General Debate

I move, That the House take note of miscellaneous business.

We’ve had a couple of interesting questions during question time today, and Mr Parker actually just referred to one of those, which was around what has happened to the National Party’s policy on congestion charging. We did have an inquiry at the transport and industrial relations committee, and at that inquiry every single political party said that they endorsed congestion charging, including the National Party. Then, a mere matter of months later, the National Party have changed their position and they no longer support congestion charging. So this really does emphasise the importance of remembering the National Party’s slogan for this election: “Backtracking for New Zealand.”

When we come to thinking about the election that will occur in October this year, like all elections, New Zealanders will approach this election with a mixture of hope and a mixture of fear. This has been an incredibly challenging time for many New Zealanders: meeting the additional cost of living pressures that they have seen off the back of the COVID pandemic, and the stresses and strains that put on many New Zealand households. So what they are looking for from a Government—and indeed what they have seen from this Government—is that we will be alongside them every step of the way, just as we did through COVID, making sure that New Zealanders were kept well and safe and healthy, making sure that businesses kept going, making sure that we supported New Zealanders across the board to come through COVID in better shape than most other countries, and then looking to a future where we continue to look after New Zealanders, where we continue to provide housing—in particular, State housing. I am extremely proud of the 12,000 additional State houses that this Government has put in place.

I am also proud of the 77,000 children who we have lifted out of poverty as a result of the investments that we have made. I am proud of the fact that, as a Government, we have looked to the identity of New Zealanders and have said, “We believe we can celebrate Matariki. We believe that there is room to look at our histories in our schools—that we are proud as a nation. We must keep learning from our history and look into our future.” So I am proud of all of those things. They are the things that give hope to the future: the investments we’re making in infrastructure, in the game development sector, in research and innovation to grow the high-paying jobs, and to lower our emissions. That is what gives New Zealanders hope. But what gives New Zealanders fear is the opposite—what is at risk if the Government changes.

I was fascinated to hear Christopher Luxon say on the radio this morning that there was “good alignment” between ACT and National. Well, we know on this side of the House what that means. That means that public services across the board are at risk as a result of an ACT-National Government. The letters that we get from people about the winter energy payment, about what that means to New Zealanders—to Maggie, to Glenys, to Leigh, to Jane—who, just in the last few days, have written to the Government to say thank you for the winter energy payment. That’s gone with ACT, and that’s gone with National, because of the good alignment that they have.

There was one other interesting thing that Christopher Luxon said this morning, when he said that they hadn’t got their tax policy out because they were “just making sure we’ve got everything fully funded”. They’ve finally cottoned on—they’ve finally cottoned on—that, if they actually want a tax policy, they have to work out how they’re going to pay for it. Now, to the credit of the ACT Party, they have worked out how they’re going to pay for their barmy tax policy: they’re going to cut public services. They’re going to cut contributions to superannuation. They’re going to cut welfare benefits. And, at the moment, that’s the alternative.

So what’s at risk at this election is good, strong public services, a commitment to climate change action, and a commitment to supporting the most vulnerable New Zealanders. That’s what’s at risk. That’s at risk from an ACT-National Government who believe that tax cuts at all costs is what is needed, even if that means the undermining of our health system, even if that means the undermining of our education system. This is a party who went to the last election with a fiscal hole, the “Bermuda Fiscal Triangle”, and nothing has changed. That is a party over there with an unfunded tax policy, versus the hope that this Government gives New Zealanders.

That was an angry speech—an angry speech—from a Minister of Finance who is wagging his finger at New Zealanders, telling them they should be grateful for what he’s delivered. Well, they’re not feeling grateful, Mr Robertson—they’re not feeling grateful—because they are struggling to pay for their groceries each week, which have increased in price at such a rapid clip that there are people at the checkout aisle who have panic attacks. They’re not grateful, Minister Robertson, that their rent has gone up $170 a week on average under Labour. They’re not grateful that their incomes are not keeping up with the mortgage payments, that they’re paying higher interest rates than other countries in the world, and that that Minister has mismanaged the economy so poorly that we are not only in recession, but we have high inflation, high, high interest rates, and New Zealanders from all walks of life are struggling.

You know what? I think this is why he’s angry: because he’s actually realised that the last six years have proven that Labour cannot manage an economy and Labour can’t deliver. Because, actually, under Labour, people are struggling more than ever. There are more children in benefit-dependent households. There are four times as many people on the State house waiting list. There are thousands of children growing up in motel rooms. There are thousands of children not attending school regularly. There are so many elderly people on waiting lists, wanting hip operations and cataracts replaced, that some of them are flying to Australia to pay for those operations themselves. There are people on gurneys in cold hospital corridors because there aren’t enough nurses. Grant Robertson has realised that this Labour Party project has failed.

What it is New Zealanders say when they see that ridiculous slogan “In it for you” is “Who is the ‘you’?” Because this is a Government that says they can’t afford to reduce New Zealanders’ taxes—oh, no, it’s not the right time, apparently, despite the fact that this is the time when the cost of living is higher than it’s ever been, when more people are falling behind in their debt payments, and when people can’t pay for the food for their kids’ lunchboxes. Now is not the time for tax cuts, apparently.

I’ll tell you who it is time for because—actually, I’ll tell you who Labour is in it for; they’re in it for BlueScope Steel, because there’s enough money for a cheque for BlueScope Steel, a multi-billion dollar company. There’s enough money for them to get $140 million so they can decarbonise, because why should they pay for that themselves? Who cares if they’re a big, profitable company? Actually, New Zealand taxpayers should be padding their pockets further.

I’ll tell you who else they can find money for. They may not be able to find money for a tax cut for someone on the average wage, but they can find another $90 million for Fonterra. Poor Fonterra only made $1.2 billion last year, so why would you prioritise taxpayers and ordinary working people when you can write them another cheque?

I’ll tell you who else they can find money for. He can’t find the money for tax cuts—apparently it’s impossible to find anywhere, there’s just no cash—but there is $1.8 billion for consultants and contractors to write reports for the Government on policy ideas that they then reject. There was enough money to spend hundreds of hours of officials’ time—huge amounts of money—developing new plans to tax New Zealanders, but there’s not enough money to let New Zealanders keep more of what they earn.

There is enough money for the IRD this year—this year, when New Zealanders around the country are pulling their belts tighter, are looking for cash, the IRD has got $30 million to spend on redecorating and refurbishing their offices. What I put to you is that when I hear about a Government that is not prioritising, that has failed to rein in the cost of living crisis, and then they say they’re in it for you, the “you” is not New Zealanders any more.

It is not enough for Grant Robertson to stand up and say that they tried, and they cared, and they did it for the right reasons. They have failed. In New Zealand today, we have an economy that has failed working people, who are slipping further behind. Many of them are chasing the hope that that Minister talks about—on a plane to Australia. That is not a failure that you can stand up and defend, when, at the same time, the services you said you would deliver are under more strain than ever, and crime is at record levels. This is a Government of failure. It’s time for change. National will deliver it. Don’t vote for the same thing if you don’t want the same result. No more failure for this great country.

Literally the one thing I agreed with from that member who just resumed her seat, Nicola Willis, from the rant that we heard, was the fact that times are tough. I don’t think anyone would disagree that things have been difficult for the past few years for New Zealanders and for us globally. But what we’ve always said, as the Government on this side of the House, is that while many of the drivers of that might sit offshore, overseas, and outside of the purview of us as a Government, what we will continue to do is work to mitigate the impact of that on New Zealanders. And that is what we have consistently done. We’ve done a fair bit of work to tackle the cost of living increases that people are seeing, but we’re also focusing on the rebuild—rebuilding more resilient communities.

I want to touch, briefly, on both the physical and the social infrastructure rebuild that we’ve been investing in and focusing on. In addition to our $71 billion infrastructure plan over the next five years, Budget 2023 set aside $6 billion extra for strategic investments as part of our National Resilience Plan. It is undeniable that we’ve seen both the hangover, the economic hangover, of the COVID pandemic, but more recently the severe weather events that we’ve seen, the flooding in Auckland, plus the impacts of Cyclone Gabrielle. We must ensure that we build back better in the face of that. That includes things like futureproofing rail, roads, and local infrastructure that was wiped out by the wet weather events, and setting straight our telecommunications and electricity transmission infrastructure.

We don’t say it lightly when we say we are the Government of infrastructure and delivery. For example, just look at housing. I have spoken ad nauseam in this House to questions from members opposite—a certain member opposite—on public housing and our record there, both the housing crisis that we inherited when the then National Government was in denial that a crisis even was what we were experiencing, and since then, since we’ve taken office, we’ve delivered a record number. We’ve delivered 12,198 public homes. Over 10,000 of those are brand new builds.

I remember speaking to a young woman who was a teacher aide at the time, in my electorate of Maungakiekie, who had come back from Australia to raise her young family here. She was wanting to buy a house, was wanting to get into homeownership, and was living temporarily, she thought, with her family. She ended up living in a three-bedroom house with 14 others. This was with the National Government at the time, who did not build housing. In fact, one in seven of the public homes that we have in New Zealand today have been added in the last five years. This is an incredible achievement. Alongside that, we’ve increased transitional housing by 4,223 net places since October 2017.

If that side of the House, when they were in Government, had actually continued to build houses instead of leaving us 1,500 public homes fewer than when they took office, there would actually be over 21,000 new State houses, accounting for 85 percent of people on the current waiting list—85 percent. This could have been avoided; yet we’ve been building our way out of the crisis that we were left.

I also want to touch quickly on a couple of initiatives in Budget 2023 that speak to our social infrastructure. That is, policies that will directly benefit Kiwis feeling the pressure of increased costs of living: extending 20 hours’ free early childhood education to two-year-olds; the scrapping of the $5 prescription co-payment—I visited a local pharmacy in my electorate over the recent recess and he told me that just in the year, just in terms of what he had counted, he had absorbed $15,000 because of families who couldn’t afford to pay for their prescriptions and pick up the medication that they needed. Our local pharmacies will no longer have to do that because of the investments by this Government.

That side of the House, as Grant Robertson said, their tagline should absolutely be “Backtracking for New Zealand”. Their alignment with ACT will see us not have equitable services for our various communities, because that is ACT’s policy. We will lose the winter energy payment that so many have benefited from. Food in schools—many schools in my electorate are worried that they will lose the food in schools if that side of the House becomes Government after October this year, because, frankly, they will take us backwards into the crises, the multiple crises that we inherited back in 2017. I’m proud of our Government.

The member’s time has expired.

A third of New Zealanders rent, and in my home and community of Auckland Central, it is more than half. Those renters in this country spend more of their income on older, colder, and mouldier housing than those who own. I challenge any MP in this House to argue anything other than the obvious reality that this is morally, patently wrong. Fiscally, I might add too, as it also comes at an immense social, health, and productivity cost, and a cost to education and employment absence. Under international law, anything short of adequate, affordable housing happens to be a breach of the United Nations’ recognised human rights.

So why is it that things are so bad for renters in this country? Well, a few decades ago, politicians in this House right here decided to put profit ahead of people. They decided to abandon the social contract which saw the sell-off of State houses in their masses. They sold off those State houses and handed over responsibility to the private market, to the extent that we now see the accommodation supplement paid out to the tune of approximately $2 billion per year, bidding up the private rental market.

We live today with the consequences of those decisions, and those consequences are one of the most unaffordable housing markets in the world, on almost any metric that you choose to measure; those consequences are found in the 25 percent of retirees living in insecure and precarious rental properties, which the Retirement Commissioner predicts will double, based on present policy settings, within the next 25 years; those consequences are renters presenting in our hospitals with preventable illnesses, particularly respiratory illnesses, some of which will stay with them for their entire lives.

The point of traversing this history is to demonstrate that the status quo is not inevitable; it is a political choice, and we are living with the consequences of political choices that have been made in the past—

Andrew Bayly: Are you giving a talk, Erica?

CHLÖE SWARBRICK: —and to this day. The challenges faced by renters are consequences of decisions made in this place, Mr Andrew Bayly. Different political decisions can be made, and we can fix these issues. The solutions are clear, and so far only the Greens are willing to put forward the evidence-based solutions to those issues. They are, of course, a rental warrant of fitness, which would work incredibly efficiently in tandem with a register for property managers and landlords, and, of course, rent controls.

Here, I might elaborate that we actually already have a form of rent controls in our Residential Tenancies Act. Those are limitations on the amount of times that rents can be increased per annum to no more than once per year, and also that rents can be set at no more than what is considered market rate. The problem is: who determines what a market rate is? Well, it is landlords and property managers—

Andrew Bayly: It’s normally determined by the market.

CHLÖE SWARBRICK: —and, therefore, a self-fulfilling prophecy. Stoked to see that I’ve hit the Andrew Bayly button.

These solutions are blueprints to fix the rental housing crisis. You may hear members of the Opposition, as you just did, crowing about how ensuring these basic rights for renters comes at a cost to landlords. Well, let’s be straight up. Sure, there could be a slight reduction in the profits for the 2 percent of landlords in this country if we are to guarantee warm, dry, and secure housing for the 1.5 million renters. We make this political decision when it comes to the minimum wage, when we say that you can’t keep your workers in poverty in order to keep your business afloat. We understand that that is the basis of a false economy. That is the privatisation of profit and the socialisation of cost. I’ve got to say, it’s past time that this place realised that the exact same damn logic applies to the rental housing market, and the Greens are saying that enough is enough. We have clear evidence that the rental market is cooked. We have it in our housing crisis stories, which more than 700 New Zealanders submitted stories to. We have it in the people’s inquiry into student wellbeing, which also demonstrated that two-thirds of students regularly cannot afford the basics.

These are political decisions, and we have a solution—one which we put in the ballot today—in the form of a rental warrant of fitness member’s bill. In 2017, this House—and the Green Party, working with the Labour Government—passed the healthy homes standards. The problem with the healthy homes standards is that we are not accountable, as a Parliament, when we are not counting compliance. This rental warrant of fitness could bypass the ballot if the Government choose to adopt the legislation to fix precisely those issues, and we are calling on Labour to do—

Order! The member’s time has expired.

Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. It was great to hear the member speaking about the great work that we did on Healthy Homes. It was a great collaboration between the Greens and the Labour Party to make homes warmer and drier for all New Zealanders. It addresses those big, long-term challenges, and certainly in my role as the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, I absolutely am focused on some of those big challenges, because it is so easy, if you listen to the Opposition, to go for those quick wins.

In the commerce sector in particular, I want to have a reflection on the work that we’ve done. We when came into office, nothing of any substance had been done in the area of competition law for nine long years. This Government has looked at what really matters every time someone goes to the shop to buy their groceries, fills up their tank, does some DIY, gets some insurance, or pretty much anything they touch in the area of competition. We need a competition law framework that is fair for all New Zealanders—fair markets for all, not for the few but for everyone, and that’s what we’ve been working for. We want markets that are productive, effective, but in particular, markets where profit does not illegitimately accumulate in the hands of the few.

The reforms that we did early on to make it possible to probe into markets that weren’t working were really, really important, because sometimes you look and think something doesn’t seem right but you haven’t got the ability to really delve into it. Well, the amendments in 2019 to the Commerce Act enabled the Commerce Commission to be directed to do a deep-dive and really find out places where things were going wrong. And every time we’ve looked, every time we’ve shone the light, we’ve seen problems there. So that’s what we are about—about looking for the biggest gain for those that need it the most, and that’s what a competitive market is. It’s one where prices are fair and where there is innovation—markets that are effective, efficient, and productive, not markets that are fat and lazy and monopolistic, and that’s the markets that the other side were sitting on for nine years, watching their mates get rich while everyday New Zealanders were paying too much at the supermarket, paying too much for their fuel, and while all kinds of other things were going wrong.

So we are focused on making sure that markets work for everyone, and we’ve looked at that. We’ve dived into the detail as well, looking at when market power is being abused, and for a long time those rules were pretty much a farce. It was almost impossible to hold anyone to account. So we changed the market power test to be an effects-based test, so that the onus is really thrown on the person exercising market power to show that they weren’t acting anti-competitively. What’s more, to reflect how important those rules are, we’ve upped the penalties that can be imposed, so that if you can’t determine quite how much money they’d made on their market breaches, you can impose a penalty of 10 percent of their turnover. Now, if you’re one of the big supermarkets, or one of the big banks, 10 percent of turnover is hundreds of millions of dollars, and that is how important this is, because that’s the kind of wealth that is being illegitimately extracted from ordinary consumers, who the other side of the House don’t care about. But that is who we want to put first—mum and dad going to the supermarket, filling up their car, doing a bit of DIY, and just trying to make ends meet. Rather than money going out of their pockets into the pockets of banks, insurers, and big fuel companies, we want to see it stay where it belongs.

Those market studies have real and immediate effects. We’ve seen—

Andrew Bayly: They haven’t had any effect yet.

Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB: Thank you, Mr Bayly, for your support of the grocery legislation. Thank you for your support for the removal of land covenants. Thank you for your support for the appointment of a Grocery Commissioner, because it’s with your support that The Warehouse is entering the grocery market, Costco is entering the grocery market, Circle K is entering the grocery market, and Supie is entering the grocery market—and here comes my favourite capitalist, Damien Smith, heckling from the floor of the House in breach of the Standing Orders! This Government is committed to making gains that count for real New Zealanders, for families in New Zealand, and we’ll continue doing it now and for ever.

Well, if you have ever wondered what Grant Robertson does all day—because clearly it’s not growing the economy, solving our cost of living crisis, or reining in his wasteful spending—what he does is he sits in his office devising new party slogans for the National Party that he then emails around to all of his colleagues and says, “Don’t forget to use this every chance you get.” Then he has the audacity to stand up here and suggest that the National Party will make cuts to the education budget at the very same time that schools around the country have been emailed by the Ministry of Education saying, “Tools down. Stop your builds. Actually, you need to pull back on that school hall; that’s not going ahead. That gymnasium? That’s not going ahead. You’re not getting as many classrooms as you thought you were going to get.” Cuts in every direction—

SPEAKER: Order! Sorry to interrupt. Is there a Minister in this House?

Hon Dr Deborah Russell: Yes.

SPEAKER: Oh, sorry. Sorry to interrupt.

ERICA STANFORD: That’s OK—cuts left, right, and centre to school builds because this is a Government that cannot deliver and cannot deliver on their promises. At the same time, in this Budget, they’re promising hundreds of new classrooms. They are completely unable to deliver on the promises that they already made to these schools, because we’re seeing cuts left, right, and centre.

Now, on the theme of a Government that talks a big game but just cannot deliver, despite their holier-than-thou claims about reduction of migrant exploitation, we now have the worst situation we’ve ever had in terms of migrant exploitation in this country. We have an influx of low-skilled, no-qualification, no-English migrants who are being exploited. They are the victims of scams, aided and abetted by poor Labour immigration policy that is teamed with terrible implementation at Immigration New Zealand (INZ) that has caused our borders to be porous.

The drawbridge has not only been lowered, but the castle walls have been knocked down and someone left the back door open. Three hapless immigration Ministers—in just under a year—that are totally blind to the Government’s actions and how the Government’s actions have caused what can only be described as a humanitarian crisis. Story after story in the media highlighting the scale of the problem: “Migrants cheated out of money in New Zealand work visa scam”, “Migrants pay thousands of dollars for visas, only to be left without jobs”, “Immigration job visa scam”, “Recovery of visa being paid for by migrants $30,000”, “INZ scheme ‘breeding ground for migrant exploitation’ ”—hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of migrants being exploited. It is being reported every single day, and yet these Ministers have their head in the sand.

Anu Kaloti from the Migrant Workers Association said that she is being “inundated with calls from migrants who are being exploited”. A simple search online shows scams on TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, videos, and adverts in their hundreds: “No English, job guaranteed, and a pathway to residence”, “No skill, no qualification required”—and with multiple emails to my office from people who work inside Immigration New Zealand pleading with me to do something. This is people who work at Immigration New Zealand saying that “within Immigration New Zealand, staff morale around the AEW risk management is below zero”—from the department itself.

All of this evidence of migrant exploitation, and this Government that talks a big game but just cannot deliver, because we remember the immigration reset speech in 2021 delivered by Stuart Nash: “We want to send a strong message that the migrant exploitation is unacceptable in New Zealand. We want to put a stop to migrant exploitation.” Despite the big words, despite the big promises, it is worse than it has ever been.

Despite all of this evidence, despite the slew of headlines, these Ministers, so divorced from reality, are not asking the right questions. Andrew Little, on TV last week, said, “I am satisfied the regime we’ve got in place is working.” Well, let me tell you why it is not working. This is a Government who has 24,000 businesses; they say they’re going to accredit to stop migrant exploitation. They have checked 2 percent of them—497 have been checked. By their own admission, they’re only going to check 15 percent. They’re giving out job tokens that are now tradeable commodities. These migrants are paying up to $40,000 for one of these tokens.

Hon Andrew Little: The member’s making it up.

ERICA STANFORD: Oh, the Minister says I’m making it up? Minister Little, why don’t you go and speak to some of these people? On the weekend, I met with 18 of these employers—18 of these migrants who are being exploited.

Hon Andrew Little: Why does the member make things up?

ERICA STANFORD: I’ll tell you what, Mr Little, wait till Q+A this weekend, because they are going to tell you exactly what you should have been asking the sector, but refused to do so because you’ve been blinded by your officials who tell you what you want to hear, but you’re not going to the sector—

Hon Andrew Little: Making it up.

ERICA STANFORD: —and asking what’s actually going on. It has been reported in the media, these things.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mr Little—

ERICA STANFORD: The Minister needs to do better.

Thank you, Mr Speaker—

Tim van de Molen: Point of order. The inferences made by the Minister there—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I heard them, and I’ll judge accordingly. Thank you for any assistance you may offer. Just to remind the member, you can’t be offended on behalf of another member. I heard the comments, and I’ll—

Tim van de Molen: It’s not about offence to an individual member; it’s about offence to the House itself.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Yes. Well, I heard those comments, and I will judge accordingly, but thank you for your assistance. Just start the clock again for Camilla Belich.

CAMILLA BELICH: Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take a call in this general debate. Now, you may have heard it said in this debate, or just in general, that Labour is the party of infrastructure, and that’s what I want to start my contribution with today. I’ve recently been talking about infrastructure at a number of different events; I was at the Building Nations conference in Christchurch, when infrastructure was discussed at length. I’ve also been on a number of panels in my home town of Auckland, discussing what Labour’s doing for infrastructure. As we know, infrastructure is vitally important for New Zealand, and we have, as a Labour Government, put $6 billion into a National Resilience Plan—and additionally $71 billion over five years, which is our pipeline of infrastructure changes that we have committed to and will be implementing. So that is why I feel very confident saying that Labour is the party of infrastructure, and in fact I think you heard the Minister say during question time that we’re the Government of infrastructure.

What do we need to implement these ambitious infrastructure targets to keep this country moving forward? We need a workforce that can deliver these for us. You’ve recently heard contributions from members opposite about their concerns about the workforce in New Zealand, and I sympathise. I’ve spent my career working for working people’s rights, working to make sure that their basic standards are upheld, and so I sympathise with that sentiment.

What I cannot accept is that that party opposite puts itself up as some kind of saviour of working people. Just last year, they voted against the Worker Protection (Migrant and Other Employees) Bill, a bill in and of itself to protect migrants. You voted against it—you voted against it. So I do not entertain any arguments from that side of the House on protecting working people, and if the member Erica Stanford wants to look at the biggest risk to working people in this country, she needs to glance to her left because that party—the ACT Party, unlike her party—has announced a suite of reforms in the area of workers’ rights.

Let me tell you about those policies. Those policies outline, essentially, the destruction of employment within this country. Now, that might seem—or it might sound—hyperbolic, but it is not—

Erica Stanford: Can’t deliver. No understanding.

CAMILLA BELICH: I do understand, actually, because this is my professional area of expertise. They have said that if they are part of the Government, the policy that they will be implementing is, essentially, to allow all employers to force workers into a contracting situation. What does that mean? That means the end of health and safety regulations for employers. That means the end of the minimum wage. I’m not making this up; this is the ACT policy. It means every right associated with employment rights would go. It would be a disaster for this country. It would take the model brought in by the John Key Government for screen workers, making sure that they weren’t allowed to truly be employees, and it would implement it across the entire economy.

I hear members opposite saying to me, “Well, that’s the ACT party policy; that’s not the National Party policy”. Well, we heard your leader on the radio saying there is “good alignment” between the ACT Party and the National Party—good alignment! If there’s good alignment, the only thing that we can expect is that their policies become your policies. When your policies come into place, we lose paid parental leave, we lose sick leave, we lose Matariki, and we lose holiday pay. Every single right that people enjoy and expect in this country as employees would go. This is the direct flow-on effect of this policy, and let me tell you, that is a lot to be at risk for New Zealand; the destruction of our working conditions is at risk this election.

Alternatively, you have the Labour Party: we’ve increased the minimum wage; we’ve increased paid parental leave; we’ve increased holiday pay; we’ve increased sick leave; we have increased almost every sector which directly helps New Zealanders with the cost of living, and we commit to continue to do that with the advent of fair pay agreements to make this country more productive and have better conditions for working people. We truly are the Government and the party of infrastructure, and we will get New Zealand moving with a workforce that is respected.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I want to talk about two reports the Government doesn’t want New Zealanders to see, and won’t release, and one report that they requested be delayed. The very first report that this Government is still hiding and does not want to release is the 2020/2021 health promotion unit, “That’s Us” campaign. This was a social media vaccination campaign for $1.5 million. It was signed off at the end of 2021 but actually only started after 87 percent of the target audience had already had their first vaccine. The lead person co-signed multimillion-dollar contracts, awarded to an advertising agency that their own private company also had contracts with.

Staff were so concerned that they wrote an open letter and left copies of it lying around the office, having already spoken with their management team, gone through appropriate process, and heard nothing. The person’s nephew and his partner were reported as both being university students at the time, and were paid thousands of dollars a week to work on the campaign while they were still living with the lead person. The small and late content that was produced also had issues, so the content wasn’t that great anyway for $1.5 million. A clip published in March riffs off what seems to be a young man about to skull a bottle of beer down a hosepipe. In another, a kid mistakes “getting vaxxed” with “Big Macs”. It’s against Te Hiringa Hauora’s policies—that’s the health promotion unit who organised all of this—to promote alcohol or fast food anyway.

This was a delegated responsibility to Minister Ayesha Verrall. She had the delegation for health promotion. Te Hiringa Hauora was the organisation. This was on her watch; $1.59 million. Now, more than a year later, she is still refusing to release the independent review that she asked for in March 2022. Why would we expect her to release any other information when a year later she is still refusing to release that information—that independent review?

Here’s how the Minister and her officials responded to questions around the programme—this is how it’s reported by journalists who are pursuing it. One: Health New Zealand has refused to release any signed conflict of interest forms, or the date they were signed. Two: it is reported that Health New Zealand declined to be interviewed, did not answer written questions, and appeared to hide behind the health reforms as reasons for why the campaign failed. I call on the Minister to release the independent review from a year ago now, on the “That’s Us” vaccination campaign—the failed “That’s Us” vaccination campaign.

That’s the first report that they are hiding. The second report that the Minister is hiding is the independent report into the Māori Health Authority that she received on 5 May—two months ago. There’ll be two possibilities: one, maybe there are improved outcomes for Māori, and, if so, spread the good news and celebrate it; or two, the Māori Health Authority has failed to achieve outcomes, and breached the Crown Entities Act by failing to provide full financial statements with their statements of performance expectations for December last year. Three: they’ve failed to have income and expense budget planning for the first four months of its existence; it’s a half a billion dollar entity, and this was referred to the Office of the Auditor-General. And four: they’ve seen an unbelievable bloating in staff numbers that is staggering.

The briefing to the incoming Minister in February this year revealed a staggering 227 fulltimeequivalents (FTE). Six months later, in fact, a few weeks ago, the chief executive told the Health Committee that the number, at full establishment, for FTEs for the Māori Health Authority will be 321. Not surprising, about a week later, in fact, in our post-hearing questions, that’s gone back to correction, and we’re kind of hoping that it might be a bit less. Actually, it’s 50 percent more, and the correction is that the fulltime-equivalent number for the Māori Health Authority will not be 321, but actually 400. That’s almost three times the number of FTEs than at Pharmac for half the budget. The Minister needs to release that independent report into the Māori Health Authority.

As for the report that she’s delayed, well, that’s just a circus of errors. This was to the faulty data that was put up on the website. They were warned by the Health Quality and Safety Commission that there were a number of concerns around the data. This advice was not followed. They gave the first report—remember, they said they could do it monthly; clearly they can’t. They gave the first report to the Canterbury team who were reluctant, “reluctant to undertake the work anyway because they didn’t have subject matter expertise.” Come the second report, they say, “No, let’s not give it to Canterbury, let’s try and manage it in-house.” Regional director roles weren’t present. The data was not checked by a second analyst. Districts were not asked to validate the data. What a mess—66 pages of indictment of failed planning, failed data, and failed accountability by this Government. Release the reports, Minister.

Thank you, Mr Speaker, and it’s my pleasure to be able to speak in the general debate and bring some happiness because, too often, I’m placed on the list about now—all the anger and unhappiness is outpoured but I always have to bring the good news. Time and time again I have to bring the good news, so here I am, yet again, placed right on the right spot on the agenda to talk about something I really love, and that’s infrastructure. There’s no better place to talk about that good news than the wonderful Chatham Islands which I represent—those good people who live in that isolated community 800 kilometres offshore between Wellington and Christchurch.

I say that because six years ago that community sat down and came up with an investment strategy; an infrastructure plan that said these are the things that matter most to these people. The bread and butter stuff that they said, “If we’re going to have a good, decent life in Aotearoa New Zealand, these are the things that matter most.” They include, and thanks to the Provincial Growth Fund, bringing the islands into the jet age, being able to get there, to that community—a vulnerable community, in a sense. Thankfully, five years on, $50 million later—what a good investment—they were delivered a runway extension to ensure that that community is resilient going forward.

I want to also add, too, that some of you may not know that they would have been the last people in this country to receive the mobile phone. We take it for granted. A year and a half on, those residents there now have access to mobile technology; a wee communication with someone who owns Starlink to enable those satellite dishes to be turned on. They have access to Starlink and a mobile phone network. The then Minister, David Clark, was quite shocked to learn that. He said, “So I’m going there to turn on a mobile phone network, to make the first call back to the mainland?” But those are the differences that a small investment but a good investment makes, helpfully delivered by Crown Infrastructure Partners, the rural connectivity group which comprises our three network providers, to literally get poles in the ground on the best sites, so not only Chatham Island but Pitt Island too, so those residents can do what we take for granted.

Most of the students have to go to the mainland for boarding school once they reach the age of 13. I wonder what it’s been like for them to come home during the school holidays and be able to keep participating in the lives that they enjoy on the mainland. That’s good news for them, because they are able to do the basic things that every other New Zealander has the right to do.

During the Budget, I was really happy to see that the $10 million was allocated for renewable energy. It’s diesel generated, a bit like Stewart Island / Rakiura and other isolated islands in New Zealand. But here we are, here, where there is no reason why renewable energy—so windmills, solar power, which many of them already have taken their own initiative to say, “This is the best way to bring our power bills down.” And they have probably some of the highest in the world. I think that was unacceptable. I think we could have done a lot better and we did, and I thank Minister Woods for that because it sounds like a lot of money, but, certainly, it’s not when you say, “Look, this is just basic stuff: being able to turn on the power, keep that power running, have a cup of tea, keep your mobile and your laptop charged, and live a decent life with dignity.”

Former Minister Nash, sitting in front of me here, with tourism—the cultural tourism product on that island is unseen by most New Zealanders. The good news is that the Tourism Infrastructure Fund provided just a little bit to unleash, and to uncover some of the secrets of the Chatham Islands. Look, I offer any member a hosted tour to take them across and see these are the things that matter most to these people of New Zealand.

To cap it all off, can I acknowledge the local council there, where the CEO will finish after 21 years in the job—Owen Pickles—53 years in local government, and that Crown appropriation that we give them to enable those citizens to live with basic services, as any council would, is delivered by them.

Yesterday, Radio New Zealand board member Jason Ake doubled down on his political commentary about the Hon Kiritapu Allan, despite the Prime Minister calling it inappropriate for a board member of a Crown entity to make such political commentary. I completely agree with the Prime Minister, and I don’t agree with him often. Today, he has quit the board. Ake questioned why Kiri Allan was cleared to return to Parliament—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Excuse me. Could you gentlemen at the back have your party outside, please? Sorry, Ms Lee—carry on.

MELISSA LEE: Do I get extra—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I’ll give you an extra 10 seconds.

MELISSA LEE: Ake questioned why the Hon Kiri Allan was cleared to return to Parliament. He hit out at reactions to her arrest and resignation, saying sharks were circling while there was blood in the water. RNZ chair Jim Mather reminded Ake that he must avoid certain political activities in his new role, while Minister Willie Jackson said yesterday that, although Ake had been a vocal person, his commentary needed to stop if he was to remain on the RNZ board.

As a supporter of free speech, I completely support Ake’s right to commentary, except that he was on a Crown entity board—RNZ—and it should have been made very clear to him that while on a Crown board political commentary is completely inappropriate. It’s not the first time he’s done this. He actually did it on 18 July, after he was appointed to the board, on his Facebook, criticising another media company on their translation of stories into Māori, saying that stories written from a non-Māori perspective are a complete and utter nonsense. On 5 July, he also attacked a journalist from another news organisation, on his Facebook, for investigating a teacher who was allegedly struck off the teachers register for inappropriate behaviour with a student, or grooming that student—Ake’s words—saying that journalist’s questions did not need to be answered by the kura in question where the teacher had been employed, saying that there was no statutory obligation for the kura to answer the journalist. He was on the board of RNZ, has responsibilities to the Crown, and yet he was interfering in editorial matters, and it is none of his business and he should have known better, because Mr Ake has actually been on Government boards before, and still is. He was also the Hon Parekura Horomia’s press secretary from 2002 to 2006. He was the chair of the Māori Media Sector Shift panel from 2020 to 2022. He is currently serving as a panel member on Māori Education’s Te Pae Roa, since 2021, and he is serving as the Māori committee member for the Law Commission, since 2018. Should he or his comments be considered for the current boards that he now sits on—whether it is appropriate for him to still sit on those boards—is something that other Ministers should actually take into consideration.

The Radio New Zealand Act specifically says in section 14(4), “No governor of the public radio company shall be appointed to represent, or promote the views of, a particular interest group.” When Minister Willie Jackson appointed Jason Ake, did he know Mr Ake’s position on his role—that he was bringing to the RNZ board issues around the Treaty and transformation—which Mr Ake has actually said on his Facebook: that, as a board member of Te Whakaruruhau, it was his mandate “to be noisy around political stuff”?—I’m quoting Mr Ake. Is that the reason why the Hon Willie Jackson brought Jason Ake to the RNZ board, to change the culture that he actually often talked about? I can hardly believe that Mr Jackson did not actually know Mr Ake’s political connections or his political views, but members of a Government board should not make these kinds of commentary.

Today, I was also alerted to another board member with a conflict of interest—this time, the chair of TVNZ board, Alastair Carruthers. He’s also the chair of the New Zealand Film Commission. When media first contacted me about the potential conflict of interest of being on two boards, I actually said Mr Carruthers is an experienced board member and I believe that he will manage the conflicts very well. But today I am unsure. The information I have now actually says he’s a member of the Cornwall Park Trust board who voted against enabling film studios to be built on the Auckland Showgrounds site. He also is a director of Tātaki Auckland Unlimited, which controls Screen Auckland. Tātaki owns, on behalf of the council, two of the film studios. One has to wonder which hat he was actually wearing when he voted on the Cornwall Park Trust board to decide—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

MELISSA LEE: Do I get 10 seconds more?

I believe that 10 seconds was already added. Thank you for your patience.

Kia ora e te Mana Whakawā. It’s always an honour and a privilege to give a contribution at general debate. I’m just going to talk about where I’ve been in the last couple of months. I know that the MP for Rongotai talked about bringing the happiness, but I didn’t hear any happiness in his speech. Anyway, I’ll just talk about where I’ve been—observing from a distance as our Prime Minister, the Rt Hon Chris Hipkins, has been out selling our country in China. I want to acknowledge his leadership for taking Te Whānau-a-Apanui, the winner of Te Matatini. When we saw them perform at the Great Wall our hearts were really warm as New Zealanders, so I just want to acknowledge that. My speech today is about the leadership that I am currently experiencing under the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon Chris Hipkins, and as I talk about four points of my speech, I’ll be able to demonstrate why we are in it for you.

I met with Malcolm Bell; he is a local board member in Franklin in the area of Papakura. I am a list MP based in Papakura, and after my meeting with him I went to have a sausage roll at the local bakery, and then I saw a chemist so I thought, “Oh, I’ll go into the chemist and just have a chat to them”. It’s Clevedon Village Pharmacy, and I spoke with Sue and Glenda and I asked them: “Is the $5 co-payment free prescription going to make a difference to anybody?” This is what they told me. They said that prescription bills are at the bottom of the list for everybody. If they’ve gone to the doctor—if they’ve got a grocery list, the last thing they will spend money on is their medication. They told me that it is making a difference—that the $5 free co-payment is making a difference.

So then I fell sick and I went along to the doctor, got my prescription—four lots of medication. I went to the Unichem chemist in Onehunga, and I’m ready to get out my card to pay for my medication and they said, “Oh, it’s free now”. I said, “Oh, what?” I had, myself, even forgotten that was happening. He said, “Oh, it’s free now, and it’s making everybody happy”. When we say “in it for you”, that’s what we are saying.

I then visited Sustainable Papakura. It’s a group that volunteers in Papakura with Rosemary Nash, and on a Monday they usually volunteer sewing bags for free and give them out to shops in Papakura where you can use them instead of plastic. I asked them about the winter energy payment: is the winter energy payment making a difference? They told me that the winter energy payment is making a difference, and can they have that the whole year round? I said, “Oh, I’ll go and talk to the policy makers about that”. So they said that it is making a difference in their lives. When we say “we’re in it for you”, that’s what we’re talking about.

I also went to Papakura Intermediate and I spoke with principal Bec Kaukau about the food in schools—the free lunches. I asked her, “Is it making a difference?”, and she said, “It absolutely is making a difference.” Why is it making a difference? She said that they’ve got volunteers in the school, they’ve got someone locally coming in, the community, the parents are coming in to help make those lunches, and it’s connecting the kids to their food—growing food at school—and it’s connecting them to their community.

I also met with Simon Craggs of Papakura High School, and he was proudly showing me this new outdoor facility at Papakura High School with a big smile on his face. He wanted me to extend a message of thank you to the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon Chris Hipkins, because when he was Minister of Education these changes, these school renovation funds—I’ve forgotten the name. Anyway, it allowed Papakura High School to have this new outdoor facility where everything now happens in there. I also went along with the Minister of Education, Jan Tinetti, to Beachlands School where the principal, Anthony Noble-Campbell, said to me to pass this message to the Prime Minister: thank you for the classrooms that they’ve had when he was the Minister of Education.

Those things that I have just said came in under the leadership of the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon Chris Hipkins. He is a fair leader, and all we want is a fair leader that is going to be fair for all of New Zealand. I can go on and on and on, but for me this is what we stand to risk—what is at risk—if we don’t look at the leadership from this side compared to that side. Mālō.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Over the last three weeks, my colleague Mark Cameron and ACT candidate Andrew Hoggard and I have travelled around New Zealand—the width and breadth—in our heartland tour, speaking to ACT’s great policy ideas on tackling the issues that are in the faces of Kiwis every single day.

There’s a number of problems that our communities face. Not only are Kiwis struggling to put food on their tables and keep the heaters going, but they’re also struggling to understand why the Labour Government is so hell-bent on the divide between Māori and non-Māori within our society.

What really stood out in every single town, though, was their concern at the lack of law and order, lack of consequences being faced, cultural reports resulting in discounts, and, in fact, alarm when I mentioned to them that cultural reports are now costing not $3,000 per month, but $630,000 taxpayer dollars per month. Communities speak of our youth running amok, and of gangs left unchecked, unapprehended, to do as they please. Our communities are sick of it, and we’ve heard them loud and clear.

Just look at the statistics on crime under Labour: a 500 percent increase in ram raids, a 121 percent increase in serious assaults resulting in injury, a 20 percent increase in knife crimes over the last two years, a 42 percent increase in serious crime victimisations, and a 300 percent increase in assaults on police. Our retail workers are being beaten on by people who are 30 percent more likely to have done it before. There have been 18,769 aggravated robberies under Labour up to April 2023, but only 8,162 proceedings brought. There’s a 700 percent increase in youths on the National Gangs List, who have committed on average 26 offences each before they reached the age of 18. Between December 2022 and May 2023, gang members on the National Gangs List committed 2.8 firearm offences every single day, and the gangs will have no intention of registering their firearms.

I don’t think this is about being hard or being soft on crime; it’s about recognising the failure of this Government’s ability to deal with crime and criminals, and rejecting their social experiment on our communities. It’s failed, and it’s failed badly—not only our communities, but our country as a whole.

Recently, a 17-year-old convicted for the murder he committed while being a prospect for a gang received his gang patch while on bail and got a 70 percent discount on sentencing from his cultural report—12 months’ home detention for murder.

Last week, another criminal yelled out “Cracked it” to the court as he was escorted away to serve home detention for sexually assaulting a pregnant woman in her own bed while her child was beside her.

Labour has removed consequence to criminal actions; ACT will reintroduce it. Labour has focused on reducing the prison population but hasn’t focused on reducing crime. ACT will immediately start work on both policies. Labour wants to focus on reducing prison numbers and reducing Māori in prison, yet, under Labour, the Māori prison population has increased. ACT will focus on correcting behaviours while offering opportunities.

Our communities are living in fear. Our communities want change, and they need real change, and ACT is here to deliver it from this October. ACT will bring back three strikes for serious violent offenders, and at the same time will introduce three strikes for burglary. ACT will build more prison beds and abolish the prison reduction targets. ACT will place our youth justice facilities under corrections and build more youth justice beds. ACT will introduce infringement notices for shoplifting, resulting in instant practical punishments like community service, so that our youth experience consequence. ACT will introduce electronic monitoring for our serious youth offenders, ensure harsher penalties for crime in the workplace, and make 17-year-olds fit within the adult justice system.

New Zealand needs real change now, and Kiwis can make that happen this October by giving their party vote to ACT.

The debate having concluded, the motion lapsed.