KiwiSaver Budget Measures Bill

The House is resumed. When we were suspended last night we were debating the first reading of the KiwiSaver Budget Measures Bill. The Hon Ruth Dyson was speaking and she has 5 minutes and 30 seconds remaining to speak, if she so wishes.

I certainly do wish to continue the speech that was so rudely interrupted at midnight. It seems like just a couple of hours ago when the Hon Maurice Williamson was contributing so strongly to this debate. It is a sad day when the National Party rejoices in taking $1,000 out of the pockets of hard-working New Zealanders, particularly those people who have found it so hard to save and put aside money, but know they should build up their KiwiSaver accounts so that they will have better financial security in their older days. The National Party members last night were making it very clear that they had no understanding at all of what it is like for people for whom $1,000 is a target they would never be able to reach without the support of the Government. Those people are now seeing that money go away.

I heard some National Party members yesterday talking about the $25 increase in benefits and how that would justify it. That is 40 weeks of benefit being lost by this bill, this KiwiSaver Budget Measures Bill. It is not a one-off. It is not just a one-off, with Bill English scrambling to try to get another surplus, which he has again failed to reach. For the seventh year in a row there is no Budget surplus, despite two election promises: the 2011 election promise of a Budget surplus this year, and the 2014 election campaign promise of a Budget surplus this year. Those are two significant election campaign promises broken in this Budget yet again. This is a mean-spirited bill that takes away that $1,000 for KiwiSaver savers.

About half a million New Zealanders, many of whom are young people just entering the workforce, and about 70,000 children will now miss out on getting that $1,000 kick-start to KiwiSaver. What makes it even worse, what makes it more unfair, is that it is retrospective. It started from 2 o’clock on Budget day, even though by the parliamentary calendar today is Budget day. Today is still Thursday. The rest of the world has actually moved on, and for them it is Saturday. It is going to be a long Saturday for the National Party.

💬 Iain Lees-Galloway: When do the benefit increases kick in?

That is a very good question from my colleague Iain Lees-Galloway, MP for Palmerston North. The benefit increases do not start until 1 April next year, but the KiwiSaver cuts that this bill is all about started from 2 o’clock on Thursday of the week that we have just ended.

This is retrospective legislation being rammed through this Parliament all stages under urgency. I wonder why that is. Is it because there is some genuine urgency to this legislation? Is there a desperate need for this measure to be introduced? No. It is like all the other measures that are being put through under urgency. It is because none of the National Party members can front up to members of the public, let alone their own constituents, for those who are electorate MPs, or for list MPs. They cannot front up to the people whom they deceived during the election campaign by not mentioning that they would take away the $1,000 kick-start to KiwiSaver. Not once on the Ilam election campaign trail did Gerry Brownlee say: “We are going to take away your $1,000 kick-start to your KiwiSaver account.” But he did say that next year’s Budget would be a surplus Budget, just like he did in 2011.

This has been a Budget of broken promises, and of mean-spirited legislation, including this one. It has been a scramble for Bill English to try to get to a Budget surplus, and once again he has failed. If people had signed up to KiwiSaver at 1 o’clock on Thursday, they would be getting the $1,000 kick-start, but if they had signed up at 2.30 on Thursday they will miss out.

David Seymour took the cake last night. He said that that is what Budgets are about—you take from some people and give to others. It is depends whom you take from and why. Taking money from low-income, middle-income, and hard-working New Zealanders—the key trigger for them to have an incentive to be better savers than they were in the past, has been taken away by the National Government. Where is that money going? It is really hard to say. There is no commitment to investment, no commitment to our regions, no commitment to employment, and no commitment to a vision or a plan for the future. This is just a scramble of ideas in the Budget. It is mean-spirited legislation and unfair.

This is a continuation of the watering-down and cuts that National has brought into the KiwiSaver scheme. This is the eighth cut to KiwiSaver since National was elected in 2008. There has been a series of cuts to KiwiSaver, which was one of the biggest changes that we had to the savings culture in New Zealand. There is no money going into the New Zealand Superannuation Fund. KiwiSaver is the biggest saving incentive that we have had in New Zealand since the Bill Rowling scheme, which National cut as well, actually, in previous years. KiwiSaver and superannuation are our commitment to the future, and all National wants to do is cut them.

We have had about an hour of contributions from the other side. That hour has confirmed in my mind that those guys have absolutely no idea what they are talking about when it comes to fiscal responsibility. You will have already heard Ruth Dyson talking about surpluses. She talked about—[Interruption]

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! Can we just lower the volume from my left a little bit, please. I just cannot hear him at all.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. Ruth Dyson was talking about surpluses and forecast smaller surpluses, but she did not talk about what the $790 million of reduced or small surpluses is funding. There is a choice, Ms Dyson. You cannot have everything. You can take away the $790 million package and that will give you increased surpluses, but that is not what we choose to do. We care for those who can least afford it—beneficiaries with children. When you care about things like that, you have to make choices.

💬 Hon Ruth Dyson: You have just taken 40 weeks of benefit increases off them.

That is only one-third. Last night we heard from a professor of economics who talked about nonsense. I commend this bill to the House. [Interruption]

Order! And on this occasion I think I am having trouble hearing the member because one of his colleagues is yelling over him. I think he might have been breaching outside the bill, but I just could not hear. Is the member finished?