General Debate

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

No doubt today we’re going to hear speeches from the Labour Party, the Greens, and “Te Pāti of radicals” about how they think our Government is racist colonisers and anti-Māori because we’ve restored democracy to local ratepayers. But, first, let’s have a look at this pointless, ill-informed, nonsense article that Arena Williams, Labour MP, had published in the New Zealand Herald today about the Cook Strait ferries. [Holds up newspaper] There it is.

Hon Willie Jackson: Oh, good on you, good publicity.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: No, no, no. Not all publicity is good—not all publicity is good.

Arena Williams: Tell us what your plan is.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: The headline should read—

SPEAKER: That’s enough.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: The headline should read—but in her shouting over there, she knows enough to think she is right, but doesn’t know enough to know she’s wrong. She says, “A reliable Cook Strait ferry connection is an invaluable strategic asset for New Zealand.” Well, we all fell out of our chairs. Too many people in the Labour Party don’t understand what a strategic asset was if their future depends on it. And it does.

Here’s the real point. Here’s the party that allowed the shutdown of Marsden Point, allowed the Ned Kellys to commit economic sabotage by drilling holes in the pipes and filling them with concrete, and abandoned our greatest and the most essential strategic assets our country had. That’s what a strategic asset looks like, and what’s she doing about it? Nothing. What Miss Williams doesn’t mention in her article is the fact that in 2020, when yours truly was the Minister in charge, we ensured a cost of no more than $400 million was set for replacement ferries—no more than $400 million for two ferries.

Hon Willie Jackson: Well, you mucked that up.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Oh, Willie says we mucked that up. Isn’t it unbelievable. Once Labour took over—

Arena Williams: You told Cabinet it would cost $400 million.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: No, no, no. You’ve got it in the article, honey, don’t worry about it. Once Labour took over, they allowed the project to bloom to guess how much? To $3.2 billion.

Arena Williams: You were the Minister.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Miss Williams, where’s that in the article? See what I mean? Not even there. And the cost was meant to be $400 million for two, had blown to $551 million in one year, but here’s the point: only 20 percent of the whole project was for the ferries. How perverse can you be and come into this House and say you know something about economic management? What Miss Williams is saying is that they may as well have made it $10 billion and let us sign the contract. The level of economic mismanagement by Labour of a simple ferry replacement is just astonishing. And you could almost rest your case there, but here’s my point: why would the NZ Herald publish a story like that? Why would the NZ Herald publish a story like that and not ask the Labour Party transport spokesperson whether they agreed to such drivel? What’s going on with their society?

You know, they used to represent—the Labour Party—the workers, the goldminers, the coalminers, the labourers, the foresters, the fishery guys, the hard-working blue-collar battlers. But over there now they wouldn’t know what a worker looked like if they fell over one. And you can see the way they lie and sit down there—ask them to turn their hands down; there are no veins showing. You know why? Never done any physical work. That’s their problem, and it shows. They used to represent those workers; they used to understand. But I want to tell the Labour Party—[Interruption] The Labour Party can shout and shout—

Hon Member: Show us your hands, Winston—are they steady, mate?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Listen, sunshine, I’ve done more work than you’ve ever dreamt of doing and more jobs than you ever thought of doing, which is the reason why we are more sympathetic to the ordinary people than their party. And here’s the real point: the Labour Party doesn’t realise—

Rawiri Waititi: You wouldn’t know what work is—you’ve been in here for so long.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Oh no—look, Mr Waititi, you wouldn’t know what work looked like, either. We all know about your background. You’re all talk, mate. It’s all show-off, loudmouth—

Rawiri Waititi: You’ve only been pushing paper, all your life.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Take your hat off. Come on, give us a look at you.

Rawiri Waititi: You take it off—you come and take it off.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Take your hat off. Go on.

Rawiri Waititi: Take yours off! Ha, ha!

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Hey, sunshine, I’m not going to have a duel of wits—I’m not having a duel of wits with an unarmed opponent. What a waste of my time.

SPEAKER: Righto, we’ll get back to the debate.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Yes, it’s going fine. You know, the Labour Party’s entire election strategy—and I’ve found out from inside information—is the sort of jilted boyfriend or girlfriend or the divorced person who says, standing back after the divorce, “Don’t you miss me yet?” That’s their whole plan for next year. That was put to them as a proposal. All you’ll do is wait and say, when all the two years have gone by, “Don’t you miss me yet?”—and they’ll all come and vote for Labour. That’s how bereft of opinion and ideas they have got. Now, these three parties are in a race to the bottom, and if an MP from any one—

Hon Members: Time’s up!

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Is that five minutes up?

SPEAKER: Yep.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Point of order. I want to move an extension of time. Ha, ha!

Leave is sought. Is there any objection?

Hon Members: Yes.

Today is a great day for Kiwis—31 July—because for the first time in 14 years New Zealanders are getting tax relief. The National Party campaigned on it, the ACT Party campaigned on it, New Zealand First campaigned on it, and together these three parties have come together in a coalition—the first three-way coalition in Cabinet in New Zealand MMP history—and we have come together and we have delivered fully funded tax relief for New Zealanders that comes into effect today. It’s a great day for Kiwis—83 percent of Kiwis will be better off; 94 percent of households will benefit. And there are many people—mainly on the other side but including a few commentators in the media—who said it couldn’t be done. They’d never be able to deliver it. The books were too bad, economic circumstances, lots of different excuses. Well, we have put them wrong and delivered it: fully funded tax relief, because we know that over the last many years fiscal drag has pushed many people into higher and higher tax brackets. And, alongside a cost of living crisis driven by excessive, profligate spending, New Zealanders have been worse off.

Now, the response between the two sides of politics has been indicative of philosophy and priorities. On this side of the House, our starting point is people should keep more of what they earn. It’s their money—it’s their money. Generally, they know best how to spend it. The response from members opposite, on the Labour benches and beyond, has been to come up with a series of rinky-dink, dumb policies, all of which have been based upon the idea that the Government can spend money better than individuals.

Remember the cost of living payment? Remember Grant Robertson’s big idea in the 2022 Budget? Everyone got very excited in 2022 because, at that point, inflation was over 7 percent—double what it was meant to be—and Kiwis were facing pain at the pump and everyone went, “Oh, maybe.” I remember in the National Party, we were thinking, “Maybe, just maybe, for the first time in 12 years, we’ll get tax relief. Maybe they’ll gazump us. Maybe they’ll nuke us by actually doing tax relief.” We were genuinely quite worried about it. We were a little bit concerned. That would really have taken the wind out of our sails. But no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. The Labour Party’s never seen tax cuts they didn’t want to oppose, and Grant Robertson turns up to the House in Budget and says, “Oh, I’ve come up with this grand plan.” Outside the allowances, wasn’t counted, special rules were added for himself, billion dollars in cost of living payments—free money handed out.

Well, that’s sort of OK up to a point, until we worked out dead people got it. Investment bankers in London suddenly found themselves getting a couple of hundred bucks richer to go out on a Friday night, living in London, working at big magic circle law firms. And then, of course, we found out about the stories about the French backpackers who are currently watching the triathlon or about to watch the triathlon back in France, who’d come down here on a working holiday back in 2009 or 2010, and earned a bit of pocket money, who’d registered with the Inland Revenue Department (IRD), gone back to France, and 10 years later found the good old New Zealand taxpayer had deposited a couple of hundred bucks in their bank account via the IRD. Remember the cost of living stuff?

Then we had all the rinky-dink fuel tax cuts that were temporary, except they weren’t actually temporary—they kept on going. This is an example of the major difference between the two parties. Our starting point is let people keep their own money. The response from Labour is to dream up ever more stupid ways to fleece more and more money off New Zealanders.

Well, today that stops. Today the tax relief kicks in. But what is ongoing is this Government’s constant desire for fiscal discipline and a determination to get Government spending under control. The size of Government is too large. The Government spends too much money. The Government spends too much money wastefully. That is why we have put a stop to stupid Labour programmes like Lake Onslow, like industry transformation plans; these massive doorstops that once we abolish, no one even knew we’d gotten rid of them because no one bothered to read them, other than an army of public servants creating them. We have stopped the waste—well, we are stopping the waste, I should say. And as part of our ongoing desire for fiscal restraint, we will get this country back on track.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The Government has made it so clear whose side they’re on, and it’s not on the side of children living in poverty, renters, or workers who struggle to make ends meet. It’s on the side of mega landlords, of mining CEOs, and those already raking in millions. No amount of empty platitudes from the previous speaker, Chris Bishop, will hide the fact that this Government’s own advice has warned them time and time again how much damage their own policies will be causing to the children who are living in cold, damp homes and struggling to put food on the table.

Let’s look back. In February, the Government was warned that up to 13,000 more children will be pushed into poverty as a result of benefit changes. And when I asked Louise Upston, Minister for Social Development and Employment, about cuts to benefit increases, she said it’s not a cut. But let me tell you, the Government’s own advice tells us that it will be a cut, that more children will be plunged into poverty as a result of decisions. Time and time again, politicians have told us that child poverty is somehow inevitable, but it is not. It’s a result of political decisions made by successive Governments who have failed ongoing generations. This Government is absolutely complicit with children living in hardship.

Now, let’s move forward to July. The Government quietly shrank its own child poverty reduction targets, which will see over 20,000 more children experiencing material hardship—a definition that means children will be struggling to actually meet their essential needs. And yet at the same time, this Government wants us to believe that we should join in celebrating tax cuts that will actually benefit those families the least while benefiting the richest New Zealanders the most.

Sam Uffindell: No, that’s not right.

RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: So let’s make it clear—yeah, I see Sam Uffindell saying no. It seems like Sam Uffindell needs to read his own Government’s advice and realise the facts. But facts, as Chlöe Swarbrick has said, are not enough. We need to actually go beyond the facts into our communities and organise so people on the benefit, renters, and others struggling to make ends meet make this Government a one-term Government, because our communities deserve far better.

They deserve a Government that is willing to make the hard choices, not the easy choices of continuing with a broken system that has given billions of dollars to landlords who are enabling more children to live in poverty—a Government that has seen rents rising at a rate faster than inflation. So while they talk about inflation going down, they ignore the fact that rents continue to be the driving force behind inflation, behind the cost of living, the cost of inequality crisis that we have in this country. The Greens campaigned to end child poverty once and for all, because we know that it is not impossible, that if we put forward policies that will see the wealthiest few paying their share, we can absolutely eliminate poverty in this country.

Again, I see the members sitting to the opposite of me just looking confused and looking angry. They seem to be angry at the facts that are being presented to them, the facts that they have probably read and just ignore because they don’t care. They don’t care about children living in poverty. They don’t care about rents going up faster than inflation. They don’t care about the fact that they’re celebrating more State housing tenants they kicked out of Kāinga Ora homes. They don’t care about the fact that they have been celebrating more people losing their income—sorry, what was that?

Tim Costley: Just make the whole speech up while you’re going.

RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: Well, they say, “Make the whole speech up”. I’m not. The thing is, what we are doing here is putting a line in the sand and saying enough is enough. Child poverty doesn’t have to be a reality that is accepted. And, let’s make it clear, this isn’t a decision that the National Party has made alone. This is successive Governments that have failed to tackle the difficult challenges that we face, because no amount of passing the ball between successive Governments and passing on the blame will actually alleviate people’s hardship. No amount of stunts by politicians to donate their tax cuts to charities will eliminate the fact that they’re making child poverty worse.

The Greens will keep fighting to ensure the wealthiest few pay more tax to make sure that we can end poverty, build enough State housing, and make this a society where everyone can thrive, rather than the Government washing their hands and accepting more children going without. Because that is what’s happening. The members opposite to me are enabling more children to live in poverty because of the decisions they have made. They have actively—actively—pushed more children into poverty. No matter what they say, it does not hide the fact that this is in their own papers. This is the reality they’re facing, and they need to confront the hard realities that through their own decisions they’ll make life harder for those struggling to make ends meet, the people who will least benefit from their tax cuts.

Today was an utter, utter shambles of a demonstration of a Government. If members on the other side are looking for a new job, they might want to try being a bus driver, because, time and time again today, we saw the bus driving and them throwing each other under the bus.

Let’s start with the Prime Minister, who threw his Minister of Health under the bus. And then the Minister of Health threw the board under the bus. And then, to make matters worse—so that’s one, two, three—maybe there’s 14 layers of a shambles of a Government, because then you had the 11 ACT members throw their coalition partners under the bus by refusing to move a pin and refusing to ask questions when they are members of the Business Committee. They know that there is a rule in this Parliament to respect the rulings of the Speaker. There is one rule for ACT and another rule for everybody else—to show the disrespect. So we have 14 layers of a shambles of a Government, throwing each other under the bus, and those members on the other side know that.

Up and down the country, we heard they were promising New Zealanders $250 worth of tax cuts, and, today, apparently those tax cuts arrive. But are they $250? Go and have a chat to the pensioners who now only get $2.50 a week, to the minimum-wage earners, who get $12.50 a week. The Associate Minister of Finance today read a whole lot of feedback that he had received about tax cuts. That is the thing with this Government—they are giving with one hand and taking away with another. So I’m going to read some feedback that I’ve received about this relief that this Government is supposedly giving for the cost of living.

From Ana of Auckland who is a second-year nursing student, a Pacific nursing student—she writes to me, “What is even the point of me completing this degree when I am so uncertain whether I will get a job? A lot of my friends graduated in February and have decided to move to Aussie because they couldn’t find a job. I have never been so uncertain about anything in my life, and I definitely, without a doubt, want to be a nurse. I want something that will make my babies and my mum so proud. But knowing this Government has frozen new graduate nurses has made so many of us question: has this all been a waste?” What do you say to Ana of Auckland, that nursing student?

Well, how about Charmaine from Wakapuaka, which is in the South Island, which I understand Simeon Brown is still trying to find. He says about the tax cuts, “They’re giving with one hand and taking twice as much back with the other.” And he is absolutely right, because you know why? In the last quarter, rates are up 9.6 percent, because of the choices this Government made to unwind affordable water reforms. That’s on every single one of your heads. Those council ratepayers cannot blame their councils. They can blame every single one of you in that shambles of the Government sitting on the other side of the House. This Government is so disconnected from everyday Kiwis, and every day, I hear from people saying, “I don’t need my $20 tax cut. Please put it towards health; please put it towards housing; please put it towards education.”

Again, insurance—another area that has gone up by 14 percent because of the choices made by this Government. And, just in the last 24 hours, the monitoring report for emissions reductions was released and basically said that this Government is lumping the future generations of New Zealand with at least a $240 billion bill, coming to 2030. That is what it’s been estimated at. But this Government doesn’t care. They don’t care about the insurance companies and the reinsuring companies on the other side of the world who are looking at New Zealand. Those companies need clear direction from this Government that they are serious on climate action. Those companies want to see from this Government that they are serious about resilience. Instead, what has this Government done to the Budget? They removed $6 billion from the National Resilience Plan so it can go and pay for a measly tax cut that won’t matter to anybody.

This Government is a shambles. It is 14 layers of a shambles of a Government. Shame on you.

Mark Cameron: Point of order, Mr Speaker.

Unfortunately, the ACT Party continues to wear their badges in the House, and for that reason, they’re not being recognised. You can’t be in contravention of a Speaker’s ruling and then expect to participate as you do.

Mark Cameron: Speaking to the point of order, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: Well, there is no point of order at the moment. There is no point of order.

Mark Cameron: This is not an ACT pin, sir. This is an ANZAC pin, and I would be absolutely disgraced if I can’t wear an ANZAC pin in this House to the point that I would remove myself from it.

SPEAKER: Don’t grandstand with me. Are there any other ACT members in the House with badges on?

Mark Cameron: No, sir, there are not.

SPEAKER: In that case, point of order.

Point of order. Can I wear an ANZAC pin in this House? Does anyone take umbrage with that, Mr Speaker?

No. Don’t get clever, because what I’ve made absolutely clear is it is party logos that are banned, nothing else.

Mr Speaker, thank you very much. For those that have tuned in today, they’ll be wondering what’s going on. But, none the less, I wanted to begin my contribution by really focusing on the things that matter and by congratulating the Black Ferns, who won a gold medal this morning—well done to them. I personally didn’t get to see the game, but it was fantastic that we’ve finally got off the naught and got a gold, so well done to those ladies.

There’s been quite a bit of talk about tax cuts, and I’m going to talk about them because, actually, it is a great day today. A lot of people are actually very excited to get their tax cuts: 83 percent of New Zealanders are getting a tax cut today and 94 percent of households are getting a tax cut today, and that really is making a difference. It is a rather dull, dreary winter at the moment, I’d have to say, and to have a bit of sunshine brought into people’s lives with a bit of extra money in their back pocket will be welcomed right across the spectrum.

I have heard from a lot of people who have been looking forward to this. The cost of living has really bitten hard on New Zealanders, and it’s made it very tough for Kiwis and their families. We’re getting inflation under control, and that’s a long, hard job to do that, but we are getting there. Bracket creep is an insidious thing. It’s something that successive Governments have allowed to continue on, and I’m looking forward to the day when we can actually have that indexed to inflation so that people are not having a thief in their back pocket by way of bracket creep, which has been happening for a very long time.

Today is also the day that the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act has been—well, what is it: 11 pages. It has been scrapped in the last 24 hours. It’s phenomenal, the perverse effect that that had on people who were applying for loans. I had a person in my office who was very upset about the intrusive nature of the questions that were asked by banks when that person was going for a loan. She told me that she felt very embarrassed and ashamed by the questions that were being asked, and I think it was an absolutely appalling piece of legislation. Yes, it was well meaning. It was there to try and prevent people from pay-day loans, mostly—to stop people from getting in over their heads—but to actually go through people’s payment records from the bank about what they were spending and to question their spending choices was really intrusive and totally unnecessary. So I’m very pleased that that has actually gone, as well as there being the updating of the responsible lending code, which was what I was referring to earlier. But all politics is local, and I want to focus on something in my electorate.

The Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) has put forward $20,000 of funding for the New Zealand Veterinary Association, to go towards animal welfare work in the Hurunui area. Despite what the weather is like here today, in Hurunui there is a significant drought going on. There is very little in the way of feed and very little in the way of soil moisture, and stock are under significant pressure. Having that support from the local vet to ensure that there are no animal welfare problems or to be able to get ahead of them is going to be welcomed so much by my constituents. Farmers are out there in the bad weather, doing their work, and, actually, despite what most people think, they love their stock. They really feel very hurt if they are not able to look after them in the way that they would like to, and they can’t really get rid of stock that easily. They have gone through, in some cases, and scanned those ewes that have got twins and triplets and have sent them to the works, because the ewes wouldn’t be able to raise those lambs and would likely be at risk of milk fever.

So this additional help from MPI through the vets will be very, very welcome, and I’m sure that my constituents are looking forward to that. It is a big worry, because there’s very little in the way of snow out in the back country. Now, that may have changed in the last 24 hours, but we all should be concerned about that because that drives the lake levels that secure having the lights remaining on in New Zealand, and given that pernicious ban of oil and gas exploration, we now are very much short of gas to secure our electricity supplies. So, with that, Mr Speaker, have a great day.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The Labour Government’s—that has just been unceremoniously turfed out—anti-car approach led to an imposition on the life of road users and took their eye off the important job of maintenance on our roads.

Earlier this year, the Transport and Infrastructure Committee conducted an investigation, after it was suggested that we examine the extreme costs of building a single raised speed table in Auckland—Williamson Ave, to be specific; $490,000. It was gold-plated road improvement. Now, whether this speed-reducing piece of infrastructure was required or not, New Zealanders are rightly shocked at the abhorrent waste of money that led to nearly half a million dollars being spent to build this speed bump. A large proportion of the cost was spent on complying with ridiculous traffic management plans.

The reforms which Minister Brooke van Velden is conducting in the health and safety at workplace legislation will ensure rules are clear, sensible, and proportionate to the risk. This will address some of these issues. But it cannot be right that in a country that is going forward and paving its way in the future of this world, the only way we can achieve lower incidences on the road is by adopting a “slow them down and stop them” sort of mind-set.

Labour’s anti-car, safety-ism approach led to wire barriers spreading over the country like the roots of a noxious weed. This Government is grabbing that weed and pulling it out. The misguided Road to Zero policy led to plenty of meetings and policy groups, but the decision to focus on things that slowed us down, in a desperate attempt to achieve a lofty goal, lost sight of the easy wins. Road repairs, scheduled maintenance, resurfacing, and fixing potholes all improve road safety. Instead, we got things like raised speed tables, and barriers that get in New Zealanders’ way. The ACT Party is here to advance the removal of barriers, freeing our citizens and our businesses, to grow and achieve for the betterment of all New Zealanders.

Last week, along with the local member Scott Simpson, I attended a meeting of over 350 concerned residents who live on State Highway 2 between Ōmokoroa and Katikati. The reason these residents got together was because the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA), under the direction of the last Government’s Road to Zero programme, decided to put wire barriers down the centre of their road. This piece of road is a single carriageway, a two-lane road. It is almost as though the last Labour Government forgot that people lived along these roads. It’s another case of ignoring rural New Zealand, because highways aren’t just for cruising from one downtown to another; for many that are living rurally, a highway is the only way they get anywhere.

The good people who attended this meeting raised many concerns which may have missed the previous Government’s thoughts, such as if one has to travel 7 kilometres extra to access their road. That adds a heck of a lot of travel time. In a medical emergency, every second counts. When there’s a rural fire, every second counts. God forbid, if a tsunami was to strike the Western Bay of Plenty, there would be a barrier stopping people from quickly escaping to the hills. This is all serious stuff. When it comes to the day to day, people want to be able to exit their properties and return home after a long day at work without needing to drive, in many cases, an extra 7 kilometres in the other direction just to get home, adding cost and time and taking away from people’s quality of life, not to mention the emissions.

As a result of all this lobbying by these local communities, in fortuitous timing, one hour before the meeting in Katikati, NZTA put out a press release, saying, “As a result of community concerns, NZTA will reconsider the options for the section of median barriers along the stretch of road.” They further go on to say, “which is getting in the way of many intersections, including Work Road intersection.” This news will come as enormous relief for residents I’ve met. While it is difficult to say exactly what pushed NZTA to make this announcement, it is clear that fierce advocacy and protests from the locals has been effective. I was contacted by residents tearing their hair out over the prospect of being blocked from turning right out of their roads, and have been privileged to take their concerns further. ACT is getting barriers out of the way of New Zealanders. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Look, I’d just like to start my contribution today by referring to the bus drivers that the member the Hon Barbara Edmonds, on the other side of the House, spoke about earlier, because today is a historic day for bus drivers and all hard-working New Zealanders. Today, after 14 years, those bus drivers and the hard-working New Zealanders are getting tax relief—yes, tax relief. In fact, 83 percent of New Zealanders will from today be paying less tax, because, on this side of the House, we respect hard-working New Zealanders. Kiwis earn their money and they should be able to keep more of what they earn and not have it wastefully spent by ideological projects—$1.2 billion on three waters, Te Pūkenga, all sorts of wasteful spending that doesn’t get delivery, doesn’t get results; just wasting taxpayers’ money.

The previous Government wanted to tax, tax, tax—that’s how they thought they would get our economy back on track—and spend, spend, spend. Well, today is about respecting the work of hard-working New Zealanders—the tradies, the hairdressers, the supermarket workers, the nurses, the teachers, who are all struggling to pay their grocery bills, their electricity bills, and their fuel bills. But, now, today, they will be better off and they will be able to afford more as they can keep more of what they earn. In fact, the average household in New Zealand will be getting $102 more a fortnight. That is a significant difference in a cost of living crisis.

There is the FamilyBoost package—all those families out there with children. Childcare has been going up and childcare costs are expensive. The other week, I was just at the BestStart early childhood centre in Hastings and the parents there were really, really welcoming this tax rebate. It’s just going to make it easier for them to be able to afford their childcare. Parents and families out there are struggling in this cost of living crisis, and today is about respecting low to middle income earning families.

This is all part of our plan to strengthen the economy. We’re already seeing some green shoots: 3.3 percent inflation recently announced, the lowest that we’ve seen in the last couple of years. On this side of the House, we spend money wisely. We get more value out of the money we are spending. We are fiscally managing, we’ve got discipline and care for New Zealanders, and we are into reducing the cost of living for many, many families out there. Driving productivity; getting the wheels moving again—that’s what’s going to strengthen our economy.

Let’s just talk about the taxes that we have scrapped, actually, since we became the Government and we are being a lot more wise with our money. The ute tax—what a stupid tax that was. It wasn’t fair on rural and provincial New Zealand, on our tradies, and on our farmers—scrapped that. Taking agriculture out of the emissions trading scheme—again, punishing our hard-working farmers. Getting rid of the Auckland regional fuel tax, restoring interest deductibility so we can see our rents go down and more housing supply, getting things built in this country—all about delivery.

Look, when I get back to the electorate, I enjoy getting out of Wellington and into the real world, into provincial New Zealand. On Friday, I got out of the bureaucracy of Wellington and I got down to central Hawke’s Bay. I spent time down there looking at the issues, spending time with our farmers and our contractors on the road, and seeing the huge investment that we’re now putting back into infrastructure in this country, into roading, into the potholes, maintaining our rural roads, building State highways. This is what gets people around faster and more efficiently and will drive more productivity for our regions. Our regions have been neglected in the past six years. It is time to put some focus back into our regions like Hawke’s Bay, where we’ve seen our farmers facing an avalanche of red tape, rules, regulation, costs, high inflation, high interest rates—it’s been tough out there.

Just on Monday, I was at the New Zealand Apples & Pears Annual Conference with our growers, and they are once again feeling like we’re being aspirational—we’re being aspirational for provincial New Zealand. No longer are we villainising our farmers and rural communities, and it’s about time.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Fourteen layers of dysfunction fully on display on the other side here today. In fact, I think we could probably even find more layers of dysfunction over there, especially after the member Catherine Wedd, who has just taken her seat, has had the floor.

This is a day that the National Party have been counting down—apparently for 14 years. It seems quite a popular number for the National Party to bandy around, that they’ve been waiting for, so they can get out there and they can convince New Zealanders, and particularly retired New Zealanders, that $2.50 is in fact $250. Because that’s what they went on the campaign trail and promised them. And, on that day, they’re trying to do the magician thing and convince New Zealanders that $2.50 is what they voted for in October. What has happened?

They’ve got one Minister that comes into the House and can’t answer the most basic of questions that are put on notice, and we’ve got another Minister that is more interested in wearing the insignia of her gang than defending her Government or her ministerial record. You’ve got one job as a Minister in question time, and that’s to front up to the Parliament and not put the interests of your jewellery or your insignia ahead of that. And nothing is more emblematic of the kind of dysfunction that we’re seeing in this Government than the behaviour that we’ve seen in the House in the last hour and a half from this Government. This was meant to be a day when the Government would go out and try and sell its desperately on life support tax relief—so-called. But what did we see? We saw one part of the “throuple” more intent on trying to create a distraction to take away from the Government’s messaging. There are problems, and we are firing up the popcorn machine for the day that David Seymour becomes Deputy Prime Minister. That’s going to be an interesting episode for us to watch.

But, if today is tax cut day, let’s have a look at the price of those tax cuts. Specifically, I want to talk about the $3 billion that was cut from climate initiatives to fund tax cuts, interest deductibility for landlords. And we’ve had the previous speaker stand up with great glee and say that, you know, “We’ve done great things. We’ve cut the youth tax.” I’ll tell you what they did: they have taken away one of the few initiatives that actually was reducing emissions in this country. All New Zealanders are going to pay. I want that member to go back to rural New Zealand, to Hawke’s Bay, and tell her constituents that the Climate Change Commission has said that the result of this Government’s inaction in transport and agriculture climate initiatives means that $300 a tonne emissions pricing is coming. Now, at only $200 a tonne that means an extra 40c on the cost of a litre of petrol. So we know it’s going to be skywards of that. So she talks about scrapping the Auckland regional fuel tax; front up to rural New Zealand and tell them you’re putting 50c to 60c on everyone’s litre of petrol because of the inaction of a Government that you are part—sorry—that that member is part of.

Let’s look at what else they’re doing to pay for this. They seem to think that they can bandy around with great glee that they got rid of corporate welfare. What they’ve got rid of, in the Decarbonising Industry Fund, is something that was accounting for 17 and 35 percent of the emissions reductions that we needed to achieve. Have we heard one alternative from this Government of what they’re going to do? No. We have a Government that is hell-bent on increasing emissions in this country. They have no idea, they have no plan, and when their Minister comes to the House to answer the question, can’t even tell me what a specific initiative is. Instead, what she lists are the very things that the Climate Change Commission has told us are failing. This is a Government in la-la land, and they are costing New Zealanders. Treasury has told us New Zealanders are facing a bill of $24 billion because of climate inaction, and that is on this Government and their inaction. This is a Government that should hang its head in shame. It is failing future New Zealanders and taking us backwards.

Tēnā tātou. Tēnā koe e te Pīka, otirā tēnā tātou e te Whare.

[Greetings to us all. Thank you, Mr Speaker. Indeed, greetings to us all in this House.]

I want to also congratulate the women’s sevens team this morning on a wonderful, wonderful win, and our first gold medal. I just wanted to acknowledge the ladies, leading the way, and just to acknowledge the efforts of all of our Olympians over there in France at this particular time.

E te iwi Māori, kia mataara mai. [To the Māori people, be vigilant.] Te Tiriti o Waitangi is under threat. Our tīpuna consented to Pākehā settling here. This country was not settled by conquest; it was settled by consent. Our tīpuna consented for Pākehā to govern themselves on the condition that they acknowledge the absolute authority—our full, exclusive, and undisturbed right of our authority over ourselves, our whenua, our kāinga, our taonga, our moana, our ngahere, our reo, our mokopuna, our whakapapa, that the Queen would keep her people in line and afford Māori equal rights and citizenship, and none of that has happened.

We are punch drunk from the racist agenda this anti-Māori Government lead and have been led by the “dark triad”. The dark triad are leading an anti-Māori agenda in this House. We are punch drunk. You have been punching Māori since you took office.

Hon Nicole McKee: Point of order. Thank you, Mr Speaker. I just wonder whether the Standing Orders 121 on personal reflections count here. There’s been accusations made about the Government being racist. I see that as a personal reflection. I just wonder whether or not the Standing Order comes in here.

SPEAKER: This is a general debate. People will say things in the general debate that others might find affects them particularly, but it’s not meant in anything other than a general sense. It is not out of order to suggest that a policy has a particular bent to it. Both sides of the House regularly do that, and there is nothing out of order in what I’ve heard so far.

RAWIRI WAITITI: I apologise if my kōrero is triggering, but we are punch drunk from the racist agenda this anti-Māori Government lead and have been leading and are led, by the dark triad. They’ve been punching Māori since you took office. The attack on Māori wards—punch. Demolishing of the Māori Health Authority—punch. Removing section 7AA—punch. Rushing through the Fast-track Approvals Bill—punch. Cutting Matariki funding—punch. Erasing te reo Māori from public service—punch. Cutting supply and capability of Māori housing—punch. The establishment of youth bootcamps—punch. Gang legislation that will disproportionately target Māori—punch. Ignoring tribunal and High Court rulings—punch. And, yet to come, the Treaty principles bill—punch.

The dark triad, like any abuser, is grooming us. In actual fact, this Government and successive Governments have been grooming us for the past 180-odd years through colonialist tools like divide and conquer. So they embed the theft of our takutai moana with the marine and coastal area bill, the confiscation of 100 percent of the whenua here in Aotearoa. Māori only have less than 5 percent—95 percent of the land is out of Māori ownership. Where has that gone to? Yeah, some of you are going to say, “Oh, you sold it.” No, we didn’t. The majority was confiscated.

Sam Uffindell: Does that include privately owned Māori land?

RAWIRI WAITITI: No. The others were given by land ballot because the soldiers—Pākehā soldiers—got back earlier, right. So our people missed out on the land ballots that they were promised. And the mokopuna are still benefiting from it today.

This marine and coastal area bill is the expansion of the empire that you continue to advocate for. This is a shameful, shameful Government. I’ve never seen anything like it. And nobody would have seen anything like it in their lifetime, absolutely. I’ve just laid out all the anti-Māori things that you have been absolutely relentless in this. But will just say to my people: e te iwi Māori, kia mataara [to the Māori people, be vigilant.] Do not allow the divide and conquer tactics. I spoke to one of our iwi leaders today, and they said they went to an iwi hui where Ministers were promising all this money, and our leaders were drunk like alcoholics on the Government’s money. These are the tactics that the Government constantly uses: divide and conquer.

E te iwi Māori, kia mataara. He hīkoi nui kei te haere. He whawhai nui kei te haere. Kia mataara tātou. [To the Māori people, be vigilant. A great march is brewing. A great fight is brewing. Let us be vigilant.] Do not allow this taniwha with its teeth of silver and its teeth of gold to penetrate us, to devour us. We will not allow that to happen. And we put this Government on notice. You are on notice today that we will no longer allow this anti-Māori agenda to run its course anymore. Kia ora tātou.

Today is a really good day that a lot of the communities are celebrating all across New Zealand. Let me set the scene: New Zealanders are actually worse off in the last few years, and I say that because I went through to the Stats New Zealand website today and I had a really, really good look at information on Stats New Zealand. This is—please, if I can read: the average cost of housing per week was up 14.5 percent in the year ended June 2023 than one year ago. So the average cost of housing for New Zealanders has gone up 14.5 percent. That includes 4 percent increase in rents, 27.5 percent increase in mortgages, 5.9 percent increase in property rates, 14.1 percent increase in building-related insurance costs.

Costs are going up everywhere, for almost all households throughout the top to the bottom of New Zealand, for almost every New Zealand household. So this is why, when I travel up and down the country, most people are asking me—the number one thing that people ask me is, “What is the Government doing with addressing the cost of living problem for New Zealand—

Ricardo Menéndez March: Increasing child poverty.

NANCY LU: —because we are suffering?” And, yes, members across the House are yelling about child poverty, but what about house poverty? They are struggling; parents are struggling.

In the year ended June 2023, 8.5 percent of New Zealand’s population were in material hardship. That is another 1.1 percent increase than the previous 12 months, and also 0.9 percent increase in New Zealand’s population in severe material hardship. All of this has occurred under the last Government, and this is concrete evidence in stats to show that New Zealanders are suffering up and down the country. So when the National Party campaigned on providing tax relief to the hard-working low to middle income earners in New Zealand, when we campaigned throughout the country, people voted for it because that’s what people wanted and that’s what people need.

What does that mean for New Zealanders from today? Many of my colleagues have talked about what it means for their region and what it means for the hard-working New Zealand Kiwis. I must emphasise: 83 percent of the New Zealanders—and that is 83 percent of people who are listening in and tuning in on TV—83 percent of you will have some support and some benefits from the tax relief that will be effective from today. It will help to increase your personal income. It will help whether you’re a family with children. It will help if you’re an individual tax earner. It will help if you have young children who are going through the early childhood education.

So, New Zealanders, we do have some really great news for you all. We had a record low of 3.3 percent inflation under the National Government for the last 12 months. We are bringing in tax relief to help our New Zealand families, and this is the first time in the last 14 years. Some of the members before me, in the Opposition, actually talked about what does $2.50 matter for New Zealanders. Well, it does matter, because I have met a family who told me they have to borrow $5 to fill up gas so they can drive to a supermarket to get some food for the family. So $2.50 matters; every cent matters and every single dollar matters. So, for those watching on TV, if you have to borrow $5 to go to the supermarket, it does matter. If you have to borrow from your neighbours and your family just to get by the next few days, it does matter. And I have to say it matters also to Yali and Isaac, who I have talked about in the House, who texted me on the first day that we announced the Budget that they will be getting $116.50 in tax savings every two weeks, amounting to $3,029 for the year.

Today, it matters. It matters to you, Yali and Isaac. It matters to many of our New Zealand families around the country. Today is a day that is worth celebrating because today is a day where you feel some break and a little bit of pressure taken off you. So, please, families like Yali and Isaac, go out and take a little time out for you and your family today and celebrate, and please go on to check the tax relief and tax calculator.

Sadly, every one of those dollars being paid out in tax cuts is borrowed. I recently read a book titled Everything is possible, nothing is real. It’s about Russia and the lies and disinformation that abound there. But, sadly, in this post-truth world, that sort of thing’s happening in the United Kingdom under Johnson and in the USA under Trump.

New Zealand politics has never been perfect, but until now we have avoided the extremes that we’ve seen overseas. But the media reported it now that we’re on that slide in New Zealand, because we’re told, as we were by that last speaker, Nancy Lu, everything is possible, but in truth nothing is real. National said anything to get elected. They made false promises. Kids could have everything they had under Labour plus more. They said debt was too high. They claimed the post-COVID deficit that peaked at 2.75 percent was massive and they fixed it. But, instead, they’ve increased the deficit by billions, and the biggest porky we hear is that they’re not borrowing for tax cuts.

What do the commentators say? Matthew Hooton, former adviser to the National Party: “Nicola Willis will need to borrow $28.7 billion cash over her first four full financial years as Finance Minister.” That’s up 22.2 percent from the $6.5 billion forecast at the half-yearly fiscal update. Over the same four years, tax cuts will cost $14.7 billion. The numbers don’t lie. There’s no doubt she’s borrowing for tax cuts and then a bit more. Shamubeel Eaqub: “This increase in borrowing chooses to rack up debt for future generations to give tax cuts now.” They don’t like him, on the other side. What about Cameron Bagrie: “They’re borrowing because they’ve got a mismatch between expenditure and revenue and tax cuts give you less income. It’s not hard maths to work out.” Former Reserve Bank economist Michael Reddell: “It’s not time for tax cuts.” But under National: no, no, no, no. Everything is possible, but nothing’s real. It’s the same old National Party trick: cut revenue, increase the deficit in Government debt, then use both to justify cuts to health and housing and other services. Strangle the economy.

This week, Judith Collins and I, the only two survivors from the 2002 intake—we’ve been here 22 years. I’ve been here for 22 Budgets, 11 surpluses under—sorry, 13 years of Labour and nine of National. Under Labour: 11 surpluses and four deficits. Under National, while I’ve been here: two surpluses and seven deficits. Excluding the COVID peak, the largest deficit we ever ran was 2.7 percent. This crowd have upped it to 3.1 percent. It’s probably going to be worse. Everything’s possible, nothing’s real. It’s the same in health. They said it was a shambles and they’d fix it. They promised more cancer drugs. They got slammed for not doing it in the Budget, so they borrowed more money, then poked it out after the Budget. They complained about a lack of nurses and now they’ve put a ban on employing more nurses. Everything is possible, nothing is true.

They said you could have lower petrol taxes but more roads. They voted for the zero carbon Act. Megan Woods has covered that. They pretend to reduce emissions and then they reversed the policies needed to achieve it. The number of internal combustion cars coming into the country has doubled. Environmental and economic vandalism! Everything is possible, nothing’s real. And then, to add insult to injury, they say that’s why we need fast track. We know that the Labour Party fast track worked, sped up the process, consented wind and solar. It didn’t override the Resource Management Act, the Conservation Act, or the Wildlife Act, and it didn’t allow Ministers to override conditions introducing the risk of corruption.

The media aren’t stupid. Bernard Hickey this week: “‘Going for housing growth’ means stopping building.” Everything is possible, nothing is real. Fourteen layers of bureaucracy at Health New Zealand? Rubbish! Not borrowing for tax cuts? Rubbish! Christopher Luxon giving his tax cut to charity, having claimed his accommodation benefit for his house here at $50,000 a year rather than living at Government House? More spin. Kiwis know the gesture was hollow. What about child poverty reduction? Well, it’s the Olympics, so what are the cartoonists saying? “Next up, Louise Upton, champion of child poverty reduction. Here she is at the child poverty high jump. Let’s see how she does it. She lowers the bar. Cracked it.” Everything’s possible, but nothing is real under this Government.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’d like to start with two “F” words, if I may, just in reply to the Opposition member there: fully funded. That’s something that I’m not quite sure that that member gets. There are two things that he said that I’d like to pick up on, one was true and one was so false: “Everything is possible, nothing is real.”

Well, I can tell you, Mr Speaker, that tax cuts today are real, and you can check the tax calculator on your way out, Mr Parker. What’s the website? Budget.govt.nz—thank you for that. The other thing he said, which I actually agree with, is: “Tax cuts give you less income.” We realise this but we also realise that New Zealanders get to keep more of their own income, and that’s a big part of our policy. I wonder if members can think back to 2010 and how old they were, what vocation they were in, what house they were living in. Can they see the faces of their children? It was 14 years ago. That was the last time that tax adjustments had been made. In fact, we would have made them seven years ago, in 2017, but it got reversed by the Labour Government.

Anyway, today is good news. Isn’t it amazing that we’ve increased investment to police, health, and still provided tax cuts in the first eight months of Government? It’s incredible. Ninety-four percent of households will benefit, 3.5 million Kiwis; an average of $20 per week, per working Kiwi—I’m using a conservative figure here. Some might say that’s not a lot, but let’s put it in perspective: $20 for an average family—that’s a kilo of cheese, a loaf of bread, and some milk.

Hon Dr Duncan Webb: Ha! A fish and two scoops!

RYAN HAMILTON: It could be some extra mince or a roast for the good man there—Duncan.

Hon Kieran McAnulty: Jesus, how big is the roast?

RYAN HAMILTON: Depends. Do you go to Pak ‘N Save or Countdown? A roast chicken; how about some good old New Zealand lamb? Slow-cooked lamb, five hours in the oven, on a Sunday afternoon; that’s what you can get with your $20. How about some money towards the nappies or the infant formula, which I recall was always a big part of the grocery bill? Or a little bit of a luxury like a flat white, half milk, half cream. Or how about Darryl in Te Rapa, who couldn’t afford a coffee for a while, and now, on smoko break, as the sun pops out through the dark, foggy Waikato mornings, and the sun warms his face, he can go and sip his flat white, with his extra $3.50 a day. Isn’t that amazing?

Some might say that it’s not enough, and it’s only $20, but, of course, working couples and those with the ability to now be reimbursed for childcare will be even better off. I’m not going to give financial advice, but if we were to take the $20 for those who say it’s not enough—and some in the Opposition might like to follow this advice; at your own risk, of course—and put it into an investment fund, like a KiwiSaver but not one that locks it up for retirement, and you did that every week for 10 years at 8 percent, you would have a total of $15,654.55, where about $5,000 of that would be pure interest. My point is that this might seem like a small amount of money, but compounded over time—

Tom Rutherford: It adds up.

RYAN HAMILTON: —it adds up. Thank you, Mr Rutherford. We are doing a lot of things as a Government and have done a lot of things in this Budget—some big and some small. But we’re, hopefully, here for a long time. My point is that the compound effect of the changes that this Government is making is real. The changes will provide enduring social, environmental, and economic dividends to the people of New Zealand. The compound effect of this Government will make a positive impact on the future of this great country.

The debate having concluded, the motion lapsed.