General Debate

I move, That the House take note of miscellaneous business. It says everything about the National Government’s priorities that in a week when it has been hocking off State houses up and down the country it is wanting to find $11 million to buy a luxury apartment in New York for the diplomats working over there—hocking off State houses that everyday New Zealanders live in, although it can find $11 million for a luxury condo for the diplomats living in New York.

I want to know why Murray McCully does not replace Nick Smith and Paula Bennett in the housing portfolio, because then we may actually get some action on improving the state of State housing in New Zealand. If Murray McCully can bring peace to the Middle East, as we are now being told, why can he not sort out the New Zealand housing crisis? That is what we want to know.

If the Government cannot find money for the cold and mouldy school buildings up and down the country, why can it find millions of dollars for charter schools, which miraculously goes unaccounted for and no one can explain where it has been spent? If the Government cannot find money for teachers, nurses, the police, and the myriad of other public servants who, basically, have had their wages frozen for the last decade or so, how is it that it can find money for a wage explosion at the highest levels of the Public Service, where the managers are getting massive pay rises? If the Government cannot find the money to keep its promises to the people of Northland to build them 10 more bridges, why can it find $26 million for that great vanity exercise for the Prime Minister that is the referendum on the flag, which New Zealanders have said they do not want?

This is a Government full of self-importance that has become so arrogant and out of touch with New Zealanders that it seems to think there is one set of rules for the Government and another set of rules for anybody else. We have got Te Ururoa Flavell, who thinks that he can interfere in the programming decisions of Māori Television when there is coverage unfavourable to him and to the Government; we have got John Key, who sends the police in to raid media outlets when they behave in ways that are unfavourable to the Prime Minister; and we have absolute contempt from Government members when it comes to them doing their job, which involves releasing information. They ignore the Official Information Act, they ignore parliamentary questions, and they simply do whatever they want, with absolute contempt for the people of New Zealand, who deserve better.

Let us return to where I began, with the fire sale of State houses. John Key promised New Zealanders before the last election—and it was a promise in National’s campaign—that there would be no more asset sales if the National Government was re-elected. Nobody saw the fine print—except for the millions and millions and millions of dollars’ worth of State houses that it is going to hock off in a fire sale. First of all it said it was going to be to the community and voluntary sector because it was closer to the communities that those houses are there for.

That was the first promise. But oh no, the community and voluntary sector did not want them and could not run them, so now the Government is talking about hocking them off to the Aussies. Hocking them off to the Aussies is what we have come to under this National Government. We are not going to own anything if this current Government continues in office for very much longer.

The Government’s State house sell-off has been a boon for private property developers, who are picking up ex-State houses, demolished State houses, and vacant State house land at fire-sale prices, or, in some cases, they are even being given them, and they are making huge returns on the redevelopment process. What, of course, does the Government end up getting out of it and what does the taxpayer end up getting out of it? More private houses, but not more houses for people who cannot afford to buy their own home.

Let us not mention the surplus. Let us not mention that surplus, which was the cornerstone—

💬 Dr Megan Woods: Don’t mention the surplus!

Do not mention the surplus, the cornerstone of the National Government’s re-election campaign. The Government did not say it was going to deliver a surplus; it said it had already delivered a surplus. The surplus has not arrived, it has not eventuated, and it is not even on the horizon.

This is a Government that has completely lost its way. It has its priorities all wrong. It is not a Government that is there for ordinary, everyday working New Zealanders who are trying hard to get ahead. It is a Government that is interested only in the top 2 percent. It is not interested in all the New Zealanders who cannot afford to live in luxury New York apartments or the New Zealanders who do not earn massive managerial salaries in the State sector—salaries that have blown out under this Government. No, it is not interested in those New Zealanders. It is time we had a Government for all New Zealanders and not just those in the top 2 percent.

That was an audition before Parliament by Chris Hipkins. This has been the week where we have seen the dance of the deputies. Earlier this week we had the issue of Ron Mark, New Zealand’s answer to George Speight, having a go at ousting Winston Peters. Everyone thinks it is Tracey Martin, but it is actually Winston Peters he wants to get rid of. Ron is one of those men who has got a lot of experience with a lot of parties. In fact, just 18 months ago he would have been part of any party that would take him, and we know that from discussions he had in all sorts of places around the country. So here we have, this week, poor old Tracey Martin coming under the pump from Ron Mark. The question is: what has Tracey Martin done? The answer is nothing, which is probably the reason why Ron is in that sort of situation.

But the most fascinating thing is that meanwhile, over in Labour, all of the deputies are starting to line up. We are seeing the parade of talent on the horizon. It is extraordinary, and hot off the press we hear that one of the hot contenders now is Carmel Sepuloni, making quite a strong bid. She is one of those experienced people who came back into Parliament just recently after a short burst some time ago only to announce to the whole Parliament: “Oh, the Committee stage—that’s new. When did that happen?”. It is that sort of discovery that could be useful for a Labour Party deputy leader, because they might accidently discover a little bit of caucus loyalty as well. Then there is the bolter from Christchurch—Megan Woods. I have to say, Megan, that that Kardashian-esque makeover screams ambition. Day after day this member comes into the House, gives very cogent, very passionate, and very—you would say—well-structured but completely irrelevant speeches. She offers her argument with the most beautiful enunciation and, frankly, day after day, week after week, she wins the 7th form debating prize over and over again.

It would be wrong of me to be too harsh on the next contender. I have to say a couple of things, though. Nothing screams leadership ambition like Hollywood headshots on the front page of a weekly magazine. I have to say: did not Jacinda Ardern carry it well? I have to say that a lot of people on this side thought she carried that well—in fact, so well that most people did not recognise her for some weeks after it was actually published. There is a problem here, because so far this year there have been over 19 questions asked in the House on the issue of small business.

💬 Simon O’Connor: How many?

There have been 19 primary questions asked in the House by the National Party. They were patsies, set up for the Opposition spokesperson. And what did we see? Utter failure—utter failure. Today there was an absolute sitter, and what did we get? Not a thing—nothing at all. So my advice to Jacinda is to break away from Grant Robertson and his strange sort of machiavellian, Walter Mitty - type world, strike out on her own, and see what might be possible.

Then there is the other candidate, the omnipresent and “omni-positional” Phil Twyford. One minute he is here in Wellington putting his arm around Grant Robertson in commiseration, and next minute he is in Auckland anointing David Cunliffe with the red rose of socialism. This guy is everywhere. No one can do a 180 like our friend over there: “The Government should sell State houses. The Government shouldn’t sell State houses. The private sector should engage in social housing. The private sector shouldn’t engage in social housing.” Then we heard the classic today: “Interest rates are too high for young people to buy houses. Interest rates are so low now that young people can’t buy houses.” This man has got so many positions and so many twists and turns to him that it will be no surprise that after the deputy leadership vote is taken, even when he loses it he will not believe it.

💬 Hon Annette King: Gerry!

I save the best till last. So where does all that leave the Labour Party in its deputy leader quest? Well, I look across at my old friend Annette King. She sits there loyally beside Mr Little—almost in agony sitting next to Mr Little. She is supposedly warming the seat for someone else. All I can say to her is that I am moved to predict: hang in there, baby; soon you will be a queen.

That was quite entertaining. I was thinking to myself, before I got up, I wonder what I am going to talk about in terms of this wonderful relationship accord, this mana-enhancing relationship that we have. Then I listened to all the mana-enhancing statements that were coming from my good friend Mr Brownlee in reference to our Labour Party colleagues.

Actually, you know what? We have been able to do some things by being in a confidence and supply agreement. We were able put our hand on our heart and say that from this recent Budget there was $1 billion that the Māori Party could say we had influence over, to get gains for our whānau, and that is why we are here. That is why we are in this agreement.

I was asked on the weekend: “Marama, why do you do it if you disagree with so many things?”. Yes, there are some things we disagree with but we do it because we would rather be in and making a difference, than sitting on the cross benches, throwing stones and doing nothing. So what are some of the things we have agreed with? I have mentioned some of those today. Today we get to take our babies to the doctor for free if they are 13 years and under. Everybody is jumping up, putting their hand up, and saying: “But that’s our policy.” To be fair, our policy was for the under-18s, and we would like that to be the thing. We could not get that all the way through but we could make a change through the Ministerial Committee on Poverty, get a change, so that today under-13-year-olds can go to the doctor for free.

But there is one thing in recent weeks that we categorically disagree with, and that is the way in which these special housing areas have been determined without first having consultation with iwi, and that is what I want to talk about today. This morning we were in an extended sitting. The Māori Affairs Committee, a very hard-working committee, sat this morning to discuss the Treaty claims and settlement bills that are before the House. The Minister at the time referred to the right of first refusal, and given my generosity of spirit in the limited time available to us at the time I gave some of my time to my colleague Peeni Henare, who wanted to extend some of his time. So here I get my chance to address the right of first refusal. This is where we categorically disagree.

We believe that if you are going to have mixed-tenure areas on which you build a lot of houses that then get sold to private interests, and are not being used for State housing, that land is then open land that should be referred to iwi for right of first refusal. There is certainly some deficit theorising going on here. If the Minister does not think that the iwi are capable of building homes to the capacity that is needed in the Auckland area and therefore does not discuss with them the right of first refusal and the opportunity for those iwi to build homes that will help their people—not just because they can put people in them, but also because they can have apprenticeships and those sorts of things in a culturally intelligent and responsive way in order to build communities with community input—then that is deficit theorising and believing at the outset that iwi do not have the capability.

You need only to look, as the Speaker did a few weeks ago when we went to Christchurch with Kai Tahu, at the amazing opportunities that can come when communities come together and work together with iwi to develop housing areas that are culturally responsive, culturally intelligent, and supply homes for all ranges of people, and where green spaces and wāhi tapu are also acknowledged.

So that is the content of my kōrero today. Yes, we are here in the Government, working alongside it because we want to make a difference, and we can do that in a number of ways with Ministers, but we also have the independence and the right to disagree when we fundamentally disagree about something, and on this we disagree. We will continue to uphold the rights of iwi, and we will continue to push the rights of iwi as long as they knock at our door and require us to do that—I tell you now. Thank you.

July 1: it is a great day to take the temperature on the health of New Zealand. A very impressive list of measures has come into being today. Free prescriptions and free general practitioner visits for all children under 13—that is going to impact positively on the lives of 750,000 New Zealand children. That is outstanding. How you treat the most vulnerable at both ends of life’s continuum is, I feel, a measure of a successful society. So I am very pleased, on a personal level, to see that we have a number of measures coming in today to really impact well on the end-of-life care of many New Zealanders. This John Key - led Government believes in targeted, timely funding of life’s fundamentals and in the difference that it can make not only to quality of life but also to the quality of life that is passing.

From today, an additional $13 million in funding will help hospices and rest homes to provide better-quality palliative care for those who are in those last stages of life. This is the first year of a $76 million commitment, and over the next 4 years some $16 million of that funding will be going into the Auckland area—for example, into my own electorate of North Shore, I am very proud to say, which is already an outstanding example of its kind with the North Shore hospice. It will definitely benefit from that additional funding, not only for the people who want to pass in a hospice themselves, but also for those who want to be at home for those important last times and last days. I know, very personally, how important quality palliative care is. I was the patron of Mary Potter Hospice, where my father died, and also I have been patron of Hospice New Zealand for many years. My mother passed away in a rest home, and the variation in the ability of those different places to deliver end-of-life care is something that I think we need to be very mindful of, but the hospice funding will certainly make a difference.

When I became a member of Parliament, back in 2011, I was a co-founder of the all party parliamentary group on palliative care. It is a complex area of medicine, but we wanted to be able to share with palliative care specialists and our parliamentary colleagues some of the impacts that it can make on the psychological, spiritual, and social well-being of the patients and of their families. In 2013 more than 15,000 people received care and support from hospice services, and hospice staff made over 145,000 home visits. Being able to have the choice to have your last breath at home is something that is very important to many people. An additional $3 million this year, rising to $7 million next year, and then on, will support the recruitment of 60 new nurse specialists who are palliative care educators and who will also perform other roles at hospices. These are the nurses who are going to provide a crucial role in helping to train, mentor, and support staff across aged residential care services, GP practices, and also home-based support services. Generally speaking, at a time when many countries are cutting back, freezing, or even cutting the amount of money that they put into health, National will be investing more than $400 million each year in public health services, and that is a tribute to the prudent economic management that is practised on this side of the House.

As Minister for Senior Citizens, I am very aware of the impact that our ageing population will have on this country, and we need to plan ahead for it. We need to be able to support palliative care in rest homes, and in the future we will need more specialist facilities for conditions like dementia. In 2001 there were some 48,000 New Zealanders who suffered from some form or degree of dementia. In the next 30 years or so, that is forecast to treble to around 150,000 of the population.

💬 Rt Hon Winston Peters: I can see one.

The member opposite from New Zealand First may well make fun of it, as he is indeed closer to both of those target groups than anyone on this side of the House. However, it is not a laughing matter. We have put $47 million extra into dementia care since we have taken office, and it really does sit well with our annual investment in aged residential care. It is now over $985 million, and that is going to ensure that we continue to provide older New Zealanders with the very best care possible into the future. Our Budget has a number of measures to protect the vulnerable and to add to the health of New Zealanders and to their quality of life. I think this is proof again—as if we need more proof—that this is a Government that cares. We do deliver on the things that matter to New Zealanders. We are very mindful of our responsibility to rise above the petty politics of the people on the opposing benches and, instead, to deliver what New Zealanders need and want. Thank you.

Today New Zealand assumes the presidency of the United Nations Security Council for the first time in 21 years, and only the sixth time since 1945. It is a matter of considerable global responsibility. This House should convey its best wishes to the delegation for a successful job. What might New Zealand aspire to achieve as president that might be in some way unique? There will be the usual tasks of the council involving United Nations peacekeeping missions around the world. It may be appropriate for the council to discuss the latest independent review of peacekeeping, the Horta report. This essentially updates the Brahimi report of 15 years ago. It makes sobering observations about the current effectiveness of UN peacekeeping, including the need to distinguish between peacekeeping when there is a peace to keep and combat when there is not. We shall not solve this fundamental problem in the course of July 2015. However, what we might be able to do is add value on the issue of climate change, and in a creative way that the Government may not quite yet have in mind.

New Zealand is convening an open debate on 30 July on the security of small Island States. It took effort to persuade the council to focus on small States, but it was wise to do so. We look forward to the debate, because the focus on the security of small Island States may come to define the council’s engagement with climate change in a way that New Zealand has not anticipated. I refer to the relationship between the onset of climate change and the council’s responsibility for international peace and security. Under the United Nations Charter, the council has primary responsibility to maintain international peace and security. This includes determining any threat to peace and formulating measures in response. In recent years, the council has broadened its scope of what constitutes such a threat, including internal conflict, terrorism, unconstitutional regime change, weapons of mass destruction, and even health epidemics. The way is therefore open to identify climate change as a threat to international peace and security.

In fact, the council has considered this. It first addressed the issue in 2007 without making any statement. In 2009 the Secretary-General advised the assembly that, in his view, climate change does constitute a threat to international peace. In 2011 the council issued a presidential statement that climate change is a “risk multiplier”. It stopped short of saying that is constitutes a threat, thereby avoiding any responsibility for action or mandating itself binding powers. In 2013 it organised an Arria meeting on climate. As is the norm, no statement was made that day, but to quote the leading scientist who gave the briefing to the council: “The council is where the world powers are convening and taking hard decisions, so it would be good if its members put their full weight behind the quest for a global agreement.”

The time has come to get this over the line. It is time now that the Security Council formally declared climate change to be a threat to international peace and security, thereby mandating itself to take whatever measures are necessary to avert global danger. The presence of our island neighbours in the chamber will convey to the council the existential threat that exists for them and, through them, for all of humanity. I appeal to the Government to draft a presidential statement for the open debate on 30 July declaring climate change to be a threat to international peace and security.

I believe that 1 July 2015 will go down in New Zealand’s history. Before I explain why I just thought we would take a quick little history lesson. On this day in 1903 the first Tour de France race began, and Ghana became a republic on this day in 1960, and in terms of our history, on 1 July 1988 Bastion Point land was returned to Ngāti Whātua. But in terms of 1 July 2015 we saw the retirement of our Clerk, Mary Harris, recognising 28 years of service to this Parliament, so I am sure this date will go down in the history of our Parliament for that reason. I am not sure about it in terms of the history books of New Zealand First. It might go down as the day that the deputy leadership was a 10-way split and depending on where the arrow landed was whoever wound up with the job. Or it could be, as Minister Brownlee said before me, a 20-way split in the Labour Party for who became the deputy leader there.

But, anyway, on to more important matters. As the speaker before me mentioned, today the presidency of the United Nations Security Council was taken over by New Zealand, which is a very important day. But New Zealand families, hard-working New Zealand families up and down this country, will recognise today. Today will be part of our history because of the fact that GP visits and prescriptions became free for under-13s. In the election campaign last year this was the single most talked about policy announcement of this Government. It recognises that there should be no parent who has to think twice about whether or not they take their child to a doctor. So I am very pleased about the announcement and the introduction today, on 1 July 2015, that all children under 13 will have access to free GP visits and prescriptions.

It is estimated that more than 400,000 children will benefit from this scheme, which will take the number benefiting to more than 750,000 children. If I look at my own electorate of Taupō, around 20,000 children fall under the Lakes District Health Board and a further 60,000 under the Waikato District Health Board, and they will be very pleased to have access to free GP visits and prescriptions. We recognise how important it is to give our kids the best possible start in life, and so this is a great day for New Zealand families.

I want to follow on from the comments that my parliamentary colleague the Hon Maggie Barry made about the importance of additional support for hospices. If I look at my own electorate, additional funding for palliative care for the Waikato District Health Board and the Lakes District Health Board has gone up by $5.8 million. That is significant for the many families who have a very challenging time with their loved ones going through those last days, weeks, or months and I know that this is a huge announcement for communities large and small. But this is another policy that directly benefits our families.

Another announcement that actually came into force a couple of months ago and one that I am continuing to get strong feedback on as the Minister for Women is the paid parental leave increase. We are planning to increase it again by 2 weeks, to 18 weeks from 1 April next year. This is another policy that supports families, supports children, and is balanced exactly in the right place.

Another initiative that Minister Tolley announced today was news of the accommodation benefit rising to match the accommodation supplement. One of my priorities as Minister for Women is ensuring that women are able to participate in and gain further education and training to support them in work. This particular policy means that sole parents who are studying could be up to $165 a week better off. For some families that is the difference between having that parent studying or not, so I think it is significant. The more women who are able to get an education—and those who I believe are particularly vulnerable are sole parents—their ability to continue their education, improves not only their prospects in terms of employment but also the options and future for their children. Clearly on this side of the House this is a Government that is really delivering for New Zealand families, and I am proud to be part of John Key’s Government.

At the end of question time today we heard the Speaker remind a Minister not to be arrogant. I am waiting for this to be entered into Speakers’ rulings because this is a Government that is arrogant, it is a Government that is out of ideas, and it is a Government that is out of touch. It is in small-term thinking, it is petty stuff, and perhaps that was no better exemplified than by the Hon Gerry Brownlee’s contribution in this House this afternoon. Gerry and I, we are both from Christchurch so I know that when he says these things he is actually being really nice. I never actually knew that Gerry felt that way about me and that this is his way of being nice. So to hear Gerry though—I mean it is really the equivalent of a sonnet from Christchurch’s own D H Lawrence. To hear Christchurch’s own D H Lawrence talking about deputy leadership we have to consider that Gerry was once deputy leader of the National Party. Gerry was the man who walked the plank with Don Brash. Gerry walked the plank with Don Brash so he knows a thing or two about being a deputy leader. But Gerry, to give him his due, has achieved quite some feats in Christchurch. The best is the memorial gate at Christchurch International Airport, the place that marks where Gerry broke the law and snuck through to catch his plane. It is a very difficult gate to navigate so it is quickly and colloquially becoming known as a Gerry-proof fence. It is certainly, I am sure, going to keep that Minister at bay.

But this is a Government that is failing. Let us have a look at them. There is Murray “Peace in our time” McCully, and my colleague David Parker has chronicled in this House many of the things that Mr McCully has been up to. But as my other colleague David Shearer might like to say: “Let him drink milk.” But Murray has a cunning plan. Murray knows that he is on the ropes and Murray knows that peace in the Middle East is not going to be enough. He is going to have to come up with something more to save his reputation, so he has come up with a doozy. A demonstration farm in a New York apartment complex is a beachhead for a new breed of sheep with straightened wool. That is his big thing. But he is still currently negotiating the facilitation payments and seeing what he can come up with—and coming up with straighteners. Let us think of this.

If there was ever a symbol of how out of touch this Government has got, it is a pair of $400 straighteners down at the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment. I am reliably informed that these are Cloud Nine straighteners. For the uninitiated in this House this is a brand of hair straightener—an offshoot of ghd to be specific. Cloud Nine exemplifies this no more. Word on the street is that these straighteners have now blown up. Someone left them on and they have now burnt out—much like this Government. But I have my suspicions. I am thinking that Steven Joyce snuck into the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment in the dead of night, aggrieved that the symbol of his reign of power was going to be a pair of Cloud Nine straighteners and he smashed those straighteners to get rid of them, because he never really did want his legacy to be a set of hair straighteners.

Then of course we have the other “Minister for Everything”—and goodness knows why you would give Nick Smith a pile of things and ask him to sort them out because none of them are sorted out. We have Nick Smith in housing crisis mode and we have his other portfolios absolutely suffering because he is distracted and unable to give them the attention. We literally have a tyre mountain growing in this country, which Nick Smith refuses to act on. My only suspicion is that Nick Smith is thinking: “If you leave enough of them to build up, I’ll be able to build some more houses there. I’ll call it Crown land, I’ll get a busload of journalists, I’ll take them around, and I’ll tell them that that’s where we are going to build some houses.” He has now dropped the ball on liquid and hazardous waste. I am going to resist the temptation to make jokes about what that might be because this is actually a very serious issue that Nick Smith has dropped the ball on. He is leaving us vulnerable. So if we wanted a symbol of waste in this Government, Nick Smith is literally giving it to us. This is a Minister who is failing to manage waste literally. This is a Government that is mired in sleaze. It is mired in scandal, it is out of ideas, it is out of touch, and its greatest legacy is a pair of hair straighteners.

I would define that speech by Megan Woods as a cream puff. She talked about what the Government lacks in ideas. Unfortunately, every idea that Labour has had in 7 years it has canned. I will not talk for any longer about that. I want also very briefly to mention the outgoing Clerk of the House, Mary Harris. It would be an unenviable job, listening to us, day after day, night after night. I was quite excited to hear about her fishing spot. I happen to know where she goes fishing. If she improves her fishing at that rate, no doubt I will catch a few more. But the other thing I was really intrigued with was her cricketing record. I have, for a long time now, had assisting me a couple of New Zealand cricketers who, in the words of a previous Deputy Speaker of this House, were women of substance. I am sure that that is how you could adequately describe Mary Harris.

I want to get on and talk briefly today about the region of the Horizons Regional Council—in fact, the Hurricanes region—both of which of course encompass the Rangitīkei electorate. What a fortnight it has been for that region. There has been significant flooding hitting the Wanganui and Rangitīkei areas earlier in this last fortnight, followed by a couple of decent thumpings that the Hurricanes have given their opposition in recent times. Of course the other end of my electorate stretches right into the territory of the Chiefs, who were the finalists at the end of this week, and the Highlanders of course gave them a good thumping in Otago last week. The Government’s response to the storm event in the Manawatū and Wanganui areas, in my view, has been outstanding. I was around at the time of the previous massive floods in that region, and saw the response of the Labour Government of that time. I think Minister Kaye—

💬 Hon Annette King: And you praised us for it.

I did not criticise. You are absolutely right, Annette King. We loved George Hawkins coming to see us on a regular basis. I want to talk about the response of Ministers Kaye and Guy. Simon Bridges, Minister Bridges, is in for a bit of a fright, I think, when he gets his roading bill because there is some significant roading damage throughout that region.

I also want to talk just briefly about the performance of the mayors in that region, because it does give you a bit of a fright, as a mayor, when you suddenly see your territory decimated by something you have got no control over. I think Annette Main, Andy Watson, and Ross Dunlop have done a great job of keeping their communities together and keeping the Government interested. I think it is absolutely key in an event like that that you keep a Government interested. They have done a great job, and I think they should be congratulated on the work they have done. I think the region, although it has got some significant challenges in front of it, is over the worst of it and, hopefully, the weather will be kind to them in the next few weeks. I spent this morning in the lower part of my electorate, looking at some extremely badly damaged farms and houses. It was in a very small area, interestingly. This flood was very different from previous ones in that it has caused damage all over the place, but not in every place. There are isolated spots of significant damage.

The response from the Government, in my view, has been quick and effective. Taskforce Green is benefiting to the tune of $500,000 and another $310,000 is going into the regional disaster funds of one sort or another—whether they are mayoral funds or regional funds. As I said, Minister Bridges is going to get a significant fright when he gets the roading bill because it will be the biggest part of the clean-up for this job. The roads in rural Rangitīkei and rural Wanganui and in some parts of South Taranaki have had significant damage. There has also been $145,000 that has gone into the rural support network, which will help particularly the people in the rural areas who are under stress, and there are a number of them. The Minister for Social Development has put some money into that sort of support as well.

This afternoon Minister Guy announced another significant supplementary funding round going into the Horizons Regional Council sustainable land use initiative. After 2004 it did a significant amount of work right throughout the region, from coastal Hawke’s Bay to the mountains in the north, on dealing with fragile land that had been significantly damaged during the course of that 2004 event. This afternoon Minister Guy announced another injection of about $4.7 million into that fund. That will make a massive difference to Horizons Regional Council’s ability to continue the work of that fund. The basic work of it is to retire land that is fragile, a lot of which should not ever have been farmed. It should not have been broken in. But of course in our history we have had times where we have significantly subsidised the ability of farmers to break land in. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but probably some of that land should never have been broken in. This fund gives those farmers the opportunity to retire that land, to plant trees on it, to re-fence it, and to get it operating again. If you look at the Government assistance that went into the East Coast after Cyclone Bola and you look at the result up there, it has been significant. Thank you.

Can I acknowledge the outgoing Clerk of the House, Mary Harris, and thank her for her wonderful efforts through the years.

I want to talk about the Saudi sheep scandal. One of the things that the New Zealand population relies upon the Government to do is to hold up standards of decency, freedom from corruption, and fair dealing in the world. Those are very, very important to New Zealand’s reputation. Indeed, they are one of the reasons why we secured the Security Council membership that we are taking up just today. It is with great shame, I think, that Mr McCully has sullied that reputation through this Saudi sheep scandal, which we did not know anything about until 2 months ago.

From his perspective and from John Key’s perspective, it is just another deal. That is how they see the world. They have got no standards. They do not see this as being wrong, and that is why they make these fundamental mistakes that—

💬 Paul Foster-Bell: What a load of rubbish.

What rubbish? Well, we have got the history of the Skycity deal, where they sold casino rights in a secret, behind-closed-doors deal, which was criticised by the Auditor-General. We had the Warner Bros deal. We are now living in a country where lobbying and special pleading gets you a special leg-up from this Government, and nowhere is this worse than in respect of this Saudi sheep scandal.

Two years ago, essentially, the deal was done. The Government approved some payout to Mr Al Khalaf and this so-called model farm in the desert, and, yet, we heard nothing about it until earlier this year, when Minister Guy went to this so-called model farm in the desert and said things that were preposterous, but none the less he talked it up. In fact he said, amongst other things, that it was going to be a model of the way we do farming. There is no model farm in the world that the Government has funded other than this one, and so the media started to pay attention. They thought that there was something fishy about this and they started to dig, and it was actually the media that got on to this story, before politicians did. I pay my respects to the fourth estate because I think it has done a good job on this.

The next thing that happened was that the $6 million figure paid for this bizarre farm in the desert turned into a higher figure, because someone leaked that the sheep had been flown to the other side of the world at the cost of $1 million. This is when we had the first of the cartoons starting to appear, making a mockery of the Government. It says: “Last time I’ll travel on this line … no deck quoits, no pokie machines, no mah-jong, no swimming pool …”. The Government was starting to be made fun of because it was just bizarre that we were flying sheep to the other side of the world.

Then, the day before this long-overdue Cabinet paper, which the Government has hidden since 2013, came out, Mr McCully said: “Oh, actually, the total is now $11 million.” What was the difference between the $6 million and the $11 million, other than the $1 million that the Government spent on flights? There was a $4 million payment, which has been unpicked as a facilitation payment to buy off Mr Al Khalaf. That is called a bribe in other countries. I am not suggesting that the money went into Mr McCully’s pocket—there is no suggestion of that—but it is wrong of this Government to bribe a foreign person who is getting in the way of a free-trade agreement, and that is what happened.

How have we proved that? We have proved that because initially Mr McCully, in this House, blamed the prior Labour Government and said that we had left behind a $20 million to $30 million legal risk. So the obvious question was: well, why did no one tell us that? Check with the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister, former Ministers of Trade, and former Ministers of Foreign Affairs—that is, Clark, Cullen, Peters, Goff, Anderton, and Sutton. None of them have heard about it, because it was an untruth—it was an untruth. We unpicked that.

Then Mr McCully admitted that there was no live legal claim—in fact, none had been filed. Then the Prime Minister admitted that there was no cause of action. He admitted that to the National Business Review, and still the Government pretends that this was a payment for good value, rather than to get Mr Al Khalaf out of the way of the free-trade agreement. It was a disgraceful episode.

Then we had the bizarre thing where the Minister for Primary Industries said that the 75 percent lamb losses were caused by a desert storm. “Sandstorm” he said. I kid you not. This was a cause of more mirth amongst the media. We had this from him: “There’s a lot of sand in the desert, and the wind can get it up and that caused all those lambs to die. Yeah, that’s what I reckon happened.” That is what he said. They were all over the place. On the same day we had the contractors saying that they died as a consequence of a rain event.

Firstly, I would just like to acknowledge our secondary schools and colleges that competed in Stage Challenge, and in particular Ōrewa College, which won its open division. I would also like to just mention the RSAs in Warkworth, Wellsford, and Kerikeri, and in particular the president of Kerikeri, Frank Lewis, and the president of Wellsford, Terry Blakemore. Thank you for hosting the defence white paper meetings that we held there over the last couple of weeks.

Talking about the defence white paper meetings, we have to note that Major Ron Mark appears to be on manoeuvres this week—he appears to be on manoeuvres. Let us talk about that. I might have to use some military terms, but please bear with me. What did he use? He used the blitzkrieg. Major Mark used the blitzkrieg. This is an attack that uses concentrated force and rapid speed to break through enemy lines. But the deputy leader was quick to react. She had her colonels—she had Colonel Denis O’Rourke and Colonel Richard Prosser—and she mobilised them. She mobilised them into a blockade. A blockade is an attempt to cut off food supplies and war material.

But we are dealing with an experienced veteran here, who moved very quickly into a deception. He moved into a deception. A deception is a strategy that seeks to deceive, trick, or fool the enemy, and create a false perception in a way that can be leveraged for a military advantage. He then quickly moved into a feint. Mr Peters would know about this: a feint is to draw attention to another point of the battle where little or nothing is going on. And then—it did not end there—it was straight into a flanking manoeuver. A flanking manoeuver involves attacking the opponent from the side or the rear. But Denis and Richard were ready for this. They responded quickly; they responded with a human wave attack—a human wave attack is an unprotected frontal attack—and then quickly into an indirect approach. The indirect approach—dislocation is the aim of the strategy. Direct attacks almost never work. One must upset the enemy’s equilibrium.

But Mr Ron Mark is sensible. He knew that he was going to call on other fine examples of strategy in terms of a change of leadership, so he decided to call on the Labour Party’s divide and conquer. The divide and conquer is to induce rival states to engage in a protracted war of attrition against each other. But he realised that things were not going his way—not this time. It was not going to work this time. But let us give him credit. He tried one more manoeuvre. He tried one more; it was the turning manoeuvre. The turning manoeuvre is an attack that penetrates the enemy’s flank, and then curls into its rear to cut it off from home. He used the turning manoeuvre, but unfortunately it all came to an end.

The big guns arrived. The .50 calibre arrived, locked and loaded, ready to go—the Rt Hon Winston Peters. What did he use? Can anyone guess? He used shock and awe—shock and awe. He rolled out the shock and awe. That is right. That is an attack that penetrates—oh, no, sorry. I have already covered that one. The shock and awe—I have got to get this right—is a military doctrine using overwhelming power to try to achieve rapid dominance. That is what we saw unfold today. Thank you very much.

New Zealand First has just been attacked by Wikipedia. First of all, from 1 July, free doctors visits is a New Zealand First policy. They say imitation is the most sincere form of flattery, but a bit of old-fashioned honesty would have been a good idea.

Today Nick Smith got up in the House and clearly misinformed every New Zealander. If you go to the Forests Amendment Act 2004, section 67C—we are talking about section 67C(3)(a)(iii)—it is as clear as daylight: “the timber has been presented to a Forestry Officer for inspection and he or she has inspected and approved,”. Mr Smith misled the House. Damien O’Connor was precisely right.

Now we go back to Northland—well, before I do, why would they have meetings with the RSAs of Wellsford and Kerikeri without asking the man who believes, and whose party believes, in proper funding for defence forces? I mean, those guys up there are going to be told: “If you want some help, then there is one place to go to, and it starts with ‘NZ’ and it ends with ‘First’.”

Now, on Northland, Simon Bridges is a politician who will double-cross any bridge he comes to. On 8 March National’s candidate announced the 10 single-lane bridges that were to be replaced, and there it had this candidate surrounded by, of all people, the Minister of Transport, “Simple Simon”, and a man from down in Wellington who cannot get a seat, Mr Bishop. There they were. There they were at the election—all promising. It was 8 March. This was not as a rogue candidate. Then you had National promising up to $69 billion—

💬 Chris Bishop: Billion?

—$69 million, I said—for these 10 bridges. So where is the money? Where is the money? Where is the Wellsford to Pūhoi roadway? Where are the plans? Where is the money? On 18 March Mr Joyce was asked to list the bridges for double-laning, and he had no qualms about listing the likes of the Darby and Joan Kauri Bridge. Everyone in Northland knows that that is manifest nonsense. It puts me in mind of the former president of Russia, Nikita Khrushchev, who said about politicians that they will promise a bridge where there is no river. That is what he said a long, long time ago. The Darby and Joan Kauri Bridge does not have a river, ladies and gentleman. For the umpteenth time: it is not a bridge.

Anyway, Mr Key said: “We are in Government and we can do things.” And then he got caught out. He said that the Government would spend up to $69 million on 10 bridges regardless of the outcome of the Northland by-election, the blitzkrieg about which Mr Mark Mitchell was being so effusive. A blitzkrieg—[Interruption] Oh, yes, it was! It was a blitzkrieg of truth and commitment to the people of the north. Then on 30 June Simon Bridges waded back, saying that the New Zealand Transport Agency had ruled out double-laning three of the bridges, including the Darby and Joan Kauri Bridge. That is what he said. So National announced three bridges yesterday, not 10. Are you confused? It gets better. Speaking to the Dominion Post yesterday, Mr Bridges said that despite most of the 10 bridges promised to Northlanders failing to make the $13.9 billion transport plan announced on Tuesday, National will keep the campaign pledge and fund them anyway. Really? When, where, and how? Oh, of course, that is the kind of thing responsible people do when they are in Government!

Someone must have been costing Mr English out, because Mr English was asked a question at a select committee. He got asked the question “Have you got costings for all of these things?”. This was 2 weeks ago. Mr English said: “Well, yes, there will be.”—yes, there will be. That statement was demonstrably false. But it comes back to this: we want Maurice Williamson back. At least Maurice told the truth. That is why Maurice tore into the Minister of Transport in the select committee, but National’s deceit will be known in Northland. My job—and, indeed, Mark Mitchell’s job—is to ensure that Northlanders know the truth, which is that they have been grievously let down again.

It is an absolute pleasure to follow on from the right honourable member Winston Peters—the last remaining Privy Counsellor still sitting in the New Zealand Parliament. In the last week we have seen some very grave matters unfolding in the international scene. As chairman of the New Zealand - United Kingdom Parliamentary Friendship Group and the France - New Zealand Parliamentary Friendship Group, I want to put on the record here my personal condolences to the British people in particular, and to all of the countries that lost nationals in the attacks in Tunisia. The number of British nationals—in fact, 22 dead and others wounded—is the largest loss of British life since the 7 July London bombings 10 years ago. It has precipitated Scotland Yard’s SO15 counter-terrorism commands, the largest operation since those bombings, comprising over 600 police officers. The Home Secretary Theresa May visited the site yesterday and the House of Commons has observed a minute’s silence. I think it is very appropriate that we are mindful of our friends in democratic countries elsewhere who have been attacked, hurt, and killed, and the families and friends of those who have lost their loved ones in those attacks.

I would also like to mention the attack in France at Saint-Quentin-Fallavier, in which Yassine Salhi, an Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist, decapitated in the most barbarous way an innocent man and rammed a company van into a gasworks, causing further injuries and damage. These attacks were coordinated. They were at the behest of ISIS senior leader Abu Mohammad al-Adnani, and they demonstrate why we as a Western democracy, proud of our tradition of peace and democratic governance, need to cooperate with our friendly, like-minded countries and allies and ensure that our own domestic and internal security processes are sufficient to prevent such outrages ever happening in this Realm of New Zealand.

I want to talk to perhaps more mundane, domestic matters now, having spoken about that. We have seen unfolding in the Opposition parties a drama that is perhaps equivalent to that recently released Australian Broadcasting Corporation documentary The Killing Season, which depicts the internecine warfare within the Australian Labor Party between Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard. There are some chilling moments in that documentary where we see what can only be described as the sociopathy of Mr Rudd, but also the intense betrayal that he felt when his formerly loyal, or ostensibly loyal, deputy Ms Gillard put the knife in. In fact, I am a firm follower of that other TV series Game of Thrones, and what we are seeing playing out across this House reminds me, and I do not want to put any spoilers in here for the New Zealand public, but it is reminiscent, perhaps, of those end-of-series bloodbaths that we see in that particular show. I can only describe the Leader of the Opposition as New Zealand’s political equivalent of Stannis Baratheon, that dour but treacherous member of that particular show, up against the Lannisters—that is Mr Cunliffe—the well-moneyed, very eloquent, and smooth urban dwellers.

In the New Zealand First Party there have also been ructions. I want to put on the record in this House my respect and admiration for Tracey Martin. I have always found her a very, very good member to work with on the Education and Science Committee, and I admire any member who brings to this House a measure like the clothing for orphans measure that she has brought in. I can only say that the attempt by Mr Mark to remove her from that position must be the equivalent of a—well, let us call it the night of the short knives, given Mr Mark’s stature. So I hope Ms Martin does remain in place, because she has been excellent to work with.

We have had, on 1 July, some wonderful measures introduced by this Government—free doctors visits, free prescriptions, free after-hours care for under-13s. In the Wellington region our children will be incredibly well catered for. There are 46,000 children within the Capital and Coast District Health Board area who will benefit from this measure, and I was delighted to see Dr Coleman and the Prime Minister launching it today and choosing to do so in Karori in the Wellington Central electorate.

My colleague the Hon Maggie Barry also referred to the medical care that we provide at the other end of life; that is, palliative care for those who are ending or approaching the end of their lives. I particularly welcome the $4.6 million worth of the investment of the over $30 million that Minister Barry referred to that is coming into the Wellington region and will benefit those who are going through that very, very difficult stage of life when they are coming to the end of their life, perhaps suffering from a terminal disease. I think that investment will be very welcomed not only by the people in that situation but by their families. Thank you.

It is tragic to interrupt the member before we hear the latest update on The Simpsons or SpongeBob SquarePants, but the time for this debate has expired.

The debate having concluded, the motion lapsed.