General Debate

I move, That the House take note of miscellaneous business. Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. John Key told families today in question time that under another 3 years of a National Government they can expect to keep on struggling with their daily lives while he makes sure that the privileged few continue to improve their lot. On 20 September I will be asking New Zealanders for their party vote because we must change this Government. Party vote Green to change this Government. We must not allow another 3 years of a National Government that puts our kids and our environment at risk.

New Zealand children are being cheated by John Key and the National Government. At every turn over the last 6 years, with every report that has been produced, and with all of the evidence that has come before this House, families have still been falling behind. More and more children are living in poverty under John Key than ever before, and yet John Key will stand in this House and pretend they do not exist. Those 45,000 children whom Treasury lost last year still do not exist for John Key. John Key denies that inequality and poverty are growing, denies that struggling families are facing more and more difficulties just to pay the rent, and denies that these additional 45,000 children have been living in poverty since he took office.

Today when I asked him about those families, he blamed me in part for them and, worse still, he blamed them for their circumstances. They should be grateful, he implied, that he did not cut Working for Families. They should be grateful he did not cut Working for Families, he said. They should be grateful that national debt is greater now because of them. He is blaming New Zealand families for the plight they are suffering. A working family with a couple of kids and parents on $15 an hour that is getting the accommodation supplement and getting Working for Families is still living below the poverty line in this country—they are $132 short a week. National is driving New Zealand families backwards and silences those families by blaming them for their circumstances.

We need a Government that looks out for every child. No child should be living in poverty in a rich and progressive country like New Zealand, yet child poverty is a national disgrace. Child poverty is a national crisis. No family should be left living below the poverty line when a parent is working full-time and getting above the minimum wage, yet that is the case for 40 percent of New Zealand’s poorest children. What happened to our New Zealand values of a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work? What happened to the values of taking care of our neighbours so we are all doing well, not just the very privileged?

John Key and his National Government have abandoned those values that were delivered to us by our parents, our grandparents, and their parents before them. Today he refused to assure New Zealand working families that they would not still be in poverty in 2 years’ time. He refused to ensure that the rewards of the economy would be fairly shared with all New Zealanders. That is not an unreasonable thing for New Zealanders to ask for—that the rewards of the economy, as it continues to develop, as we slowly come out of the global financial crisis, as things slowly improve, should be shared fairly with all families. Yet when asked today whether he would guarantee that families that are currently working full-time for more than the minimum wage but that are still living below the poverty line could expect that their circumstances would improve, he refused to guarantee that to them.

John Key has abandoned those families. The National Government, which does not like to hear this truth, has abandoned these families. That was made very clear today in John Key’s answers to my question. If New Zealanders want our inherent values as a community to be returned to the centre of our decisions as a Government and as a Parliament, a fair share of the bounty of this country to be distributed to and shared amongst all of our families, and a country where every child is doing great no matter what their family’s circumstances, then we must throw this National Government lot out on 20 September.

A few months ago I stood very gingerly in the middle of the road from Gisborne to Wairoa at a place called Shaws Cut on State Highway 2, which is just north of Nūhaka, and cut the ribbon on the last of about six or seven new passing opportunities that this Government has funded—$4 million of passing opportunities on that road. One of the New Zealand Transport Agency staff approached me and said: “Minister, I just want to thank you very much.” He said “The plans for these passing opportunities have been developed, they have been costed, they have been ready to go, and they were stuck on the shelf, all of us knowing that they were going to make that road safer, they were going to make that road more efficient for motorists,”—

💬 Jacqui Dean: Saving lives.

—saving lives—“but, of course, they never reached the threshold and they were put on the shelf until that day when there was some extra money, and you and your Government and your Minister of Transport got us that extra money. I just want to say thank you. And, by the way,” he said, “there are another couple left on the shelf.”

So imagine my delight on Sunday at our National Party conference when the Prime Minister got up and announced extra spending—$212 million of extra spending on regional roading—and that two of my passing opportunities were there in the first five. I was delighted. This is an example of new money from the Future Investment Fund creating assets out in our regions. I know that the Opposition hates it, because we are out there in the regions and we understand what works.

Secondly, I was delighted when I heard that a bridge that is well known in my part of the world is featured in the next six projects. It is called the Motu Bridge. It is a one-way bridge on State Highway 2. When the Hon Gerry Brownlee was in Gisborne just a few weeks ago, he said to me: “God, everyone talked to me about the two-laning of the Motu Bridge and how it had to happen and how they wanted the money to do it.” So there it was, announced by the Prime Minister on Sunday—a two-laning of the Motu Bridge. I can tell you there were champagne corks popping all over Gisborne at that announcement. But, hello, I read in the paper that the Labour list MP is not welcoming this Motu Bridge investment.

💬 Chris Auchinvole: Who’s this?

It is someone called Moana, and—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): Order! The member’s full name, please.

It is someone called Moana Mackey, and she is claiming that that money, $3 million, should have been put into the uneconomical rail line instead of the Motu Bridge. Well, actually, what she forgets is that it is going to cost $3 million to $4 million every year to keep that subsidy to keep that rail line going. Instead we have $3 million-odd going into the two-laning of the Motu Bridge. She went on to say that she could not remember the last time she actually had to stop for another motorist, and she wondered why the Government had not come up with a decent plan to create real wealth and grow jobs in the region.

Well, funnily enough, not long after she was in the paper saying that, I saw an email from a local grower. He said he had noted that she had never had a problem. Well, he makes the point that Dr Ganesh Nana, who has been in our area quite a lot and works for Business and Economic Research, had said that getting produce from provincial New Zealand to market efficiently is the best form of economic development spending you can have. And for once, I agree with him. This grower went on to say: “Apart from the obvious, the difference between the Toyota Prius that Moana Mackey apparently drives and a 50-tonne truck is the time and energy it uses getting up to speed or up to an efficient velocity. To have to stop or slow to a standstill at any point literally costs money getting back to speed—worse if you’re about to embark on a 7-kilometre uphill steep gradient. This means you have to travel the whole hill two or three gears lower, which is heaps less efficient because you couldn’t maintain momentum at the bottom.” This grower is an example of the misunderstanding from that side of the House about what creates jobs and efficiencies in produce in our regions. So Moana is driving—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): Order!

Hon ANNE TOLLEY:So Moana Mackey is driving in her little Prius and does not have a problem on the bridge, but the guys who are getting their produce to market, in order to create wealth, know the problem.

The Labour Party has a positive plan for New Zealand. While the National members over there are crowing about spending more money on roads, they cannot find more money to spend on kids’ education. That says everything about this National Government’s priorities. It is vitally important that we invest in the future of our country through an investment in education. This Government is ignoring the enormous pressure that schools are under financially, the enormous pressure that teachers are under, and the enormous pressure that parents are under. This Labour Party, as part of our positive plan for New Zealand, will do something about that. We are not going to turn a blind eye to the fact that schools’ funding is not keeping up with the rising cost of educating children.

Today David Cunliffe and I went to Fergusson Intermediate School out in Upper Hutt, and we announced that a future Labour Government, after the next election, will abolish school donations in all those schools where they are willing to accept an extra $100 per child per year in exchange for not asking for donations. Almost all decile 1 to 7 schools will be better off not asking parents for donations and taking the extra $100. It will massively alleviate some of the pressure that those parents face. It will remove the stigma from the children whose parents cannot afford to make the donation. It will ease the pressure on those schools so that they can get on with what they are there to do, what they are passionate about doing: educating kids.

This is a Government that has got its priorities all wrong when it comes to education, and, I tell you what, we are going to change the focus on 21 September when a new Labour Government takes office. We will reject the narrow focus of the education system that this Government is trying to indoctrinate into the system based on last century’s needs for education. We will make sure that every child in New Zealand is taught a broad and balanced curriculum so that they have the skills they need to thrive and prosper in the 21st century. We will not go labelling teachers as failures in the way this Government wants to do with its low-trust model of education. It seems to think that all teachers are out there to do their very best to fail kids. I actually think every teacher who goes to work every day wants to do the best by kids, and the biggest thing that is letting them down at the moment is that they are not being supported in their job with enough resource from the Government to meet the increasing needs that students are arriving at school presenting.

The Labour Party acknowledges the enormous pressure that schools are under to meet an increasingly diverse range of student learning needs, and we are going to do something about that. We are not going to ignore the snowballing mountain of special education needs that are going unattended by this Government. We heard more reports today that specialist support for students with learning needs is being taken away—another set of reports came through today of yet more support for kids who need it the most being taken away. This Government said that it is going to keep measuring the problem—it is going to measure and assess kids more and more so it can target the resources where they are needed. Instead, what we are seeing is that the Government is taking resources away from the kids who need them so it can spend more time measuring. It is constantly focused on measuring, and it is not putting any extra resource into the kids who most need it. Well, we are going to turn that around. We are going to make sure that those kids get the support that they need—

💬 Hon Tau Henare: When is that?

When is that? It starts on 21 September, I can tell Tau Henare, when this National Government is going to get voted out.

New Zealanders are going to see the positive vision that Labour has for this country, which puts education front and centre of our programme to make sure that we are investing in the future of this country. Every dollar that we spend on education, every dollar that we spend giving kids the best possible start in life, is a dollar that we are investing in the future of this country.

💬 Hon Tau Henare: What happened to you?

I got a very good education, and I want to make sure that every child in New Zealand gets the type of good education that I was fortunate to receive.

I know that a lot of kids at the moment, a lot of parents at the moment, are struggling. Parents are struggling to contribute to their kids’ education in the way that they would like to. They cannot find the money that they would like to be able to give to their local school so that it can deliver on educating kids in the way that it wants to. The Labour Party is going to do something about that. This Government is ignoring the fact that parents now contribute, in the form of voluntary donations, nearly $100 million a year. In a supposedly free State education system, parents are being asked to contribute by way of donations of nearly $100 million a year. This Government has got its head buried in the sand if it thinks that school funding is enough to keep up with the cost of educating kids. It simply is not. The Labour Party is going to do something about that. We started today, and there is more to come.

I was so pleased to hear that Anne Tolley’s electorate of Gisborne is going to be gaining a two-laning of the Motu Bridge. I was really pleased to hear about that initiative, announced last weekend at the National Party conference. Our Prime Minister, John Key, recognises the importance of economic growth in the regions. I knew exactly how pleased the Hon Anne Tolley was at the announcement of the Motu Bridge because 3 years ago I was in exactly the same situation when the Hon Gerry Brownlee announced the funding for the Kurow bridges project over the Waitaki River.

The reason I was so pleased is not just that it was a $20 million project in my region, benefiting the township of Kurow; it was the something like 150 jobs over a period of a year and a half and all the attending expenditure that went into the Kurow township and up and down the Waitaki Valley. But it was not just that I was pleased about. It was not just the fact that there was going to be a cycle lane separate from the traffic on these also two-laned bridges over the Waitaki River, which would mean that the cyclists on the Alps 2 Ocean Cycle Trail were going to be able to cross the Waitaki safely. No, it was not just that, and it was not just the fact that the stock trucks and the transport and the tractors were going to be able to get over the river safely and get commerce from the farm to market. It was not just that either. Probably more important than anything else was the fact that our school buses could cross over the Waitaki River safely, transporting our children into our wonderful schools in the Waitaki Valley, which have been so well supported by this Government through a huge investment in education.

So what have they had up the valley? They have had an investment in rural broadband, so now our kids in our small rural schools in our small towns in the South Island and my region of Otago have the best technology available to them. They might be remote by bus and they might have to travel an hour or more to school each way every day, but they can learn anything. Not only is broadband making a difference in their lives but the different style of teaching these days means our kids are learning in a very modern environment, and that is thanks to Hekia Parata and the work she is putting into schools.

But there is more—there is far more good news for my region of Otago. There are the national cycleways. I have already talked about the separate cycle lane over the Waitaki Bridge. Here is a small pop quiz for my colleagues: how many cycleways are there in the Waitaki electorate? Come on—guess. How many?

💬 Chris Auchinvole: How many? Two?

Is it two? No, it is not two. Is it three? No, it is not three. It is four. There are four cycleways in the Waitaki electorate. Why does that matter? Because the first, and, arguably, the best, the Otago Central Rail Trail, back in 2011—and the figures will have gone through the roof by now—was returning $12 million into the local economy. That is significant.

💬 Chris Auchinvole: How much?

$12 million. That was back in 2011. So just think back: in 2014, that was one rail trail. In another 5 years, let us almost double that, perhaps, because things are going so well. Add in another three developing cycle trails, and you can imagine the cumulative impact that these cycle trails are having on regional development in Otago.

Unemployment is running at 3.9 percent. It is one of the lowest rates of unemployment in New Zealand, and that is because there is so much Government intervention in the Otago region and in the Waitaki electorate that we are just going gangbusters. Growth is at around 3.9 percent. I would have to put it down to the initiatives that this Government is putting in for a productive economy through the Business Growth Agenda. There are something like 350 separate Government initiatives to grow the economy and grow jobs in our regions. I have talked about several of them, but wait—there are many, many more.

Let us talk about the Sustainable Farming Fund. Let us talk about the Sheep Industry Transformation Project, which is being put in place to transform the sheep meat industry—sorely needed, and very welcome.

As our inboxes on this side of the House get absolutely swamped with emails on aged care, it is really time that we take a call on aged care. At every Parliament we get petitions on this very important issue—on the disparity between district health board facilities and privately owned rest homes. In view of the importance of this aged-care sector and the ageing population, New Zealand First is calling for a national strategic plan—not a National plan but a strategic plan—where we look at the future of aged care.

Some time ago PricewaterhouseCoopers published a report. It identified that the aged-care industry was underfunded by 20 percent. In New Zealand First we made a commitment to address this funding deficit, and we were responsible for the additional $587 million that went into the aged-care residential sector in 2006 and 2007, under the New Zealand First - Labour confidence and supply agreement.

In New Zealand First we strongly support pay parity for caregivers who work in rest homes along with caregivers who work in district health board facilities. It is absolutely essential. The current situation is deplorable. Caregivers working in rest homes are paid over $100 a week less than caregivers doing the same work for district health boards. Caregiving is not an easy job in any way. Physically and mentally it is totally exhausting, regardless of the facility, so pay parity is absolutely essential for these workers.

Back in 2012 the Prime Minister said: “In reality, it’s one of those things that we’d love to do if we had more cash and as the country moves back into surplus.” Well, this year the Prime Minister rides into the election campaign on the back of a rock star economy. If this is the case, is he going to use some of the money from asset sales to increase residential care funding for the residential aged sector, so that the people who actually paid for those assets can be looked after by decently paid caregivers?

Who does the Government believe is more deserving to receive the benefits of a surplus economy—multinational companies who make movies and aluminium, or caregivers who look after the elderly? New Zealand First is, again, committed to fixing this blatant unfairness. The priority for any extra funding should be targeted towards pay parity for rest home caregivers.

We applaud the introduction of interRAI—we know that it is a great assessment tool—as the information collected should lead to better policy development and implementation, but again, interRAI is an added job for rest homes and caregivers. New Zealand First agrees that the Government should be covering the costs of interRAI as these costs arise from Government regulation.

We also support an examination and review of palliative care. It is increasingly falling on rest homes to administer this function. Rest homes must be given extra resources and funding for palliative care in their facilities. New Zealand First is committed to the residential aged-care sector, and we want to see some changes in the wages paid to private rest home caregivers as well as those in district health board facilities. It is not good enough that there is this huge disparity, and we want to see this eliminated. It needs to be. It has stayed that way for far too long. Thank you.

It is a pleasure to take this call in the general debate. The members over there need to listen and learn what a good Government does for the country of New Zealand. This good Government delivered this weekend the infrastructure that our regions have been seeking. I see our regional members of Parliament here, ranging from the great provinces of Taranaki and Waikato to the deep south, which all benefit from these great proposals. They realise the importance of what was announced in the weekend for their communities and for our country going forward.

💬 Su’a William Sio: You’re only doing it because local government is starting to get angry with you.

What? What did you say, Mr Sio? No, no—you have nothing to say. Those regions have been given $212 million for regional State highway projects. Let us list them. Let us see what they are. The five projects are the Kawarau Bridge in Otago—that is a great place, is it not, down there in Otago—the Bluff to Rough Creek realignment in Canterbury, the curves realignment and passing lane in Northland, the State Highway 35 slow vehicle bays in Gisborne, and the Normanby Overbridge realignment in Taranaki. I am sure we are going to hear a bit more about that later on. Those five projects will be fully investigated and designed to address current safety and productivity issues. They are projects that will deliver great results for those regions in our country going forward.

We have also committed to six other projects: one in the Manawatū-Wanganui area, the Motu Bridge in Gisborne—

💬 Andrew Williams: You said that.

No, no, this is a different bridge. This is a different one. This is a different bridge. There is also the Ōpawa to Wairua bridge replacements in Marlborough, the Taramakau road-rail bridge in the West Coast, the loop road in Northland, and the Mount Messenger and Awakino Gorge corridor in Taranaki. That last one is really important for the regions of Waikato and Taranaki. It links both our strong agricultural and growing industrial regions together, and is something I know that members from that region have advocated long and hard to see happen. I think it is a testament to the strength of those members and their work that we see the Mount Messenger and Awakino Gorge corridor in Taranaki come to life through this Government. This is good stuff.

Then we have looked further into some projects that could be in the future, and that is the Port of Napier access package, the Nelson southern link, and the Rotorua eastern arterial. These are roads that cover the breadth of New Zealand from the north to the south. They cover from the east to the west. They are the roads that link our country together and make it a stronger place to be. I think that is an important part for this country going forward when you look at the economic growth that has been experienced in New Zealand in recent years. Put on top of that, the transport packages that you have seen announced for Auckland in the Budget—that strong transport package there. The large investments that we already make in local road maintenance are there. There are funds that are already there.

💬 Hon Tau Henare: That’s right.

That is right, Mr Henare. The Accelerated Regional Roading Package just announced is something we should take with great credit and great support going forward.

The Labour Party, the Green Party, and New Zealand First cannot accept these projects. They simply cannot accept them and they will not support projects like these, which are in the best interests of the regions going forward.

💬 Andrew Williams: What about the Gisborne rail line?

You want to talk about the Gisborne rail line, New Zealand First? Well, let us see New Zealand First come out with the money. Have you promised that? No, it will not promise it. It cannot promise it. It does not promise it. Labour over there has got a lot of hollow promises as well. But we all know that transport policy in the Opposition is dictated by one person and one person alone, and that is Julie Anne Genter. There will be no transport policy coming out of the Labour Party or New Zealand First, because Julie Anne Genter says what goes for the left. They will follow her and there will be no roading projects under the Labour-Greens Government, if there ever was one.

When we look at the Waikato, for example, it is crucial that we have these roading projects, and the Waikato Expressway is a major project. I know that my good friend and colleague here Tim Macindoe and I are very pleased to see that National is committed to making that a reality, unlike our Opposition.

Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. I have to say it is just as well that Labour has a positive plan for New Zealand that goes beyond a few roads. We have got a positive plan that is about decent work and decent jobs. Yesterday this piece of information was released, and it is the Hays worldwide recruiting experts’ report, called Temporary Workers: A Permanent Solution? A final solution—the 84,000 jobs that this Government boasts about growing last year. I bet there is not a member opposite who can tell me whether they are well-paid, secure, full-time jobs. Is there? No, I did not think so. I bet they cannot tell us whether they are part-time, casual, temporary, or contract jobs either. Can you? No, of course not. How many of those jobs are so miserable, and where the hours and wages are so pathetically low that a worker cannot make a living, let alone pay donations to schools. Thank goodness again that Labour has come up with a plan for that.

This report is very interesting. It shows that 64 percent of employers use temporary or contract staff, and 18 percent intend to increase the use of temporary or contract staff in the coming year. It also says that the demand is going up, so 35.8 percent said that their demands have increased. Well, they are increasing the numbers of workers they are using on a temporary or contract basis. And 83 percent say that temporary or contract workers constitute up to a quarter of their entire workforce—a quarter of their workforce. So that means that 25 percent of all jobs in New Zealand are temporary. The members opposite may not understand what a temporary workforce looks like. A temporary job is one where you are employed by a labour hire company, and you are sent off—you are loaned—to go and work for another company. You might have work for a day, you might have work for a week, or you might have work for a month if you are lucky, but then it is gone and you are back to the dole queue. Many of the jobs that are being added to the New Zealand economy are those kinds of contingent, insecure jobs—temporary and contract jobs. That is, about 635,000 workers in New Zealand are in that kind of insecure work. This Government is doing nothing about it. What it means for those workers is worse conditions, less security, less say, and they are more vulnerable.

There are all kinds of new devices being used for temporary work. Some employers employ workers quite legally on fixed-term contracts—they are allowed to do that—to replace a worker on extended leave or parental leave. That is fine; everybody knows what the deal is there. But what is not fine are the temporary work arrangements that are employed through labour hire firms to replace good, well-paying permanent jobs. We are seeing that in manufacturing. We are seeing it in fish processing. We are seeing it in food services, in banking, in construction, and in the Public Service. We are seeing it even in teaching. The teaching profession is riddled with fixed-term contracts. This is a Government that claims it cares about kids and about kids’ education. How can they be having good education when people do not know whether they have got a job from one week to the next? It is seasonal work. It is casual work. It is growing and it is being ignored by the National Party. So it boasts about jobs but these are not good jobs. These are not good jobs where people can earn a living and feed their families. What is more, National plans, if it is re-elected—and God forbid—to implement its employment law changes, which it could not get through, thanks to John Banks.

This is another example of a recovery that is not delivering for New Zealanders and why we are seeing an increased gap between the haves and have-nots, and a growing income gap between the top 10 percent and the rest of us. This is bad news. This sort of report, this Temporary Workers: A Permanent Solution? kind of report is something that the Government should be ashamed of. It is bad news for secure and decent work in New Zealand. Temporary workers have no rights to ongoing employment and no defence against arbitrary dismissal. Contractors have no employment rights at all, including no minimum wage, no holidays, and no rights to protection against unfair dismissal.

Well, it is good news for the regions from this Government. I have to say that there is only one person who is unhappy in Taranaki—maybe two—and that is the Labour MP for Rongotai. The Labour members come out and say “This is what we need. This is what we want. This is what the people of Taranaki deserve.” And when we get it, they are very sad. I cannot believe it. It is not about the people; it is about them. That is what it tells me. This Government over nearly 6 years has seen the GDP of Taranaki grow by nearly 50 percent. That has got a lot to do with our business-facing policies, it has got a lot to do with the encouragement we have given, and it has got a lot to do with the fact that this Government sees that building infrastructure is important.

In just a number of days or a week or two coming up, we are going to be starting a roading project in New Plymouth. Let me tell you that when people came to me and knocked on my door, person after person, week after week, asking what was going to happen about the Waiwhakaiho project and the bridge, I said that New Plymouth had had a Labour Party MP for 15 years. I asked what had happened during that period of time—absolutely nothing. They brought to me newspaper clippings that said that this bridge is an issue going back to 1969. Is that not amazing? Is it not unbelievable that a Government in that period of time, which had surplus after surplus after surplus, neglected infrastructure? Not only did it neglect infrastructure but we know there are issues around economic growth, development, and also road safety.

This Government has been working hard and we have a region that is being rewarded for its hard work and contribution to the New Zealand economy. That is what a lot of people say in my region: “Here we are producing 3.9 percent of the nation’s GDP, from 2.4 percent of the people. We work hard and we bring great benefits.” That is true. This Government has been very, very supportive of Taranaki.

Just last week, as the Minister of Health, Tony Ryall, announced today, we opened the brand-new Taranaki Base Hospital, servicing 110,000 people from the north to the south and from the east to the west. It is a great hospital that does a great job in supporting and bringing excellent, state-of-the-art, modern health care.

We have a new police station in New Plymouth, which the Minister of Police, Anne Tolley, came and opened last year. It is a fantastic police station. I went there on the open day two weekends ago, and there I was greeted at the entrance by the area commander, as he was greeting every person. Hundreds and hundreds if not a thousand people, maybe even more, went through that day. I asked all of the policemen and women how it worked and whether this space worked. They said that they loved it, that it was absolutely fantastic, and that they have a relationship with corrections. It is the first time, I think, Minister, that that has happened here in New Zealand. They said that this relationship with corrections is working fantastically. They have a really great relationship and it is working well. So what we are seeing is excellent men and women who are protecting our community and enabling people, as they go through the corrections system, to come back into our city and find employment and a place where they can be reintegrated.

New Plymouth and Taranaki are doing very well. I am very pleased to stand here after being the local MP for 6 years and say that we continue to have good news in our region. I am sure that my colleague the Hon Chester Borrows will talk about what is happening down in his part of this fantastic province.

One of the great announcements we had last weekend was about the work being done on Mount Messenger and the Awakino corridor—the gorge there. Some people say that what we should have is a tunnel straight through that area. I asked a colleague of mine, a friend who does tunnelling, and they said that that would be the biggest roading project in the country—

It is my pleasure to take a call and speak in this general debate and endorse the comments that have been made by my colleagues around the importance of investing in our future—we focused a little bit with our education spokesperson on some of those issues today—which, I think, are in stark contrast with the comments made by Government members, who have spoken primarily on issues around roading projects. Look, no one is going to argue that ensuring that our regions have decent infrastructure is important, but the Government is basically replacing what it stripped away and basically replacing what it has taken away from some of those regional areas.

I want to reflect a little bit on the other form of investment that we need for our future, and that is investing in our past.

💬 Hon Anne Tolley: Eh?

Oh, we seem to have forgotten that arts, culture, and heritage is part of our policy area that I cover as well—children, prisons, corrections, arts, culture, and heritage. Heritage has become one of those issues that, for the region of Canterbury, has, unfortunately, been sidelined in recent times. Obviously, there have been a number of competing priorities for that region, the first of which has been—rightly so—housing. But we have needed the Government during that period to multitask in order to ensure that we have the retention of an integral part of Canterbury’s tourism, their sense of place, and one of the things that has drawn so many to that city, which has been the gothic revival style of architecture that exists in that place. We know that there are economic gains to revitalisation of our heritage areas. In fact, an expert on the economics of historic preservation from the United States came out to New Zealand not long ago and talked about the fact that for some of their main street programmes, for every $1 of investment they leveraged $18. So there is a spin-off to that kind of investment.

We have seen really good examples—the restoration of the old Government building, the Heritage Hotel. That is a category 1 building. The private owner worked collaboratively to ensure the restoration of that fantastic space. Contrast that with the loss of the beautiful Majestic Theatre building in Christchurch, which, as far as I can tell, was removed not primarily for safety reasons. It was demolished under section 38 of the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Act because the Government had transport plans that meant a widening of the road and meant that that beautiful piece of infrastructure was removed.

I think it is time that we listened to what was said in the Heritage Quarterly recently, where it said: “Naturally, safety must be the primary concern but we are at a point where the remaining buildings are not considered a significant risk, or can be brought up to standard.” We have lost 47 percent of heritage buildings in the Christchurch central business district.

💬 Jacqui Dean: That’s because we had an earthquake.

We are 3 years on and no longer are these buildings being removed solely because—these are not buildings that fell down in the earthquake. Many of them are ones that are being demolished under the extraordinary powers that were granted to the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority at that time, but it is time that we reconsidered the way that we deal with heritage in that city. It is time that we reconsidered those war-time powers. It is time that we actually had a plan for the heritage infrastructure of that region. Labour is focused on a revitalisation plan for Canterbury. We have talked about housing and we have talked about transport. Tomorrow morning we will be talking about our thoughts on heritage for that city, and how we can invest in the past in order to preserve something beautiful for our future.

Heritage is not the domain of simply the last generation. Heritage is something that we need to keep focused on for the next generation so that we can build our sense of identity, of place, whether it be in Canterbury, whether it be in our small provincial regions, or whether it be in my city, Auckland, which has decimated so much of its historical features. Tomorrow Labour looks forward to building a plan for heritage and preservation in Christchurch and looks forward to showing our positive vision for that region.

I too get to my feet to say that it is good news in the regions. I know that those people on the other side of the House may not be all that happy about it, but in South Taranaki we had some real good news on the weekend around the realignment of the Normanby Overbridge. That is a big thing for us. I know that people in South Taranaki are pretty good at political memorials. Not too many years ago when a certain Minister of Education closed a number of schools around Taranaki, a big sign appeared on the side of the road that said “Open season on Mallards”. After last week’s announcements about the realignment of the Normanby Bridge, it would not surprise me at all if some big round bales were got together and a huge effigy of Gerry Brownlee was built beside the Normanby Overbridge.

The Normanby Overbridge has been a death trap in South Taranaki for 20 years. It has claimed 21 lives over 20 years, it has been a blight on our landscape and on State Highway 3, and all that has been done over a number of years is to move the speed limit and put a few signs around it. It has never ever been good enough. Just a few years ago land was bought alongside the railway line so that the road could be reconfigured to take away the need to travel over this overbridge. There were three bridges constructed in the 1920s. They were all identical. One of them has been completely realigned but the other two continue to be traps for motorists. We had the land, we had the plans, but we did not have the dough. A series of incidents around the country had detracted from the Government’s ability to be able to construct this bridge—such as the earthquakes, such as Pike River, such as the collapse of South Canterbury Finance, etc.—and meant that these projects had to be prioritised.

I was absolutely ecstatic to find out on the weekend that that bridge is going to be started next year. It is done at a time when, as the previous speaker, Jonathan Young, said, there are other road projects happening in Taranaki that have been given the same priority—albeit in South Taranaki we think that road safety is a little bit more important than a bottleneck. It is good to see that it has happened.

The word from the other side is that that is an election bribe. Apparently it is an election bribe when you find some money to do away with a death trap. Well, if ever I saw an election bribe, it was coming up to the 1999 election.

💬 Chris Auchinvole: Oh, what happened?

What happened then, Mr Auchinvole, was that the then would-be Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition at the time—

💬 Chris Auchinvole: Who was that then?

—Helen Clark—flew by chopper to a little place called Ruatītī with the then would-be Associate Minister of Transport, Harry Duynhoven, and stood on another bridge. They stood on another bridge, and that was a bridge that superseded one that had collapsed. There was a death on that bridge. It is known because a beekeeper fell through that bridge and was killed. We know that the farmer was a man called Berryman. The Leader of the Opposition at that time, a couple of months before the election, pledged that post-election, should Labour be in Government, Labour would then negotiate with Mr Berryman around costs—the costs that he had incurred having been charged before the court, having had his home burnt down and emergency services being unable to get there and the losses that he had incurred. Labour made big promises prior to the election and yet in 9 years in Government it did nothing. It made one offer that was to be negotiated, but it refused to negotiate, having stood in the election campaign and said that the Government should be negotiating with Mr and Mrs Berryman to put this right. In 9 years the Labour Government did not. I am pleased to say that one of my first accomplishments as the member for Whanganui was to go to Cabinet and ask it whether it would sort out this issue, and it did. So to have the other side of the House talk about election bribes last weekend, when that is their history, is huge.

Another good point to make is this: we know that the flea on the tail of the dog in the next Government, if Labour was ever that next Government, would be the Greens. What we know about the Greens is that they hate roads. They do not want to build any roads. This Normanby Overbridge would never be built if a Labour Government ever got elected, and that is the message for the people of the Whanganui electorate.

We have just heard the National backbenchers prattling on about roading projects. They never mentioned the $100,000 that they have just finished spending on a bridge that they have renovated, which they are now going to pull down and replace with another bridge. I think that shows something about the fiscal responsibility of the National Government.

💬 Hon Anne Tolley: Just shows how little you understand about the process.

But I say to the Minister of Police that, instead of listening to her pork barrel politicking about her own electorate, I want to come to a topic that is intimately involved with her portfolio of policing.

In the last couple of months in the Auckland region that I represent, we have had a number of tragic murders, including the killing of two members of our ethnic communities. Blessie Gotingco was murdered after being abducted on the way home from work, walking from the bus stop to her family home. [Interruption] Well, the Minister can laugh about it and put it down. I happen to think that that is a tragedy for that family, as indeed is the other case of Arun Kumar, a Henderson dairy owner who was stabbed in the neck and murdered in front of his wife in his dairy just a fortnight ago.

Members of the ethnic community have come to me in the last couple of weeks because they say that they are at the front line of criminal offending in New Zealand. They are the people who drive the taxis, they are the people who staff the shops such as our dairies around the clock, and they tell me very clearly that their concern is about the complacency of the Government in terms of their right to feel safe in their communities and on the streets. They say that when they go to a National Party member of Parliament, they get told the one thing: “Oh, crime’s coming down.” Well, I am sorry, but, you know, when your husband or your father or your son has been murdered, to have the Government say: “It’s all right, crime is coming down.” really does not wash.

💬 Hon Anne Tolley: No MP has said that to them.

Actually, Minister, I looked up your own figures from April of this year. There were 360,000 reported criminal offences—360,000 reported criminal offences—in the last year. And what has that Minister done about it? I will tell you what she has done. In every Budget since National was elected, the real spending on policing has declined.

I went to the Parliamentary Library. I wanted an independent analysis of what has happened to expenditure on policing. Do you know what it told me? It said that since 2009, spending has been cut in real terms by $114 million. That is $114 million less to spend on policing and on keeping people safe. In the last year it was down $42 million—$42 million. No wonder Inspector Greg O’Connor says publicly that this year policing at the front line will become harder for our men and women in blue. That is what Greg O’Connor said.

I asked that Minister in the Law and Order Committee: “Have you cut the number of police in the last 2 years?”. “No.”, she said, and then I got this letter. It is a written answer to the same question from the same Minister. Do you know what has happened in the last 2 years, Minister? You have cut the number of sworn, deployed constables by 80—80 fewer policemen and policewomen are on the street now than there were 2 years ago.

Then I asked a question about community policing stations, because in Henderson they say: “You know, with these kids who are out of control and have been causing problems for months, if not years, what we really need is a community police station.” What is the National Government doing about community policing? It has cut it by 16 stations in the last 2 years—three in Manukau East in the last year alone. It has cut St Lukes, Blockhouse Bay. It has cut Mount Albert. That does not even include stations like mine in Mount Roskill, which has been temporarily closed, for how long? For 2 years it has had a sign on the door of the station saying: “Temporarily closed to the public.”, because those members do not have the guts to front up and say—

💬 Mr SPEAKER: Order!

—“Actually, we’ve closed the station.” That is the dishonesty of it, Mr Speaker. They have cut spending on policing in real terms. They have cut spending on the police in terms of percentage of Government expenditure. They have cut spending on the police in terms of a percentage of GDP. They talk tough about law and order. Their trouble is that they do not walk the talk. That Minister’s administration of her portfolio is, frankly, a disgrace.

Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. As the last speaker in this debate, I stand to support my colleagues on the outstanding work that this National-led Government continues to do for this country when it comes to economic growth. When we came into Government, the cupboards were bare. Actually, they were more than bare; we found bills that needed paying. [Interruption] Yes, in 2008 the previous Government had left office and left a growing debt behind it—shame on you—in a so-called time of surpluses for this country. So how did the previous Government stuff up so badly? I know: it did not have a plan and that party still does not have a plan today.

In addition to this, there was the global financial crisis, the Christchurch earthquakes, and the Pike River mine tragedy, followed by the Rena and, recently, the Christchurch floods. Yet through all of this, it was this National-led Government that has remained resolute in its mission to do the things that matter most to New Zealanders as we continue to build a brighter future for everyone. It is a mission that this National-led Government set in 2008 and one that has been recently swiped by the Opposition because it has nothing left in its tank.

💬 Iain Lees-Galloway: Ha!

Yes. It is a mission that has seen the emergence of a growing economy, planned by a carefully crafted financial plan—

💬 Iain Lees-Galloway: We’ve got a few more ideas than roads.

—listen, listen—underpinned by a strong Business Growth Agenda, an agenda for New Zealand to build a more productive and competitive economy.

So where has this economic growth come from? It has come from the regions—the regions, of course—and our aim is for all the regions to achieve their potential. Most have experienced strong growth and most have lower unemployment rates. Just look at the South Island. Unemployment is at 3.9 percent. That is low. But that is not the only thing we are doing. We are getting our regions moving through our roads of national significance and the regional roading projects. That is a total investment of $600 million. This will help the regions to lift production, and transport through these regions will be made much safer with our Safer Journeys strategy.

But this is not the only thing we are doing. We have got ultra-fast and rural broadband, which allows the faster and more efficient digital and electronic communication, so the isolation issues faced by those in the rural sector have been minimised. This Government is encouraging oil and gas exploration, and we are doing this with our environment in mind. Taranaki is a great example of such a region, which we have just heard about before from the member from Taranaki. It has benefited from oil and gas exploration—40 percent of its GDP comes from oil and gas exploration. There are not many Taranaki people whom I have met who are sad about the region’s economic growth from oil and gas. Just imagine the potential benefits for the Otago and West Coast regions.

The Government’s Youth Guarantee and increased apprenticeships plan see more opportunities for our rangatahi to work in the many trades areas where employment abounds. Just look at the opportunities in building and construction in Canterbury. We are rebuilding Christchurch in all ways, from the central city development plan to the social housing accord. Christchurch stands on the precipice of great things as the opportunities it presents in growing the Canterbury regional economy go without saying.

But let us not forget one of our key regional economic growth areas: tourism. We have combined this with fitness and well-being in our national cycle trails. Not only do we get fit but we get to see places that we would not have been able to see in a car or a bus. We get to smell regional economic growth, people, in the rural sector, in our native forests, and in the grand expanse of Central Otago, but the best part about this is that everyone wins. Our gains in regional economic growth will be lost if the policies of the left are allowed to get in there. Introducing a carbon price five times the world price and having a capital gains tax on every productive business and farm would go a significant way towards stopping economic growth.

This National-led Government is working for all New Zealanders. Our economy grew by 3.8 percent in the year ended March—the third-highest in the world’s developed economies. Growth is forecast to be 4 percent. We have a plan, we have a hard-working and diverse team, and we have the most outstanding leader in our Prime Minister, the Rt Hon John Key, a leader with international respect from our global leaders. He is the man of the people—the only man to lead this country into the future.

The debate having concluded, the motion lapsed.