Debate on Budget Policy Statement

I move, That the House take note of the report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee on the Budget Policy Statement 2018.

I am delighted to present the Finance and Expenditure Committee’s report on the Budget Policy Statement (BPS) 2018. That committee worked extremely hard on the report, and I want to acknowledge my fellow members. It is the hardest-working and most dynamic select committee of this Parliament, I am quite convinced.

The reason that this is an important debate is that Budgets are not simply dry, textual bits of parchment. Budgets are—as one of my favourite theologians, Jim Wallis, says—moral documents. You see, when this House approves a Budget—and we’ll get to that a bit later on in this year—it’s not just a bunch of numbers and text on a bit of paper. Budgets are documents that shape real people’s lives. It’s Budgets that ultimately determine whether our people do or don’t have jobs. It’s Budgets that determine whether they have decent and dignified housing, whether our people have the healthcare that they need when infirmity strikes, and whether our kids and our young people have the education that they need to reach their very fullest potential in life. This Budget Policy Statement is a document that this new Government is very proud of, because it points to a new Government that is energised, that is ready to lead, and that is determined to turn around the social and the infrastructure deficits that have arisen over the last nine years.

I want to refer to the Salvation Army’s recent state of the nation report, and it describes this very well. It says this: “it is clear that the benefits of this recent strong economic growth have not been shared across the board, or trickled down, as the theory would have it.” What that tells us is that it is perfectly possible—

💬 Chris Bishop: There’s no such theory.

—to have economic growth and it is perfectly possible to have fiscal surpluses, and let me just put on the record, for the benefit of Mr Bishop, that those things are good things. We can acknowledge that by the end of its term, the previous Government, having piled up record debt, did achieve those things. Well done—good work. But it’s of no benefit to the kids who are living in cars; it’s of no benefit to the 75,000 young people not in education, employment, or training; it’s of no benefit to the people who can’t get the healthcare they need; and it’s of no benefit to the people who are battling away on minimum wage and simply can’t see a way out.

So this is a Government that does aspire to having good fiscal surpluses. This is a Government that does aspire to having good economic growth, but we aspire to so much more. We aspire to dignity and respect and a good standard of living for all of our people, and that is exactly what this Budget Policy Statement—which precedes the Budget later in this year—points to.

Let’s just speak a little bit more about some of those deficits—those social and those infrastructure deficits that have arisen and that were highlighted through the Budget Policy Statement process. Well, the very first one, I believe, is housing, because no society can be said to be successful when its people want for one of the most very basic human needs.

What do we need as human beings? What are the most basic things we need? We need food. We need clothing. We need shelter. But right at this moment, we have 40,000 people who don’t have decent and stable housing in this country—40,000 people who are homeless or who have insecure housing. They don’t know where they’re going to sleep next week. That is not the mark of a successful society, and that is something that this Government will turn around.

Is it a successful society when we have a health system that is so overstretched that last winter, Middlemore Hospital had to put a sign out the front saying, “Sorry, we’re closed. Don’t come in if you’re sick.”? Is it a successful society when we have the principals in Auckland telling us that because of the low pay rates and because of the housing crisis, we’re going to be short of something like 3,000 teachers in the years to come? That is not the mark of a successful society, and that is something that this Government will turn around and that we have talked about in the Budget Policy Statement. And, perhaps most seriously of all, can it be said to be a successful society when we have our children—the most vulnerable members of our society and the source of our greatest potential as well—living in poverty in our communities, in every single community up and down this country?

I put it to this House that this is a wealthy country. This is a country of limitless potential, and we do not need to accept any of those things, as that last Government did over the past nine years. This Budget Policy Statement talks about a different and better way of doing things.

Let me refer to one of the very good submissions given to the Finance and Expenditure Committee around the Budget Policy Statement. It was from the Justice and Peace Commission of the Catholic Diocese of Auckland. They said this: “We see the core role of any representative Government is to foster the common good of a ‘fair go’ society rather than encourage exploitative personal gain. To this end we welcome the Government’s intention to ensure every family has a warm home, good health care, education opportunity and an adequate family income.” Those are the things that we are absolutely focused on. I’m pleased to report that in the Budget Policy Statement and in the report from the Finance and Expenditure Committee, those are exactly the things that this Government is very busy implementing.

But here’s the good news: this is also a Government that is focused on those fiscal bottom-line issues. We say that we can balance the two. We can balance the books, and we can have a strong economy at the same time as making sure that people have dignity, respect, and hope. In fact, I would say that those two things are interlinked, because when we give people opportunity, when we give our kids good education, and when they have stable housing, then we will be a more prosperous country. A child that is brought up with good education and stable housing is more likely to succeed, is more likely to go into the workforce, is more likely to start a business, and is more likely to contribute to the future economic success of this country. Those things are not indivisible.

So the good news is that, as reported in the Budget Policy Statement, and also the Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update (HYEFU), I might mention, the Government’s books are in good order and the Government’s Budget responsibility rules, which are confirmed in this statement are very, very clear.

This is a Government that is going to reduce net Crown debt to 20 percent.

💬 Andrew Bayly: After you put on another $10 billion of debt.

This is a Government that is going to prioritise—oh, here we go, Mr Bayly. Here we go.

💬 Andrew Bayly: $59 to $69 billion.

Mr Bayly’s getting very excited. He is the Scotch terrier of the New Zealand Parliament. He’s so excited—it’s like a van has just pulled up on the driveway outside the ranchslider.

This is a Government that is committed to fiscal responsibility. We’re going to get net Crown debt down to below 20 percent. This is a Government that is going to manage those books very prudently. What we hear in the HYEFU is that growth is projected to carry on at around about 3 percent over the coming years. Wages are forecast to grow at over 3 percent on average over the next five years, and that is good news for the workers of New Zealand, who, for so many years, have been struggling under that previous Government, which held wages down as much as it could.

The news is good, and I want to finish by going back to those original points made by a number of submitters—that we have got to have a focus. We’ve got to have a focus on the well-being of all New Zealanders. The Salvation Army said this in their submission: “In particular we support the commitment to put child wellbeing at the heart of what we do, and to lift the wellbeing of all New Zealanders and our environment. We are encouraged that Treasury”—and you might say the Government—“is developing a holistic living standards and well-being framework”.

And that is probably the most significant shift that is referred to in this Budget Policy Statement. This Government is going to set clear goals, not just for the fiscal bottom line, but for child poverty. And you know what we’re going to do? We’re not just going to talk about it; we’re going to embed those targets in the Budget. We’re going to say that the state of living of our children is just as important as those figures on a piece of paper.

This is a Government that is going to develop and embed a living standards framework so that we’re measuring our natural capital, because we say that every New Zealander should be able to swim in their local stream or river. We’re going to measure ourselves against our success with human capital. We’re going to measure the skills, knowledge, and physical and mental health in our community, because those things are just as important as a fiscal surplus or deficit. We’re going to measure our social capital—that is, the connectedness of our people, the success and the vibrancy of our communities—because those are the things that make life worth living. And we are going to measure our fiscal and physical capital.

And, I might say on that—and it’s mentioned in the BPS report—that we’re going to invest in New Zealand’s infrastructure. I am very proud to stand here, as a Government member, with a Budget Policy Statement that commits to lifting our infrastructure investment from $32 billion to $42 billion over the next four years. A lot of that investment is going to go where it is really needed—to our neglected provinces, which are crying out for a Government that will listen to them and invest in that infrastructure.

I tell you what—and I’m proud of this as well, Mrs Collins. We’re going to invest in a First World public transport network for Auckland, because that is what a growing, successful, and dynamic city needs.

💬 Hon Judith Collins: Great! Is it going to work?

Oh, Mrs Collins, Mr Bridges was very quiet when you were slagging off the public transport before. I think we’ve got a note of tension there.

I am proud to stand up and present this Budget Policy Statement to the House. I very much look forward to whichever National Party front-bencher stands up to respond. I’m not sure who it will be.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’d like to thank Michael Wood, the chair of the Finance and Expenditure Committee (FEC), for his comments there. He makes a good point—the importance of reducing child poverty. The Budget Policy Statement talks about that. It talks a little bit less about how we’ve been able to reduce child poverty so far, by the growth of the New Zealand economy and the announcements made in Budget 2017, prior to the election, that were largely picked up by the new Government, with a couple of changes. They were mostly set up by the previous Government, once it had done the work of getting the fiscal books back in surplus, so it could take the initiatives required to support those children and their families.

What worries this side of the House about the Budget Policy Statement is some of the opaqueness in the statement, which was discussed at the select committee. One of the areas of—and I worry about it because in order to keep making the progress that the previous Government made and to keep building on that, the new Government needs to be clearly honest with itself about its fiscal position and manage its fiscal position.

What worries us, the National members of the Finance and Expenditure Committee, is a lack of clarity, a lack of openness, about the costs of some of the Government’s expenditure plans. We had this very interesting situation where the Budget Policy Statement contained reference to the Government’s 100-day plan but nothing beyond that, despite the fact that those things had already been discussed, with some precise numbers around them, in the case of things such as the Regional Development (Provincial Growth) Fund.

In fact, we had the, I think, very unusual situation at the select committee where we were comparing two documents, the Budget Policy Statement and the Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update, and the Government was talking about the $1 billion a year Provincial Growth Fund in one document and wasn’t mentioning it in the half-yearly fiscal update. So Treasury presented a set of books that had no funding in them for the Provincial Growth Fund.

Members of the committee asked Treasury why this was the case. Treasury said, “Because we’ve been focused on the 100-day promises of the Government.” We said to Treasury, “There is a whole lot of other stuff that needs to be costed into the forward fiscal projections.” Treasury said, “Of course, and we’ve noted 29 separate new fiscal risks, as an alternative to putting some of the money in the Government’s accounts.” The Secretary to the Treasury also said that he has accepted the Government’s assurance that it will be able to meet all its spending commitments within its projected Budget operating and capital allowances.

I think it’s important to refer this to the House, because the Secretary to the Treasury sounded a warning. He sounded a warning to the Government, and said, “I’ve made this clear to my chief executive colleagues, that they’re going to have to continue to run their departments extremely efficiently and extremely well, and they’re going to have to be ready, whether it’s to prioritise or support Ministers’ reprioritisation decisions and to make sure evaluations of policy proposals”, and so on, and so forth. And then he finished: “There’s no reason for me to doubt that it will, but it will have to make some very tough choices.”—very tough choices.

The Government actually hasn’t shared that with anybody. In fact, even the chair of the committee popped his head up and talked about all the things that he wanted to see money spent on, which, incidentally, weren’t in the Budget Policy Statement. So we have a Government that is building up every day, whether it’s the finance Minister, the chair of FEC, other Government Ministers—building up expectations of expenditure of this Government. That’s not surprising, because the one thing the three partners in the Government can agree on is spending more money.

But if we’re going to make real progress in things like child poverty, we will need money set aside for that. This Government is not heading down that path, partly because of this transparency issue. I want to raise that again, in relation to the Provincial Growth Fund, which was discussed at length in the committee. We tried to get Treasury and the Minister of Finance to tell us how the money was going to be allocated. We asked something simple, to start with. We said, “What will be the allocation between operating and capital, of the billion dollars?” They didn’t know.

We thought, “OK”, and we asked when it would be known. The answer was, “Early next year.” Well, here we are. Last week, the Government released a Cabinet paper that pointed out that in December they’d made a decision to actually allocate the balance of operating and capital by February of this year. Today is 28 February, and there is no allocation—no allocation whatsoever. In fact, the Government now says it won’t be known until the Budget in May, having said in December that it would be available in February.

The other thing that was really interesting about this paper about the Provincial Growth Fund, which was talked about so much at FEC, is that all the money amounts were blacked out. They were all redacted. The Government had announced that it was spending $61 million, as a sort of down payment on the Provincial Growth Fund. Not a very big down payment, but nevertheless, it said it had made a down payment of $61 million, and said it with much fanfare. And then we have the spectacle of the Acting Minister of Finance, in the House this afternoon, unwilling to reveal how much money was actually new money—actually how much money was new money. If you go through the documentation with the Provincial Growth Fund, and you have to go through it carefully because, as I say, a lot of it’s been redacted, that actually points out that the money that was allocated is already subject to existing decision processes because it comes from existing funds.

So now we have a situation where the Provincial Growth Fund is not only opaque but, quite possibly, none of the money is new money, and this is despite the Government itself saying that the Provincial Growth Fund will not fund any projects that would have actually been funded anyway. It’s in the list of things to the Provincial Growth Fund: it will not have money spent on it that was already going to be spent.

And that’s interesting too, because the big project so far announced in the Provincial Growth Fund, which was discussed so much at the committee, and which the Government could say nothing about, is, in fact, a roundabout in Northland that, incidentally, was already being funded by the New Zealand Transport Agency through the National Land Transport Programme. It’s number five on the list of projects for construction over the next three years in a report that was released before the election. And now, it is the big new thing in the new Government’s opaque, not so transparent Provincial Growth Fund, which is largely smoke and mirrors.

So perhaps that’s how they’re going to balance the Budget. Perhaps, that’s actually how they’re going to—they perhaps played one of those shell games with their coalition partner New Zealand First, when the money is, in fact, imaginary, where we’re adding up existing transport money, existing irrigation money, existing broadband money, and pretending it’s a billion-dollars-a-year Provincial Growth Fund. Well, we will find out, no doubt, in the fullness of time, exactly what’s going on, but what we do know is that the projects announced so far are projects that are from money that was already allocated and that the biggest project was already going to be funded over the next three years.

And that’s the problem with this Government: they put out the Budget Policy Statement that doesn’t have any of their policies in it, even though we know how much actually needs to be allocated. In health and education, we were told exactly how much needs allocated, and yet none of it is in the Budget Policy Statement. The Provincial Growth Fund, despite being mentioned in the policy statement, has not actually been allocated for the Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update. I come back to my first point: if the Government is not going to be honest with itself, how can it possibly make sure that it has the funding available to reduce child poverty further, as done by the previous Government?

Well, I think the interesting thing about that: that was a lecture on clarity and transparency by National’s “11.7 billion dollar man”. Once again, I think Mr Joyce has revealed in the last 48 hours that he’s not so hot on the numbers. That speech, I can assure you, was watched very, very closely by the other speakers from National in this debate: Judith Collins and Amy Adams—the other people auditioning today for his job, for the finance spokesperson’s job. That’s what’s going on here today. Everyone in this House knows it. There’s the three contenders for the finance spokesperson’s job, and I’m afraid that for Mr Joyce, while today he was aiming for comedy, unfortunately, he only achieved tragedy.

The Budget Policy Statement (BPS) was released on 14 December 2017, and it confirmed the Government’s Budget priorities and fiscal strategy for Budget 2018, which will occur on 17 May. The new Government has signalled a desire for an economy that is fair and inclusive. We’ve talked about a shared prosperity. We want an economy that is beneficial for all New Zealanders. Too many of our people have missed out on the recent benefits of growth, and, as the previous Government has failed to make the necessary investments in public services and infrastructure to keep living standards high, as Kiwis expect, we are signalling a different direction in that respect. We will begin to address the social and infrastructure deficits that have built up over nine years.

The Budget Policy Statement shows that Budget 2018 will make progress towards remedying these deficits through a clearly laid out set of priorities, and these include: building quality public services for New Zealanders and improving access to core services, taking action on child poverty and homelessness, supporting families to get ahead and sharing the wealth generated by our economy with a wide range of New Zealanders, sustainable economic development and supporting the regions, and managing our natural resources and taking action against environmental challenges, such as climate change.

The Speech from the Throne, which incorporated the coalition and confidence and supply agreements, indicated the policy programme required to deliver on these priorities. The BPS outlines how Budget 2018 will secure the funding to allow for such a robust and ambitious programme. This Government takes seriously the need to invest in social and infrastructure projects to clear that deficit left by the previous Government, but we’ve also committed to governing fiscally responsibly within a set of Budget responsibility rules. Within those rules, we will deliver a sustainable operating surplus across an economic cycle. We will reduce the level of net core Crown debt to 20 percent of GDP within five years of taking office. We will prioritise investments to address the long-term financial and sustainability challenges facing New Zealand. The Government will maintain its expenditure to within the recent historical range of spending to GDP ratio. We will ensure a progressive taxation system that is fair, balanced, and promotes the long-term sustainability and productivity of the economy.

Treasury’s Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update was also released on 14 December 2017, and it showed that we are on track to meet the Government’s Budget responsibility rules. The HYEFU, as it’s known, had a few highlights that I’d like to share with the House. The highlights are that the economy is growing at a solid rate, with growth expected to peak at 3.6 percent in 2018-19. Growth is slightly lower than forecast in 2017-18 and 2018-19 while we transition to a more sustainable, productive, and inclusive economy, but then forecasts beyond that are looking incredibly strong, and rating agencies have seen fit to comment on this. The Government’s package of investment in social and infrastructure programmes—this signal direction is one that gives rating agencies confidence that this Government is going to see a growing economy strengthening further over time.

Unemployment is expected to fall to 4 percent in late 2020—it’s lower than the forecast 4.3 percent in the Pre-election Economic and Fiscal Update (PREFU). There is a lot of good news here. I am really, really going to watch closely to see just how—how, if in any way—the Opposition can manage to talk the economy down from here, when the news is so good. Wages are forecast to grow at just over 3 percent on average over the next five years, reaching 3.5 percent growth in 2021-22, around half a percent higher than average in the PREFU, and underpinned by a tightening labour market, building inflationary pressures, and recovery in labour productivity growth. Lifting the minimum wage will further support this.

Operating balance before gains and losses surpluses are forecast to rise, reaching $8.8 billion in 2021-22. Net core Crown debt is forecast to decline, down to 19.3 percent of GDP in 2021-22 within five years of office. This is a strong coalition Government that is delivering a strong programme for the economy and lowering debt at the same time—slightly slower than forecast in the PREFU, but that’s to make allowances for investment, to start to address the social and infrastructure deficits that we inherited from nine long years of neglect under the previous Government.

It is important that surpluses are maintained to allow us to meet the need for new capital investments, and no one in this House—no one in this House—will dispute that. But nine years of under-investment by the previous Government will see the need for increasing investment in housing, hospitals, schools, and roads. That is something this Government is committed to.

We’ve also resumed contributions to the New Zealand Superannuation Fund, so that our retirements can be sustainable. This is a responsible Government that is investing for future generations. More good news—watch them try to talk this down and audition for finance spokesperson at the same time. They’ve got their work cut out, those two women opposite.

Capital investment is expected to total $42 billion over the next five years, significantly higher than the previous Government’s plans, because we are committed to addressing those deficits. By reversing the previous Government’s tax cuts for the wealthy, we can afford to make major investments in health, education,—

💬 Hon Amy Adams: Are you reading that speech? How pathetic.

—and infrastructure while paying down debt, Ms Adams.

The Budget Policy Statement outlines the operating and capital allowances for the next five years, and these allowances provide the fiscal room to make the investments that are needed after that neglect. And they will be made. There are also extra free allowances beyond that—more free allowances, because our allowances overall are larger than previous Governments. We make no apology for that, because we are going to address those deficits, as I’ve outlined.

I want to speak also, briefly, about the 100-day plan, because there’s not much time left—not because there’s not a lot to say about it. This Government has achieved much in its first 100 days, and let’s not forget that investment. Let’s not forget what Treasury—somebody at Treasury let slip to me the other the day that they thought it was the biggest redistributive package since 1991, to make sure that families are well supported. And, of course, in 1991 redistribution was happening in the opposite direction. We’re looking for a fair society.

Ha, ha! The Deputy Prime Minister’s passed me a note, just reminding me that they’re sitting together across there because “misery loves company”. I think he’s hit the nail on the head. Perhaps a little unkind but woefully accurate, I have to say, Deputy Prime Minister.

This Government is determined to invest for the good of New Zealanders. New Zealand may have experienced strong growth during the previous Government as house prices rose uncontrollably and as population growth inflated the figures, but this headline growth came at a time of rising homelessness, inequality, a housing crisis, regional deprivation, and the opening of an infrastructure deficit that will take years to fix.

Growth is one thing, but shared growth is what we aspire to. The Budget Policy Statement delivered by this Government on 14 December is the starting point in our plan to deliver sustainable, productive, and inclusive growth for all New Zealanders.

Well, thank you, Mr Speaker. I’m very pleased to take a call on this Budget Policy Statement (BPS) debate—well, actually, technically the debate on the report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee. I do want to acknowledge Michael Wood, the chairman of the Finance and Expenditure Committee, who introduced the debate. I do think it’s a shame, I must say, that Labour have never managed to have a female chair of the Finance and Expenditure Committee. You know, for all their grand talk about supporting women and equality, never once have they managed to have a women in that position. Of course, National have had two, but there you go. That’s just because we actually walk the talk.

We just heard a very—well, I was going to say “very interesting”, but it was actually a kind of boring speech from the Minister of Health. But the one thing that I took from it, other than the fact that he can’t give a speech without reading it, is that this is a Labour Government that has learnt nothing from their previous terms in Government—they still believe that their success will be measured by how much money they can spend. Dr Clark—sorry, I was about to call him “Mr Clark”—stood there and told us, or read through, a laundry list of all of the spending they were going to do, as if somehow that meant that they would be a good Government. Well, actually, Dr Clark, the Budget Policy Statement is about holding the Government to account on how it is blending fiscal constraint with its policy objectives.

Of course, when the BPS was presented to the House last year and we had the urgent debate on it, it was presented alongside the Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update (HYEFU). Mr Joyce has already made a number of very strong points in his contribution about the lack of any detail in the HYEFU about the very policies and promises that were being made in this document, and I want to reflect on that in the context of core Crown debt because, actually, core Crown debt is something that is incredibly important to New Zealanders and their fiscal long-term stability and security.

Now what we know from these documents that we’re debating today is that this is a Labour Government that already is projecting to take core Crown debt from $56 billion to $70 billion. So for all the big talk, what we’re actually seeing is a Government that knows how to do nothing but spend and throw money around, and they’re quite happy to put it on the plastic. So while National had a strong trajectory of debt falling, Labour already have got core Crown debt increasing from $56 billion to $70 billion. But—just like the infomercials—wait, there’s more, because that increase to $70 billion is before they count the cost of any of those large spending promises that Mr Joyce ran through, and they are not included in the HYEFU numbers at all.

So, as soon as you start looking at the reality of this, we’re already moving it up to $70 billion, and now, of course, we know we’re going to have to add in the $15 billion that Mr Twyford wants to spend on a light rail set in Auckland. The $1 billion, or however much of that is new money, because they can’t seem to actually figure that out and tell us—none of that from the regional growth fund is included in these numbers. Now all of this will go straight to debt because it is quite clear that any money that they had available has all been blown through in the 100-day plan with the fees-free policy for tertiary, which we know is not increasing university enrolments by a single student, it appears, and we know is widely likely to be rorted.

All the money has been spent already, so every single extra spending commitment that we know they have made—that they have committed to making; that they’ve talked about in this House—goes straight into debt. It goes straight on to the future stability of all of our children and grandchildren, and it just adds to that $70 billion they’re already planning to increase it to. So this shows us that it’s a Government that, once more, has gone straight back to the “just keeping spending, and let future generations worry about the impact of that debt” approach. Well, actually, any family and any business knows that if you just keep running up debt, eventually the bough breaks—you cannot keep doing it.

So I talked about those two commitments. What about the impact of wage rounds? None of that has been included in this, and we know that the policies that Mr Lees-Galloway wants to bring in, where we move to centralised, industry-level, union-controlled wage bargaining—we know that is going to lead to significant additional fiscal costs on the Government. None of that has been included in these documents, none of it has been costed, and it is just another example of the Government firing from the hip without a clue what the fiscal cost of that is. That is just not prudent, responsible governing.

Dr Clark has talked often—and voluminously, and not that interestingly or intelligibly—about the $8 billion extra he wants to put into health. Well, where is that in these numbers? Where is it? How does that get paid for?

I would like the Government Ministers to stand up and not spout off about how much money they’re going to spend, because spending is easy. I’ve been a Minister in very hard, challenging portfolios, and I can tell this House that spending is the easiest part of being a Minister. It is the easiest thing to do. What is hard is balancing careful control of the money that taxpayers send here with our objectives and our desire to make New Zealand better. That’s what National focused on when we were in Government, and this Government already has shown us they have no idea what their policies will cost them, they have no idea how they’re going to pay for it, and they’re not being up front when they put out these documents about what’s coming down the pipeline and what it’s going to cost. That’s why we’ve got those 34 pages in the BPS—34 pages of uncosted fiscal risks. Treasury said, “Well, we can’t say nothing about them, so we’ll just go on through 34 pages of areas where we know that there’s extra pressure.”, and all of that goes straight to debt.

Look for a moment at the issue of the 1,800 extra police. Now the various members of the Government talked about this as, what, “Forty million dollars maybe, or $50 million. You know, it could be $80 million.” Well, last week in select committee, the Commissioner of Police made it quite clear we’re looking at more than $300 million of cost for that, and yet none of that is included in these numbers. Is it because the Government didn’t know—they just made the policy commitment without any idea of the cost on New Zealand—or is it because they just didn’t want to tell us? Either one of those is a completely unacceptable outcome.

Another example. A few weeks ago we had Dr Clark again announcing the extension of the pay equity deal to mental health workers and addiction workers—a decision that had clearly been in the pipeline for some time—and yet nowhere was it included in these documents.

I find it quite extraordinary that a Government that stood up and told us—and, in this House, repeated—that their intention was to be the most transparent Government ever have started, in the most critical of accountability documents to the public and to this House, by failing to cost their policies. They have failed to understand the impact of those policies and have failed to be open with New Zealand about what that’s going to mean. I will tell this House what it’s going to mean: it is going to mean that debt level goes even higher. It’s not going to be just going from $56 billion to $70 billion; it is going to be going considerably north of that, and that is a real concern for the future prospects of New Zealand.

I want to touch on one final comment, and that is looking at the impact of the industrial relations changes that the Government is proposing—which I’ve talked about in question time—on the economic trajectory of this country. When you harm the economy and job creation and the businesses that actually create jobs, you harm tax revenues and you make this imbalance between spending and income even worse. So, even with everything I’ve already said, you have to allow even more debt to come through, because we’re going to see fewer jobs and we’re going to see fewer businesses wanting to invest and to grow, and that not only hurts the workers who miss out, but it hurts the tax revenues and the ability of the Government to make their numbers add up.

There is no doubt that the Government has been talking ad nauseam about higher wages. Higher wages help no one if they can’t get a job. We’ve already seen Treasury saying that just one of the Government’s changes is going to mean 28,000 fewer jobs and, actually—even worse than that—for the jobs that are there, it is the young and the vulnerable workers who will miss out on the chance of getting them.

The BPS alone tells us very clearly that we’re going to go from employment growth in this country that was in excess of 5 percent a year under National, to almost zero. That is what Treasury has said in this BPS. Because of the actions of this Government, employment growth, which is the chance for New Zealanders to get a job, will go from 5 percent—or, actually, more than 5 percent under National, where we were creating 10,000 new jobs a month—to almost zero.

This is a Government that in their first 100 days have managed to completely destroy the creation of new jobs in this country. They are running up debt in a way that is unsustainable and that will hurt future generations, and it is not a good start for New Zealand.

Thank you, sir. It’s a pleasure to rise on behalf of this fantastic Government. I do have to say, I was ready and willing to listen to the member Amy Adams and her audition for the finance spokesperson’s role, but I actually stopped—I stopped listening because, actually, I took umbrage. She was somehow offended at the composition of the Finance and Expenditure (F & E) Committee. I have been a member of that committee—privileged to be a member—in the last term and this, and there could not be a greater contrast in the composition of that committee. On that side of the House, that committee membership was pale, male, and stale, and they made no attempt themselves. And yet, the contrast today, on this side of the committee’s composition—more females, more Māori participation. The contrast couldn’t be more stark, and so I stopped listening—I stopped listening, but then I heard the words about debt, and she made some obscure references to the debate that we’re having today.

Could I first touch on wages, which the member raised. This Government is committed to raising wages amongst New Zealanders. We want to incentivise a highly productive, contributive economy, and this is what has been outlined in this report from F & E. What the member opposite may not realise is that in doing that and saying somehow it will be bad for the economy, she has discounted the nature of a circular economy—the very nature of those increases in wages and what that will do to aggregate demand. Those increases in wages are a good thing for New Zealand in so many ways—retaining and attracting skilled employment—but in stimulating economic growth, actually, they are a good thing and I am proud to be in a Government that is part of that.

I speak to the audition, or the contribution, from Mr Joyce, and I say to Mr Joyce—he spoke about how that previous Government brought the Government’s books into surplus. For seven long years, year after year after year after year, they were never able to achieve that. The unbelievable nature of not having achieved that was that at the same time, whilst we are actually spending money on growing infrastructure in health and education, that party over there, while they could never get to a surplus for seven years, froze the police budget, cut tertiary education budgets, cut the health budget, managed to cut back on the conservation budget so severely—in all that time, they could not reach a surplus.

I put it to the House that while those members opposite grinned about achieving that near 3 percent—[Interruption] Oh, yes, Mr Speaker. Yes, Mr Speaker, I will come to the matter for the debate. Well, OK, let’s put it in this context: we are forecasting just under 3 percent growth for the economy in this half-yearly report, and I have no doubt the Budget will confirm that. In contrast to that, Mr Joyce, in his time as the Minister of Finance, spoke about his 3 percent in GDP growth. He never spoke about the nominal growth rate that discounted the impact that that growth was having on individuals, which was negligible—nothing to negligible—and he never spoke about investment in the New Zealand economy, because that Government was too afraid and unwilling to spend a dollar on New Zealand business to generate and grow our regions.

By contrast, I’m proud to speak to the Budget Policy Statement today, which very much speaks about a Government that is willing and able to contribute to growing New Zealand business. Yes, our focus is in the regions, because we all know that the regions have been neglected for nine years—nine years of neglect—and it is only now that a Government is willing to stand up, take stock, and rejuvenate what, I put to this House, is the heart of this country. We are a Government that has stood up and, in this report, has put forward our commitment to the well-being of children in this country, because this is a Government that says that is at the heart of the decision-making process that we undergo on this side of the House. We believe that in doing that, we are looking at the well-being of all New Zealanders.

This Budget Policy Statement kind of had a past and future focus. What we’re talking about when I say that is that we are about addressing the issues, because now we need to build better-quality public services and improve access to core services like health and education. The contrast could not be more stark. The members opposite spoke about 3 percent GDP growth rate with that grin on their face for so many years when they were in Government, but, at the same time—I put it to the House—they wore like a badge of honour the fact that people were living in cars and cardboard boxes because that was simply symptomatic of their financial success. We do not accept that on this side of the House. We cannot accept that that is a measure of economic success, and so this Budget Policy Statement commits to building better-quality public services.

We had a contribution from this side of the House that spoke about the shortage of teachers—3,000, I believe, is projected in the not too distant future. In fact—Mr Hipkins, correct me if I’m wrong—I think we’re talking within the next financial year. So we have issues to deal with there because of chronic underfunding to our education system. We know that New Zealanders have been missing out on their access to doctors, nurses, and medical experts because of chronic underfunding from the other side of the House, and so now this Government must address that.

The other issue that we must address—and we cannot and we will not look past this—is poverty and homelessness. This is the core, the heart, of this Budget Policy Statement. So we must be about supporting families and sharing the wealth generated by the economy with, hopefully, all New Zealanders—those who want to engage, those who want to be part of it, those who want to work hard and earn a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work. We want to reward them for that, and we want to encourage New Zealanders to be a part of it—to say to you, no, a job is not one hour a week. A job, to this Government, is a full-time job where you can be proud because you can look after your children, you can look after your family, and you can enjoy yourself in the weekend—have a beer, or if you don’t want to do that, have a Fanta, and enjoy yourself and reap the rewards of your effort. We say that everyone must enjoy that.

I spoke to the other part of this report from the select committee. We are proud to say that this Government is absolutely focused on sustainable economic development and supporting regional New Zealand. I couldn’t be more proud to have been part of the group of Ministers that travelled to Gisborne on Friday. I was there to share in the announcements from the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister, and the Minister for Regional Economic Development. In Gisborne, every person in that hall—and that hall was packed—had a smile on their face because, finally, they had a Government that was committed to supporting good people with good ideas, good economic plans, and a commitment to make it work for this country. What they needed, and what they need still, is just that little bit more of that support, and this report talks proudly and speaks proudly to that.

I suppose I must finish by saying that we have made a commitment to managing New Zealand’s natural resources and taking action against environmental challenges like climate change, and I’m very proud to say that that is our mandate forward, too. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Can I just start by congratulating the member who’s resumed his seat, Fletcher Tabuteau, on his recent elevation to the role of deputy leader of New Zealand First. He’s the third one with whom I’ve always had quite good chats. The first was the Hon Tracey Martin, followed by the Hon Ron Mark, and now himself. So congratulations, Mr Tabuteau. I hope you last longer than the previous ones. I think it’s always good to see young blood coming through.

I think, on the other side—I’ve heard some great speeches today on this side of the House and on the other side, but the best on the other side has actually been from Michael Wood, MP for Mt Roskill—socialist though it was. But I thought it was a good speech, and I thought Michael Wood should be teaching some of the current Ministers how to give a speech. He’s referred to various things, but I thought one that I have to pull him up on is that he did refer to a comment that—he’s made some sort of comment about how Budgets create jobs. Well, only if one is still in printing, actually, because Budgets don’t create jobs. What creates jobs is business. Business creates jobs, and it is business that must not be destroyed by any Budget statement or any Budget or any Government. It’s business that actually creates the jobs, and it’s the workers who help to create that business.

But also what’s needed in that business is capital, and we have a Government at the moment whose Budget Policy Statement is very focused—is very focused—on how to take more money off people who earn their money and save their money: more taxes. We just have to look at some of the statements in this Budget Policy Statement. There’s a statement along here that the Government will “Ensure a progressive taxation system that is fair, balanced and promotes the long-term sustainability and productivity of the economy.” Well, then it goes on: “Taxation is an important tool for rebalancing the economy”. Well, we know what that means. That means not rebalancing; that means ripping the guts out of small business, day in, day out, until they become even smaller business—microbusiness—and they’re out the door. That’s what that means.

We see a statement here: “The Government believes that we need a better balance in our tax system to support the productive sector and ensure all taxpayers are paying their fair share.” Well, who would argue with that, except what that really means—what that really means—is ripping the guts out of business, ripping the guts out of mum and dad business owners, and making sure that they don’t just pay their fair share but they pay for all of the rubbish that this particular Government wants to do.

They’ve made some big promises—big promises—about what they’re going to do; they’ve been very quiet about how they’re going to fund it. So, instead, what we see here is a statement where—and I’m quoting—“Recent transport investment has been overly focused on a handful of expensive roading projects selected for political reasons, rather than on improving the whole transport system as an integrated, multimode network.” Well, could they just please stop using stupid words like “multimode” or “integrated”? Why don’t we just have “comprehensive” and “progressive” all at the same time, because you have to have “comprehensive” and “progressive” and “multimode” and then, all of a sudden, it’s going to work.

Well, how about this: who’s paying for those roads? I can tell you. It’s not coming out of Budgets; it’s coming out of the National Land Transport Fund, which is funded by the petrol taxes on the petrol that we buy to put in our cars and it’s funded by the road-user charges where the diesel users on the roads—they’re paying for that. They’re specifically paying into what always has been a hypothecated fund specifically to fund those roads, and yet we’ve got a Government here that’s trying to talk in its Budget Policy Statement not about what it’s going to do with the Budget but what it’s going to do with the normal taxation funds, but what it’s going to do with the money specifically paid for and taxed on constituents in Papakura and constituents in Albany and constituents who are paying, day in, day out, for this particular fund, the National Land Transport Fund.

And where is that money going? Well, remember there’s an accusation that there have been expensive roading projects selected for “political reasons”. Well, we know where it’s going, don’t we? They’re going to rip off the New Zealand road users to pay for a dopey trolley up the electorate of the Prime Minister. So don’t talk to me about political decisions—that was entirely a political decision.

Let’s have a look at one of these so-called political roading decisions that the Government wants to talk about. Just let’s talk—shall we talk about the extra lanes on the Southern Motorway from Manukau, from Hill Road through to Papakura. Is that a political decision? Ooh, I don’t think so. I think the people who are coming up that road going to the airport or the people coming down to work for Manukau or the people going the other way—I don’t think they think it’s a political decision, stuck in the two lanes each way on a road that is one of the major arterial routes of our particular transport system. I don’t think they think that’s political; they think it’s, strangely enough, necessary—necessary, needed. I often thought, what would happen to these poor people caught in this traffic, in this gridlock—what if someone was trying to have a baby in the back of an ambulance or in a car, would that be a political decision? Would that be a political decision? Would it? No, I don’t think so. That would be called a necessity. Would it be, in fact, something that’s just for that? No, it’s not political.

And how about Mill Road—how about Mill Road? Yes, it does go through my electorate, but, actually, it is, again, the only way through other than the Southern Motorway. So if there’s a crash on the Southern Motorway at the moment, through Hill Road, through to Papakura or Drury, it’s two lanes each way—that’s all it is. If you get a crash on that, if you get something overturned, all of a sudden everything blocks up and the only other way through is Mill Road, and yet it’s referred to in this Budget Policy Statement as a political decision—no, “political reasons”, paid for, by the way, not by Budgets but by the hypothecated fund specifically taken off of users of petrol and diesel.

Let’s have another little look in this Budget Policy Statement. I was looking for anything here that was going to deal with child poverty—not a dicky-bird, other than to say that they’d look at child poverty. I’m not quite sure how they’ll look at it—what, through a lens, through a window, through something else—but what it won’t be doing with child poverty—what it won’t be doing with child poverty—is, actually, a damn thing.

💬 Hon Damien O’Connor: You should have been leader. Why didn’t they pick you? Why didn’t they pick you, Judith? They should have picked you.

And it’s great to hear the Hon Damien O’Connor finally speak. I thought he’d like to speak about what they’re doing to the mining industry on the West Coast. I thought they’d like to talk about Te Kuha mine where the metallurgical coal is. I wonder if he wants to talk about that—nothing in here about what they’re doing for the people of the West Coast. Not a dicky-bird in here about the West Coast, and should there be anything about the West Coast? Well, I would have thought so.

What I can tell that member from the West Coast, though—I can give him some good news: the West Coast will very soon have an excellent MP. Maureen Pugh is coming back, and Maureen Pugh knows who puts her into Parliament: it’s the people on the West Coast, not the Hon Damien O’Connor.

Coming back to this Budget Policy Statement yet again, can I say, “Where’s the money in here for law and order?” No, no, we know who’s going to be paying for all these dopey schemes from the other side. It’s actually, the victims of family violence, the victims of serious crime, because this Government has spent already—before it’s even had its hand in the till, it’s already spent the money that should be going to keep in prison the worst recidivist violent and sexual offenders and methamphetamine sellers that this country has seen. Instead, that Government wants to let them out nice and early—30 percent early. It’s an utter disgrace. Instead, they just want to buy votes, use other people’s money, and rip off our road taxes.

I’m going to have to start off my contribution to this Budget Policy Statement (BPS) debate by picking up exactly where the previous Government and its members have taken up today. I want to pick up some of the terminology, some of the words that they used to make it sound like they left this country’s economy in good shape.

So they go on a lot—I think it was the Hon Amy Adams. She was going on a bit about the future stability of our grandchildren. She talked about having to make very tough choices—and also, I think, the Hon Steven Joyce. They talked about: are we just going to have to spend more money? They talked about making sure that we can carefully balance the control of the money. Did they know, in their planning of their amazing rock star economy, that they were going to end up with children visiting hospitals 42,000 times a year because of preventable illnesses from cold and damp homes? Did they carefully balance the future sustainability of our grandchildren when they thought about restricting and not making sure that all our homes are safe and warm—did they know? Did they know that they would end up spending $100,000 day on motels because of the homelessness levels that are facing our country in this so-called rock star economy? Did they know? Did they carefully plan and carefully spend so that that’s where we arrived at as a country today? Did they know?

They talk about being honest. They talk about making sure that a Government can be honest about where it puts its money, that a Government can be honest about the figures. Are we honest when we restrict our unemployment figures to just unemployment figures, or can we be a bit more honest and take into account the full labour market and take into account those people who are employed in jobs and are still living in cars? Can they be that honest with themselves?

💬 SPEAKER: Order!

Come back?

💬 SPEAKER: Just leave the “honesty” word out.

Sure. Fair enough—well, it was raised by the previous benches. So I understand, Mr Speaker.

💬 SPEAKER: The member’s got a higher standard.

💬 Chris Bishop: Why don’t you talk about the BPS?

So we’ve got a bit of a clean-up to do, and that brings me to—thank you, my colleague over here, Mr Bishop. That brings me to the Budget Policy Statement.

There’s a bit of a mess to clean up, and we know that communities in Aotearoa have been degraded economically, socially, and environmentally for quite some time with incredible underfunding to essential departments and organisations that help us to make sure that we’ve got all our things in a row—socially, economically, and environmentally.

So the Budget Policy Statement talks about a fiscal management that we need to be looking at now that goes beyond just measuring deficits or surpluses, that goes beyond just wanting to keep the debt to GDP ratio under a certain percentage. The Budget Policy Statement that we are putting up now introduces a far more sustainable way of planning our future together. This Government understands that fiscal management is also the responsibility of a Government to maximise real outcomes for actual people, not just on a spreadsheet. Real outcomes like, you know, full employment and better-paid employment and more permanent employment. Real outcomes like making sure that people’s living standards are, at the least, decent in this country—in this country, where we have enough—making sure that we are building warm, affordable homes that aren’t going to send our kids to hospital and that aren’t going to get people evicted because the rents are rising and the wages are stagnating.

This fiscal management that we are putting up is starting to understand that having a world-class health system, education system, and justice system is also about how we balance our books, because what are the costs—what are the costs—when we fail in that fiscal management? And, alongside all of this, we absolutely can keep our inflation stable. Things aren’t going to be stable when you’ve got people in employment still struggling to pay the rent, still struggling to buy healthy food, still having to take time off work because their children are sick constantly. Those 42,000 visits a year to hospital, they were repeat visits because the kids had to keep going back to the same cold house. What sort of fiscal management do we call that?

So, I’m really proud that we are going to have legislation to put more money into families’ pockets—an average of $75 a week with the Families Package, and that’s going to help around 384,000 families. And what I like about that is the way we did that. We’re getting rid of National’s tax cuts, which kept the majority of the wealth in the hands of a few. That’s not how we design an economy. No matter what we produce, it has to be shared equally in a way that’s going to matter, in a way that’s going to keep our communities cohesive, in a way that we can continue to protect our environment and our communities.

I am especially pleased and proud of our Healthy Homes Guarantee Act, where landlords now know and understand that properties have to be warm and insulated and have a way of being kept warm. These are basic things. These are basic things that are going to insist that we are stable in the long run. I am especially pleased about the extension of paid parental leave—which I’ve had to call on myself—starting with pushing it out to 22 weeks, currently I think it’s 18, and then eventually to 26 weeks. These are the things that will make our economy and our communities strong.

I wanted to, particularly, pick up on the fact that we know that the way that we measure well-being has long had to change, and I’m particularly pleased because the Green Party has understood this. We’ve understood that there is a connection between our economic, environmental, and social outcomes. They are not isolated. They depend on each other for our whole well-being to go ahead.

I have to quote the incredible previous Green Party female co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons, who said, “If we value only what can be priced then of course we will pursue economic growth right to the point where the collapse of our life support system destroys us all. If we instead value our families, friends, community and human relationships, our natural environment and time to enjoy them, quality rather than just quantity, we will measure our success with a Genuine Progress Indicator rather than by the sheer size of economic output.”

I’m most proud of the work we are starting, and of my Minister James Shaw in particular, for pushing through indicators that tell the actual truth. You cannot just say you left the books in good shape when you’ve still got families living in cars or even just in rentals that are insecure—in rental properties that are going to finish in three or six months. You cannot say you left the books in good shape and ignore all of the downfall and all the hangover around those books. We are not going to do that any longer. We understand that we have to measure all of the well-being indicators. I am proud to stand up and speak in support of the Budget Policy Statement. Kia ora.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. It’s wonderful to take a contribution in this, the debate on the report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee on the Budget Policy Statement. Regrettably, though, although the committee is hard working and has fine contributions from members on this side of the House, this report and indeed the Budget Policy Statement are just something that this side cannot possibly support, not necessarily because of what the report says in its entirety but pretty much because of what it doesn’t say.

So this Government, when they took office, came in and talked up a big game of all of the things it was going to do to help New Zealanders. They talked about a billion dollars a year in regional development expenditure. They talked about billions of dollars of investment in health and education. And, lo, here we have a Budget Policy Statement, following the half-year update, and it is conspicuous for the absence of any of those things.

The Government has tried to put forward a rosy picture of life under them—particularly, they’re trying to paint a picture of sound or good fiscal management. But what do they do, though, really? They leave out the big-ticket items. They, quite frankly, think they can fool New Zealanders into believing they’ve got it all under control, but, really, they’re hiding it. The ultimate in shell games and politics, they’re trying to keep the public guessing, to have them believe they’re doing a good job. This shouldn’t be called a Budget Policy Statement; it should be called a “Budget Policy Snow Job”, because that’s exactly what they’re trying to do to the public.

Look at the actual evidence they have to deal with that they’ve tried to hide. You have a case where 29 new fiscal risks are identified in the half-year update and the Government just tries to pretend they’re not there. Then, when you get the Opposition raising them for their attention in committee, seeking to get this stuff into the report, and seeking to debate it in this House, they try to make out that the risks aren’t that severe. But the threshold for a risk to be noted in that update is the risk has to have a value of $100 million or greater. So what we’re really talking about here is billions of dollars of risk identified by Treasury in the economic management of this new Government and they’re trying to paint some rosy picture of sound fiscal management. Well, as I’ve said, it’s actually a case of a new Government just wanting to try to pull the wool over New Zealanders’ eyes.

Well, actually, New Zealanders are a lot smarter than that. They can see through these smart games. They can see through, quite frankly, the duplicity inherent in the statements the Government’s trying to put out. They can see through the snow job that this policy statement represents, and we reject a rush makeover snow job on this House and on New Zealand. We simply can’t support this report.

I call the Hon Willie Jackson—a five-minute call.

I’m pleased to have the opportunity to speak in this debate on the report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee, which was released on 14 December. Can I also take the opportunity to pay tribute to this Government for the Budget Policy Statement and the seamless way in which it has happened as part of the first 100 days on the Treasury benches. So I’d just like to applaud ourselves for the work we’ve done.

But, first of all, I really need to give my condolences to Mark Mitchell over there. Mark, you were our choice. You were our choice because—Mark Mitchell, one of the good guys on the other side, did the numbers—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Mr Jackson—

Yes, I’m coming back to it.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): No, no, you come to it now—right now.

Hang on. Sir, it’s only right that I pay my condolences to Mark and to Jami-Lee Ross, because he missed out—the other two Māoris beat him.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Try speaking to the Budget Policy Statement—

Well, I’m speaking to it.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): —while you’re doing it.

I’m speaking to it, because these people are the same people who have been saying—and I was really offended in the last hour with the rubbish I kept hearing, for instance, about jobs, and the waffle about how things were tracking so well in terms of the National Party and the way that the stats have come down. We’re very proud of the way the stats are coming down, too, but you can’t pat yourself on the back, as Mark Mitchell and Jami-Lee Ross have been doing, when you’ve got statistics within statistics—when you have Māori struggling at double the rate of the general unemployment figures, at 9 percent; when you have jobs being advertised that “a job’s a job”, when you do one hour a week. And we had the Hon Judith Collins waffling on about how well the previous Government has done—that’s not reality, that’s just nonsense. That’s just nonsense.

This Government is into investing into real jobs and into the people. We’re not into investing into our mates. That’s the difference with this Government. We’re not going to give tax cuts to our mates to avoid investment in health. It’s clear. The statement is clear: we’re going to actually invest in the people. So I’m pleased with where we’re going on this. I think we’re on track in terms of building an economy where everyone can benefit.

Marama Davidson from the Greens mentioned a couple of areas, I think, that our Budget Policy Statement talks about, particularly in the Healthy Homes Guarantee Act that was passed in November, which sets minimum standards for rentals. Māori, in particular, are going to benefit in that. No longer are we going to have the types of sicknesses that we’re getting in some of our kids, and that, in South Auckland. We’re actually going to invest in healthy homes. I mean, it’s fantastic.

Other features of our plan, which have been coming out, are restarting contributions to the Superannuation Fund, a ban on overseas speculators buying existing homes, the Tax Working Group, student allowances and living costs to be increased by $50, a directive to Housing New Zealand to stop the sale of State houses—it goes on and on; you know, this has all been happening in the 100 days—the Pike River Recovery Agency, the inquiry into abuse of children in State care. You know, this is what this country wanted. We didn’t just want waffle; we wanted investment in terms of our people.

💬 Chris Bishop: You’re the Crown prince of waffling.

That member over there, he knows what I’m saying—that this is a Government that will invest in families. Families. The Families Package is something that’s outstanding; something that that member and his mates forgot about in the previous nine years. So I’m proud of the package. I’m proud that the package provides a significant boost to the incomes of low and middle income families. Many have been struggling under a National Government who was fixated—fixated—on investing into their mates. The sad part of that is that data tells us that the richest 1 percent of New Zealand own 30 percent of the country. Meanwhile, the poorest 30 percent own only 1 percent. That’s data that the previous Government should be ashamed of.

And we’re going to change things. We’re going to try and set up a more equitable society for everyone, where we’re not just going to look at the stats, at 4.5 percent; we’re going to look at equity and equality for women, for Māori, for disabled, for people right across the spectrum. So today, I’m proud to stand up and support our Government who are absolutely on track at the moment. Kia ora, Mr Assistant Speaker.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. There’s a theme whereby the Minister of Finance, Grant Robertson, points out that his updates are truly just the starting point. Well, this is the starting point of my parliamentary career. I’ve started other roles before, and I’ve reasonable expectations of the environment that I normally come into. The expectations—they’re not unrealistic or onerous; they’re reasonable and they’re sensible. Who wants to sign on to something that doesn’t create a good future?

On election night, the country overwhelmingly chose the National Party. The majority of New Zealand expected the National Party to retain the Treasury benches. Why? So that we could continue certainty and we could carry on with the growth that earned us the lion’s share of support in the first place. Some liked our ability to create 10,000 a jobs a month for the prior 18 months or achieve 4.5 percent unemployment rates in December 2017, a nine-year low. Some liked our 21st century economy where the IT industry grew 9 percent per year since 2007. The total value of $3.6 billion to the economy in 2015, that’s massive, and some, put simply, felt quite safe knowing that we’d achieved 3.5 percent general economic growth over the past three years—higher than anyone thought.

That was my starting point, and I wanted to know that I was getting good governance, clarity of direction, wise spending, and avoiding debt. I also wanted honesty about where the risks are, to avoid them and to gauge where they are. Well, the post-election period kicked up something different, and that’s what we have here today: a Budget Policy Statement that reads not at all what I would call a decent starting point. Instead of certainty, risk mitigation, we have a Budget Policy Statement that promotes uncertainty and a small taste of the new Government’s spending appetite. Do you know what certainty would have been? It would have been if the Government had fully costed up their full policy programme. Instead, the pre-Christmas half-yearly update contained only items in the 100-day plan. Where’s the rest?

There’s a huge number of election commitments yet to be included in the Government accounts. Where are they? What’s happening is cost cutting in some very regrettable areas to support the incredibly expensive 100-day plan—for example, Aspire Scholarships for disadvantaged students and a fund for rare diseases. Infrastructure spending is up in the air, and we’ve got road projects in uncertainty all around the country.

If you think I’m nit-picking, let’s see where the benchmark lies. Let’s take Treasury’s own technical thresholds for what it considers to be a specific risk. It’s $100 million. Does that sound like small bickies? Does that sound like pocket money? How many specific risks do you think the new Government has clocked up with Treasury? Benchmark—it has to be a minimum of $100 million. Twenty-nine specific risks. That’s right—29, with a minimum level of $100 million each. Do the math—that’s some serious uncertainty.

If one’s not concerned about the Budget Policy Statement at this point, then let’s add my final kicker. I said at the start that my starting point for any role was good governance, wise spending, and avoidance of debt. You build debt only when you need to, at the times when it’s required—let’s say, a couple of catastrophic natural events or a global financial crisis—but when it’s good times, you do what? You pay it down, until now. Debt has been dropping down under the previous National Government, and now, in just four years’ time, the current Minister of Finance plans for debt to be at $70 billion. That’s on top of the 29 specific Treasury risks, at $100 million each minimum.

Finally, when I survey this Budget Policy Statement, I think it’s plainly obvious the Government have not prepared themselves for any future risks. We’re in uncharted territory here. They’re walking on a tightrope, and we need only a small bit of wind to blow them off.

I’m pleased to have the opportunity to speak in this debate on the report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee that was released on 14 December 2017. A big part of this report—this Budget Policy Statement we have here—is about improving the living standards and well-being of New Zealanders, and a big part of how that’s going to be done and continued to be measured is the living standards framework, which is the crucial start of how that’s going to happen. That will be how we create future Budgets, and it will be how we measure success of our work going forwards.

Let me quote—and this is a long one; we’ll unpack it—“The [Living Standards Framework] is based on an OECD framework that organises indicators of … intergenerational wellbeing.” Well, what does that mean? That means to the average New Zealander that this Government is measuring more than just money. It’s moving far beyond the narrow indicators that we’ve been stuck with in the past, and it’s looking at how we gauge the success of people and families that live here in New Zealand.

If we take the average New Zealand family and look at how we measure whether they’re healthy and happy and successful and how this country is operating, it’s got to go a bit further than how much they’re earning, how much the mortgage is being repaid, or how much bills are being paid. It’s also about their health, about their community, and about their well-being. I’m proud to see a Labour-led Government start setting up indicators in a framework that now allows us a far more comprehensive way of measuring the success of our country, and that is where this Government is different to the previous one.

We’re looking in terms of health, mental health, and connections between people and their community. What’s the point of being ultra-productive—of going faster to the point where the people are broken? That’s exactly what New Zealand has seen over the past nine years. Families and mums and dads work longer hours for lower wages to pay higher rents and higher food costs to spend less time with their children and put them in after-hours care, so the next generation of New Zealanders have far more problems than the previous generation, and that’s what we are here to put a stop to. We want our families to be strong and resilient, to have high-quality healthcare, mental health services when people need it, education services that are world class, and homes that are warm and dry. That is how we will be measuring the success of this country going forward.

Over the past nine years, we have seen, not investment in New Zealand, but running it down. Things have been run down to a point where they are breaking. That is going to take a long time to fix, and we know that. It’s going to take a long time to fix, because the people that have borne the brunt of the running down of those resources are New Zealanders. They are the people in Hutt South that have not been able to get mental health services when there are immediate suicide risks in their family. Those are the people that don’t know where to turn or to go to because the basic rights they need as New Zealanders have not being delivered to them, and this is a cycle that will require investment—investment and building up the strength of our country—not milking it and letting it run down.

So of the four capitals in the list—the four main capitals that we’ll be looking at in this area—number one is natural capital: aspects of our natural environment. Making sure that we can swim in our rivers—that is a measure of how healthy our country is. Social capital, number two, is how our Crown-Māori relationships are working, that our Treaty relationship is healthy and functioning, and that the connections we have between people and our communities are working well. Number three, human capital: the skills, knowledge, and mental health of our people are well. That we enable people to participate and fully partake of society is a measure. Number four, financial and physical capital: that we have houses, roads, buildings, hospitals, and factories—a direct role in supporting the incomes of New Zealanders. These things are being measured, as well.

In the past, the previous Government created surpluses by running down expenditure in key areas and then crowing about their success. This is not sustainable. This is not sustainable for the long-term development of our country, and those people—as I’ve already said—who wore it, through the lack of housing, through the lack of health services, and through the running down of education and other services, were New Zealanders. This Government is about investing in our strengths, investing in our people, and investing in our services and about strengthening New Zealand for future generations to come.

In our first 100-day plan, we have set out bold targets. Those have been completed, and they pave the way for good work to continue to come. The first one, which I’m really proud of seeing, is the fees-free programme for post-secondary education and training, and after two years’ time, there will be two years’ free in 2021, and three years’ free by 2024—planning for a future workforce that has strong skills, whether it be trade training, university, or polytech, and giving employers the ability to offer the right types of jobs to keep our young people here in New Zealand and not going offshore.

Restarting contributions to the New Zealand Superannuation Fund—there’s a good one. We just let those go for nine years—the first thing they did when they got in, under the National Government. We need to help protect the Government’s ability to pay super from the age of 65, and that’s exactly what we’ve done. It is irresponsible to cut payments and to bury your head in the sand and think that those things won’t come in the long term. It’s important to restart those contributions, like we have, so that we look after those people when they retire.

Three, banning overseas speculators from buying existing houses—this is a good one. While the housing crisis spiralled out of control, we still saw people from overseas with the ability to buy a residential property here in New Zealand, and the only action that was taken was the limp-wristed two-year brightline test that’s been put into place, which has since been extended to five years.

We want to see foreign investment where it adds to our country and where it adds to our economy, not where it stops the average Kiwi family from owning a home and not when it drives up rent prices to the point where no one can afford to pay for their groceries because all the money’s gone on rent. That’s where we’ve seen real issues going, and by having a KiwiBuild policy and having a commitment to building 100,000 affordable homes over the next 10 years, we have a clear plan of how we want to turn that around and how we want to make New Zealand families the priority and give those families the basics in life to get on and take full advantage of the benefits that this country offers.

The last one I would like to touch on is what we’ve done for those families with kids—those families who have a hard time, whether they be working or in the middle. It’s very hard having children when you’re trying to go back to work and pay the bills. By extending paid parental leave—the first piece of legislation that was passed through this House—we saw that 22 weeks of paid parental leave were made available. That will soon increase to 26 weeks’ paid parental leave.

As a mum—a working mum—that works very well with 20 hours’ free early childhood, a previous Labour policy. That enables mums and dads to go back to work at a number of hours per week and add an additional salary to that income to make life a lot easier for those in the middle. That is in addition to the Working for Families package, which is targeted at that middle-income family area to make life easier for New Zealanders, to make sure that they can give their kids the best start in life, and to make sure that they have a real chance of trying to save enough of a deposit to buy their own home, which is what this Government is about.

I am very proud to stand by this Budget Policy Statement because of what it provides to do, but also because of the fact that it looks deeper than just the two-dimensional view we’ve seen in the past. We want to measure more than just money, more than just GDP—we want to look at the whole well-being of our country, and that means putting our children first. Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take a call on this topic this afternoon around the Budget Policy Statement. Now, we’ve just heard from the previous speaker, Ginny Andersen, about measuring it and measuring everything. It’s all very well to talk about measuring it, but when we ask “What are you going to do? How you going to measure it? What are the details?”, we’re never getting told what they are. We don’t actually know how you’re going to measure it because you haven’t actually said. This Government doesn’t like targets.

I also have a statement for the last speaker, which is: a Budget is not what the Government has done. The last speaker kept referring to what the Government has done. What the Government has done has referred to it in a Budget Policy Statement.

💬 Kieran McAnulty: [Holds up Budget Policy Statement] This is what we’re discussing, not the Budget.

No, but the Budget Policy Statement—the last speaker was talking about what this Government has done. The Government has put a Budget Policy Statement in place, and it’s full of opaqueness. I also heard a colleague of mine, my colleague next to me here, Denise Lee, talking about the serious uncertainty. I can tell you that what you’ve got on the piece of paper that was just held up, Kieran McAnulty, is a statement, but the public are not buying that statement because there is serious uncertainty and there is opaqueness in it.

So that statement came out on 14 December—that was over two months ago. So, yes, we can have Christmas and we can have New Year, and this Government is up to its 100 days. In fact, it’s 28 days, almost—not quite, but almost—past its 100 days. So do we have to wait for Easter before we get any—you know, we’ve had Christmas, New Year; do we have to wait for Easter? We want the “how”. We don’t know how we can measure stuff when this Government’s not prepared to set targets.

And we’re already aware that Treasury’s got 29 fiscal bombs waiting to happen—time bombs—within this statement, Mr McAnulty. There’s major policies—like the Provincial Growth Fund, extra Department of Conservation funding, justice policies, primary healthcare policies, new rail links, and all this talk about employment relations and increasing the minimum wage, and the population’s out there going, “How on earth is this Government going to be able to afford all the things that they’ve promised in this Budget Policy Statement?”

This Government’s convincing themselves. They haven’t yet convinced Treasury, and Treasury’s got serious concerns about this. So it’s ambitious. Why is it ambitious? Because this Government has no idea how it’s going to achieve its wish list. There are a whole host of committees that have been put in place to try and discover how this Government is going to achieve its wish lists, and now we’re seeing reports of putting an inquiry and a committee in to make an inquiry into the committees that have been set up. It’s like the song that never ends.

So, yes, it does identify in this statement—as some of the members have rightly talked about—the tertiary education package. Well, the tertiary education package is being put in place. Half the surplus that was around at that time has been allocated to this tertiary education package. We’re hearing that it’s having very little impact on the number of students, so there’s going to be a target and a measure. That’s a target—that’s a target that we’ve got on this side of the House, because we’re very happy to measure the targets so that we know at least the quantum of the amount of money that’s being spent. We are going to be watching to see how many dollars per extra student is going to be achieved in year one from this money that’s being put out for the students.

So beyond that, it’s very squishy indeed. I mean, there’s been the Family Incomes Package, and yes, we want money to go to the families as well, and we had a pretty impressive tax package that actually was giving tax cuts to hard-working New Zealanders.

💬 Denise Lee: Gone now—gone.

So I’m really concerned about these hard-working—yeah, it’s all gone. It’s all been spent.

There are also no numbers around this Regional Development (Provincial Growth) Fund. So we keep hearing lots of promises. We keep hearing about the quantum of the fund. We’re still not sure how some of this is going to be applied, and we’re still not sure that some of what had already been committed to is not in this Provincial Growth Fund. So I have some serious questions, because when the National Party was in Government, we had a whole string of towns that had been promised ultra-fast broadband. We also had a rural broadband initiative in place, and I’ve got a string of towns in my electorate, as will other people, where this rural broadband was going to go.

The Hon Clare Curran was often in the House getting up going, “How you going to do it? Too slow—too slow. It’s not coming. It’s not happening.” Now, we’ve actually got the Hon Clare Curran up there still waiting to appoint a group—you know, there’s groups and more groups and more inquiries. I’ve got questions. In fact, I’ve written letters to that Minister from some of my communities asking when that rural broadband initiative is going to be put in place.

We’ve also been told that there will be extra police numbers. We’ve been told that there will be rural constabularies established. Now, as a rural MP, I would be really happy if rural security was beefed up. But, again, in all of these things—no reference in this document to these commitments, in terms of additional money. So we would really like to know how much—how it’s going to happen. It’s all very well to make these promises. As I said before, the last speaker talked about what they’ve done; so far, this Government has done nothing other than make a few promises. There’s three things that they’ve committed to that they’ve actually physically done something about, and one of them is going to result in no extra result.

The other thing that I’m quite interested in is that the agriculture Minister has said that he’s going to look at the splitting up of the Ministry for Primary Industries. I’ve seen some figures on what that might cost, depending on options and ways and things to do that. I would suggest, instead of looking at putting stickers on doors and that type of operation, perhaps some of that money would be better spent on getting rid of the stink bug. We have got farmers down in Southland who are screaming out at our local member of Parliament for Clutha-Southland down there, Hamish Walker, every day. They have uncertainty about whether it’s eradication or whether it’s containment. They have uncertainty about whether they’re going to get some compensation, and, for the amount of questions we ask, we are certainly not getting any answers.

And the other thing I’d like this Government to commit to is—I’ve heard a lot of things in this House this afternoon about swimmable water, and whenever we talk about swimmable water, we set those targets back on our rural communities. I’m going to say, right here and now: that is not only a rural community issue. While Christmas and New Year might have gone by in this whole 100-day process, and we’re not getting many answers, there were a lot of noticeable things around the cities—and particularly around the city of Auckland—over that Christmas period around water.

I’m not pointing any fingers here, and I’m not making any accusations in terms of any particular people. But we have an issue in this country of New Zealand that we have to tackle. I’m just wondering where in this Budget Policy Statement—when everyone on that side of the House is getting up and talking about swimmable water, how are we going to measure that? How are we going to get swimmable water on our beaches in Auckland? How much is that going to cost?

So let’s not talk about what we’ve done and what this Government’s done in this Budget Policy Statement because, to date, very little has been done. There are still 29 risks that we’re waiting to see the Government overcome. I would suggest that some of those environmental issues that have been brought up today are going to be some of the most difficult ones to cover off. I would like to see some more targets, measures, and certainty as to how we do that as a whole country, all together. With that, I would like to say that it’s my pleasure to speak on this statement. I’m very pleased to be opposing it today. Thank you.

It’s an absolute pleasure to follow the member for Taranaki - King Country, Barbara Kuriger. I have to say that we may not agree on many things but I will take the opportunity to say that she is a good woman with a good heart, and she does a lot for her constituency. She gave that speech her all.

But I cannot say the same for the previous speakers from the other side of the House. We had Amy Adams and what was a terrible audition to be finance spokesperson for the National Party. If that was her best, then I would say the new leader Simon Bridges should be very, very worried. In her scaremongering, Ms Adams pointed everyone to the back pages of the half-year update, to the net debts forecast released by Treasury. She said—and I’ve written it down—that it would get worse than this. She said that all of the policies that the coalition Government talks about in the Budget Policy Statement will have to be paid for with borrowings, on top of these net debt figures. She could not have been more wrong.

Ms Adams failed to realise that the operating and capital allowances, which the Government has set aside to pay for our policy package, and more, are already incorporated into the half-year update. This is, quite frankly, very disturbing to see such an experienced former associate finance Minister get it so wrong. I would go as far as to say that perhaps Steven Joyce, who is desperate to keep his position as finance spokesperson, slipped her the wrong data. Only then would it explain why she, with so much experience, could get something so simple so wrong.

But, after that, we also got to Judith Collins, or contestant number 3, as she presented herself. When she was not standing in that seat and looking at herself in that screen up there, she was getting some pretty simple things wrong, as well. It was very clear that she had read this document only five minutes before entering into this House. I wonder why that could be. What could have distracted the National Party members over the last few days that meant that they didn’t have the opportunity to read the Budget Policy Statement? But I do feel sorry for the Hon Judith Collins, because she missed an opportunity. She missed an opportunity to present what the other side of the House has as an alternative vision, or lack thereof, to what this Government is proposing.

There was no vision for the future. All we heard was roads, roads, tax, and roads. That side of the House are still fighting the last election. This side, however, has presented a vision for this country and it is outlined in this Budget Policy Statement. It is emphasised fully in our 100-day plan. We’ve got to look at the bigger picture. What is the measure of success in a country’s economy? Is it figures, or is it actually how well off the people are in this country? What good is an economy, if a growing share are missing out on prosperity? What good is a strong economy, if people are sleeping in cars and children are going to school hungry or without shoes on their feet?

When that side of the House wishes that we were doing tax cuts, this Government is actually, through this Budget Policy Statement and the 100-day plan, committing to things that matter to this country and matter to the people that live here.

Earlier speakers from this Government touched on legislation to give impact to the Families Package. How is it that in 2017 and 2018, leading up to this last election anyway, there were families who were working for a living and going without the basic necessities of life? Parents and families were working full-time—40, 50, 60 hours a week—and struggling to feed their kids and make ends meet. That is not a strong economy.

You can take the view that the other side of the House wishes to take—that the market will deliver. We’ve had nine years of that ideology, and the market has delivered inequality and poverty. This Labour-led Government has had to come in and bring in measures to try and address that. We had people, leading up to the last election, living in damp, cold homes. So this Government has introduced the Healthy Homes Guarantee Act. If they were living in damp, cold homes, it also meant that they couldn’t afford their own homes. So we’ve clamped down on speculators, particularly those from overseas, to ensure that homes—something that was a right almost in this country not long ago and is now out of reach for so many of our people here in New Zealand.

But it’s not just those that are working that are struggling to make ends meet. It’s those that are working but are struggling to keep their jobs, because of insecure conditions, low wages, and the insecurity that is brought about because they do not have the right to be able to negotiate collectively, as a group. They are on individual employment agreements. They do not have the confidence to be able to fight and negotiate for good, decent terms, because they know there are 10 people around the corner waiting to take their low-paying job at any rate.

So in our 100-day plan, which is outlined in the Budget Policy Statement, it clearly says that this Government has legislation to provide greater fairness in the workplace. Perhaps there is no greater example of this than the 90-day legislation. The previous National Government said it was fair to bring in a rule that said that after 90 days someone who is on this trial probationary period could be dismissed without any decent reason. No reflection of dignity, no reflection of the work that they’ve done. They’re down the road. We’ve always said that was wrong, and I’m proud to be part of a Government that has got rid of it.

💬 Alastair Scott: No, you haven’t.

Except for the small businesses, of course, which was the original rule—

💬 Alastair Scott: You don’t know what you’re talking about.

I’ve been accused by the member for Wairarapa, Alastair Scott, of not knowing what I’m talking about. That is the “Everywhere Man”. They call him the “Everywhere Man” in Wairarapa because he’s everywhere but Wairarapa. That is the Wairarapa MP who never turns up. No wonder his majority was reduced by 5,000 last election. I look forward to reducing it even more in 2020.

The fact is that you should never be able to be dismissed from a job—

💬 Alastair Scott: Where were you on the weekend, McAnulty? Didn’t see you on Sunday; didn’t see you on Saturday. Sitting on your arse at home, McAnulty. You do nothing.

I think I’ve touched a nerve. He hasn’t stopped barracking since I made that point that really hurt him. The thing is, he’s not happy.

Let’s move on to the minimum wage. [Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! Please don’t bring me into this debate.

💬 Alastair Scott: McAnulty, your party still hurts the most.

Oh, Mr Assistant Speaker—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! There’s a correct way to address members, and that’s not it.

Thank you, sir. Let’s move on to the minimum wage, shall we? The fact is that it is an absolute disgrace in this country, when people that work full-time—

💬 Hon Carmel Sepuloni: You’re getting to him.

I think I am getting to him, Carmel. I think I am getting to Alastair Scott. I think I’ve touched a nerve; I really do. But let’s get back on to this, shall I? Give him a breather.

The fact is that the minimum wage, if not increased—people do struggle to make ends meet. They do struggle to feed their families, and there once was a principle in this country that if you did a fair day’s work, you got a fair day’s pay. Over time, when workers have been absolutely undermined, their capacity to negotiate collectively and keep the rights that many have fought for over generations—this is why this Labour-led Government had to come in in this Budget Policy Statement, in our first 100 days, and actually deliver for the working people of this country. And I know, coming from a regional area that has a large number of small businesses that depend on people’s capacity to spend, that when workers have money, when working families have money to spend, small businesses do well. That is how you are measuring the success of an economy—not for some figures, not how the top, 10, 5, 2, and 1 percent are doing; it’s how we are all doing.

If the working family is doing well, the whole country is doing well. In the last nine years, we’ve seen conditions not just in the workplace but in the home eroded by loopholes in the law that allowed people to take advantage and exploit. I’m proud to be part of a Government that has indicated through this Budget Policy Statement and in our 100 days that we’re on the side of the everyday New Zealander, and we’re going to deliver for this country.