to extract concessions from President Obama and the Democrats. As a result, one credit agency stripped the US of its AAA rating, adding roils of further and largely unnecessary stress to the foundations of the already shaky global financial system. If petty politics pertain in the US, we could be in for more of the same.

Some economists at Davos expressed some optimism regarding China, as its economic slow-down seems less serious than a year ago, but challenges remain, as there is a shift in focus from an export-driven economy to one that relies on domestic consumption. China’s vast reserve of cheap workers is dwindling rapidly, and it will not be very long before China’s demographic dividend is spent.

Although Mario Draghi of the European Central Bank is trumpeting 2012 as the year that the troubled single currency was relaunched, deep systemic failures—fault-lines—run beneath the surface of the eurozone. Rising unemployment, a growing social disconnect, declining competitiveness, and the fundamental tension between integration and sovereignty in times of austerity are becoming more and more evident.

This principled, pragmatic Government is making the prudent financial decisions necessary to weather the ongoing economic turbulence. No Government has a magic wand to wave, and no Government can change things overnight. However, our balanced approach of economic stimulus combined with deficit reduction is working, and working well. It is worth reiterating that it attracted a ringing endorsement from one of US President Obama’s financial advisers, Peter Orszag, who was Obama’s director of the Office of Management and Budget until 2010. He singled out New Zealand as the model sans pareil for its balanced approach to the deepening international debt crisis.

New Zealand is the only country in the world that has “coupled additional stimulus with medium-term fiscal consolidation.” Just last week the international credit agency Moody’s in its latest credit analysis of New Zealand said the country’s AAA Government bond rating reflected “high economic strength, very high institutionalised and government financial strength and low susceptibility to event risk.” That is sound recognition of this Government’s strategy.

A society is judged by how it treats its most vulnerable. This National-led Government has borrowed to cushion vulnerable New Zealanders from the sharpest edges of the recession, at the same time as maintaining strong financial discipline. As a result the New Zealand economy is performing better than that of the US, Japan, countries of the eurozone such as Germany and France, and also the UK. We have focused on growth that is sustainable and is built on higher savings and earnings rather than ever increasing debt.

How have we worked to protect the most vulnerable? Around $2 billion of borrowing over the last 4 years has been used to protect and grow public health services. This has contributed to the improved health services New Zealanders are seeing every day, including free doctors’ visits for children under 6 years, 35,000 more New Zealanders getting elective surgery each year than 4 years ago, and record numbers of patients being treated in emergency departments within 6 hours. But it is not only that—hugely increased numbers of our children are being vaccinated, and we are aiming to do even better. We are increasing the target for infant immunisation rates to 95 percent of 8-month-olds being immunised with three scheduled vaccinations by 2017.

We regard the incidence of rheumatic fever in some of our communities, including the vibrant and diverse community of Manurewa where I have my office, as unacceptable. We are investing $24 million and have set ourselves a target of reducing the incidence of rheumatic fever by two-thirds by 2017. Delivering better services to the public is one of our four key priorities. Our public services are steadily improving their effectiveness to get the most out of every health dollar.

Attending a global health forum last year, I met many delegates who were complaining that their Governments were cutting health spending. By contrast New Zealand’s public health service is doing extraordinarily well. In 2009-10, while other OECD countries were reducing health spending, New Zealand had a 3.4 percent increase in real health spend—the third-highest of 27 nations. This is possible only through prudent financial management and building a strong and competitive economy.

New Zealand is a trading nation. Building a more competitive and productive economy for New Zealand provides the resources necessary to protect the vulnerable in society, maintain the rule of law, provide high quality public services—some of which we have just mentioned—look after the environment, and provide opportunities for our young people. Trade is our lifeblood. About 2 weeks ago the OECD and the World Trade Organization launched a new database of Trade in Value Added. This new data estimates trade in value-added terms, which helps convey the interdependence of global value chains and reveal who ultimately benefits.

New Zealand is especially well connected to global value chains in agriculture and the food sector. The OECD estimates that 81 percent of New Zealand exports’ value is created domestically. This is higher than the OECD average of 72 percent and reflective of both our geographic distances from market and the importance of agricultural products to our exports. As the Minister of Trade, Tim Groser, pointed out, this database provides an important reminder that imports are vital to production of exports. About one-third of New Zealand imports of intermediate inputs are used to produce goods and services that are then exported.

Now that we can quantify the contribution of imports to value-added exports, it becomes clear that any barrier to imports in turn becomes a barrier to our exports and to our firms engaging internationally. Countries must ensure that business can access world-class inputs at competitive prices if they are to be productive and reap the benefit from global value chains and trade. The economic shamans and rune readers on the left constantly cry out for intervention to force the dollar down. One is reminded of King Canute—the cri de coeur from the economic sans-culottes is never accompanied by any explanation of how this may be achieved without ruinous inflation. It betrays a touching faith in the manifest abilities of our National-led Government that they believe us capable of doing so.

It is worth knowing that Australia receives the bulk of our manufactured exports and the New Zealand - Australian cross rate has never been more favourable in the last 10 years. Obviously, a strong kiwi dollar can provide a headwind to some New Zealand exporters, but also, depending on the proportion of imported inputs to the goods and services, can be an aid to exporters. We constantly need to remind ourselves that companies like Apple, Toyota, and indeed Fonterra did not achieve their global success through selling goods cheaper than anyone else.

The strong dollar has had other consequences. We ran a $486 million trade surplus in December—the largest trade surplus recorded for the December month as a percentage of exports in 21 years. The surplus is due in part to the costs of imports coming down because of the strong New Zealand dollar. Taking out the big one-off items and adjusting for exchange rate, imports were actually up 7 percent in the December quarter. This, of course, suggests our economic recovery is continuing, and we may be in for a pleasant surprise; an increase in the 0.4 percent Reserve Bank forecast when the December quarter economic growth figures are released.

World dairy prices have improved in the December quarter and export prices are turning up, which augurs well for 2013. A healthy, growing, sustainable economy allows us, as I have mentioned, to provide a safe, secure environment in our communities, high-quality public services, and the opportunities for our young people to unlock the potential and creativity that lies within them all, and to protect the most vulnerable—in other words, a brighter future for all New Zealanders.

I wish to acknowledge and congratulate our Speaker, David Carter, on his role and wish him all the best in that role. We look forward to seeing him progress in that position over the next few years.

This debate is a very important one, because it sets out the philosophical differences between the two political parties that represent the two main parties of this Parliament. On one side you have the National Party in Government with our great Prime Minister, the Rt Hon John Key, doing the right thing by New Zealand, and on the other side you have the Labour Party—a party of envy, a party distraught in itself about who its leadership actually is, a party that is looking for itself in the mirror but cannot find itself there. Then on the heels of that you have the smaller parties like New Zealand First and the Green Party there. New Zealand First members are beaming at the thought of being in Parliament for another 3 years. They do not actually care whether they do anything, but just the fact that they are here is enough for them. The Green Party members are sitting there, diligent as ever, but completely misrepresenting to the public what they stand for and what they want for this country going forward.

It is a shame that politics becomes a battle of perceptions. We think in this Parliament that it is a matter of perception and it is advertising. It is like Coke against Pepsi, is it not—you know, National against Labour—but it is not really that, actually. The public out there are much smarter than we think. They can see through the perceptions and the facades on the other side. They know that the Labour Party and the Green Party and the New Zealand First Party do not actually stand for what is right for New Zealanders. They know that those parties will not do the right thing for this country going forward, and they do not vote for them. It is that simple.

The public out there look beyond the perceptions that this House tries to portray, look at the realities of the policies, and determine that those Opposition parties do not have a plan, they do not have the people, and they do not have the resources to actually do what the people out there actually want. What the people actually want is what this Government is delivering. They want good, solid management that is going to direct this country through very difficult economic times. They want a Government that cares about social, health, and education issues. They want a Government that is interested in our people and, especially, in our young people’s future. They want a country and a Government that builds and builds a stronger country going forward, so that future generations of New Zealanders have the opportunities and the ability to live in a first-class country going forward. They know they are getting that from the National Government. They voted us in because they knew our plan. They like it and they want to keep it going.

💬 Andrew Williams: You tell this to the 50,000 going to Australia this year.

The New Zealand First Party keeps on talking about people going to Australia. Well, that is the competitive pressure that we have. You know, we cannot avoid it.

💬 Andrew Williams: 50,000 a year. It’s the only reason why they’re not staying here.

We live right beside Australia, that is right. We have a competitive pressure there. But that means that New Zealanders and the New Zealand Government have to step up. The Opposition wants to do exactly the opposite. The New Zealand First Party wants to create Fortress New Zealand. It does not want anybody coming into New Zealand and it does not want anybody leaving New Zealand. It just sees New Zealand as a fortress that will survive. Well, that is completely irrational. It is not going to happen. It has never happened in world history.

The Labour Party, on the other hand, is saying: “Well, why aren’t you doing something? What are you doing?”. Well, we have got a plan, and the plan is something that the public sees. It is about investing in this country going forward.

💬 Andrew Williams: It’s a cunning plan. Nobody knows what it is.

You want to see the plan? I will tell you about the plan. Come to Hamilton and you will see the plan, because Hamilton is going ahead and it is doing really well. Do you know why it is going ahead?

💬 Andrew Williams: That’s because it’s getting a bypass.

It is getting a bypass—exactly. The New Zealand First Party gets 10 points. A golden star to the New Zealand First Party for getting it right. The Government is building the infrastructure that enables Hamilton to take advantage of its biggest opportunity, which is Auckland. It is linking Hamilton to Auckland, just like New Zealand needs to link with Asia. Our opportunity in the future comes from those big Asian economies that will direct a lot of money around this part of the world. If we do not link into those countries, we will miss out on our opportunity.

💬 Andrew Williams: Skycity Casino.

Skycity Casino is another thing that the New Zealand First Party does not want to see happen. It brings jobs into New Zealand, but you do not want to see it happen.

When we look at it, the issue that the Labour Party and the Opposition have tried to promote over the last couple of months has been housing. That is what they have been saying. They have been pushing the housing button. Well, let us have a look at it. We live on the Pacific Rim, beside the countries that will be the richest on this planet for the next 100 years—Australia, China, Viet Nam, the Philippines, and Indonesia. Those are the countries that will pump out the wealth of this world for the next 100 years. If the New Zealand public and the Opposition think that there will not be some impact on the New Zealand economy from being right beside those countries, then we are being naive. We will need to be able to play the game with those countries. We will need to be able to have a world-class education system, so that our young people can grow up and compete.

We will have to compete on our assets, as well. We will have to pay the price for housing. There will be no free rides in this world. There is no fortress mentality where you can say that New Zealand lives in a different world. We want to be in that world. We want to be in a world where our children can aspire to getting good jobs, can aspire to getting a good income, and can aspire to having their own home, because in that way they will be living the First World dream. If we do not aspire to that, if we think that we can dumb our economy down, if we think that we can dumb our people down, and if we think that we can deliver houses for $300,000, then you are dreaming. Get in the real world.

We need to compete. That is the challenge that New Zealanders understand. That is the challenge that the New Zealand National Government understands. That is the challenge that the Opposition denies. It denies the challenge of this world and it denies the challenge of our people. That is why it will suffer in the polls in 2014—because it does not understand the reality of what our people are going through and the challenges in front of our country.

But do not look at it as a challenge. It is not a challenge; it is an opportunity, because the real opportunity for us is to succeed. If we succeed with those countries in the next 100 years, New Zealand can be one of the wealthiest countries in the world. That is the crossroads we have in front of us now: to accept the challenge and succeed, or to try to put up some walls and say: “It’s too hard. We’re not part of that.” That is the choice that the public has out there.

We have young people watching from the gallery today. They have that choice today. Their choice is to get a good education and make the most of their opportunities, or to not get a good education and think that it is going to come their way. Well, it is a different world from when we all grew up. The world that you grow up in will not give you that choice. You will have to make the right choices, and that involves getting that education and doing that hard work, because there will be no second chance. The Opposition believes that there is some pot of gold that will suddenly deliver that for them.

💬 Andrew Williams: On the bypass—it’s on the bypass.

The New Zealand First Party talks about the bypass. Well, that is linking Hamilton to Auckland, like New Zealand will be linked to China and those other countries going forward. Hamilton is doing well, because we understand the future. We are not afraid to take those challenges. We have invested in those challenges. We have put money into broadband, we have put money into the university, and we have put money into the hospital—we have put money into the infrastructure. My colleagues from the north look with envy on us, but we have done it and we are succeeding. That is the future of New Zealand, just like it is the future of my city. I look forward to this Government carrying on through this term and delivering that future. It is a strong future, it is the right future, and it is the only future that will enable our younger generations to actually succeed in the modern world. Thank you.

May I express to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, a happy new parliamentary year. I also join other parliamentary colleagues in congratulating our new Speaker, the Rt Hon David Carter. We wish him all the best in his new role. We have seen his first outing as Speaker in his first question time today, and I think we will give him a provisional pass—it used to be a C- back in the fifth form, a provisional pass. We wish him all the best in that new challenge. I know he is a Canterbury man, born and bred, so he has what it takes to be able to succeed in that role. Can I also wish members of the House a happy New Year too.

I apologise to those people watching at home, because they have just had to put up with three speakers from the National Party—that is 30 minutes uninterrupted of absolute spin and drivel from the Government. We heard that from the last speaker, David Bennett from Hamilton. Hamilton is a lovely place. I have got nothing against it, other than what the MP for Hamilton East has just said. He said that this debate is important because it is a philosophical debate about what our party stands for and what their party stands for, and he is absolutely 100 percent correct in that. I cannot agree more with what Rodney Hide said about the Government when he was in this House: this is a do-nothing Government. It is a do-nothing Government, and we have seen that for the last 4 years.

And then Cam Calder, earlier, talked about judging a country on how it treats its vulnerable. I want to talk a little bit about that, because, Mr Calder, one vulnerable part of our society is the Pacific Island community. If you want to talk about how that Government’s track record over the last 4 years has gone about looking after that vulnerable community, last week when the unemployment statistics came out we saw that 16 percent of Pacific people are unemployed—16 percent. That is, roughly one in eight of the Pacific people in this country who want work have no work. Let us look at that track record over the last 4 years. It has gone from 15.6 to 16 percent—so, another rise in the last quarter. At this time last year the Pacific unemployment rate was 13.8 percent. So how is this Government looking after the Pacific community, when in the last 12 months it has looked after the vulnerable Pacific Island community by letting unemployment go up by 2.2 percent? How is that Government going to be judged by the Pacific community when it looks it in the face in 2014 and says “We’ve looked after you. You’re a vulnerable community.”? You have not. You have not one iota, because 16 percent is more than twice—more than twice—the current average national unemployment rate. So when that member of Parliament says “We’ve looked after vulnerable communities.”, you have not, and especially not the Pacific community.

💬 Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

I am sorry, Mr Deputy Speaker. This Government has not; it has not looked after the Pacific community.

We are talking about the Prime Minister’s statement, and, you know, the brave effort that he made. I thought it was not his best—potentially his worst. But I want to know what has happened to the old John Key. What has happened to the old John Key? Back in 2008, and before that, he was positive about our country. He used to say “We’re aspirational for a brighter future. We’re turbocharging. We’re kicking the tyres.” But that John Key has gone. That John Key has gone. We have seen someone who said he stood on principle—and then Mr Bennett says that voters want to know what this party stands for. I think it is clear to see that the people of New Zealand know that the National Party stands for whatever the last focus group said. The people of New Zealand know that this National Government stands for whatever the last focus group said. So where is the old John Key? The “Shucks!”, happy-go-lucky Prime Minister whom the people of New Zealand thought was the be-all and end-all and would change the future of this Government—a man who said he was going to be a leader for New Zealand to a brighter future but who has become only a manager of a bleak present. He said this pretty soon after he came into power: New Zealand would be coming out of recession “reasonably aggressively” by early 2010. So New Zealand would come out of the recession “reasonably aggressively” by early 2010. Well, one measure of that is our unemployment level, and it is still—still—much, much higher. And I think it was Steven Joyce, at question time, who started patting himself on the back because last Thursday the unemployment rate went from 7.3 percent to 6.8 percent.

But let us do something that the National Party hates, and let us look at the facts. Let us look at the facts. When those figures came out it was very interesting to read, and a very helpful lady at Statistics New Zealand, the industry and labour statistics manager Diane Ramsay, said: “We’re seeing fewer people working and looking for work, and more people outside the labour force. More younger people are solely in study and more older people are entering retirement,”. So, basically, what she is saying, in her statistical frame, is that it is bleak out there for most New Zealanders. It is bleak out there for most New Zealanders. And the sad thing about that is that when she is saying that fewer people are looking for work, she is saying they have lost hope that they can find work. They have lost hope that they can find work. This Government will be worried about that because when people start losing hope that they can find work, that is going to start really impacting the Government, and I think that will really impact it over the next 12 months.

As the MP for Mana I want to take a bit of a closer look at those figures, take a closer-to-home look at those figures, because Wellington unemployment is at an 18-year high. Wellington unemployment is at an 18-year high. Not since 1994 has it been worse. It went from 7.1 percent in the September quarter to 7.9 percent in the December quarter—1 percent higher than the national average. Basically, the raw numbers are that there are 22,600 unemployed people in the Wellington region, and in the previous quarter there were 21,000. So 1,600 more people in this region, in our capital, are now unemployed compared with the previous 3 months. Again, those are people who are losing hope that they can get a job, and losing hope that this Government can do anything to help them to try to find a job. Those New Zealanders are the forgotten New Zealanders whom National does not care about any more—whom National does not care about any more. Kiwis across the country are working harder than ever. They are doing their fair share. They are either working or looking for work, but they feel let down by this Government, which promised them a brighter future. Where is this brighter future? This is a Government that has forgotten about those people—those people who have gone off the register, who are no longer looking for work. It is only a Labour-led Government that will stand up for those hard-working Kiwis whom this Government has forgotten.

As I said before, this is a do-nothing Government, and in 2014 the people of New Zealand will elect a hands-on approach that will be different from what this Government has done. This Government has been a do-nothing, let-the-market-decide Government. Well, that has not worked for the last 4 years, and you can feel the sense of unease that the people of New Zealand put faith in that Government, in that party, that things would turn round, and all they get is excuses and more excuses that things have not. There needs to be a new era here in New Zealand, and that is what we are promising in terms of a hands-on Government. We need a smart, hands-on Government, and a Government that is prepared to be a player and not a spectator.

I think one of the best ways that we have done that—and we actually promised this at the last election—is we are going to help our young people, whom Mr Bennett claims he was going to help. We on this side of the House have been saying that apprenticeships have been a priority for a lot longer than this party, which thought it was a good idea in early January because the focus group said so. Back in 2011, when we put out our policy, we basically said that we would make an investment in our young people who wanted to upskill and get into work, and we would help those people—those chippies, those plumbers, those electricians who needed help with an extra pair of hands—by having a policy of making sure that we turn the dole into a subsidy for those employers that need an apprentice. And when we go around—and I was speaking to a builder in my electorate the other day—they love that idea. They love that idea, and they do not necessarily buy what the Government is doing at the moment: coming up late to this party, saying that apprenticeships, all of a sudden, are important to the Government. This Government has done very little around jobs for the last 4 years, and then all of a sudden—

💬 Hon Michael Woodhouse: Rubbish.

He calls it rubbish, but look at the figures. Look at the figures. The figures do not lie, Mr Woodhouse. The figures do not lie, and the people know what is going on there. When you come late to the party around apprenticeships, people will notice that. People will notice that. Our policy of turning the dole into a subsidy for employers is a good thing for those young people whom Mr Bennett says he cares about, but also a good thing for those employers that are struggling, that need an extra set of hands, and that would love to take on somebody but cannot quite make the commitment because it is too much of a financial barrier. So that is one of the hands-on things that we are going to do. That is not stand-offish. That is not letting the market decide. That is a hands-on approach.

And then you look at our KiwiBuild scheme—100,000 homes over 10 years to address not only the employment problem but also the housing affordability problem, which this Government has done nothing about. Its only answer to the housing affordability problem is to make Nick Smith in charge of it. Is this some kind of joke?

Can I begin by thanking members of the House and those others who acknowledged and congratulated me on my promotion a couple of weeks ago. It has certainly been a very hectic and busy time, and I am looking forward to the challenges those portfolios hold. I also want to acknowledge my former junior whip, now the chief whip for the Government, Louise Upston, and her new team of Tim Macindoe and No. 3, “The Whippet”, Jami-Lee Ross. I am sure they will be a tremendous team and continue to keep the caucus energised.

If there was any theme that underpinned Christmas 2012 for me it was the theme of the Christmas hamper. Of course, many hampers were given out, but I think the interesting thing for me was the one that was not. There was an article in the Otago Daily Times that rather warmed me, actually, through the very challenging period of the closure of the Hillside railway workshops—at least, that part that was not taken up by Bradken—and the work that local MP Clare Curran did to provide hampers for what was believed to be all the workers at Hillside. Indeed, she was quoted in the Otago Daily Times saying that “she called for donations of hamper items for Hillside staff, and said yesterday ‘hundreds’ of products had come in from Dunedin businesses and individuals since the appeal was launched”—businesses that I think thought would be donating to all KiwiRail workers who were affected by this closure. But apparently not, because one member was not given a hamper, and that member had something that the others did not. He was not a member of the trade union. In fact, he was quoted in the Otago Daily Times as saying: “I asked if there was a hamper for me and was told no,”—

💬 Clare Curran: Make sure you get the facts right, Michael.

—these are the facts as reported by the Otago Daily Times—“because I was a National supporter and a scabber. The union people simply don’t want me to have a hamper because I voted National and always have.” So those Dunedin businesses were not donating to Hillside workers; they were donating to union workers. Clare Curran cries tears not for Kiwi workers but for her union mates, because when she had an opportunity to say that this was a mistake and that clearly there was a misunderstanding about who would get the hampers, she did not.

💬 Clare Curran: I seek leave to make a personal explanation.

💬 Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: No. Order! The time to do that is between when members have the call. It is not a mechanism to interrupt a speaker. I will not put the leave, but that is not saying that the member cannot do it. I am informing the member when she can do it.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I fear I have touched a nerve. However, there was an opportunity to say that this was a misunderstanding. There was an opportunity to correct this, but, rather, Miss Curran was quoted in the Otago Daily Times saying that “She ‘understood’ some workers would not get hampers”—“some”, notice, not “one”—“but said she did not ask why, and did not know whether hampers were given only to union members. She said she would not be taking any action.” Well, I know what the public of Dunedin thought about that, concerned though they were at the closure of the Hillside railway workshops. There was disgust on social media at the perceptions of that action.

But roll on the new year, and we have last week’s decision by the Auditor-General to not, unlike what Ms Curran had requested, conduct a further inquiry into the purchase of flat-deck wagons by KiwiRail. I note the Office of the Auditor-General basically said “We have concluded that the decision to select CNR as a supplier was made for normal business and commercial reasons after a competitive market process.” This happens to be exactly what KiwiRail was required to do under section 4 of the State-Owned Enterprises Act, an Act passed by a Labour Government. It could have amended it, but it did not. Section 4 says that there was a requirement to adopt normal commercial practice. But the Office of the Auditor-General goes on to say “We did not identify any unfairness in the way the proposal from Hillside workshops was treated.”, and it concluded—significantly, I should say, for me—by saying “we have seen no evidence to suggest improper influence over these decisions.” So, no influence, and KiwiRail did exactly what it was required to do: follow normal commercial practice, invite Hillside to submit a bid, which it came a distant third on, and make a commercial decision that an Act passed by a Labour Government required it to do.

The only person prepared to stand up and say that they would change that law was Clare Curran. Phil Goff, when he was Leader of the Opposition, came down and said he would not change the law. He said “We’d look into it. We’d give Kiwis a go.”—and, absolutely, that is required in any event. David Shearer stopped short of saying that he would change the law, but Clare Curran said: “Nope. Under a Labour Government we’d reopen Hillside. We’d give them the subsidies that they would need. We would take $160 million, by conservative estimates, out of the pockets of hard-working taxpayers to fund that project, because, unfortunately, Hillside was not big enough or technological enough to compete on the world market.” So there it is—$160 million more in subsidies, and heaven knows what else would come our way.

It is tough out there in manufacturing. It is not a crisis, but it is tough. This Government does not have the luxury, however, of only talking about the negatives. There is job growth. I happened to visit Bradken yesterday morning. Bradken purchased the foundry at the Hillside railway workshops, and, in fact, its admin officers were moving into Hillside Road just this morning, so I was very grateful to them that they accommodated me. And they are upbeat. There is new work, there are new jobs being created, there are plenty of opportunities for the big pots that it has there to do foundry work under one tonne, and it could become Australasia’s leader in that market. So there is cause for optimism.

I just want to touch on some of those new responsibilities that I have as, firstly, Minister of Immigration, which perhaps on the face of it would seem like a rather dry portfolio. But I am very excited by it, because it is an absolutely vital cog in the wheel of the Government’s Business Growth Agenda. New Zealand is in a contest—a global contest—for talent, for tertiary students, for tourists, and for migrants who are prepared to invest in this country. I have been really, really encouraged by the manner in which Immigration New Zealand has improved over the last 4 years, and there are strategies under way that will supercharge that organisation and ensure that the skilled migrants that we need in order to take that Business Growth Agenda forward will be here.

I want to touch on one small matter that has been raised over the last few days in respect of the immigration portfolio, and that is the issue of asylum seekers and the passage of the Immigration Amendment Bill, which is due for its second reading soon. I have been asked—and it has been claimed even in this House during oral question time that there is no risk, and that it would be completely impossible for a boat to get from Indonesia, for example, to New Zealand. Well, I want to remind the House that most of our ancestors arrived here in sail ships and waka.

💬 Andrew Little: How many refugees have been found in waka?

And anybody who thinks that a steel-hulled, motorised vessel with a number of people—dozens or hundreds—could not make New Zealand shores is, frankly, being naive. And I challenge Andrew Little to be saying the same thing if and when that event occurs, because the risk is real, the possibility is real, and the response is necessary.

💬 Andrew Little: No, it’s not.

Well, there we go. We have it on record. Mr Little says “No, it’s not real.” Thank you. I shall mark the date and time, because the risk is real and if Labour does not believe so, well, we will just see.

I want to just finish on the issue of veterans’ affairs. This is a very busy year for veterans’ affairs. Planning for the 100th anniversary commemorations of Gallipoli, begun under the previous veterans’ affairs Minister, the Hon Nathan Guy, is well under way. There will be an announcement very soon, if not already, on the allocation of places for New Zealanders and Australians to that event. There are also a number of other commemorations taking place this year that are going to be very important: the 70th anniversary of the war in the North Pacific, the 60th anniversary of the signing of the ceasefire in Korea, and, of course, we have the very important work that veterans are looking for in the rewrite of the War Pensions Act 1954. So I can tell you it is going to be an extremely busy year. I look forward to all of those things taking place as part of the important work this Government will be doing.

I seek leave to make a personal explanation in response to comments made about me by the previous speaker.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): It must be personal comments, to you personally. Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is no objection.

I think it is important to put the correct facts into the Hansard around the donation of materials for Christmas hampers to the Hillside workers and my part in that before Christmas. There were 112 hampers put together. More than $18,000 worth of goods was donated by dozens of local businesses, which I organised, and, as I said, 112 hampers were produced. Not all of the people given those hampers were union members. Quite a number of them were not union members, and there were certainly more than 112 people still at Hillside. The list of people whom those donated hampers were given to was certainly drawn up by the union delegates, who gave me that list, and I was unquestioning in that because that was their right. As you can imagine, there was a lot of emotion at the Hillside railway workshops before Christmas, as 90 people lost their jobs due to the prioritisation by this Government of lowest cost—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! The member can relate only how you were personally affected by the comments that were being made. You cannot get into debate. Has the member finished?

Not quite. I certainly think that there is relevance here, because the previous speaker, Mr Woodhouse, has made comments about the unfairness of one particular person—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): No, look—[Interruption] Order! A personal statement is your response to be able to put your position. This is not a debate; it is about how the comments made by a previous speaker have affected you personally. That is your right and you have got leave to do that, but you cannot then get into a debate about the substance of that. So I ask the member to be very succinct on this, because otherwise I will close it down.

Thanks, Mr Speaker. Certainly it had an effect on me—having the wrong facts put into the Hansard by the member across the House. There were certainly many people who received Christmas hampers who were not union members, and there was certainly more than one person who did not receive a hamper for very good reasons. Thank you.

I would just like to take an opportunity to congratulate our new Speaker. I hope that we can have a great relationship with him and that the opportunity of free speech in this present Parliament will be upheld by all of us for the benefit of all of us as an important right that should be protected by all Speakers and also by all MPs, irrespective of the political bias of any political party.

I would also like to acknowledge that the debate on the Prime Minister’s statement came at the end of a beautiful summer, but after that I slightly lost my will to live. I find my will to live struggling when we listen to motherhood and apple pie, which we can all agree with, but underneath it the ideology, the rhetoric, and the attempt to justify the attack on education in the Prime Minister’s speech, but also in the Minister of Education’s speech, were quite notable. The Prime Minister’s speech was focusing on national standards as the only—and deeply unpopular—method by which educational outcomes are going to be changed. Hekia Parata’s speech was very defensive. It was understandably defensive because there are so many debacles on the list.

I want to talk a bit about the debacles but also about the positive vision, because out there, outside the beltway, there are some fantastic people working in education who absolutely believe in quality, public, local education. I had the privilege of attending a hui at Waitangi for engaging Māori learners, which occurs every year. It is a conference of teachers and principals not only in Northland but often Northlanders. They were very welcoming because what they are really interested in is how quality, local, self-managing schools with a good relationship with the Government can actually achieve the goals of supporting their young people.

We have schools such as Moerewa School, where Ngāti Hine have worked so hard to make a curriculum based on their own community’s desires for how their children will become good citizens, and then the school is cut off at the knees by Government policy and by Government action. It was distressing to see people from that community in tears while talking about the loss of their children. What has happened is that with the axing of the school’s senior class, which was being taught in Te Reo, we have lost young people from the system. We have lost young people who did not want to go to other schools and who now have had the message that the Government does not want them to be part of education on their own community’s terms. A punitive approach to education and towards schools that have an aspiration—a favourite Government word—for their own children to be educated according to their own beliefs has been lost, and that is a very sad thing.

I could also pick on Wanganui Collegiate School, if I felt like it. It is really tempting. My partner went there, and he has got some interesting things to say about it. The Government is certainly spending a lot of money on it, bailing it out to the tune of $3 million a year through integration, because that school cannot stand on its own feet. But it is still going to charge thousands of dollars of fees and we are going to help pay for that—a very bizarre scenario. When you look at the deed of Wanganui Collegiate School in 1852, Sir George Grey actually said that the school was to benefit Europeans and Māori. And if you look further down the deed, you will see—and this is something my partner has often quoted to me—that it was supposed to be for the poor of Aotearoa and the Pacific and Māori, as well as Europeans. Instead of which we have a private school that has now been bailed out, which is going to cost the taxpayer at just the time when the Christchurch schools are facing tremendous stress about their viability—and that announcement is coming up really soon.

We are talking about Wanganui Collegiate School, Novopay, national standards, charter schools, and early childhood education fees going up because of the targeting of people who are 100 percent qualified. I met somebody this weekend in Invercargill who lost her job because she was qualified. That is the kind of perverse incentive for any country that wants to build a stable, strong, viable system where all our children have access to a quality, creative, participatory education system, when somebody in early childhood education loses their job not because they are not good at their job but because the early childhood centre, under this Government, cannot afford to hire them any more. That consequence will ripple through the generations, because our smallest people need our best. Just because they do not vote does not mean we should not focus our attention on the smallest people. They need the quality teaching and the quality support, instead of which we have a privatised sector where the not-for-profits are struggling and with baby barns, where the babies are lined up and all have their nappies changed at the same time. That kind of robotic universe prepared for some kind of weird production line is not the future for early childhood education.

If you look at Te Whāriki, which is a fantastic curriculum, there is now pressure that there should be more assessment of children. So in early childhood education we are going from portfolios and the idea of child-centred integrated learning to the idea that we need to have more assessment like national standards for 3-year-olds. That will really work, because it is really not working in schools. There is an alternative to national standards, and that is actually called trust. It is called trusting schools and trusting parents to actually develop a curriculum that works, and to stick within the broad parameters of a very good curriculum, instead of imagining that measuring is going to work. Instead of actually feeding the cow, as they say in Canada, it is about weighing the cow. No matter how often you weigh things, especially if you weigh them differently in every community, you are not going to end up with any information that is going to be worth having about how to improve the so-called long tail of underachievement.

I would never belittle the reality for children who are struggling in our school system. I would never belittle that. That is why at the Engaging Māori Learners Conference we heard from principals and teachers who are actually innovating. They are not measuring, they are not labelling, they are not putting on their website, they are not competing, they are not trying to be privatised, they do not want to be charter schools, they do not want to have secret contracts, and they do not want unregistered teachers. Actually, what they want to do is make sure that they are meeting the goals of the families and whānau of their communities in terms of actually making our teachers able to be culturally inclusive and responsive.

What we have is Te Kotahitanga—one of the most culturally responsive programmes—which allows Pākehā teachers to become reflective practitioners on their bias against Māori children.

💬 David Bennett: How can you say you’ve got a bias? How can you say you’ve got a bias?

It has been blocked. Forty-four schools have seen great success. One in Hamilton, which the member from Hamilton may not know about, saw National Certificate of Educational Achievement results go from 23 percent to 77 percent. That happened because of Te Kotahitanga, because of the fact of that programme, and the Government has limited it to 44 schools. It has cut it. It has been limited because the Government thinks it might cost money. I am speaking about the importance of Ka Hikitia—Managing for Success and Te Kotahitanga as instruments of allowing teachers to reflect on their own practice, and when you have that instrument blocked, you have got to ask why and what the alternative is.

National standards versus proper professional development of teachers is a very, very sad thing, because what we are seeing is that proper professional development has been sacrificed. Everything has been sacrificed to national standards. The Government Budget has been sacrificed to narrowing the curriculum. Science advisers, drama advisers, all of those advisers who have lost positions are constantly contacting the Greens and saying that a broad curriculum allows a child to learn differently. It may be news to some people, but all kids start at different stages. Some talk when they are 2, some talk when they are 3 months—I was one of those—some talk when they are 4, some cannot stop talking. The fact is that they all develop at their own rate, and so when you start trying to measure them and put them in boxes, and when you start saying that the only pathway to literacy is through literacy—rather than through drama for some kids, it is through science for others, it is through Enviroschools for others—you have narrowed the curriculum. National standards—everyone knows they are not national or a standard, so that is another sad debacle. In hindsight, as we have heard from Hekia Parata quite a bit lately, national standards will be another of those jokes.

Moving right along to the education amendment bill that is before the House at the moment, it is reflected by the Government’s commitment in the Prime Minister’s speech that these are going to be the solutions. Privatisation is the solution to inequity. The trickle-down theory was introduced in the 1980s by former members of this House, with disastrous consequences for people who did not happen to be at the top, and who happened to be trickled down upon. So the trickled down upon will now have the opportunity to go to schools with no registered teachers if those schools desire. That is an extraordinary response, but it is not a local one. Unfortunately, it is part of what we call the GERM—the global education reform movement—which is the neo-liberal fight-back, because in education early childhood is being privatised, tertiary is being privatised, and there is one thing left: the school system. So let us do it. Let us take the school system and privatise it and let us say that choice, the mantra of choice, is actually about the mantra of privilege. You have only to talk to people from New Orleans who actually saw the consequences of Hurricane Katrina with the loss of their schools to see that the privatising agenda, which is driving the Government’s education policy, is not going to be a vision for a healthy, happy, just, and equitable community. The Green Party has a much better vision. Kia ora koutou katoa.

It has been very interesting sitting here listening to National Party members giving their speeches on the Prime Minister’s statement. It has been basically spin and rhetoric and meaningless drivel constantly all afternoon. I think that if members of Mr Key’s own caucus are unable to elucidate exactly what his vision and his plan are for New Zealand, then the rest of us do not really stand a chance. This is the fifth year of this National-led Government and we have been saying since the day it was elected: “Show us the plan. Where is the grand plan for our economy? Where are the jobs going to come from? Where are the ideas? Where is the vision of this John Key - led National Government?”. Here we are, 5 years down the track, and still no answer.

There was a lot of apportioning of blame from Mr Key and from National Party members, a lot of telling us whose fault it was and who should have done this and who should have done that, and a lot of trying to blame the previous Labour Government, saying that the previous Labour Government is to blame for the financial difficulties of today, despite the fact that the previous Labour Government reduced net debt to zero, paid off the debt, and ran surpluses every year. The IMF, not a loony left-wing organisation by any stretch, actually said that New Zealand was one of the best-placed countries in the world to go through that global financial crisis relatively unscathed compared with other countries, because we had been prudent, we had reduced debt, and we were in a position where the Government could get in and play its role in supporting its economy and in supporting its communities and its families when times were toughest. Instead—instead of the acknowledgment of that, instead of John Key and Bill English saying thank you to Michael Cullen and the Helen Clark Labour Government for leaving the books in such a good state—what we have had is John Key and Bill English trying to blame the last Labour Government for the global financial crisis. Well, I can tell you that Helen Clark was good, but she was not that good. She was not that good. There is no way that Helen Clark was responsible for the entire global financial crisis, but to listen to the National Party, that is exactly what it would have New Zealanders believe.

What this side of the House has been saying consistently is that the Government does have a role to play here. When economic times are really good, when things are humming along, a Government might play a lesser role, but when things get really tough and when the levers that need to be pulled are the levers that only the Government can pull, that is where a Government needs to get involved. That is what Governments are there for—to listen to the business community, to listen to those families, and to say when times are tough “What do you need from us?”. There are things that only a Government can do. With the best will in the world, the private sector cannot pull some of the levers, like monetary policy, that a Government can pull. So on this side of the House we say that there is an appropriate time for Government to step up and be a part of the economy.

What a radical idea, that a Government that expects everyone else to be part of the economy might actually see itself as a player in that as well, and might actually see itself as having the ability to reduce certain barriers that no one else can reduce, to make things easier where no one else can make them easier, and to pull levers that do not exist for anyone else in the country other than with Government! That is what a Labour Government will do. That is what a Labour Government will do, because we do believe that a Government has a role to play, and we do believe that saying Governments should stay out of it just for the sake of it is not good for New Zealand, it is not in the best interests of our economy, and it is certainly not in the best interests of the families that are really struggling at the moment because this Government has taken its hands off the wheel. This Government has said it is asleep at the wheel, it will go wherever it wants to, and it will go completely off course if that is the case, because no one should be driving this. Well, Labour says that is not the case, in fact. We do have a role to play. There should be someone in that driver’s seat because at the moment we are headed off the end of a cliff.

I think a really good example is in the area of housing. Labour has released our plan for affordable housing, and is it not a unique and novel idea for a major political party to have a plan on affordable housing? The National Party hates it. It hates it because it knows that in 5 years it has done nothing. It has done absolutely nothing. Let us have a look at what the National Party did. Well, the first thing it did was that John Key said he did not want any of those State house people in Hobsonville. Hobsonville is in his electorate. We have very few opportunities in New Zealand for greenfield housing developments. Hobsonville was—and still is, because we are going to be in Government in 2014—a great opportunity, and what we said was that within this development of 3,000 or so houses, 500 would be State houses and 500 would be affordable homes for first-home buyers. That is what we said when we set the project up. That is what all the research and all the evidence tells us works best: mixed communities. We had all the amenities: the public transport, the schools, and the jobs for people who were going to be living there. And what John Key said was that it would be economic vandalism to have State houses in Hobsonville. I mean, some of those properties have sea views. God forbid that poor children should get to look at the ocean as well! Surely that should be something that is only the preserve of freehold homeowners!

💬 Andrew Little: How could it possibly help?

How could it possibly help them? Absolutely. What utter garbage. It is so offensive, from a man who at every chance he gets trades on his State house upbringing, that he has now pulled up the ladder behind him and denied that same privilege to 500 families in his electorate—500 families.

What the then Minister of Housing, Phil Heatley, said was: “You know, there’s not really the demand out there.” Well, there is not the demand out there because there are no State houses out there. All those people are living in South Auckland, often in overcrowded situations, and going on the waiting list there. But there are going to be jobs in Hobsonville for people—you know, minimum wage jobs. There are going to be jobs for people who are going to clean the school and clean the businesses. There are going to be a lot of jobs there for people who are going to struggle to be able to afford to live there, but the National Party vision is that those workers should have to travel all the way from South Auckland up to Hobsonville to clean those schools and to clean those offices, rather than saying that here is an opportunity for them to live in this fantastic new development and this new community. That was our Prime Minister—our Prime Minister, whom we are all very proud of, who said he did not want State housing in his electorate because it might damage house prices.

The other tranche of that was that there was going to be 500 affordable houses in Hobsonville, as well. I think at the end of the National Party’s last term in Government we had about six—about six. And the only people who could afford them—and this is the really fantastic bit—were people who could already afford to buy a market home at market rates. The only people who could get into National’s Gateway Housing Assistance programme were people to whom banks would lend the entire amount up front. So in its first term of Government not only did the National Party have tax cuts for the wealthy; it had an affordable first home ownership policy for the wealthy. That is pretty impressive, even for the National Party: to manage to set up an affordable homeownership scheme that only the wealthiest New Zealanders could possibly access.

So Labour has come in with an affordable housing plan that will make a real difference and will create jobs. This is what the Australian Labor Party did after Australia’s last election, right at the beginning of the global financial crisis. It recognised that housing not only provided a social good but also provided an economic good, and that it created a lot of jobs and it created them quickly. It had what was called a long tail, which meant that it employed a lot of other people outside of just the construction industry: the people who sell the whiteware, the people who sell the carpet, the people who do the landscaping. All those people were involved. Apprentices were involved. This is an area where you get a very quick short-term and medium-term benefit. That is why so many Governments around the world, when the global financial crisis hit, decided that housing was one of the areas that they were going to put a focus on. They did that because, like New Zealand, a lot of other countries in the OECD have under-invested in this area over a long period of time. So this was not creating an asset that was not needed; this was actually taking an opportunity to keep people in employment, keep income tax flowing, keep GST flowing, keep all that money coming into the Government, and keep incomes going into households at a time when the private sector was pulling back, and at the same time create an asset base that was desperately needed and that we are desperately short of in New Zealand, especially in our major cities.

So the Australian Government invested billions and billions and billions into housing. It created tens of thousands of new houses for State housing and affordable homeownership. It kept people in work. It kept apprentices in training. It kept all its income taxes flowing. It got all the peripheral benefits that come from building that housing, and it did not go into the deep recession that we went into. It did not have the issues. I remember reading about a building firm in Australia. One hundred percent of its work came from that economic stimulus package. The only reason it was able to keep all of its staff on and all of its trainees on was that housing was used as an economic stimulus package.

That is what a Labour Government would have done. That is what a Labour Government will do again. We recognise the importance of housing, not just for the social benefits it brings; I also welcome the moves that we have announced to increase the warmth and the health of our housing in New Zealand, and also for those in private rentals. But the reality is that there is a big economic benefit to taking housing seriously, which this National Government does not do. The market is not going to provide in this area. What we need is a Government that is prepared to take action, is prepared to be a part of the solution, and will not just sit on the sidelines telling everyone what the problem is.

I move, That the debate be adjourned.

Motion agreed to.