Tuesday, 10 September 2019

TUESDAY, 10 SEPTEMBER 2019

TUESDAY, 10 SEPTEMBER 2019

The Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

KARAKIA

KARAKIA

SPEAKER: Members, because it’s Māori Language Week, I’ve asked Joanne Hayes to say the prayer for us today.

JO HAYES (National): E te Atua. Whakapāho ai tō wairua ki runga i te mata o te whenua, ki te kare o ngā wai katoa. Tukuna mai e koe tō ringa matau hei pai mō mātou i tēnei Wiki o te Reo Māori. Tō Wairua Tapu hei whakakamārama i a mātou o tēnei Whare. Tukuna ngā tātai o ō mātou hinengaro kia ū ai ngā kupu o te tika, te pono me te aroha. Āmine.

[Lord almighty. Announce your spirit on the land, on the waves of all bodies of water. Send us your right hand to do good this Māori Language Week, and your Holy Spirit to explain to us of this House. Send the thoughts of our minds so that they may be infused with words of right, of truth, and of love. Amen.]

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Question No. 1—Finance

1. Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central) to the Minister of Finance: What recent reports has he seen on the New Zealand economy?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. Tēnā koutou katoa. Last week, Stats NZ released data on building work put in place during the June quarter. Stats NZ said that “The total volume of building activity remains at historically high levels, and the trend has generally been increasing for the past two years.” Meanwhile, the total value of building work put in place in the June 2019 quarter was $6.2 billion, an increase of 11.8 percent on the June quarter a year ago. This Government’s investments, including the major hospital and school build programmes announced at Budget 2019 and our four-year State house building programme announced at Budget 2018, are providing huge support to New Zealand’s building and construction industry.

Dr Duncan Webb: What reports has he seen on consumer spending?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: This morning Stats NZ released electronic card transaction data, which showed seasonally adjusted retail card spending rose 1.1 percent in August, the highest monthly lift since January. Spending rose across all industries except for fuel, which saw a decline. This is great news for retail businesses and demonstrates increased confidence among consumers, which was also reflected in the August ANZ Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence survey, which lifted.

Dr Duncan Webb: What reports has he seen on the international context for the New Zealand economy?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Oh well, last week, Australia, in its June—[Interruption] No, no. Australia; not the Chinese Communist Party, Mr Bridges—that’s right. Last week, Australia released its June quarter GDP data, which rose 0.5 percent over the quarter from March, and 1.4 percent over the year—their lowest annual growth rate since 2009. This follows lower than expected June quarter GDP results across a number of other economies, including the eurozone, at 0.2 percent; Japan, at 0.3 percent; and Singapore, at 0.1 percent. Given New Zealand’s exposure to the global economy, we are focused on making sure we are well placed to handle the effects of the global economic volatility that we are seeing. There is no doubt that this will impact on New Zealand, but the record investments we are making in infrastructure, alongside the $17 billion worth of transport infrastructure announced, will stand New Zealand in good stead to withstand these.

Hon Simon Bridges: Does his comment about communist China indicate a complacency about the single biggest market that keeps our economy in some ways strong?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: No, it doesn’t. What it indicates is that I view the most extraordinary interview I think I’ve ever seen the leader of a National Party give, during which his praise for the Chinese Communist Party went to a level that even the most loyal members of that party would struggle with. We on this side of the House value our relationship with China immensely, but I think Mr Bridges needs to take another look at that interview, or perhaps buy a different hat.

Question No. 2—Prime Minister

2. Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by all her Government’s statements, policies, and actions?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes. In particular, I note the policies the Government has confirmed in just the last two weeks, including the beginning of the roll-out of primary mental health services across the country; a cancer action plan which sees increased investment in Pharmac, the creation of a cancer control agency, and more prevention and screening work; the launch of consultation on our plans to clean up our waterways; a child and youth wellbeing strategy, which includes a food in schools programme that will roll out food in schools to children, beginning 2021; new initiatives to help more New Zealanders into homeownership; and I will add to the list continuing the work on the Christchurch Call.

Hon Simon Bridges: What is the number of confirmed cases of measles notified across New Zealand?

SPEAKER: Order! Order! The question is quite a direct one: the Government’s statements, policies, and actions. That does not relate to any of those. The member may rephrase the question so that it fits the primary.

Hon Simon Bridges: What are her policies in relation to the number of confirmed cases of measles notified across New Zealand, and is she aware of how many cases there are?

SPEAKER: The member may answer one of those, or must answer one of those.

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I am. The latest report I received has indicated that we have—

Hon Simon Bridges: Someone’s under pressure.

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: —1,149 cases.

Hon Simon Bridges: No, no, no. We know what that’s about.

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: That’s up 15 in Auckland, and an additional three nationally since the last report I received.

Hon Grant Robertson: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. In an interjection that the Leader of the Opposition just made, he made a direct reflection on the ruling that you just made around whether or not that question was asked appropriately. It was a direct reflection that you were protecting someone.

SPEAKER: And I’m used to the direct reflections. I know that the Leader of the Opposition has both publicly, privately, and in this House reflected on me. I know that he wants to be thrown out, and I’m not going to.

Hon Simon Bridges: Isn’t it the case that, between June 2009 and June 2017, vaccination rates increased from 80 percent to 93 percent, and only began decreasing after that—under her Government?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Actually, the advice I’ve received from the Ministry of Health is that we’ve had declining rates in this area since 2014. I know the last Government had—as we share, of course—a desire to get to the World Health Organization level of immunisation that means we have herd immunity. That’s 95 percent. The last Government managed to get it to 91.2 percent, and that, in the previous quarter, was 91.7 percent. So this is an area where the last Government didn’t reach its own goals, either.

Hon Simon Bridges: Will she table that advice?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: It’s actually data on the health targets that the last National Government set.

Hon Simon Bridges: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I asked if she’d table it.

SPEAKER: Well, I heard the member ask the question. If the member had sought to have it tabled by way of point of order and it was official advice, then the Prime Minister could have considered tabling it. I understand that those things were published on a website, but, if the member really wants it—seeing as he is the Leader of the Opposition—well, I’ll ask the Prime Minister if she is prepared to table it, notwithstanding the fact that it’s come from a website.

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Mr Speaker, my understanding is it has come from a website. It’s references to the national target of 95 percent for immunisation. I was just, simply, reading the quarterly results from what I believe is a public website. There’s no problem then with that being tabled.

SPEAKER: It will be tabled.

Document laid on the Table of the House.

Hon Simon Bridges: What does she say to Tauranga mother Jessica Barnes, who has been turned away from GPs more than eight times from getting measles immunisations for her child last week?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I had a conversation with the director-general about the issue of rolling out a national immunisation catch-up campaign. I believe this is something that for some time the Ministry of Health has been interested in—well before this outbreak; a number of years, I would say to the last Government. This is something, clearly, that’s needed. We should have everyone who wants to be immunised and needs to be immunised able to be immunised. However, I’m also advised by the Ministry of Health that there is not a shortage of vaccinations. They are ensuring, however, at this point, that vaccinations are focused on the outbreak areas whilst also ensuring that they order in additional vaccinations on top of the 50,000 we expect coming in this week.

Hon Simon Bridges: If there isn’t a shortage, is it remotely good enough that across the western Bay of Plenty 650 measles, mumps, and rubella vaccinations are needed across the 15 practices but there are only 100 in stock?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I was advised yesterday by the Director-General of Health that there isn’t a shortage of vaccines. However, they put a pause on orders yesterday while they made sure that they were prioritising those areas where there are outbreaks.

Hon Simon Bridges: Does she agree with Willie Jackson, who is tired of anti-vax parents being labelled “nutters and maniacs”?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: There were statements made, particularly last week, that I don’t think correctly reflected the fact that we have a percentage of New Zealanders who will have what’s called “vaccine hesitancy”. It’s not enough access and not enough information and advice. We need to overcome that to get that immunity up to 95 percent so that we can protect New Zealanders. A 300-percent increase in measles cases worldwide—this is a global programme that we have to tackle in New Zealand as well.

Hon Simon Bridges: Isn’t it true that the number of confirmed measles cases in the United States, with a population of 327 million people is, 1,241 compared to New Zealand’s 1,149?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: My understanding is the United States and, I believe, the UK have lost their measles-free status through the cases that they’ve experienced. We too, obviously, have an outbreak in Counties Manukau, and we previously had one in Canterbury. Canterbury was brought under control, and we must do the same with Counties Manukau. That is the absolute focus of the ministry.

Hon Simon Bridges: Isn’t it true that the measles epidemic faced in New Zealand right now is worse per capita than anywhere in the world—the developed world, certainly?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: The outbreak in Counties Manukau is something that the ministry is putting every effort into making sure that we vaccinate particularly 15 to 29s, that we ensure that those at 12 months are also prioritised, and that we get that outbreak under control. It’s exactly why I’ve been in direct conversations with both Ministers and the Director-General of Health. It is a priority.

Hon Dr David Clark: Is the Prime Minister aware that there are outbreaks in Hong Kong, the Philippines, in Europe, in Australia, and also in the United States, and that around the world there has been a 300-percent increase in measles cases and that countries around the world are grappling with the challenge of—

SPEAKER: That’s a very good question and a very long question, and none of it is the Prime Minister’s responsibility.

David Seymour: Is the Prime Minister concerned that her Minister of Health appears to be finding the world’s worst examples to follow?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Actually, what the Minister of Health is pointing out is that the large majority of cases that have come into New Zealand have been traced to overseas. Of course, now, with the outbreak in Auckland, containment—of course, the spread is within the population. That’s obviously what an outbreak is, and that’s what the Ministry of Health must get under control.

David Seymour: Can the Prime Minister promise that New Zealand will not lose its measles-free status, as she recently referred to the US and UK having lost their status?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Obviously, with a 300-percent increase globally, we are seeing countries that have previously been declared measles free losing that status. Our focus has to be getting this outbreak under control and getting people vaccinated. Of course we want to retain that status, but we also, actually, want to take care of people’s health and wellbeing.

Hon Simon Bridges: Does she accept that a significant part of the reason for the increase in measles is her Government doing away with any health targets and accountabilities upon becoming Government?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Again, as I said in my earlier answer, the last member set a target that the last member did not reach. We’ve actually had an issue for a number of years with immunisations. We know that we have to get that rate up to 95 percent. This has been experienced in the 1990s before, and we have managed to turn those numbers around. Right now we have to use this as the beginning of a national catch-up campaign for those people who are unsure of their status or who aren’t fully immunised to make sure they do so.

Hon Simon Bridges: Having done away with health targets and an immunisation target, will her Government come up with new ones; and, if so, when?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Again, I want to reflect on the fact that that last member set a target which they then consistently did not achieve. It has to be about more than setting a target. We need to make sure that we have better access; that we have more nurses, for instance, in our schools able to issue these immunisations to the target groups; that we make sure, if there is any perception of access or any hesitancy over education issues around the benefit of immunisation, that we address that. We have not had decent immunisation rates in New Zealand for a number of years, and we have to turn it around.

Hon Simon Bridges: Is her position still as it was as Prime Minister not so long ago that “What gets measured gets done.”; and isn’t it therefore an incredibly significant problem that there are no immunisation targets?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I’m going to read out: quarter three 2017, immunisation rate 91.7 percent; quarter four, 91.2 percent; quarter one when we came in, 91.4 percent. The member’s goal was 95; he didn’t hit it. You’ve got to do more than set a target; you have to be proactive. That is what we are doing. I ask the member that there should not be politics in immunisation. We all need to send these clear messages.

Question No. 3—Prime Minister

3. Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by all her Government’s statements, policies, and actions?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes, including our proactive work to fix the housing crisis. That includes our focus on banning foreign buyers; delivering more than 2,000 public housing places; stopping the sale of State houses; implementing healthy homes, so no matter where you live you have a warm, dry home; banning letting fees—and I’m pleased that we’ve seen an increase from 18 percent to 24 percent of first-home buyers in our housing market.

Hon Simon Bridges: How many KiwiBuild houses will this Government build?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: We’ve made a commitment that we’ll keep using KiwiBuild as long as we need it to fix the housing crisis. That includes using it as leverage, because we as a Government can build at scale and we can address where there have been failures. It’s not always across the country but in hotspots, and that’s where we’re focused.

Hon Simon Bridges: How many KiwiBuild houses will this Government build?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: As the Minister has said, as many as we can, as fast as we can, which is more than that member did when he was in office.

Hon Grant Robertson: Does the Prime Minister stand by her statements on the Christchurch Call, and how does she believe everyday New Zealanders feel about those statements?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I absolutely stand by the responsibility that we have to make sure that the harm that was done as a result of the attack in Christchurch, and the promotion of that attack, never happens again, and I stand by that.

Hon Simon Bridges: What will happen to the Government’s $2 billion waiting to be spent on KiwiBuild, given she does not even know how many houses will be built under the programme?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: We’ll spend it on building houses.

Hon Dr Megan Woods: Is the Prime Minister aware that this Government, in two years, has built more affordable houses through KiwiBuild than the previous Government did under the special housing areas?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Yes, that’s my understanding. I believe they set a target of something like 37,000 houses and never achieved it.

Hon Simon Bridges: How does she then define “affordable”?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Obviously, we’ve set that with the KiwiBuild price caps. We know that one of the issues for first-home buyers is, for instance, the percentage—

SPEAKER: Order! If the members want to ask a question, they should listen to the answer, not yell.

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: With the deposits, in particular, we’ve learnt through KiwiBuild that that was an area we needed to do more on. Ten percent was too much of a barrier for too many, so we decreased it to five because, regardless of the price cap, that was a hurdle that we’re addressing.

Hon Simon Bridges: What Government targets remain for that $2 billion allocated to the KiwiBuild programme?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: To continue to build as many houses as are needed to fix the crisis in the housing market. The member will also know that we have a target of building 6,400 public housing spaces and, currently, we are exceeding that target.

Hon Simon Bridges: Why wasn’t she involved in the KiwiBuild reset announcement?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I’m not involved in every announcement every Minister makes.

Question No. 4—Health

4. Dr LIZ CRAIG (Labour) to the Minister of Health: What recent announcements has the Government made around improving mental health support for New Zealanders?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK (Minister of Health): On Sunday, the Prime Minister and I had the privilege of travelling to Local Doctors Dawson in Flat Bush, Auckland, to announce funding for 22 medical practices across New Zealand, and a kaupapa Māori provider in Tairāwhiti to provide mental health support for patients via their local doctors clinic. New Zealanders told us through He Ara Oranga, the mental health and addiction inquiry, that we need to provide more support to the so-called “missing middle”—those with mild to moderate needs. Providing expert mental health support for New Zealanders quickly and easily via their family doctor is a very good way to prevent little problems becoming big ones.

Dr Liz Craig: How does this align with the Government’s mental health policy?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: This Government committed $1.9 billion over five years in this year’s Wellbeing Budget to address the mental health crisis that we inherited. The $6 million in funding we confirmed on Sunday will mean doctors practices currently providing integrated mental health services will, for the first time, receive dedicated funding from the Government for this task. They are providing a sound model for other practices and organisations who are developing services of their own where there are none. Shortly, we will be allocating a further $30 million in funding to roll out new front-line services in communities throughout New Zealand from the start of next year.

Dr Liz Craig: So how much will it cost for New Zealanders to access these services?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: These services are absolutely free, although normal charges will apply for the initial doctor’s consultation, which is yet another reason why it is great that this Government has made doctor visits much more affordable for almost 600,000 New Zealanders. This Government is making healthcare more affordable, accessible, and effective. In the area of mental health alone, we have put mental health funding in to support primary and intermediate schools in Canterbury and Kaikōura through the Mana Ake programme, which has helped 2,000 children in its first year alone. We’ve extended the nurses in schools programme. We’ve set up the Piki programme providing mental health support for 18- to 25-year-olds in Wellington and the Wairarapa. We’ve begun investing—

SPEAKER: Order! I think it’s fair to say that the member has answered the question.

Question No. 5—Prime Minister

5. Hon PAULA BENNETT (Deputy Leader—National) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by her statement that “On … the difficult issues, the hard issues, we will be there, we are there in those conversations”?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes. I stand by my full statement which was: “On issues like Ihumātao, the difficult issues, the hard issues, we will be there, we are there in those conversations”. I went on to describe the importance, in this situation, of trying to find a by Māori for Māori solution to the issue.

Hon Paula Bennett: What is her response to the open letter sent to her as Prime Minister by Labour Party members regarding the allegations of repeated sexual assaults, harassment, and predatory behaviour by one of her staff?

SPEAKER: Order! There are a number of reasons I think I could rule that question out, part of which is ministerial responsibility—but it must relate to the original question. Taking a partial quote on another issue and suggesting that it relates to a secondary issue is not an acceptable way of working.

Hon Paula Bennett: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. A couple of things, Mr Speaker, then, if I can just clarify: so the open letter is blatantly to the Prime Minister—

SPEAKER: Yes.

Hon Paula Bennett: —and so it certainly is, in that respect. And as far as a quote around hard issues, then I think it is a direct quote. And this is certainly one of those hard issues that I would imagine the Prime Minister would have comment on.

SPEAKER: I can understand where the member is coming from. The area that the member is referring to is an area of my responsibility. The fact that someone else has been written to about it does not make it their responsibility. The member might want to try rephrasing her question to get it within the Prime Minister’s responsibility.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Speaking to the point of order, while I appreciate you correctly saying that it may well be in your area of responsibility, I think it is also reasonable that we believe the public statements of the Prime Minister. One of those statements, in an interview with Mr Hosking, was that she is the employer in this case. I don’t think, therefore, it’s reasonable to have the Prime Minister making that claim in the public arena and then not being able to answer questions, having said that, in this very public arena also.

SPEAKER: The member will be absolutely aware that in this particular case the Prime Minister is not the employer. The fact that she may have said that she was, she was wrong. The member trying to use that as a way of getting a question for which I have responsibility—there is not ministerial responsibility for this—is not appropriate.

Hon Paula Bennett: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. So the Prime Minister can go out and categorically make a statement that she is the employer, and because you then judge that that is incorrect after the fact, she then no longer has to make—so can she make statements about anything, be wrong, and you then make that judgment?

SPEAKER: If the member had asked a question about the Prime Minister’s statement—which happened to be incorrect—then I could well have allowed it. But the fact that the Prime Minister has made a statement in a particular area does not bring an otherwise out of order supplementary question into order.

Hon Paula Bennett: Thank you. My supplementary question is: when the Prime Minister is addressing difficult issues, does she include that in regards to allegations of repeated sexual assaults, harassment, and predatory behaviour that are alleged to have been done by one of her staff?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Yes. I will be clear, of course: convention in this House, of course, requires me to respond to those things that I have ministerial responsibility for. But I will answer in general terms. The member will have seen that I have conducted a number of interviews this morning, and will continue to answer those questions from my capacity as a Prime Minister. Of course, we need to make sure that we have environments in all of our workplaces that meet the expectations of alleged victims, and that respond to those situations. There are things that need to be dealt with here, and I will continue to work to ensure that they are addressed, whilst also taking very seriously my responsibility as leader of New Zealand to create a justice system where people feel confident going through. We have seen an example—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! Now, the Prime Minister will sit down, and I will hear the rest of this in silence. Some of us have been dealing with this issue for some time, and having the points of view of survivors of alleged abuse shouted down when they are put to the House is just not acceptable in the 21st century.

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: So I do take very seriously the systemic issues we need to address in our justice system so that we have an environment where people feel, and victims feel, comfortable using that system. We have seen clear examples in the public domain currently where that has not been the case, and I take that very seriously.

Hon Paula Bennett: Has she seen reports in the public domain where victims were told not to go to the police but keep their complaints internal?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I can speak for the area where I have responsibility. I would never ever, ever encourage someone not to take a complaint to the proper authorities. The member, if she reflects back on my statements in this House—I have conveyed that time and time again. What we have to accept is that some do not feel comfortable doing that. We have to improve our system. That is the place where we’re most able to take these issues forward—through our criminal justice system—and we have a lot of work to do to fix that.

Hon Paula Bennett: Is it correct that her Minister of Finance, the Hon Grant Robertson, has known about the allegations made about a staff member in her office for some time, and does she expect us to believe that she hasn’t spoken with him about it?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Again, I’ve answered many questions on this issue in the public domain, but what I will stick to in this House is convention, which is answering where people have ministerial responsibility.

Hon Paula Bennett: How many of her Ministers know about these allegations concerning one of her staff members?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Again, I refer to the previous answer. Again, this is an area where I absolutely accept the public interest, and I’m responding to that, but when I’m in this House I will maintain the conventions of this House.

Question No. 6—Finance

6. Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National) to the Minister of Finance: Does he have a clear idea of the costs of major Government policies and is he confident New Zealanders are getting good value for money from major Government spending initiatives?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. On 30 May this year, I tabled a very detailed set of documents called the Budget and the Estimates of Appropriations, which I encourage the member to read—well, he didn’t read them. These documents detail the costs of major Government policies like our record investment in mental health, and investments to fix mouldy hospitals, build new schools, and grow our regions. Given that these policies are fixing many problems we inherited, I am confident that New Zealanders are indeed getting good value for money from these major Government spending initiatives.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: What is the best estimate of the potential cost to the New Zealand economy of the proposed national environment standards for water, announced last week?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Those standards are out for consultation at this stage. Any costings in that regard would be entirely hypothetical at this point.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Is his Government acting competently when it is proposing measures impacting 60 percent of our export goods, armed only with a draft regulatory impact statement relating to a critical piece of that saying, “The modelling to date of the economic impacts on farms has been very limited”?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: This is a really important area for New Zealand to get right, because for too long, Governments have ignored the decline in our water quality, which in turn leads to health issues, which in turn, actually, leads to damage to the very thing that we trade off in the world, which is our clean, green image and reputation. So, on this side of the House, we are taking meaningful steps to help improve water quality in New Zealand, working alongside the agricultural sector to do that. So, at this stage in the process, those comments are the ones that you would expect to see. As we get more detail and as the consultation continues, there’ll be more work done.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Doesn’t he think Kiwis expect the Government to care about the state of our water and how we make a living in this world, and in order to make sensible decisions, any Government needs to make reasonable inquiries into the economic consequences of its decisions?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: In answer to the first part of the question, absolutely yes, and what surprises me is why the member opposite didn’t realise that when he was in Government.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Is he surprised that business confidence is at low levels, when his Government first made the oil and gas decision having sought no analysis of its economic impact, and now is proposing a very significant decision on water standards on the basis of very limited analysis?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: As I’ve said many times in this House, the business confidence levels that we see reflect businesses who are in an international environment where they are facing significant headwinds, and also reflect a historical trend whereby those confidence levels do, unfortunately, reflect some of the views already held by those who fill them out, as opposed to the economic conditions they’re in.

Question No. 7—Regional Economic Development

7. JENNY MARCROFT (NZ First) to the Minister for Regional Economic Development: What recent Provincial Growth Fund announcements have been made?

Hon SHANE JONES (Minister for Regional Economic Development): Last Friday in Helensville, on the side of the Northland line, the train whistle blew. The caps of all business representatives were doffed as I announced the $94.8 million injection on behalf of the Government, from the Provincial Growth Fund, to bring the Northland line out of managed decline. Not only is this the first segment of the $300 million Provincial Growth Fund allocation, which was announced by the Minister of Finance in the Budget, but it reflects overdue work which will cover 154 kilometres of the 181 kilometre track, and it is a recharge for the economy of the Northland area.

Jenny Marcroft: Why is this work necessary?

Hon SHANE JONES: This work, sadly, is necessary because of historical neglect. There was a long period of political animus towards KiwiRail, and, in particular, an unmitigated set of events directed negatively towards Northland by the last regime. Had this investment not been proceeded with within 12 months, we are advised that the Northland rail line would’ve been closed, and that would’ve been a very dim and dark chapter for Northland to live through.

Jenny Marcroft: What has been the reaction to this announcement?

Hon SHANE JONES: It was not unlike a firework display: it was colourful, it was loud, and it was positive. Not only senior business figures in the form of Don Braid from Mainfreight congratulated the Government on moving in this direction, not only the district’s local government leaders such as Deputy Mayor Peter Wethey from the Kaipara area, who saw great things happening at Maungatūroto—there was one discordant note, however. The sitting member from Northland described it as a white elephant rather than me picking a white rabbit out of the hat.

Jenny Marcroft: What other Provincial Growth Fund announcements have been made recently?

Hon SHANE JONES: Just to show that the fiscal love is being spread around the various provinces, the Sarjeant Gallery, located in Whanganui, has been tottering as a consequence of the former regime doing not one thing to help that landmark, that iconic feature of the Whanganui economy, to be rejuvenated. A substantial amount of money, along with money from the ministry of arts and culture, was announced, and full marks to my colleague Mr Fletcher Tabuteau, who announced it sans fireworks.

Question No. 8—Environment

KIERAN McANULTY (Labour): What are the main proposals in the Essential Freshwater announcement, and were there a consensus among the advisory groups advising the Government?

SPEAKER: OK, have another go.

8. KIERAN McANULTY (Labour) to the Minister for the Environment: Right-oh. What are the main proposals in the Essential Freshwater announcement, and was there a consensus amongst the advisory groups advising the Government?

Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): Firstly, the E. coli criteria is to be tightened for swimming spots used by Kiwi families in summer to better match the Ministry of Health safe swimming guidelines. Secondly, strict controls will be introduced to stop an increase in the quantity of risky practices, which we know cause water quality to get worse; the most obvious example being some winter grazing practices. Thirdly, the best practices already used by many farmers will be required to be used by all farmers so as to improve the effects from land-use practices. Fourthly, an upgraded national policy statement (NPS) will include wider measures of ecosystem health, and it will be put into effect by a new planning process by 2025, which is based on that used by the last Government for the Auckland Council amalgamation. And, in answer to the second part of the question, there was unanimous consensus across the Scientific Advisory Group, Kāhui Wai Māori, and the freshwater leaders group that such measures are necessary to halt the decline in freshwater quality.

Hon Nanaia Mahuta: He aha ngā pātahi i tau mai ki te hunga i noho kei ngā tāonga e pā ana ki te wai?

[How are the proposals going to affect urban populations in regard to fresh water?]

Hon DAVID PARKER: As a result of the Three Waters review, we’re proposing mandatory environmental management plans for waste water and storm water operators, and regulated standards for waste and water treatment plants. There are also new reporting requirements for waste water and storm water operators, and urban design requirements to better protect wetland and stream habitats will also help. Everyone in New Zealand needs to do our bit, so it’s pleasing to see that Auckland City is bringing forward $900 million of expenditure to better separate storm water from sewage. This is expected to result in a 90 percent reduction in the contamination of Auckland beaches by sewage within 10 years.

Kiritapu Allan: Why did the advisory groups support these proposals?

Hon DAVID PARKER: The advisory groups, which were a Māori reference group, Kāhui Wai, the Freshwater Leaders Group, which is led by two dairy industry leaders and the Scientific Advisory Group, are all clear that significant change is required, and required rapidly, to halt the decline in our waterways and return them to the state that all New Zealanders support. The regional council working group is pleased with the new plan-making process because, under the current plan-making process, almost half of New Zealand’s regional councils will take until 2030 to implement the last Government’s 2017 NPS. That’s 13 years, by which time children born in 2017 will be teenagers.

Kiritapu Allan: Are critics who say this is unnecessary because freshwater quality is already improving correct?

Hon DAVID PARKER: No. Indeed, all of the reference groups agree that if we let it get worse, it costs more and takes longer and is harder to fix. Presently, sediment is continuing to pile up, choking our estuaries and smothering our shellfish beds, and in the north it is the cause of the rampant growth of mangroves. Nitrate levels are still on the increase in many rivers and aquifers. Some rivers—in fact, many rivers—have lost over 90 percent of their macro-invertebrates, and twice as many monitored rivers still have declining macro-invertebrate populations rather than improving macro-invertebrate populations, and this is a clear indication that these rivers are in decline.

Kiritapu Allan: Why do the new rules include strict controls on wetland loss and cover urban streams?

Hon DAVID PARKER: New Zealand lost about 90 percent of our wetlands a century ago, when land was cleared for our towns and for farming. Sadly, in the decade prior to the latest Environment Aotearoa report, we lost a 20th of those remaining. No wonder our whitebait are dying, and we need these new rules to better protect our remaining wetlands.

Kiritapu Allan: Why is improving New Zealand’s freshwater quality also important economically?

Hon DAVID PARKER: Staying ahead of the game in our export and tourism markets is critical to our economic interests as well, and it’s clear that consumers in the most valuable high-end markets are increasingly concerned about environmental integrity. As Chris Allen from Federated Farmers said just last night, and I quote, “Whether it be to Europe or China, they want to know they can trust me and the food we’re producing. We’ve got good environmental integrity and we’re involved in good farming practices all right from the beginning.” I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Question No. 9—Health

9. Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National) to the Minister of Health: What proportion of the increased funding for medicines announced at the launch of the interim cancer action plan will be used to purchase cancer drugs?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK (Minister of Health): Funding for medicines is just one element of the Government’s comprehensive approach to cancer care and control. As a result of the extra funding announced on 1 September, Pharmac has begun consultation on three new cancer medicines for breast cancer, ovarian cancer, and leukaemia. It has also issued a request for proposal for a further advanced breast cancer drug, either Ibrance or Kadcyla. As the member knows, Pharmac operates independently and decides which drugs are publicly funded based on expert advice from clinicians. As a result, at this time, it is not possible to say precisely what portion of the $60 million of extra funding will go into cancer medicines.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Does he stand by his statement on 2 September, in respect of that funding, “We heard yesterday from Steve Maharey that some of the money will go into contraceptives.”?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: Some of the money is going into long-acting contraceptives from the additional moneys we’ve put forward, we’re told, and also some of the money is going into the meningococcal vaccine. Sixty thousand New Zealanders will benefit from medicines that are being funded, including, of course, those who will benefit from the additional cancer medicines that are being funded out of that extra money. Four out of the six, I’ll note, so far, of the drugs proposed to be funded, are cancer drugs, and Steve Maharey also said that there would be more drugs yet to come out of that money that’s been put aside—more drugs for more New Zealanders.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Why did he announce funding for Pharmac on the day of the launch of the interim cancer plan if the funding was not to be committed to the funding of cancer medicines?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: We had been advised under the “no surprises” policy that some of the money that we would spend would go to cancer medicines. That was great news, because we’ve certainly heard New Zealanders seeking to have more cancer medicines funded. Pharmac said they had some that were available to be funded. Indeed, before we made that announcement, in the weeks prior, Pharmac announced more cancer medicines would be funded out of money we’d put aside in the Budget earlier in the year. It is the case that the Pharmac model gets better value than other models around the world and means that, constantly, new drugs are being funded when Governments put new money in.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Will he concede that the public may have had an expectation that the announcement coinciding with the launch of the cancer plan on funding was for cancer drugs, not contraceptives, and that that announcement may have been misleading to some?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: No, I think most New Zealanders are pretty smart. They do understand that the Pharmac model ensures that Pharmac and expert clinicians make the decisions about which drugs get funded when new money is put in. I think people understand that.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Would he agree that, if the extra funding is spent in proportion to the current cancer drug spend, the new funding on cancer drugs will be just $4.4 million this year, and how far will that go in funding the plethora of currently unfunded cancer medicines?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: What I do know is that those decisions are made at arm’s length and that each funding decision made by the funding agency has different ingredients to it. The only year I’m aware of where cancer medicine funding actually went down was in 2014, when the then Government put no money at all into Pharmac whatsoever. It’s the only time in history that I can find when the funding for cancer medicines went down—it was 2014, when they put no money into Pharmac. We’re addressing years of neglect in the health system; this is one more incidence. But, in our cancer action plan, we’ve looked at prevention, we’ve looked at screening, we’ve looked at treatment, palliative care. We have a comprehensive cancer action plan, recognising that our health system has been neglected and it’s lacked leadership for a long time. We’re making a difference, and we’re very proud of that.

Question No. 10—Māori Development

10. RINO TIRIKATENE (Labour—Te Tai Tonga) to the Minister for Māori Development: He aha ngā whāinga a te Kāwanatanga e pā ana ki Te Reo Māori?

[What are the Government’s goals for Māori language?]

Hon NANAIA MAHUTA (Minister for Māori Development): E toru ngā whāinga rongomaioro a tā te Kāwanatanga rautaki Maihi Karauna. Ko ēnei: i mua i te tau e 2040, kua 85 ōrau, kua neke atu rānei, ngā tāngata e kaingākau ana ki Te Reo Māori hei wāhanga matua mō te tuakiri ā-motu; i mua i te tau e 2040, kua kotahi miriona, kua neke atu rānei, te tokomaha e kaha ana, e māia ana ki te kōrero e pā ana ki ngā take tūāpapa i Te Reo Māori; i mua i te tau e 2040, kua 150,000 ngā Māori kua 15 tau, kua pakeke ake rānei e kaha ana ki te whakamahi i Te Reo Māori pērā i tō rātou kaha ki te whakamahi i te reo Pākehā.

[The Crown’s Maihi Karauna strategy has three important goals. These are: by the year 2040, 85 percent or more of the population will be positively disposed towards the Māori language as a part of the national identity; by the year 2040, one million or more will be confident to speak often about basic topics in the Māori language; by the year 2040, 150,000 Māori aged 15 years or older will use the Māori language as much as they use English.]

Rino Tirikatene: He aha ngā kaupapa hou i whakarewatia e Te Kāwanatanga kia tāpiri atu ki te rautaki?

[What new initiatives has the Government launched to add to the strategy?]

Hon NANAIA MAHUTA: Tuatahi me mihi atu rā ki Te Pirimia nāna i whakarewatia Te Maihi Karauna i te tīmatatanga o tēnei tau. Mehemea ka whakatakoto ētehi o ngā kaupapa, ko ēnei: tētehi hui taumata mō Te Reo Māori mā te rangatahi kia hono ki tō UNESCO Tau o Ngā Reo Taketake o tēnei tau; he awheawhe ā-rohe e aro ana ki ngā huarahi auaha hei whakarauora i Te Reo Māori; he kokiritanga whakaawe hapori hei whakatairanga i te uara o Te Reo Māori i waenga i te rangatahi Māori mā tauiwi mā; me Te Reo Rarawe, he rārangi akoranga i Te Reo Māori e hangareka ana, e wātea ana ki ngā momo paepāho.

[Firstly, we should acknowledge the Prime Minister, who launched the Maihi Karauna at the beginning of this year. If I were to mention other initiatives, they would be these: a summit meeting about the Māori language for youth to connect with UNESCO’s Indigenous Languages Year this year; a community engagement initiative to enhance the value of the Māori language among Māori and non-Māori youth; and Te Reo Rarawe, a series of lessons in the Māori language that are engaging, and available to the various social media platforms.]

Rino Tirikatene: He aha te hua o te rautaki mā te hunga e ngākaunui ana ki Te Reo Māori?

[What have been the benefits of the strategy for those that value the Māori language?]

Hon NANAIA MAHUTA: Tuatahi kia rere tō tātou nei reo. Atu i tērā, ka tika me mihi atu ki a Hōnore Davis me te maha o ngā kaupapa i puta i waenganui i tana mahi kei Te Tāhuhu Mātauranga Māori. Nō reira ko tātou e whakamanatia te kōrero a te kuia, “whiua ki te ao, whiua ki te rangi, whiua ki ngā iwi katoa”. Kia rere tō tātou nei reo.

[Firstly, that our language is being used. Apart from that, it is only right to acknowledge the Hon Davis and the many initiatives that came out of his work at Te Tāhuhu Mātauranga Māori. So we are all validating the statement of the matriarch, “throw it to the world, throw it to the sky, share it with all peoples.” Let our language flow.]

Question No. 11—Environment

11.Hon SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel) to the Minister for the Environment: Does he stand by all of his statements, policies, and actions?

Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): Yes, in particular my statement that New Zealanders need to work together to stop the quality of our fresh water degrading, because if we let it get worse, it costs more, takes longer, and is harder to fix.

Hon Scott Simpson: Does he agree with the December 2018 National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) report titled Water quality state and trends in New Zealand rivers that, for water clarity, phosphorous, and turbidity, “in each case the trend direction indicated improving conditions.”?

Hon DAVID PARKER: I have the table of the results from the Land, Air, Water Aotearoa reports. For me, the most disturbing of those results is in respect of the macroinvertebrates—these are the little critters that rely upon water quality to live—and it shows that roughly twice as many of the 673 monitoring sites were getting worse as were getting better. That’s a clear indicator that we still have declining freshwater quality in our rivers.

Hon Scott Simpson: Point of order, Mr—

SPEAKER: Yes, I’m going to ask the member to ask his question again.

Hon Scott Simpson: Does he agree with the December 2018 NIWA report titled Water quality state and trends in New Zealand rivers that, for water clarity, phosphorous, and turbidity, “in each case the trend direction indicated improving conditions.”?

Hon DAVID PARKER: I have the table, which I think is referred to in the statement that the member just referred to, and all of the areas that are shown in red and orange on that bar graph are rivers that are getting worse. We have a considerable number of our rivers getting worse, and, according to the macroinvertebrate indices, more of them are getting worse. In fact, twice as many are getting worse as are improving. In respect of clarity, it is not as bad a problem as macroinvertebrates, but other indicators are sure as hell not yet fixed.

Hon Scott Simpson: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Twice in a row I’ve made it clear in my questioning that I was referring to a NIWA report, and twice in a row—

SPEAKER: And the Minister indicated in his second answer, if the member had listened, that he was referring to a graph from the same report.

Hon Scott Simpson: With respect, sir, I don’t think he did.

SPEAKER: Well, I’m going to ask the Minister whether in his intersession, in the middle of it, he did or not.

Hon DAVID PARKER: What I said, sir, was that I understood that this table of results was what lay behind the NIWA reporting.

Hon Scott Simpson: Does he agree with the same report that stated, for nitrate and ammonia, a majority of sites in New Zealand showed improving conditions?

Hon DAVID PARKER: Again, referring to this table, members will be able to see that, in respect of nitrate levels, roughly the same number of rivers are getting worse as are getting better. These figures undoubtedly show that many, many rivers in New Zealand have got declining water clarity and worsening nitrate levels, and, as I said previously, probably the best indicator of overall ecosystem health is whether the macroinvertebrates live, and twice as many of those monitored sites have declining macroinvertebrate populations as are increasing.

Hon Scott Simpson: Has the Minister read the December 2018 NIWA report titled Water quality state and trends in New Zealand rivers?

Hon DAVID PARKER: Not today, but I’m sure I’ve read it in the past.

Hon Scott Simpson: Why does he insist on telling a narrative on water quality crisis in New Zealand when Government data for river water quality shows eight out of nine key water metrics actually had more sites improving than getting worse—

SPEAKER: Order! The member’s finished the question. He’s had two legs.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Because the freshwater Science and Technical Advisory Group report to me. The report of the Freshwater Leaders Group, chaired by the former chief executive of Synlait, and the Kahui Wai Māori group, chaired by the current chairman of Miraka—another dairy company—all agree with what I have said, or, in fact, they’ve made recommendations which we are adopting.

Question No. 12—Agriculture

12. TODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty) to the Minister of Agriculture: Does he stand by his statement in regard to the Government’s proposed new water policy, that it will cost “One to two percent … of gross revenue, in my estimation”; if so, has he seen any economic analysis that confirms or rejects this estimate?

Hon DAVID PARKER (Acting Minister of Agriculture): On behalf of the Minister of Agriculture, yes. This is confirmed by the economic analysis in our Essential Freshwater proposals to stop water quality getting worse. There are a range of costs depending on the type of farm and the actions required to reduce pollutants getting into our waterways. For many farmers, the costs of meeting that best practice will be very low because they’re close to it and therefore their costs will be low. An overall figure for all farms across New Zealand is in the ballpark of 1 or 2 percent of gross revenue. I’ve also seen other economic analysis describing the economic effects on the agriculture sector as a “hammer blow”, and that type of ridiculous hyperbole is not going to get the rivers clean.

Todd Muller: Do you agree with the Interim Regulatory Impact Analysis for Consultation: Essential Freshwater when it states, “The modelling to date of the economic impacts on farms has been very limited,”?

Hon DAVID PARKER: The part of the discussion document that deals with cost starts at page 84 of the discussion document and goes to page 97. It is true that you can’t completely quantify the costs until you reach final decisions as to what is proposed.

Todd Muller: How many farms won’t be viable if this proposal is enacted?

Hon DAVID PARKER: The member seems to think that we have to choose between profitability and good environmental outcomes. I deny that. I have before me a publication from Dairy NZ, celebrating the example of the Balls. This is in respect of Adrian and Pauline Ball who won the Ballance farm awards this year. They’ve reduced their nitrate leaching by 62 percent in the last 10 years, they’ve halved their greenhouse gas emissions, and, I quote: “We haven’t lost profit.”

Todd Muller: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I asked a very explicit, direct question: how many farms would be viable? He made no attempt to answer the direct nature of that question.

SPEAKER: I think it’s fair to say he addressed the question.

Hon Shane Jones: In regard to the Government’s proposed new water policy, can he confirm it is a consultation document but is backed by Fonterra?

Hon DAVID PARKER: I can confirm that it’s a consultation document. I wouldn’t want to say that Fonterra irrevocably backed every detail of it, but what they were clear on was that they think that they need a regulatory underpinning for farm environment plans that sets environmental baselines which are then achieved through farm environment plans, and that’s what this does.

Hon Ron Mark: Can the Minister comment on whether or not there’s any similarity to this discussion document and the proposals put there to what occurred under the last Government through Horizons One Plan—

SPEAKER: No, no. The member’s got straight into an area that is not his responsibility.

Hon Shane Jones: Supplementary—

Hon Ron Mark: Can I rephrase it?

SPEAKER: No. A further supplementary, Shane Jones. No?

Todd Muller: Why did you put your signature to the proposal when you had little to no sense of the impacts of it on 23,000 farming families?

SPEAKER: Order! Order! We had, I think, in the last week or the week before of the Parliament quite a clear Speaker’s ruling in that area, and the member, I think, went over it four times.

Todd Muller: Why did the Minister put his signature to the proposal when he had little to no sense of the impacts of it on 23,000 farming families?

Hon DAVID PARKER: The member is quite incorrect. Those pages that I’ve already referred to describe the impact of the proposals on a range of different farming types. In general terms, it’s expected that the proposals would cost the average dairy farmer about 1 percent of revenue, and in respect of beef farmers, around 3 percent. Sheep farmers have very little effect from these proposals at all because the proposals don’t impact upon their farming systems.

Todd Muller: Is he telling the farmers and the sector contributing to 60 percent of our exports to simply trust him—he knows what he’s doing?

Hon DAVID PARKER: I think the member’s making a reference to something that I said on The Nation the other day, and it seems to me that the member is so rigid that he can’t comprehend humour. In my full statement—and he’ll have seen a transcript—I then praised the quality of the work from the scientific advisory group, the freshwater leaders group, and Kāhui Wai Māori, and I said “I think we’re landing it.” I would also add that these same proposals have been around for almost a decade through the Land and Water Forum, and it’s time to stop kicking the can down the road and stop our freshwater quality getting worse.

Urgent Debates Declined

KiwiBuild—Government Announcement on Reset

SPEAKER: I’ve received a letter from the Hon Simon Bridges seeking a debate under Standing Order 389 on the Government’s announcement regarding the reset of KiwiBuild. This is a particular case of recent occurrence for which there is ministerial responsibility. The housing shortage is an important issue and the Government’s policies to address it are of significant interest to Parliament and the public. However, the business of the House should not be set aside just because a ministerial announcement has been made, even though it may be important. There must be such an element of urgency that the matter take precedence over other business—Speakers’ ruling 197/5. The Estimates debate is scheduled to be held immediately after oral questions. There will be an opportunity to debate the matter during the consideration of the social services and community sector. For those reasons, the application is declined.

Estimates Debate

In Committee

Debate resumed from 29 August.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Colleagues, the House is in committee for further consideration of the Appropriation (2019/20 Estimates) Bill. There are three hours and 31 minutes remaining in the debate. At that time, the debate will expire, as will any unused calls. When we were last considering the bill, the committee was debating the Māori affairs sector. The question is that Vote Māori Development and Vote Treaty Negotiations stand part of the Schedules.

Māori Affairs Sector (continued)

Hon NICKY WAGNER (National): Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I am very pleased to be able to continue my discussion about Whānau Ora and the 2019-20 Budget appropriations under Vote Māori Development, especially as it is Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori.

Just to recap, Whānau Ora was implemented by the National Government in 2010. It was the brainchild of the Hon Tariana Turia, and it’s been a very successful model in terms of delivering social services and social investment. Unfortunately, it has not always been supported by the Labour-led Government, and National was very disappointed with the lack of funding in Budget 2018-19.

So we are pleased to see an increase in this Budget and that the Government has finally come to the party. But it’s still incredibly important that this money is spent wisely, and as I referred to the review that was recently completed, what that says is that Whānau Ora is siloed and that there is a significant amount of work that needs to be done to build understanding through Government agencies about a whānau ora - centred approach.

There are also significant challenges with the commissioning model, and I think that’s mostly to do with the large geographical areas that the commissioning agencies deal with, which means it’s quite difficult to relate to whānau, and it’s particularly difficult to get to those families in rural and deprived areas. Presently, we see that demand for the services outstrips supply, and we also see that there’s a lack of collaboration among how the administrations of services are done and the outcomes framework.

So there is a lot of work to make sure that Whānau Ora does deliver. We were pleased that in the discussion at the select committee, the Minister promised structural changes and he was also keen to cut out the middleman and work more closely with communities. I think what National wants to see is that community needs right across the country are met consistently and that all whānau who want and need these support services can access it.

I’d just like to make a point that the Minister for Māori Development acknowledged the contribution of former Ministers for the National-led Government and the Māori Party, the Hon Tariana Turia, the Hon Pita Sharples, and the Hon Te Ururoa Flavell and their work in establishing Whānau Ora. The Minister is confident that he can continue this programme and it can be used successfully in other environments. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Hon MEKA WHAITIRI (Labour—Ikaroa-Rāwhiti): E Te Tiamana. I runga i te kaupapa te wiki, Te Wiki o te Reo Māori, tēnā koe. Ngā mema o Te Whare nei, tēnā tātou katoa.

[On the topic of the week, Māori Language Week, greetings. To the members of this House, greetings.]

It’s indeed an honour to take a call in the Appropriation (2019/20 Estimates) Bill, where we’re debating the Māori sector. I want to acknowledge the speaker who just retained her seat, Nicky Wagner, in acknowledging the fine former Ministers of this House the Hon Pita Sharples and the Hon Tariana Turia, and their contribution to Whānau Ora.

But let’s be really clear: this Government tackles the big issues. In nine years, if that side of the House valued the role of Māori Ministers, they should have had them at the Cabinet table. They should have had them at the Cabinet table, but they didn’t. But, in this Government, I want to acknowledge the four Ministers that came in front of our select committee, the Hon Andrew Little, the Hon Peeni Henare, the Hon Kelvin Davis, and the Hon Nanaia Mahuta, the Minister for Māori Development, who presented a very comprehensive—very comprehensive—Māori development strategy to meet the needs of Māori today and going forward. Yes, we are, on this side of the House, tackling the big issues, and, like I said, we match our walk with our talk by putting the Minister for Māori Development, who has never been at the Cabinet table, at the Cabinet table this year, under this Government.

We also know that the issues that we are facing are not going to be fixed overnight, and particularly housing. The Ministers that came to speak to us—there’s a massive amounts of pūtea going towards enabling Māori papakāinga, shared equity. We heard it through the reset of KiwiBuild. But these particular Ministers, and the Minister for Māori Development particularly, have talked about committing more houses—affordable houses—for Māori.

Today, I joined the Minister in travelling to Wainuiōmata to work with the iwi, through Treaty settlements, who have put their land on the table, supported by Te Puni Kōkiri, and then we’re going to have 89 homes in Wainuiōmata. Now, people might think that’s not a lot of homes, but in Wainuiōmata that is significant. It is a mixed housing model made up of shared equity, of kaumātua flats, of market and affordable homes, and this is what this Government’s doing. We don’t just talk about it; we’re doing it in partnership with iwi. And I want to acknowledge Te Atiawa, Taranaki Whānui, and, of course, Port Nicholson, who have come to the party and have, over many years, developed that.

I want to also talk about the focus on the wellbeing that the four Ministers addressed, and particularly Minister Davis’ He Hōkai Rangi, and, of course, Minister Peeni Henare’s Whānau Ora. Yes, $80 million was gained in this Budget—in 2019-20, $80 million towards Whānau Ora—but that is not the extent of the opportunities available to Māori development. If we look at the $1.9 billion in mental health, if you hear during question time Ministers talking about kaupapa Māori delivery—Māori led by Māori—this side, like I say, not only talks it but walks it, because these are the big issues that we’re prepared to roll up our sleeves and ensure that this wellbeing Government delivers, particularly to Māori and Pacific communities.

But we also want to be head of a Government that’s proud—that’s proud—to deliver to our Treaty partner. I want to talk about the impact of voting. We’ve got local body elections coming up, and I want to acknowledge the many candidates that are standing to bring diversity around our local leadership, because it goes hand in hand with a commitment on this side of the House—a Government prepared to roll up its sleeves to reflect back the community. In the votes that we examined and the Ministers that came before the Māori Affairs Committee, ably chaired by Rino Tirikatene, they are painting a picture a delivery for Māori. Through the votes that we examined, it is clear: Hōkai Rangi, commitment to Māori land owners, and Vote Māori Development, but also the housing commitment that we’ve got there—backed up, underpinned, by the Hon Peeni Henare’s Whānau Ora.

This is an approach that, yes, the other side started, but our side is going to take it to another level, ensuring that we are delivering to all Māori communities, all whānau, all iwi, and all hapū up and down the country. I commend this bill to the House.

MATT KING (National—Northland): Madam Chair, thank you very much. I’m going to touch on Māori land and also on the Treaty negotiations side of things. But I would like to kick it off by acknowledging the passing of Pita Paraone, a man from Northland, a well-respected man from up there, on the Waitangi National Trust Board, a former member of New Zealand First, and an all-round good guy. So I’d like to acknowledge him.

I’d also like to acknowledge my friend Rino Tirikatene, who is the chair of the Māori Affairs Committee. He’s a good friend of mine, and he’s also a very good chair. He runs a very bipartisan and friendly committee. Actually, the Māori Affairs Committee is probably the best select committee to be on in terms of friendship.

I understand that from the Vote Treaty Negotiations, $1.4 billion, approximately, has been set down for over the next four years—from 2019 to 2023. I’m just wondering whether any of that money is going to be diverted away into Ihumātao. I know that we asked the Hon Grant Robertson if any money was spent on it, and he danced on the head of a pin two weeks ago and avoided the answer.

But anyway: Treaty settlements. For Northland, New Zealand’s largest iwi, Ngāpuhi—we’re still not settled. And I’ve got to acknowledge Chris Finlayson. I mean, if you want to talk about Treaty settlements, the National Party beats Labour hands down in the Treaty settlement department by a factor of four. But in terms of Northland—undeveloped land: we’ve got a lot of undeveloped land in Northland. So I asked the Minister Nanaia Mahuta about where they’d got with Te Ture Whenua Māori Act, because in Northland we’ve got the worst stats in the country for health, education, crime, and infrastructure. A third of our land is Department of Conservation land, it doesn’t pay rates, and a third is Māori land, some of which doesn’t pay rates. So a third of the land pays the lion’s share of the rates. So it’s in the interests of everyone in Northland to try and get their heads around getting Māori land into production. So it’s essential to the prosperity of Northland.

So I asked the Minister what they were doing with that and she assures me, Minister Nanaia Mahuta, that they are working on a set of amendments that they’re going to bring in later this year or early next year. So I look forward to that, because we did a lot of the work behind that, and our coalition partners, the Māori Party, led that charge of widespread consultation. I know that the previous speaker said that the Labour Party are leading the charge—well, we did a lot of work there: widespread consultation, 100-plus hui, a six-year exercise, draft legislation was presented, a first-class dispute resolution service, and also a body set up to help them with development. But, hello, there was a politically motivated misinformation campaign and this bill got set aside—didn’t get to it.

So that’s where we stand. So we put in the hard yards, and we did the work, and for whatever reason it didn’t get there. So I really hope that the current Government are able to progress that law, because there are definite and real benefits to Māori land owners and the economy in general.

I know that the Hon Andrew Little and the team have set up the Te Arawhiti office of Māori Crown Relations, which incorporates the former Office of Treaty Settlements. I look forward to the day that the Treaty settlement is complete for Ngāpuhi. It’s a complex negotiation, and I know that, again, we were just about there—we were just about there at the negotiating table. According to Ngāpuhi leaders that I’ve spoken to, it was looking like we were nearly there, and then Andrew Little came along, and now we’re back at square one.

So I hope that younger Ngāpuhi leaders step up to the plate, and I’m seeing good signs of that. I’ve spoken with the Minister Andrew Little, and I know he is sincere in his approach, and I hope that he is able to secure a deal—a deal that all parties can live with. Māori will definitely benefit from this, as will Northland. I hope that I am still in Parliament when this Ngāpuhi Treaty settlement goes through. Thank you.

Hon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations): Thank you, Madam Chair. I thank the member who’s just resumed his seat, Matt King, for his contributions. I want to talk about Vote Treaty Negotiations in particular. I will come to the vexed issue of Ngāpuhi later in my comments, except to say that when I assumed the mantle of this ministry portfolio, the Crown had withdrawn from Ngāpuhi; they had done so the previous June. When I became the Minister in October 2017, the Crown had had little to do with Ngāpuhi for many, many months. So I understand that members’ frustration. He’s a local member from the rohe up there, and he will know the frustrations that everybody is feeling about that particular issue.

But I do want to say how proud I feel to be in this role and the contact that I have and the work that I get to do—the mahi I do with so many iwi up and down the country and how very satisfying and pleasing it is to see—certainly at this end of the whole process—the number of iwi, many of whom have been trying for years to get to the point where they can engage with the Crown and get towards agreement over redress. So just in the last couple of months, we’ve had important milestones with Te Whānau-ā-Apanui in the Bay of Plenty, one of the other more deprived areas in the motu, and they’re making very good progress there. During the recess, I managed to sign the agreement in principle with the Whanganui Land Settlement Negotiation Trust, that deals with the land issues around the Whanganui and lower Whanganui reaches, and that has been an issue that goes back to the late 1990s and early 2000s, since the parties have been negotiating, and certainly under the leadership of Ken Mair I think they’ve got to a very good point.

This week we will have the first reading of the Ngāti Hinerangi legislation from their settlement. We signed their deed earlier this year in May. Also, during the recess I had an engagement with Ngāti Rangitihi, also with Tūhourangi, although they’ve settled, but their issues—they have a very ambitious project with some conservation land that they want to have weaved into their settlement. There’s some incredibly creative visionary thinking coming out from iwi around the country and their aspirations and ambitions for their people and for Aotearoa as a whole that we need to embrace as part of this process. I also engaged with Ngāti Whātua so they’re now dealing with the remainder of their claims, particularly around Kaipara Harbour, where they have a very ambitious project about cleaning up the Kaipara so that species that they haven’t seen there for a long, long time can regenerate and respawn and that harbour can be returned to the vibrant place that it used to be.

Ngāti Maru in Taranaki: the last of the Taranaki iwi are close to coming to their next milestone, which is initialling their deed of settlement. Waikato-Tainui: we’re dealing with their remaining claims. They’re in the process of concluding their mandate process so they’re ready to go as well. So all these things are happening. Mōkai Pātea are trying to get their mandate up. Maniapoto are dealing with the challenges in the Waitangi Tribunal for them—so a lot of work going on. When it comes to the tribunal, of course, Whakatōhea, they had their findings from the tribunal at the end of last year. We’re working with the various parts of Whakatōhea to see if we can make progress where we can make progress and deal with some of the outstanding issues by some of the hapū that need to be recognised and respected and dealt with.

Hauraki: the poor old Pare Hauraki waiting for years to draw their claims to a conclusion—just awaiting now a tribunal decision following the challenges from Tauranga Moana. Ngāti Kahungunu ki Wairarapa: they have got close. We are now dealing with some issues in the Waitangi Tribunal with them, but some positive and constructive progress being made.

Mana Ahuriri—my heart goes out to Mana Ahuriri. Four years they’ve been waiting, and they’ve got a signed deed of settlement. Four years they’ve had their deed of settlement, and we haven’t gotten to the point of introducing the legislation. I’m confident that the tribunal will report soon, and we’ll be able to progress their claims.

Then, of course, we come to the mighty, mighty Ngā Puhi—the people of the north. I’m very confident that with the continued engagement that we’ve got and that I’m having, we will get to the point where we will get to engage in some negotiations. But we do have to respect all parts of the Ngā Puhi hapū, including Ngāti Hine—they’re about to go off and do their thing. But I’ve been very clear with Ngā Puhi that there are a number of issues that are common to all hapū of Ngā Puhi so that it does not make sense for the Crown to negotiate bit by bit, piece by piece. There will have to be a negotiation of common issues across all Ngā Puhi. I’m very pleased with the progress being made, and this House can be too.

JO HAYES (National): Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m pleased to stand to take a call on the Estimates hearing for Māori Development. But, before I start, I just want to say: Kia kaha Te Reo Māori, in recognition of Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori. I want to acknowledge our Māori Affairs Committee; I think we do have a very good select committee, and it’s well-run. I just want to do a shout out to our chairman, Rino Tirikatene. I think you do a good job in keeping us all in line.

So as my colleagues have said in their presentations and their discussions today, we covered the four areas within the select committee: Māori development, Whānau Ora, Treaty settlements—as the Minister of Justice has just outlined, a list of settlements that he’s been working on as well as the Minister for Te Arawhiti, the Hon Kelvin Davis. I found the presentations rather interesting, and especially the previous contribution from Minister Andrew Little around the list of iwi that he has been working with since the hearings. It would have been great had he outlined all of this when we had asked questions around what he had lined up for his work coming up for this year. So this is very good. Maniapoto, Whakatōhea—those were areas that the Hon Chris Finlayson had asked me to keep asking the Minister about. It’s good to see that there’s been some movement, although it would be great to have some readings in this House very shortly with some of these bills, mainly because in our Māori Affairs Committee we’re running out of work, to be honest. We need some work, and, really, at the end of the day, some of these bills actually provide us with this work.

Ngāti Hinerangi is an interesting iwi because that is the iwi of Dan Bidois, as well as Maniapoto. Dan was telling us a little bit about things that have been happening with Ngāti Hinerangi, and I’m pleased that it’s starting to move along, especially for Dan. That’s also with the Whanganui land claims. I’ve been talking to some of the whānau up the awa: they were telling me a little bit about some of the things that were going on. It never is a smooth journey when iwi traverse this area.

I want to say that at the 2019-20 Budget, the Government was very generous in their Budget towards Māori development—a quarter of a billion dollars in the Māori development portfolio. Yet even today, a few months down the track, I’m still getting asked by the commissioning agencies for Whānau Ora: when is the Minister going to start releasing some of those funds out to the commissioning agencies? I was of the view that it had already been released; it obviously hasn’t been released. Its $20 million for this year—remember, it’s an $80 million fund spread over four years. So this is something where the Minister needs to—the Hon Peeni Henare—go back and actually start to have a look at the process for releasing that budget for the 2019-2020 time for $20 million to the commissioning agencies, so they can get on and start doing the mahi that will actually help to bring together, and bring closer, whānau, and some of the work that they’ve been doing within their families.

I want to talk a little bit about—again, following up on my colleague Matt King and his discussion around Te Ture Whenua. It’s really important, that bill. We did have a bill in the House that the Hon Te Ururoa Flavell was going through with the House. It was Labour working to actually go against Te Ture Whenua Māori Bill. That would have actually helped to release some of the blockages around Māori land-locked lands. Now, Māori land-locked lands—there’s thousands and thousands of hectares of Māori land-locked lands. If that could just be opened and released so production can happen for the iwi of those lands, then we would see more economic development outcomes for the iwi of those areas. Let’s look at Mōkai Pātea at the back of Taihape. They cannot get into their lands to develop and grow the very trees that the Hon Shane Jones over here has funding for. They cannot make any headway on accessing any of the funds for growing trees.

Even though this Government shelled out a lot of money, it’s all stuck in ministries, it’s stuck in this Parliament; I don’t know where it is. Why isn’t this Government more accountable to the very people that they want to grow their economic development wealth—to actually grow employment for everybody, for Māori? Why isn’t this Government being more proactive and active for a constituency of theirs?

Hon SHANE JONES (Minister of Forestry): Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I’d like to make a few contributions about this challenging area of Māori affairs. I’m really encouraged to stand after the northern parliamentarian, Matt King of the white elephants, decided to give a very distorted version about Minister Andrew Little’s carriage of the claims as they pertain to the North. Now, there is another term, the pink elephant, that’s actually associated with people who hallucinate, because that account, to the detriment of the standing of our colleague Minister Little, was nothing beyond, simply, a set of political hallucinations. However, let me get to the topic at hand.

It was the Waitangi Tribunal and their unwanted intrusion—which is why I’m incredibly enthusiastic about reining them in, insofar as they are having a hobbling effect on Māori development, but more about that later in the year. But this was a consequence of the last regime, led by Mr Key and Mr Finlayson, acquiescing with the troubled defective recommendations put forward by this body, whose writ is spreading like a kumara vine.

So it is not correct to say that this side of the House has not seized the Ngāpuhi issue. Now, there is a term in Ngāpuhi: Ngāpuhi, kōhao rau. Ngāpuhi, arero rau. Ngāpuhi taniwha rau.

[Ngāpuhi of many chiefs. Ngāpuhi of many speakers. Ngāpuhi of many leaders.]

That simply means that the house of Ngāpuhi is made up of many voices. But, as the Minister has said, there are some issues that pertain to the entirety of the iwi. It’s heartening to hear the Minister say, in public, that those issues will not be atomised and they will not be discombobulated in such a way that we don’t make progress.

I want to continue a little more on the role in Māori development of agencies such as the Waitangi Tribunal. The Waitangi Tribunal has been a key agent of change and us coming to terms with our history, but it is slowly but surely exhausting its relevance in terms of being a driver for Māori development, which is what this segment of the Budget discussions is about. So it’s important that those people who are looking to actually grow their profile and the hua—the fruits—of development stop utilising that organisation.

On the question of employment, which I’m sure other members will speak about, extraordinarily positive things have happened under the rubric of Māori development for the purpose of developing our most important talent: he tangata, he tangata, he tangata. That is something that has come about as a consequence of imagination, innovation—actually, there are three things that are driving this, and they’re quite evident, as Mr Rino Tirikatene’s report shows: number one, leadership. And the quality of leadership is fully on display amongst those Māori Ministers and their supporters within the broader Government community.

Secondly, mandating. Beyond cavil, beyond a slither of doubt, the Māori members, especially those in Labour, have an unfettered mandate to drive this kaupapa forward. Now, that was something that hobbled the last regime because they had the outhouse approach. Now, that was my old head boy at St Stephen’s School, Te Ururoa Flavell, a great friend of mine, but it was very unfortunate how he was marginalised—and that is not happening in terms of those who hold the Māori mandate under this Government.

And the third thing is execution. Now, we are very well aware that in the absence of decent delivery, execution becomes perilously close. That is why, in areas such as land development, such as employment, and such as expediting the pace at which we bring to completion the Treaty claims and especially the Ngāpuhi claim, it will be done by thinking outside of the box. It will not be completed with any unnecessary levels of attention or excrescence, with the warblings coming out of the Waitangi Tribunal—the less I hear from them, the better I’ll feel. Thank you very much.

Hon WILLIE JACKSON (Associate Minister for Māori Development): Tuatahi, he tika me mihi ki taku hoa ahakoa rerekē tō kōrero e pā ana ki te Tribunal. Ngā mihi huritau ki a koe e te hoa. E te hoa. Sixty years old. Ngā mihi ki a koe. Tēnei wā hoki e tika ki te whakanui tō tātou reo Māori. E tika me mihi ki te rōpū Te Taura Whiri mō tā rātou mahi ki te kōkiri i te kaupapa i ngā wā katoa, ki te whakanui i tō tātou reo. Ngā mihi ki a rātou. Koutou katoa, kia kaha, kia māia, kia manawanui.

[Firstly, it is right to acknowledge my friend, regardless of his different speech on the Tribunal. Happy birthday my friend. My friend. Sixty years old. Congratulations to you. This time also is right to celebrate our Māori language. It is only right to acknowledge the organisation of Te Taura Whiri for their efforts to push the movement forward at all times, to celebrate our language. They have my thanks. All of you, be strong, be brave, be steadfast.]

Just acknowledging our reo, this is Māori Language Week, and, of course, our Minister, there, Shane Jones—a wonderful kōrero there; a bit of a different view in terms of the tribunal, and we were fascinated to hear that. We wonder what his mentor Matiu Rata might think of that today. But, anyway, ngā mihi ki a koe, e te hoa.

I think that we need to congratulate ourselves in terms of Māori development and the Minister Nanaia Mahuta.

Hon David Bennett: Really?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Oh, absolutely—absolutely. Minister Nanaia Mahuta’s done a terrific job. Minister Jones has talked about some of the mahi that we’ve done. A lot of the work out there is work at the coalface that Minister Jones talked about.

Hon Member: That’s rubbish.

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Well, you might say “That’s rubbish”, but all I say is look at the unemployment figures—look at the unemployment figures. And if you want to look at the unemployment figures for Māori: 7.7 percent at the moment; the lowest ever in the history of statistics—7.7 percent. Now, that’s a terrific percentage that we have, and I’m so proud of it. A lot of that, firstly, is due to the work that myself and Minister Jones are doing in the regions, with the Provincial Growth Fund (PGF), where we’re using that pūtea—those dollars, that investment—to get our nephs off the couch, as Minister Jones would describe the kaupapa. He talked about that a year or two back; we’ve been investing in that through the PGF and He Poutama Rangatahi. I say, today, that it’s one of the reasons why our unemployment—particularly in those regional areas—is tracking in the right direction.

I want to mention, today, our cadetships through Te Puni Kōkiri (TPK), because I think they are contributing significantly towards getting Māori into work. So, yes, we have our PGF; yes, we have our He Poutama Rangatahi; and we also have Mana in Mahi. But in this year’s Budget we secured more funding to grow our cadetship programme further, supporting an extra 600 placements—600 placements—over the next four years, focusing particularly on wāhine—focusing particularly on women. These are the types of developments that we want to see. I’ve been to the coalface and I’ve seen the Code Avengers in Hamilton, where we have cadets developing careers in the information and technology business. At Pūniu River Care, we have cadets who are not only developing careers in the horticulture industry but they are also committed to the regeneration of our awas.

Just last week, I spent the morning with our cadet programme in Auckland, with Māori leaders and managers at New Zealand Post. We had a terrific hui down there at Te Puea Marae, where they talked about how were they going to bring their Māori identity into their mahi. I said to them that that’s the challenge. They didn’t want to just be part of the line-up; they wanted to be part of the contribution, they wanted to be part of the board—part of the leadership, but at the same time they wanted to carry their Māori identity. I was pleased that we had our Te Puni Kōkiri officials with us, helping with that development.

So in terms of TPK and what’s been happening: more employers now are under this cadetship, 43 up from 17 last year; more cadets, 455 now contracted up from 330; more wāhine going into cadetships, 27 percent up from 19 percent; more funding, the Wellbeing Budget supporting 600 more cadet placements over the next four years; and a wider range of industries, tourism, high-tech start-ups, finance, for example. We’re going right across the spectrum, and we’re getting into our people, investing in the young people and investing in the regions.

The Māori development portfolio is going so well under the guidance of Nanaia Mahuta, and we as a Māori caucus are very proud to support that. Kia ora tātou.

A party vote was called for on the question, That Vote Māori Development and Vote Treaty Negotiations be agreed to.

Ayes 63

New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8.

Noes 57

New Zealand National 55; ACT New Zealand 1; Ross.

Votes agreed to.

Primary Sector

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Members, we come now to the votes in the primary sector volume—B.5, Volume 9. The question is that Vote Agriculture, Biosecurity, Fisheries and Food Safety; Vote Forestry; and Vote Lands stand part of the Schedules.

Hon David Bennett (Chairperson of the Primary Production Committee): Thank you. It gives me great pleasure to take this speech at this time, but at a very difficult time for farmers. This has been the worst attack on our agriculture, horticulture, and primary sector that farmers have known in any time through this parliamentary history of this place. They are under attack from a Government that doesn’t want them in business and has taken it upon themselves to do that.

Kieran McAnulty: I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson. This is not the first time I’ve had to raise this point of order against this particular member. There is a convention in this House that when the chair of a select committee—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Yeah. I’m sorry. Yes, I do appreciate that the chair of the select committee is supposed to make a neutral speech, reflecting the discussions of the select committee. I do apologise that I was otherwise distracted—otherwise I would have stopped the member myself.

Hon DAVID BENNETT: Thank you, Madam Chair. I was being neutral, in that case. If I had really said what I thought about the Government of the day, they wouldn’t be sitting there so nice and quietly. But the reason I did raise that is because there are a number of points—five main points—that have come out of the discussions, and they are the most important part of these discussions that I think we should draw to everybody’s attention, because they are the points where we have seen what has been happening.

The first is in regard to Mycoplasma bovis. That is the first attack on farmers. The Government came out and said that they were going to pay for this. There was a great hurrah around “Look at us standing up for our farmers, standing behind them in a time of need”—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): I’m sorry to interrupt the member, but can I just ask him to report on the discussions in the select committee without the personal reflections that he’s making on the worth or merit or otherwise of those discussions.

Hon DAVID BENNETT: So one of the major discussions was the biosecurity levy that was suddenly going to come upon farmers that the Minister and his officials had made clear that they had been working on but hadn’t made public under the discussions of that committee. We grafted it out of the Minister that there will be a biosecurity levy that will be coming on farmers, and that biosecurity levy will be to refund the Government for the money that they’ve spent through the Budget in looking at the Mycoplasma bovis issue. So it is a direct relationship, and it was part of the major questioning in the committee, and it’s important that the public out there listening know the facts about those issues that were discussed in the committee, and that is the first one that I think should be drawn to attention.

The second issue that was of importance, on page 255, is around the National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) system. That is an important part of the traceability of farm animals, and that’s very much related to the first issue of the Mycoplasma bovis outbreak. Now, the big issue around NAIT is the database of information, and that information is now held by the organisations that represent farmers, namely Livestock Improvement and suchlike. The Government of the day is proposing that that information is now owned—not accessed, but owned—by the Government. So that is a second crucial issue that came up in the Ministry for Primary Industries debate, and it is the second way that the Government is looking at having control through ownership—not access—to information that farmers already own and that is sensitive to them in the sense that other competitors now, and other Government departments, can easily access that information through this Government.

The third area that came up was in regard to forestry. That was another huge issue for members of the committee, and we looked at the forestry issue in regard to the one billion trees programme. The Minister of Forestry is in the chair, and I’m sure he’s going to talk about it. It was raised in the committee why there is an exemption for foreigners to come in and buy land just for forestry, and what effect that will have on farming communities as that land is taken out of sheep and beef farming or dairy farming and put in forestry. That was a huge issue that was raised by members in the committee because they see a loss of jobs; they see forestry that will not necessarily be cut down and used for wood products but sits there just to get carbon credits. That’s the incentive that is in the market, and there is an exemption for foreign buyers to come in and access land without any requirements.

Kieran McAnulty: I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson.

Hon DAVID BENNETT: And I know that speaker’s going to say the same thing, but it’s just reflecting what the committee held.

Kieran McAnulty: The member is reflecting his party’s view as that of the committee. I think that is a misrepresentation of the committee’s views.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): No, no—I’m listening very carefully. He’s on the edge—he is on the edge—but I am following the report that is in the journal, so I am making sure that he is debating the issues that are in the journal. But I have already warned him, and he is close.

Hon DAVID BENNETT: Yes, and Madam Chair, if you look at page 260, it says that the committee says that we are interested—we remain interested—in various aspects of that scheme. So we want to see what is going to happen in forestry in that area.

The last part, on page 4 of that, is the emissions trading scheme.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): I’m sorry, but the member’s time has expired.

Hon EUGENIE SAGE (Minister for Land Information): Tēnā koe e Te Mana Whakawā. Very pleased to take a call on the primary sector Estimates and recognise the significant investment in land that the Government is making through vote land information. The South Island high country is a taonga to many New Zealanders. It stretches over 1.2 million hectares, 8 percent of Aotearoa, 168 pastoral leases. In February, we set off some public consultation on reforms to the Crown Pastoral Land Act and we saw more than 3,000 submissions. So that policy development has been ongoing, but the engagement by New Zealanders has been outstanding. In Budget 2019, this Government is again doing what the last Government failed to do: investing $3.1 million over four years so that Land Information New Zealand (LINZ) can increase its engagement with pastoral leases so that it can visit leaseholders and do farm inspections directly, rather than relying on third parties to do that.

One critical aspect of good, sustainable land management is investing in biosecurity and tackling pests. Again, it’s a theme of Budget 2019: correcting and making account for the neglect of the last 10 years. This Government is investing an additional $7.5 million over four years, the biggest increase in Land Information’s baseline for 10 years for doing biosecurity work. So that $7.5 million is enabling LINZ to tackle some of the aquatic weeds in Lake Wakatipu, in the Te Arawa Rotorua lakes, and in Lake Karapiro for the rowers—investing in getting rid of those weeds like Lagarosiphon. So that’s a major investment, and it comes after years of neglect from the past Government.

Again, under this Government, Land Information has had a much-needed boost to the land bank—again, ensuring that when we go into Treaty settlements, the properties in the land bank are in a fit state to transfer across to iwi, because there are more than 900 properties in the land bank, and some of those were in very dilapidated condition when they came in in the 1990s and when they’ve come in subsequently. Those properties that are being used for either commercial or cultural redress need to be in a good condition. So that additional funding in the Budget, $16.8 million over four years, will mean that five of those big properties, like Masterton Hospital, can have asbestos remediated and can, in some cases, like the Tokanui waste-water plant, be demolished and have improvements done there so that those properties can be passed over to iwi in a good condition.

There are a number of properties which LINZ has picked up from Government agencies which no longer require them. There are around over 500 tenants in a lot of the residential houses that LINZ has. Those properties weren’t properly insulated, and, again, in this Budget, an initial $21 million over four years will ensure that those homes are maintained, that they have proper insulation, so that tenants can live in warm, dry homes.

There was also a significant investment of nearly $2 million for the satellite-based augmentation system, enabling New Zealand to work with Australia to tender for that, to ensure that GPS positioning can assist—people like helicopter pilots, when they’re going to recover patients in difficult terrain, can get access to those areas, pin-point them more accurately. So that investment in the satellite-based augmentation system is again a commitment by this Government to ensuring that our digital technology is up to scratch, that we’ve got a really innovative economy, and that we deliver those benefits for New Zealanders.

Madam Chair, with the Minister for Regional Economic Development sitting alongside you, I’m really grateful, as Minister for Land Information, for the investment that the Provincial Growth Fund has made through the Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) work. That will enable much better mapping in the regions because of the ability, through laser technology, using the LiDAR system, to more accurately map the potential extent of rising seas, to assist regional councils and district councils with their infrastructure planning, with planning for a changing climate. So I’m very pleased to commend this bill to the House because of the major investment in land information, from biosecurity through to improved insulation in tenants’ homes, through to increased investment in innovation like the satellite-based augmentation system.

KIRITAPU ALLAN (Labour): Tēnā koe, e Te Kaiwhakawā. He tino hōnore ki te tū i waenganui i tēnei whare o Te Whare Pāremata i tēnei wiki o tō tātou nei reo rangatira, ki te āwhina tō tātou nei kaupapa o Te Reo. Otirā, tō tātou nei tangata o ngā rohe ki wērā, otirā ki te āwhina i ngā kaipāmu o ngā rohe katoa i Aotearoa i tēnei taupatupatu. Heoi anō, tuatahi, māku e whiu atu i ōku nei whakaaro ki tēnei tangata rongonui, ko te Minita o te Regional—what are you? Regional development—regional champion? Āe! Koinā te ingoa tūturu, te tino regional champion, anei mātou, pō huruhuru ngā kaiāwhina ki te tautoko tēnei tangata i ngā rohe katoa. Heoi, ka huri ake ki ngā take o tēnei taupatupatu, te primary industry.

[Greetings, Madam Speaker. It is a real honour to stand in the middle of this House of Parliament on this week for our Māori language, to assist our cause of the Māori language. Indeed, our man of the regions to those, actually to help the farmers of all the regions of New Zealand, in this debate. Firstly, I will expound my thoughts about this famous man, the Minister of Regional—what are you? Regional development—regional champion? Yes! That’s the real title, the great regional champion, here we are, your supporters, who are supporting this man in all of the regions. Furthermore, I turn now to the substance of this debate, the primary industry.]

It’s a privilege to be able to speak on this side of the committee as the deputy chair of the Primary Production Committee. It’s a privilege to speak on behalf of our Government and what we are doing, because when we listen to the Opposition and the āwangawanga that they display—I recall there was that statement: every issue that kind of passes by, they sit there and they yap. They’re whinging away, whinging away, and trying to rile up a storm in the regions, in the provinces of Aotearoa. But as a proud member of this here House who has the honour of living in regional and provincial New Zealand, I can tell you unequivocally that the sentiment in our regions and the sentiment of those that serve our nation in the primary production sector are doing well. They are thriving.

It’s absolutely beyond me when I listen to the contributions of the chair of the Primary Production Committee, which are supposed to be a recitation of the incredibly, I think, good discussions that we, by and large, have in our select committee. It’s disappointing to hear the contributions made in this committee of the whole House that make it sound like it’s all doom and gloom. Perhaps it’s all doom and gloom on that side of the House, but, on this side of the House, we are tackling the long-term issues that face Aotearoa New Zealand.

Whilst the other side let the regions suffer when they had the chance and they held the Treasury benches, we here on this side of the committee, it’s our time to restore the balance, and we are doing that across an array of areas when it comes to the primary sector. Right now, under the leadership and the stewardship of the Hon Damien O’Connor, we are tackling the real long-term issues that are before us. Right now, we are overhauling the Biosecurity Act. Now, in part, that has come about as a consequence of Mycoplasma bovis and the pain that has been suffered by many of our farmers throughout the nation. We are reforming the Dairy Industry Restructuring Act. We are making substantial investments in terms of ensuring that the regulatory environment that our primary producers in our nation, who contribute absolutely tremendously, who are the backbone of our nation—we are making sure that we are getting that regulatory environment right.

I want to turn to something that I’m pretty proud of in the Budget which was advocated by the Hon Damien O’Connor. We know that New Zealand has some of the worst mental health statistics in the country, and, for our regional folks, we have some of the worst in the world. Budget 2019 contained a $20.8 million investment over four years that will invest in mental health support for isolated rural communities as a consequence of the advocacy of many rural advocacy groups—in particular, the wives and the children of those that have endured loss as a consequence of whakamomori. I want to acknowledge this Government’s action when it comes to tackling things like mental health for our regional and provincial communities. Tēnā koe.

TODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a great privilege to speak for a few minutes on the Estimates report from the Primary Production Committee. I wasn’t on it at the time; I am now, and enjoying the experience.

There are a few things that jump out, though, when you look at the report, and you’ve heard it with the Government’s contributions thus far: very high on rhetoric, very low on substance. The great example of that was when we tested with Damien O’Connor the idea of rural proofing, which was something that he put so much store into. He had very little understanding—and you can see it there in the transcripts—around what it actually meant. At best, he had to turn to his officials and ask for them to come to the table and assist and provide further context. But it largely looks like the opportunity for the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) to have their voice heard, hopefully around a table of various Government agencies.

What is interesting when you consider the work programme that’s talked about by the primary industries—and, clearly, water quality is now front of mind for most of rural New Zealand, if not all of them. Where was the rural proofing when that document was promulgated? Where was the MPI contribution to the economic impact, which that document is completely silent on? For 23,000 farmers, there’s no real sense of what it means for them, apart from some high-level numbers around farm environment plans and an assessment of stock exclusion. There’s no assessment of, actually, if you apply those in water values to the extent that this Government wants to see—that that will mean that dairy in parts of this country of ours will be decapitated: sheep and beef equity out the back door, only can plant forests. Where is that? If that’s rural proofing, if that’s real, if that forms part of what you think’s important, live it; don’t just talk it. What we saw was a whole lot of talking about it.

I go to the extension services. That was waved from the rafters—$35 million. Again, when tested, Damien O’Connor didn’t know how many people. Largely, he said it would be leveraged off the sector’s own people in the field. We didn’t really get a sense of what they would do, and then, when pushed, he said, “Look, we’ll target them to 2,000 farmers.” Well, what about the 21,000 other farmers? What about those who now sit around their dinner tables saying, “What on earth are we going to do now? How do we farm to these limits that are so onerous we can’t see a way there?” There’s not enough extension, not enough investment, and not enough clarity intellectually around what you’re trying to do. I think the Minister was found out to be quite light in his analysis around that Estimates discussion.

Then, when there was a substance that was already in place—the Global Research Alliance on Agricultural Greenhouse Gases, which the previous Government put together, which actually is realistic in terms of working with others around the world and with respect to identifying options to reduce carbon emissions on farm—he put in a bid for $50 million and he got $8 million, which is just a rollover of last year’s money. So if you’re really serious about climate change, wouldn’t you invest, actually, in the mechanism that exists today to actually create tools for farmers to make a difference?

See, this is the problem. There’s an enormous amount of rhetoric—and some of it, bombastic or otherwise, is at times quite entertaining—but where’s the substance? The global research alliance the previous Government set up, and all they could do was give them another year’s funding, when it is a critical enabler for farmers to actually be able to respond to emissions in a very real sense. I don’t think this Government gets agriculture.

Kieran McAnulty: Ha, ha!

TODD MULLER: I don’t think they get it at all. They have a laugh—Kieran has a laugh—but when pushed—

Kieran McAnulty: Speaking of substance, where is it? Come on.

TODD MULLER: Kieran McAnulty has a laugh, but when pushed and his own community says, “Actually, I think you’re right. I don’t think ag should go into the emissions trading scheme (ETS); more critically, I have real concerns around the ETS itself.”, he’s very strong in terms of his view and what he’ll say to the Wairarapa Age—less so in this House. You know, it’s going to be interesting to see how he positions himself on what will become quite a critical debate: agriculture into the emissions trading scheme. That was listed as a work programme. I suspect that’s signed off in a couple of weeks. Looking forward to fronting that, Mr Patterson? That’ll go down well.

Greg O’Connor: Cheer up.

TODD MULLER: Well, I tell you: “Cheer up” minus 80 percent. They’re not my statistics, Kieran McAnulty. They’re the sector’s. It’s the most pessimistic outlook in 15 years. Do you think that’s a function of us? No, it’s not. It’s a function of your Government. It’s a function of the fact that you don’t understand farmers. You see them as a cost. You see them as an activity and a lifestyle to constrain. You don’t see somebody as a farming family contributing to their community. You don’t see them as part of the future. We do, and that’s the clear difference between that side and this side.

MARK PATTERSON (NZ First): Tēnā koutou katoa e Te Whare.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Are you seeking a call?

MARK PATTERSON: Oh yes. Sorry, I was getting carried away with Māori Language Week. Thank you, Madam Chair. Tēnā koutou katoa e Te Whare. Kia kaha Te Reo Māori.

Just responding to that last speaker, I am a farmer. I have been a farmer for 30 years. I live in those communities. We absolutely understand farming, and this is a time of change. There is no doubt about this. We had come before us, in the Estimates debate, a number of Ministers. They are reforming Ministers. We have come up against the ecological limits of some of our farming practices. We have signed international agreements that we must honour—

Kieran McAnulty: That’s right. Who signed those—who signed those?

MARK PATTERSON: —and, when I say “We have signed international agreements”—

Kieran McAnulty: They did.

MARK PATTERSON: —the National Party signed the international agreements.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Sorry to interrupt the member, but can I just remind Mr McAnulty to just keep it down, all right? Let the speaker have a turn.

MARK PATTERSON: Thank you. I thought it was going so well. It’s a good chance to segue into the fact that we should not catastrophise what’s going on. We are sitting on, as Kiritapu Allan pointed out, record exports—$46 billion dollars last year—coming from our primary sector. This is not a time of catastrophe. I did start my farming career in the 1980s. I do know what dire situations look like, and they don’t look like what they are now. What we have is a period of uncertainty as we land some of these big issues. That’s the challenge for this Government. It’s to get these through the pipeline. Once farmers have got their head around where they’re going—they are problem solvers—they will get there. We’ve just got to get them to the right place.

Just addressing some of the issues in the Estimates bill, we have had a major biosecurity outbreak in Mycoplasma bovis, which was referenced by Minister O’Connor in his contribution. It’s important we do not forget those farmers. There are still farmers battling through this. There was a $900 million contribution—I heard that being trivialized before—$900 million! That could have been zero. We could have just left the sector to its own devices and let the disease go, but we took the courageous path, and we are supporting our farmers through that. And, of course, we’ve had a fruit fly incursion and we’ve got the brown marmorated stink bug that’s raging through Europe. So we’ve got all sorts of threats in our biosecurity space.

Minister O’Connor has outlined to us the changes to the Biosecurity Act that are coming through. There was new funding of $12 million in the Budget and $62 million, of course, to customs, which is also part of it, and we’ve got the National Animal Identification and Tracing Amendment Bill (No 2) coming forward. Of course, one of the problems we’ve had with our response to M. bovis is that the National Animal Identification and Tracing system was under absolute benign neglect by the previous Government.

Just to cover some of the other big issues: the Climate Change Response (Zero Carbon) Amendment Bill. We’ve had a lot of debate about that. The Global Research Alliance on Agricultural Greenhouse Gases: the funding going into that is good funding. The money that AgResearch are putting into the GE rye grasses, that is a debate that we absolutely need to have as well. Farmers are prepared to do their bit, but they want to have the tools at their disposal, and that’s a debate that I’m sure we’ll have through this House often and shortly.

In terms of landing that zero carbon bill, I would say that, having sat on that committee, there has been a wave of, particularly, business interests coming in—no; across the spectrum, to be fair—saying how important it is to get cross-party consensus. We need every party in this Parliament involved. We cannot have chopping and changing with such a far-reaching bill. So I hope that that consensus is something that we can still reach as we go through that committee stage and the second reading.

The freshwater stuff, the discussion document that was brought out yesterday: I just would like to emphasise that it is a discussion document. That is the nature of those announcements. I went to the first of those public meetings yesterday, where there was some very constructive dialogue, in Dunedin. It is a wide-ranging piece of work. We must work through the details, and, yes, we must look at the implications for our rural communities, and we will.

I will note the $230 million that was allocated in Budget 2019 to the sustainable farming package. That is there for that reason, to help those farmers to adjust and to, essentially, I guess, subsidise their response and their ability. But we must do this. We must get our agriculture back on a more sustainable platform.

Hon SHANE JONES (Minister of Forestry): Madam Chair, thank you for the opportunity to make a contribution. I want to cover off several things, but, first, I want to acknowledge what we’ve heard from the last two speakers. We’ve heard from a hearty, genuine farmer, an earthy Southlander, and we’ve heard from a former executive of Fonterra. Now, I know the public watching this debate will place a far greater level of emphasis on what an earthy farmer has to say rather than someone who graced the corridors, mahogany panels, and gold-plated toilet doors and then comes and attacks not only the policy makers but the Ministers on this side of the Chamber.

In fact, I’m beginning to wonder whether or not, from time to time, as Fonterra raises its head in its woozy financial state, the Speaker of the House may need to address the member for Bay of Plenty as to whether there’s a conflict of interest in his statements on anything to do with Fonterra. So I’d like to put that on the record and—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): I’d also like the member to come to the Estimates, because he’s now spent a minute of his five minutes discussing an individual.

Hon SHANE JONES: Of course, the most exciting part about the Estimates is the $46 billion, and growing, that has been recorded, which reflects the income to the nation from this very valuable agricultural sector. Now, a key part of the broader primary sector report pertains to forestry. Now, there is some confusion out in some sectors of the farming community. Of course, they are travelling furtively with that side of the Chamber—i.e., the Opposition side of the Chamber—but I’m all cool about that, because this is contested space. But the forestry contribution is well over 12 or 13 percent of that $46 billion in terms of export receipts. It was an area that was neglected, but now it is receiving the due level of attention and fiscal love which is required.

There are some areas that do deserve to be debated, and one of those areas is: what’s the appropriate mix of pastoral activity and forestry activity in a given location? There’s one side of the debate which is covered in this report back. Now, the language is slightly extravagant, but the point is well made that in a number of our rural communities there is a balance to be struck. But I would say to the public that it is not the Crown forcing farmers to sell their land. They value property rights. They insist on economic sovereignty to do what they like, when they like, with whoever they like, with their land, their main capital asset. So if they are choosing to sell their land to other purchasers who have other uses in mind, what does the Opposition want us to do?

Do they want us to regulate the pace and who farmers can sell their land to? No. Do they want us to introduce a new level of red tape, inhibiting as to what mix of forestry and farm land use should be brought forward? No, because they are the apostles. They are the Pharisees of property rights and that land use should follow the investment patterns as to where landowners feel they’ll get a better return, and this—adverted to in the report, I’m sure, by the members of the Opposition party—from a party that’s supposed to be into free enterprise.

Now, there will be some allegations—poorly thought-out and largely unsound—that the Government has unduly favoured forestry. In actual fact, the report is based on information provided by our officials that in actual fact, forestry land, for the last 10-15 years, has disappeared into farmland. So all we’re seeing is the pendulum slowly swinging back to where it used to be. Of course, the greatest amount of afforestation took place under the National Party in the 1990s. So what we’re seeing, really, is land use going through a transition, and forestry playing a role, to enable the nation to meet its climate change obligations. I say to the farmers: it was the National Party who put you on the hook for those imposts, not this side of the House. It’s this side of the House that’s been innovative with solutions.

BARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki - King Country): Thank you, Madam Chair. Well, the last speaker, the Hon Shane Jones, said he enjoyed listening to hearty farmers, so here’s his opportunity, but I would like to go back to the previous speaker, Mark Patterson, who got up and he said that this is a period of uncertainty for farmers. It’s definitely a period of uncertainty, and it’s not around prices and it’s not around weather and it’s not around interest rates; it’s around a Green - Labour - New Zealand First Government. Right now, the period of uncertainty is about the future, and, if that member was out listening to the people in his electorate, he would work that out.

I’m looking through this report, and I wasn’t on the committee, but some of the things that stood out for me were the extension clusters, and it’s been mentioned before—$35.4 million over four years for 2,200 farmers. Interestingly, noting in here, it said clusters in farmers and growers will be set up across New Zealand to share knowledge and advice, and then down further we heard Beef and Lamb and DairyNZ have already developed their own extension system. Well, those extension systems have been going for years and years and years, way back to the 1980s and beyond, Mr Patterson—way back, probably to the 1960s. But what it says in here, and what’s quite concerning for me, is that, however, these are based on their industry objectives and may lack information about the Government’s objectives. So what are we creating? It’s like the industry doesn’t know what it’s doing, so the Government has to come along and tell it how to do better. Well, let me tell this Government that the industry’s actually done a lot of things without the help of Government—a lot of investment; a lot of time and effort. The other part of this was it says here the director-general told us that a range of extension services already exist. So where was the Minister? Missing in action—doesn’t seem to know that the work’s already going on.

There are the methane targets in the zero carbon bill. The Minister said he had not received any advice on the cost—this is what he told the committee—because he considers it nearly impossible to calculate a long-term projection to 2050. It also says that he’d asked for information about the most accurate model because he’s not yet seen a model that he considers reliable. So that, to me, is really concerning when we’ve got a bill up there, we’ve got people making submissions, and we’ve got all this talk about where the methane targets should lie—and they’ve been set pretty heavy, and that’s one of the main bones of contention. But this is really, really interesting: that the Minister hasn’t yet seen a model that he considers reliable to do this.

The next thing I noticed when I was going through this was the $8.5 million for Global Research Alliance on Agricultural Greenhouse Gases. Well, that’s great. We need that, but this is not a new initiative for this Government. This is another thing: it’s good to have some extra funding into it. The member Patterson mentioned genetic engineering and that before, around some of the pastures and things, and we do need to have that discussion. It’s a big discussion that we need to have, but, you know, this is not something new that this Government’s developed; this is something that farmers have been working on for a very long time. So, please, in announcing some of these things, don’t forget to give farmers and industry organisations the credit for where they’ve already been.

Then I get down to agriculture in the emissions trading scheme, and it says here the Minister can see the value from an international trading perspective. Well, I can see that other countries will be laughing all the way to the bank if the Minister can see the value from an international trading perspective, because the ball will be in the court of all of our trading partners and our farmers will not have anything left to bat with under the current conditions that they’re being exposed to.

Then we go down to the review of the Dairy Industry Restructuring Act. Well, currently one member’s going to be appointed to the Fonterra milk price panel; two had apparently been recommended. Again, Government knows best. Every part of this document that I’ve looked at, having not sat on the committee but going through it bit by bit, is Government knows best. The agricultural sector doesn’t know anything according to this Government, and it seems like the industry’s not meeting the Government’s objectives. Well, how about the Government start to think about meeting the industry’s objectives and provide some certainty. Thank you.

KIERAN McANULTY (Labour): Thank you, Madam Chair. You know, I have been asked numerous times since putting my hand up to stand in this House why I am standing for Labour and not National. Here I am, a man of seven generations’ farming stock from Wairarapa, standing for a party that they believe does not stand up for farmers. I look them in the eye and I say, “Rubbish.” Over the history of New Zealand politics, it has been the Labour Party that has driven change that is needed in the agricultural sector, and that is exactly what is in this report and the funding that has come from this Government into the farming sector.

We could take the conservative approach—the “leave it alone and she’ll be right”, wishing-for-the-old-days approach of the National Party. And where is that going to get us? What is that going to do to delivering our vision of a high-value, highly productive agricultural sector, addressing the challenges of climate change and environmental sustainability? Nothing—absolutely nothing. They live in a dream world. They think that if we do nothing, it’ll all be OK—that we will be able to continue to demand the great value that we extract from our primary products just because we can continue, in this fairyland, to trade off our clean, green image.

We have a responsibility as a primary-producing nation to live up to our responsibilities under climate change and to make sure that our primary production is environmentally sustainable, because the consumers overseas do not want to buy the cheapest possible product from New Zealand. We have never targeted those consumers that want to buy the cheapest products. We have always targeted those most discerning consumers in the world. They want to make sure that their primary products, the products that they are consuming, are environmentally sustainable and are from a country that is living up to its climate change obligations, that is a country that looks after the animal welfare, that is safe, and, increasingly so, that looks after the workforce that helped to produce those products.

Barbara Kuriger stands up and says that there is uncertainty. Well, I’m not surprised. When the National Party stands up and says that the agriculture industry in this country has no future, no wonder there is uncertainty. No wonder the industry is screaming out for skilled staff. Why would a young person want to enter into agriculture when the party that is supposed to represent them says there is no future in that industry? We say there would be absolutely no future in the industry of agriculture if the changes that we are proposing are not made. How would there be a future in agriculture when no one wants to buy our products? This is a connection that that side of the House fails to recognise. Barbara Kuriger says there’s not uncertainty in interest rates. I agree, because they’ve never been better.

Barbara Kuriger says that there’s no uncertainty around prices. Again, I agree, because they are historically high. The facts are that the way that the industry, the primary sector, is performing in this country does not live up to the doom and gloom that that side of the House is spouting out. There is export performance up nearly $7.5 billion in the last two years, but there’s no future in agriculture if you listen to Barbara Kuriger, nor is there no future in agriculture if you listen to Todd Muller. But he’s changed his tune. He stood there today and talked about the $229 million put into the land sustainability fund and says that this Government is not doing enough and is moving too quickly for farmers across this country.

It’s interesting that he has changed his tune, because he says here that improving the productivity and sustainability of this sector has the potential to drive significant economic benefits for the regions. So they say one thing when they’re talking to one group, and they say another when they’re pandering to another. That sums up the National Party. They are willing to go around, when they were in Government, and sign us up to international agreements on climate change and do absolutely nothing to meet those agreements, because they are trying to keep support from their support base. They know that farmers actually are doing something and actually want to see some changes driven by Government, so that we can continue to command the most value for our products. That is a backward-looking Opposition, and, as long as they keep doing it, I suspect this Government will continue to attract support of farmers, because they know that we are forward-looking and we have their interests, and the interests of rural communities, at heart. That is what the guts of these provisions in the Budget are all about.

HAMISH WALKER (National—Clutha-Southland): I just want to actually talk about a few things. My philosophy is actions speak louder than words. We’ve heard a lot of talk from this Government over the last couple of years, and let’s actually look at some of those actions. I’m just referring to 18 June, when the Minister of Agriculture came in and spoke to the Primary Production Committee. I think I actually feel sorry for the Minister of Agriculture. He needs to have more respect, more decency, from his caucus and from his leadership—to actually treat him with respect, so he can actually stick up for the agricultural sector.

I just want to talk about a question that I did ask him. It was around the Labour Party 2017 campaign promise of, “We will rural proof every single policy that goes through caucus, to ensure that it works for the rural sector, and, whatever policy we get through, we will use our lens.” So I asked the Minister: “Your rural-proofing policy: where are your roads tests? Have you got evidence anywhere, on any documentation, to show us evidence of a rural-proofing policy?” His answer—what was his answer? “Oh, where can you find that, Charlotte?”, who was his adviser. He couldn’t even point to any evidence at all where the rural-proofing policy has been applied. He actually went on to—looking at his transcript—talk about the Mental Health Act. Well, if you want to talk about mental health, you only need to look at what’s happening currently in Southland, but I will come up on to that next.

The next question I asked him, after he said, “Well, we don’t actually rural proof anything, but it was a 2017 Labour Party promise.”, was, “Are you aware of any upcoming campaigns, Minister?” This was 17 June, so this was a few months ago. His response to the question, “Are you aware of any upcoming campaigns?”: “I understand there’s one being thought out, about to start around winter grazing. I heard about it within the last week or so.” This is extremely concerning because we know, over the last two or three months, there has been an orchestrated campaign by this Government on farmers in Southland around winter grazing. If you just look at the answer here, look what’s happened since then. A winter grazing taskforce has been established, and—what do you know?—the individual driver in that has been appointed by the Minister of Agriculture to that winter grazing taskforce.

I think that’s incredibly disappointing. If you look at the work that farmers have done around water quality in Southland over the last 10 to 15 years, yes, water quality did slightly decline between 2000 and 2012, but it’s improved since 2012, over the last seven years. If you only look at the Pomahaka water catchment group, and the improvements they’ve made, they’ve been raving about their success—

Mark Patterson: Six—there’s only six out of 40 swimming holes that meet the standard.

HAMISH WALKER: What’s that, Mark?

Mark Patterson: Six out of 40.

HAMISH WALKER: Where have you been, Mark Patterson, over the last four months? Voting against a rural maternity birthing unit closing down. That’s incredibly disappointing. Where have you been around winter grazing recently? The mental health concerns—where have you been with Southern Institute of Technology (SIT)? You should have crossed the floor on SIT, but you haven’t.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): Don’t bring me into the debate, please, Mr Walker. Thank you.

HAMISH WALKER: But if we just come back to the Estimates, I think it’s incredibly disappointing. Farmers have fenced 98 percent of waterways across New Zealand, a distance from Wellington to Chicago and back. There’s around 25 to 28 water catchment groups in Southland, these groups of volunteer farmers that work together to improve water quality. The huge investment—about $1 billion of investment—farmers have made to water quality, that counted for nothing last week. There was a water policy announcement.

To be fair to the Government, John Key always said that a good policy is in one sentence. “We want to have waterways that are swimmable.”—it all sounds great, but the most polluted waterways are urban centres. We know that in Auckland; the Minister even stated that in his Estimates. We know the most polluted waterways are in urban centres, yet the farmers are the ones who’ve been making huge improvements in water.

Just lastly, I want to talk about the Government-industry agreements (GIAs). David Bennett is doing a wonderful job—a very fair, balanced chair of the Primary Production Committee. He’s doing a wonderful job. He spoke briefly about the GIAs. These were set up seven years ago by Minister Nathan Guy. Disease outbreak—farmers contribute 12 percent. The reason for this is so farmers declare early if they believe there’s a disease incursion. What did the Government do when Mycoplasma bovis came along? They increased this 32 percent, which cost the industry an extra to $220 million.

Dr DEBORAH RUSSELL (Labour—New Lynn): Tēnā koe, Te Māngai o Te Whare. We’ve had a number of speakers across this House stand up and say that they weren’t on the Primary Production Committee, which, actually, heard these Estimates hearings for the primary sector. They have, nevertheless, read the report. I count myself among those members. I did not hear the Estimates hearings myself, but I have read the report. What is astonishing is the different attitudes towards this report that have been demonstrated across this House: on that side, a tale of negativity and woe; on this side, a tale of what we are doing positively for the agricultural sector.

When I read this excellent report from the Primary Production Committee, what I hear is a story about sustainability, a story about sustaining agriculture, a story about sustaining farming, a story about sustaining our environment. This Government is about the long-term problems, and solving them. It’s about putting in place change that will last for 30 years, not just three, and it is about sustainable change. So let me talk about sustainability that is in this report. It’s not some thin, attenuated notion of sustainability that relates only to the environment, or only to conservation, or only to business. It’s about an integrated package that makes farming sustainable for the long term in this country.

In fact, it’s about ensuring that all New Zealanders thrive, that we operate our businesses, our cities, our non-governmental organisations, and our Government in ways to have careful, due regard for the other, including for the environment and including for our farmers. It is no longer enough to have a large bank balance if life cannot be sustained. So what is exactly about sustainability in this report? Let’s look at what’s being done in biosecurity—biosecurity that protects our farming practices. When the bugs make it into the country, the people who are affected are our farmers. Improving our biosecurity contributes to the sustainability of farming practices. That’s why the improvements to our biosecurity system in this report are so important. That’s why the response to the discovery of fruit flies in Auckland was so important. It is about sustaining our primary sector industries through an improved biosecurity response.

Let’s talk about, again, that biosecurity. Looking at the way that there was a review of the passenger and mail pathways, that was about ensuring that the bugs don’t get into our country—sustaining our primary sector. Let’s look at the response to Mycoplasma bovis. That, again, is about sustainability, ensuring that that disease does not take permanent hold in this country. This Government, unlike the previous Government, poured time and money and effort into ensuring that we can control Mycoplasma bovis. Why? Because that is what our farmers need. It is ensuring that our rural communities thrive.

Let’s look at the use of land. We have a fund of $229 million for sustainable land use, to improve waterways, to reduce carbon emissions, and to support farmers and growers. On this side of the House, it is about supporting our farming industries. When it comes to issues like the extensions pathways, it’s about finding the best practice on farms and enabling farmers to share that knowledge—again, contributing to the sustainability of farming practice in this country.

When we think about it in terms of waterways and the work that is being done there, water is a precious resource and it is a precious resource that belongs to all of us. The work that is being done on waterways is to ensure that best practice prevails. When we’ve announced our waters package, many of our farmers said, “We can do that.”—“We can do that.” Why? Because they are already engaging in best practice and what we need to do is to spread that best practice further to other farmers.

We know that our farmers are resilient. We know that they want to engage in the best practice they can. We are sure that this will work for them. So, despite the doom, the gloom, and the negativity that comes from the other side of the House, on this side of the House we are positive about the future. We are about governing for all New Zealanders and we are about putting in solutions that will last for 30 years. It is excellent work that we are doing in the primary sector.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): I call Tim Macindoe. Oh, sorry; I was looking at Tim.

TIM VAN DE MOLEN (National—Waikato): Close. He’s far smarter than I am, Madam Chair, of course. Thank you, Madam Chair. Look, it’s a pleasure to take a call on the primary sector section of this debate, following on from all the urban Government members who have spoken on this. It is interesting to note—

Dr Duncan Webb: Who? Bet she’s spent more time on a farm than you have.

TIM VAN DE MOLEN: Oh, here we go. There’s a flurry of activity. Apparently now they’re all rural MPs. Well, actually, I think there’s only one farmer over there—Mr Patterson—and he’s openly bagging the Minister of Agriculture at meetings in the Waikato.

Mark Patterson: Rubbish!

TIM VAN DE MOLEN: So I don’t see the Minister having a lot of support, to be honest, at this stage. Well, he might like to refute that, but that’s not the feedback we’re getting directly from members.

So in relation to some of the proposals here, he also said—actually, Mr Patterson, when Barbara Kuriger was talking earlier—“Why sign us up to it?”, apparently alleging that the National Government was responsible for some of these draconian measures under the zero carbon bill and now the proposed dairy change as well. Rest assured we are certainly not supporting those as they stand, Mr Patterson. So no concerns there on that front.

Now, a previous list member mentioned as well that farmers want change driven by Government. How arrogant is that coming from members of the Government: to stand up from their urban ideals and suggest that rural New Zealand—that farmers—want change driven by the Government? They are so out of touch, so disconnected to rural New Zealand, it’s embarrassing. I feel embarrassed for them, listening to that sort of outcry.

There is $229 million from the Government to assist with environmental improvements. Great—but only a fraction of what’s needed. Much more with some of the proposals they’re putting forward now with these latest water announcements that we’re hearing, around the standards that might have to be put in place. A billion dollars is more like it. That’s the sort of figure—not to mention the economic impact, which, actually, we have no data about because there’s been very limited analysis done on it, which is again hard to comprehend when we’re talking about such drastic changes for a major contributor to the economic wealth and prosperity of this country.

Mr McAnulty clearly demonstrated before that he is unable to listen. He suggested that there was no future—that comments from this side had claimed no future for the industry—and yet that is the absolute opposite of what has been espoused by this side of the House. We have been, and continue to be, strong advocates for rural New Zealand, and to suggest otherwise—well, I know he wouldn’t knowingly mislead the House, so clearly he is uninformed and cannot listen to any of the commentary out there.

Now, we heard through these debates around some of the anticipated improvements required, and yet, just last week, we also heard around the massive raft of changes that are being proposed with some of these water standards. The two are not aligning when we hear the Minister say he wants the primary sector to be successful, to be focused on value-add, and to be thriving. Those are all nice words, but the action simply doesn’t line up. And now we’ve got the Government trying to talk their way out of something they’ve acted their way into, which simply cannot be done.

Those water standards, in particular, stifle innovation. To suggest that one farm should not be able to undertake a particular land use simply because of the categorisation of it is ridiculous.

Dr Duncan Webb: Because it’s polluting our streams—killing our whitebait, hurting our trout.

TIM VAN DE MOLEN: If they can produce a particular land use and be farming in a particular way that is more efficient than others, then that’s their competitive advantage. Mr Webb, I’d encourage you to get out on a farm. You’re welcome to come to the Waikato and I’ll take you around some and show you, because you clearly have no understanding of the impact that’s been proposed by the Government here. To suggest that a blanket rule on land-use change is an appropriate measure is totally inaccurate and not at all in line with where the innovation in the sector allows us to go.

So that’s one big change we need to see. Again, the grandparenting right that’s been proposed is encouraging those people who have been leaching more, by rewarding them by enabling them to just reduce a bit and they’ll still be able to operate. Well, how does that align with any clear message around improving quality? If someone’s been leaching at 35 kilograms of nitrate per hectare and someone else at 20 kilograms, well, a reduction to 34 is progress versus staying stationary at 20 not being. Clearly, that doesn’t align either. The Government, again, says nice things, but they’re not thinking through how to actually achieve this. Time after time, the rural sector is being let down by this Government, and they are sick and tired of it. There is no understanding of rural New Zealand on that side of the House, and New Zealand deserves so much better.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): Can I apologise to the member and to Tim Macindoe again, for mistaking you.

RINO TIRIKATENE (Labour—Te Tai Tonga): Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m delighted to speak in this Estimates debate on the primary sector. This is a Government of focused action. We are tackling the big issues. We know that the prior Government sat on their thumbs. They’re not prepared to tackle the big issues around climate change, around environmental sustainability. They like to talk the talk, but they don’t walk the walk, and that’s what this Government is doing.

I want to commend Ministers O’Connor, Jones, Nash, and Sage, who fronted to our Primary Production Committee, who’ve made tremendous investments in their respective areas. If we look at the agriculture, in total $848 million has been going right across those portfolios into agriculture, biosecurity, food safety, and fisheries and lands. There is tremendous work going on in this primary sector. I’m very proud of that work. We are tackling the hard issues. We are tackling dairy industry restructuring. We are looking at freshwater management. We are looking at climate change and zero carbon. We’re tackling the hard issues because we need to because of the number that has been spouted this afternoon: $46 billion of exports are generated by our primary industries. We want to not only protect that; we want to grow that, but we have to do it in a sustainable way. We can’t just carry on with current practice. That’s why we are tackling those hard issues.

I want to acknowledge the Ministers, and Minister O’Connor particularly, in the decision to eradicate Mycoplasma bovis. We could have thrown the towel in and said, “Oh well, we’ll just live with it.” But, no, this Government has made the decision to eradicate Mycoplasma bovis, and we’re putting the investments in place to achieve that: an extra $17 million of compensation this year, and $68.5 million in total. Yes, the industry will be required to chip in, but that’s what it’s all about. We’re all in this together.

Likewise, biosecurity is so huge. We need to maintain that fortress, to protect our primary industries and protect that $46 billion in export receipts. What are we doing in that regard? Huge props to our Ministers for what we’ve done in terms of flies and insects—marmorated stink bugs and the like. If you mention the letters P-s-a to the kiwifruit industry, that sends shudders down all of the Bay of Plenty, and let us not forget that those incursions occurred under the previous National Government. So there were holes in the defences and the fortress under their watch, but this Government is taking the hard decisions to actually eradicate and deal with those incursions.

I want to acknowledge Minister Jones, the champion of the provinces. Massive investments going into forestry all around the motu, a 58 percent increase in support for forestry—and we’re seeing that in the one billion trees programme. We’re seeing that in forestry grants and partnership programmes, up and down the motu, and also complementing with the Provincial Growth Fund. But we’re not only just stopping at the tree-planting phase; we’re looking through all the way down the value chain through wood-processing and the like, so I want to acknowledge Minister Jones for that.

I want to speak to fisheries and Minister Nash. We often forget about the fishing industry, but it is a very important part of our coastal communities and also the export receipts and the wealth that it generates. I want to acknowledge Mr Jones again. We’re coming up to 30 years of the Māori fisheries settlement, which came about with the introduction of the quota management system. Right at the heart of our fisheries industry are Māori, and I know that our Minister Nash is very well respected by all stakeholders. He’s making some hard decisions. You can’t please everyone in every particular sector, but he’s making some really sensible decisions around dolphin threat management plans and around cameras on board vessels—particularly in those areas where we have endangered species. So I want to acknowledge Minister Nash for that.

I want to also acknowledge Minister Sage, our Minister for Land Information—in particular, one very welcome policy initiative, and that is the ending of land tenure review. For the South Island, in particular, where I represent Te Tai Tonga, the privatisation of those high country leases has been a real mamae for us in the South Island. To actually bring an end to that land tenure review is very welcome, and that just demonstrates we are focused and we are forward-looking.

Unlike the forlorn side over there, this Government is fizzing. We are getting the results, and it is very welcome, right across the primary sector. I wholeheartedly support the work of our Ministers and this Government.

IAN McKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei): Thank you, Madam Chair. It’s a pleasure to follow Rino Tirikatene. I always respect most of what he has to say. I’ll have some comments to say on his friend Mr Nash a little later.

First of all in this call, I want to comment a bit on the breeding industry in New Zealand and how important it is to this country, but I want to comment particularly on a piece of that breeding industry in the great New Zealand mare Melody Belle, who, on Sunday night, won the New Zealand Horse of the Year. The attention she’ll bring to this country will be far greater than anything that happens in this House today or tomorrow or next week, interestingly. It just shows what one animal can do for New Zealand. I think her success is hugely important to New Zealand, and I congratulate her connections and her breeder, Marie Leicester. Out of the Manawatū, it originated in Taranaki, interestingly, and that horse’s great-great-great-grandmother was born on a dairy farm in Taranaki, so it shows how important that sector is to the horse-breeding industry. I also want to briefly comment on the success of Murray Baker, who’s the New Zealand personality of the year in the racing industry, and who does a great job for New Zealand.

But before I leave this sector, I just wanted to comment on a couple of things from the Minister. I was going to hand a bouquet out to the Minister for Racing, but I decided that in light of someone’s experience over the last few weeks, it’s not a great idea to hand bouquets to the Minister for Racing. He doesn’t altogether appreciate them, and I thought even if picked off a racecourse he might not appreciate it. But, none the less, I was pretty keen, because there’s not an opportunity to bring this industry into its real place, which is primary production, because it is a great part of our breeding sector, and I think Mr Tirikatene talked about the contribution that sector makes to New Zealand. This part of the sector makes about a $1.6 billion contribution to the New Zealand primary industry sector.

So, having done that, I wanted to move on and talk a bit about the fishing sector, of which I certainly have a much greater—well, not a greater interest, but I certainly have an interest in that. The fishing sector, like much in our primary industries, is under what I’d call increasing pressure to change its ways and to, I guess, perform in a manner that some in our society would see as appropriate. I think the fishing industry has done a great deal in recent years to bring itself to a standard that both is respected and treats its environment in a manner that it should. There is always with these sectors room to improve, as there probably is with all parts of our primary sector, but we’re working very hard to do that in those sectors, and I think that the fishing industry plays a very important part in our primary sector—for a couple of reasons, actually. One is that we have one of the largest economic zones in the world, and that is primarily ocean. So we have an opportunity in New Zealand to make an industry work better than anyone else in the world can.

The issue I want to talk about here relates to what I’d call the public-private good and how we appropriate funding and how we use that funding in our particular sectors. I think the fishing sector is a little different from a lot of our sectors in that it has a very, very large recreational portion to it. That recreational portion currently has no charge on it, and I would never advocate that it should have a charge on it, but, none the less, the Government has a responsibility, in my view, to fund the research and development around our recreational sector. I think, at the same time, they have a responsibility to ensure that our commercial sector is operating in a manner that’s sustainable and that can be assured for the future.

The reason that there is a shortage of funding going into that sector and that I think we should consider in the future the way that what I’d call the public-private good part of that funding balance is achieved is because of the huge recreational sector—the huge interests that they have in being able to catch a fish on a daily basis. Because of the way in which our commercial sector currently funds a lot of their research and development, they go beyond the norm in a lot of ways to fund what goes on in that industry, and there’s increasing pressure on that. We have a very large economic zone, and then we have some species in that area that need protection, but not at all costs.

I think that’s where we’ve got to get the balance right, and I think that with respect to our Minister, he needs to make some decisions. He doesn’t currently make those decisions, and I think he needs to make those decisions in the interests of our long-term environmental and economic future, and I’d like to see that happen as we move forward. There are some species, as I said, that need protection, but we’ve got to find ways of protecting them so that the rest of our society can move on and live its life with them and not in opposition to them. Thank you.

GREG O’CONNOR (Labour—Ōhāriu): I’ve sat here this afternoon, getting quite angry—or, certainly, agitated—with the speeches of those Opposition members. However, as usual, Mr McKelvie has somewhat calmed me down. He is something of a voice of reason there.

But Mr McKelvie has probably used his years to see that there have been changes in the agricultural sector. He can probably remember when the dip used to be poured straight into the river or straight on to the field and outside, because certainly, growing up on farms, I reflect on some of the practices that I was aware of—not only on the farm I grew up on but on the farms of relations and the farms of those in the neighbourhood. They are practices that the current crop of farmers laugh at—they couldn’t believe it. I liken it to people who you tell now that we used to smoke on aeroplanes. People laugh—the current generation—and that’s the analogy I use for some of the farming practices of the past.

I’m talking about things like, as I’ve said, pouring the dip straight into the creek after it had been used to dip the sheep that had gone through. I’m talking about pouring the pig manure straight into the rivers, which is something that I was very aware of, and the outrage when the local council came and made us dig a settling pond, and the double outrage when they came and made us dig another settling pond, just so that there was some sort of straining before the effluent went straight into the river and upset our whitebaiting practices, I might say. When it was cleansed, not only did it not go straight in but it actually improved the whitebait practices.

But the point I make—and I go back to what I’ve seen today—is the attempt to weaponise the rural-urban divide, because that’s exactly what’s happening. It’s a terrible, terrible thing to do, because, fortunately, this year—and it was very apparent at Estimates—we saw two things that showed the absolute necessity for urban and rural to work together.

One of them is the M. bovis. Now, that was something that was actually threatening this country’s industry. It was going to threaten our export industry as much as anything else that is possibly going to happen this year. We made a very courageous decision, and it was paid for. There was some local funding, some rural funding, but, actually, it was paid for by the taxpayer because, actually, New Zealanders understood the need that if that were to get out of control—if we didn’t get it under control—it was going to affect us all.

I liken that to the fruit fly outbreak in Auckland—again, an absolute necessity, that New Zealanders, particularly those in Auckland, those who were inconvenienced by that, understood fully the impact on the rural sector if the fruit fly was going to get out. They were the ones who were inconvenienced directly. However, those who would be infected if that fruit fly goes beyond Auckland—who is going to be affected—is going to be the farmers of New Zealand, it’s going to be the croppers of New Zealand, and it’s going to be the orchardists of New Zealand. So that is why it’s absolutely essential that we understand.

I see it being weaponised. In fact, Barbara Kuriger—I really have to say it was probably summed up by what Barbara Kuriger said—she said that there is no problem in the rural sector with farming, everything is booming, nobody has a problem with interest rates, and nobody has a problem with the prices, but they have a problem with the change of Government. That’s, essentially, what she said, and that sums it up in one thing. There’s actually nothing wrong. Everything is fine, except you have got a National Party who are down there scaring the bejesus—with absolutely no evidence—out of the rural sector. It is going to be them.

What I’ll say to those who now may be watching farmers saying how terrible it is that we’re being made to maybe change some practices, when we talk about methane and when we talk about cleaning up our water, is, well, what I say to you is the next generation of farmer will look back at those practices and they will laugh. They will say, “Did we really make no attempt to reduce the amount of methane? Did we really advocate that that should happen? Did we really advocate that there shouldn’t be any of the other changes to cleaning up our water?”

These things are not about farming—I think, again, one of the speakers here said that this is about damaging farming. No; it’s not. This is about ensuring the sustainability of farming. This is making sure that we aren’t doing the practices that we did.

If we don’t change these practices, you will be laughing—I’m sorry, Madam Chair; I shouldn’t use that word.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: That’s correct.

GREG O’CONNOR: Mr van de Molen will be laughing at the practices of his parents and grandparents on the farm, as his sons and grandsons will be laughing at his practices if they’re not changed. This is a good Government doing good work, and the ultimate beneficiaries will be farmers.

Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m very excited to speak on this primary sector. I just wanted to tell Mr van de Molen that I was in fact in the Waikato last Tuesday, and I had a fantastic time there. I’m sure Mr van de Molen would agree with me when I say to him that we have a world-class economy but none of our world-class economy that supports our schools and our hospitals is worthwhile if we don’t have a good environment. Do you agree with that, Mr van de Molen? Oh, you do agree with it. I’m glad you agree with it.

This sector is committed to conservation and environmental sustainability. You don’t agree with that? I’m surprised you don’t agree with that, Mr van de Molen, because—do you know what?—farmers do not get enough credit for their sustainable credentials. We’re not doing anyone any favours if we can’t have a robust conversation. Isn’t that the case, Mr van de Molen? Those are not only this party’s position; those words, which you cry foul over, are the words of your leader.

So he is entirely onside—at least he was last time he spoke at the national Fieldays. I’m not sure what his position is today—certainly not sure what it’ll be tomorrow. But he is very much on board with Labour Party policy.

If we look at these Estimates, we can absolutely see what progress this Government is making to put this sector into shape. We know that the National Party didn’t keep its eye on the ball. We know our fresh water. We can look at six of the statistics around fresh water, but, if we look at all of the others, we know we’ve got problems—problems with nitrates and problems with sediment. I was very pleased to read the Estimates for agriculture, in particular, and look at the work that’s being done.

The Minister was asked about the freshwater policy that’s coming and the fact that we’re consulting on that and that it’s not just a one-step policy but a policy that looks at water from beginning to end—from the trees that we plant on the hills to stop that sediment runoff to putting money into systems on farm so that farmers can have a better understanding—

Mark Patterson: And urban—and urban.

Dr DUNCAN WEBB: And urban. You’re right, Mr Patterson. Urban as well—but here we’re talking about the primary sector, and, whilst I have a vegetable garden, I don’t think it counts. More than that though, not only on farm but also assisting with measuring what’s going on on farm and having clusters of excellence so that what’s going on in DairyNZ already can be extended to other parts—actually putting real money into farms.

Now, we know how important the farming sector is to our economy and the primary sector generally. We know that it generates billions of dollars, and, despite what the naysayers over there would say we hear, we know that it’s in very good shape—that, in fact, exports are up $7.5 billion in the past two years. Milk prices—a lot of analysts are saying that’s going to go up too. Horticulture: doing fantastic. Kiwifruit was, for example, up 25 percent. It’s great to see that notwithstanding the naysayers who talk down business confidence, in fact, our primary sector is strong, it’s thriving, and it really is the backbone of our economy, and it’s great to see.

What’s more, we know—I sit on Finance and Expenditure Committee as well—there’s a lot of debt out there. We know some farmers are under stress. But it’s great also to see particular funding to look after the mental health in our rural communities: $20.8 million for expanding mental health, essentially, in and around farmers. So for mental wellbeing, expanding telehealth and digital health supports to get to those otherwise hard to reach areas.

I must say, as Rino Tirikatene noted, I was very excited about Vote Lands and the discussion there that was had about preserving our pristine natural landscapes in the South Island in particular by the placing of tenure review on hold—not only for the landscapes themselves but also to ensure we preserve biodiversity, preserve our indigenous species, and look after our landscapes not now but for years and years to come, because this is a Government which is taking action today, tomorrow, and for the next three and 30 years. Thank you, Madam Chair.

A party vote was called for on the question, That Vote Agriculture, Biosecurity, Fisheries and Food Safety; Vote Forestry; and Vote Lands be agreed to.

Ayes 63

New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8.

Noes 57

New Zealand National 55; ACT New Zealand 1; Ross.

Votes agreed to.

Social Services and Community Sector and the Joint Venture Package on Family and Sexual Violence

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): Members, we now come to the votes in the social services and community sector, B.5, Volume 10. The debate on this sector includes debate on the joint venture package on family and sexual violence and the Finance and Expenditure Committee’s report on its briefing on the package. The question is that Vote Arts, Culture and Heritage; Vote Building and Construction; Vote Housing and Urban Development; Vote Oranga Tamariki; Vote Pacific Peoples; Vote Social Development; Vote Sport and Recreation; and Vote Women stand part of the Schedules.

ANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour) on behalf of the Chairperson of the Social Services and Community Committee: Thank you, Madam Chair. It’s a great surprise for me to rise and speak in this Estimates debate on behalf of our chair and deputy chair this afternoon, and that is because I am the newest member of the Social Services and Community Committee. However, it has been a privilege to work with the members across the three other parties to review these votes.

The Estimates reviews, reports, and debates play a key role in the financial scrutiny of Government spending. I’ll quickly outline, in my limited time, how I understand that there was some vigorous and robust questioning and answering from members and Ministers. The chair has outlined the vast number of votes, so I won’t go through them; however, I will note we had Minister Robertson, Minister Salesa, Woods, Twyford, Martin, Sio, Sepuloni, Martin again, Henare, and Genter, as well as the under-secretary for family and sexual violence, Jan Logie, and Minister Little, who appeared.

I want to quickly run through the votes in this long list reviewed. First up: social development. In 2019, the total funding for this vote is one of the largest Government expenditures. Nearly 90 percent of this is for benefits and superannuation. As well as meeting immediate and essential need through advancement and hardship grants, Minister Carmel Sepuloni told us that the Government is also working to address cost of living increases. Some initiatives include the Families Package, the winter energy package, BestStart, increasing benefits in line with wage growth, lifting the minimum wage, and removing punitive benefit sanctions with the repeal of section 192 of the Social Security Act. This sanction, the Minister told us, did not incentivise the absentee parent to pay child support. The committee asked questions around reducing long-term welfare dependency and reducing child poverty. The Minister said that the key to reducing the number of children in poverty is to support families in the welfare system in upskilling. We heard about Mana in Mahi and Oranga Mahi. The Minister told us that more than half the people on main benefits have a health condition or disability. Budget 2019 provided $26.3 million over four years to improve the outcomes of those people.

We also heard from the Minister for Seniors about the $600,000 provided to community organisations such as SeniorNet to provide training and teaching facilities to help seniors use and keep up with digital technology.

A second major area we heard from was Ministers Twyford and Salesa on Estimates Vote Housing and Urban Development. A major point of discussion and questioning was around the Government’s KiwiBuild programme. The Minister explained that the Government will complete a KiwiBuild reset, which has now occurred. The Minister spoke about the establishment of the new housing and urban development authority Kāinga Ora—Homes and Communities.

For Vote Oranga Tamariki, we heard from Minister Tracey Martin. Minister Martin spoke about the co-design solutions for iwi Māori. Partnering with iwi means that children who have been uplifted are more likely to be placed with whānau, and we look forward to seeing this work continue.

In Vote Women, we heard from the Minister Julie Anne Genter on the work to close the Public Service’s gender pay gap, which is 10.7 percent for women. The Minister considers that to make significant progress, an area has to be measured, managed, and prioritised. There has been some improvement and there continues to be improvement.

In Vote Arts, Culture and Heritage, the Associate Minister explained that there were not many salaried roles that are available in the creative sector and this area had been previously neglected. Tuia – Encounters 250 recognised 250 years since the first onshore meetings between Māori and Pākehā. Estimates vote Pasifika: a budget of $130 million over four years. The Minister for Sport and Recreation talked about the development of a lower decile school initiative to improve healthy eating, and also about the new strategy that champions participation and visibility for women. Thank you.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Leader of the Opposition): Well, it’s great to be up in New Zealand to talk about the KiwiBuild reset in this housing debate. Of course, KiwiBuild was the centrepiece—[Interruption] Sorry, I hear it over there—I hear some voices. KiwiBuild was the centrepiece Labour Party policy since about 2012. It started under a guy called David Shearer—actually the best Labour leader they’d had in a decade, I would say. They’d then gone through and KiwiBuild has been there and gone through some seven years and several leaders: I think, Mr Cunliffe, Mr Little, and now, of course, Ms Ardern. The KiwiBuild reset we had last week is, in fact, a full-scale retreat—that’s what it is. They’ve raised the white flag and they are entirely in retreat.

I think it’s something Phil Twyford once said—I may be paraphrasing him ever so slightly—“You can’t live in a reset.” You cannot live in a reset, Megan Woods. Don’t take my word for it that this is a white flag retreat we are seeing from the Government. In fact, you don’t even have to go to anyone on the centre-right. Go and talk to the woke young things that those men over there follow on Twitter. Go and talk to the serious, hard, rusted-on left and they will tell you how disillusioned they are with this Government and what it has done with KiwiBuild: the Bryce Edwardses, the Chris Trotters, the David Cormacks, the Bernard Hickeys, the Henry Cookes. The list goes on and on and on.

Here’s what Bryce Edwards had to say. He said, “There are a few positive takes on the ‘reset’, but generally it has been viewed as an embarrassing backdown at best, or at worst a sell-out.” Bernard Hickey didn’t like it much either. He talked about even the changes to it being a distraction meant to sell the capitulation, the retreat, to the public. He said it’s not just a dead rat; “It’s more of a rotting and hairy cat.”—meow. That’s what he had to say. Henry Cooke—and it must have pained Henry to be saying these sorts of things in a column—said it’s a “serious humiliation” for the Government. Well, this is what he said. I know he didn’t like it. Every word pained him, but that’s what he said. No Right Turn: this is a “broken promise” and the tinkering might actually make the housing crisis worse. Well, that’s what I found in about three minutes having a look at this. They go on and on and on. It is a full-scale, white-flag retreat from the Government.

Of course, it comes down in large part to targets. They set a 100,000 houses target—10,000 a year. Now it’s—what did the Prime Minister say?—“As many as we can.” “As many as we can.”—that’s what she’s saying now. Are they having a laugh? Are they having a laugh at New Zealanders when they say this? It’s a David Parker moment: “Trust me; I know what I’m doing.” That’s, effectively, what they’re doing. You know where that quote comes from? Sledge Hammer! Do you remember that show? If you go on Wikipedia and you look up Sledge Hammer!, you see that it’s a satire and a farce. That’s ultimately what we’ve got here with this Government with KiwiBuild.

There’s a serious point about this in KiwiBuild and housing and what they’re doing here, and that’s this: this is what they have done in every other area of Government. It’s the same pattern that we have seen in housing. They take away the targets so that there’s no basis to judge them on. There’s literally nothing there so that it’s appearances on social media, it’s trips to the UN—they’re the sort of things that matter, not actually the stuff that everyday New Zealanders need, like housing. “We’re kind and compassionate; we’re just not up to much.” That’s basically where the Government is at on this.

We’re seeing the same thing in health. We’re seeing the same thing in all the social indicators of food parcels getting worse, of hardship grants, of housing waiting lists. It is a tragedy. It would be satire and farce if it wasn’t so serious for New Zealanders. I’ll tell you what I think “reset” stands for: removing every single explicit target. That’s reset: removing every single explicit target. That is what the Government has done when it comes to KiwiBuild, and, actually, when it comes to health and all the other areas that are in this vote, because the Government’s like an invertebrate jellyfish. That’s what I think—it’s like an invertebrate jellyfish. In the year of delivery, it is marked by a failure of delivery. They simply can’t get it together, and they are failing to deliver on all of their promises. The most significant one was 100,000 houses in KiwiBuild. That was so incredibly important, because if they can’t deliver on KiwiBuild, they can’t deliver on anything—if they can’t deliver here, they can’t deliver anywhere. It was their big promise—I think their big lie, actually—in this area. Kerre Woodham got it right when she said it’s like you started the marathon in the weekend. It’s like the start of the marathon: you look over at that chap and you say, “He isn’t going to finish this.”, and they didn’t finish it in this area.

But, again, don’t believe me—let’s look at the evidence on KiwiBuild that they can’t deliver anything. There’s KiwiBuild, but I think that’s not their worst failure, actually, when it comes to public policy epic fails. I’d say fees-free is worse—$2.4 billion to deliver more students, and there’s fewer. Transport—a tram down Dominion Road. That will never start. And in a bunch of other areas, health, education, economy—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Order! I’ll just draw the member’s attention to the fact that we are actually on the estimates for Vote Housing, for a whole list, and transport isn’t one of them.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I raise a point of order, Madam Chair. The point is this: Mr Speaker today declined the snap debate on the basis that I’d come down and have a whirl here.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): That’s right, and I’ve allowed the member to talk about KiwiBuild, which was the point of the letter, and the reset—which isn’t in the Estimates, but I’ve allowed the member to do exactly that. I’m just asking the member not to go wider than housing or what’s covered by this vote.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: They can’t get it together when it comes to KiwiBuild or, indeed, anything.

What we’ve got are working groups—they know how to do that. I’m actually surprised we don’t have a working group on KiwiBuild, Angie Warren-Clark. I mean, that could be one way to spend the $2 billion, because there’s $2 billion there that they don’t know how to spend. By the way, if you want to think about how they could spend this money on a working group on housing and KiwiBuild, just think about the health one they did, where they spent $9.6 million to do nothing. That’s $32,000 a page for “H2”—$32,000. Well, I say maybe what they’re going to do is have a working group on housing and they’ll get Heather Simpson, they’ll get Steve Maharey, and they’ll get Sir Michael Cullen in, and that can be how they’ll spend the $2 billion, because it seems that’s about as good as their ideas are when it comes to housing.

Where was—and I asked her this in the House today—the Prime Minister at Megan Woods’ announcement on the KiwiBuild retreat? Where was she? We see her here; we see her there; we see her everywhere. She wasn’t there, was she? [Interruption] I hear what they’re saying; I hear them. She was at the same place she was when Nigel Haworth was having to deal with her staff member—nowhere to be seen; missing in action. Because, seriously, that’s—he knows I’m right, actually, over there. We know Mark Patterson, actually, is one of us; he doesn’t like it over there. He’s been slagging off his Labour colleagues around the country; that’s what I’ve been told, quite clearly. That’s the truth—he knows it’s right. She was missing in action, the Prime Minister, when it comes to housing and KiwiBuild, just like she has been in so many other areas, ducking and diving.

But I say to Jacinda Ardern that it’s entirely marginal to focus on all these other things that she does and not on everyday issues for everyday New Zealanders, like housing and KiwiBuild and waiting lists that have grown higher than at any time in history in New Zealand under the New Zealand Labour Party’s watch—not under us. All their excuses wear a bit thin some two years in. The Prime Minister’s got time for talks with Twitter bosses and Facebook bosses, but, actually, these are the things that New Zealanders want her to focus on and want her to deal on.

We’ve got the plan. We know what to do. We’ll be releasing shortly an infrastructure document that will make clear what we want to do in areas such as Resource Management Act reform. This Government’s set up yet another working group in that area. She’s laughing, but David Parker himself has acknowledged the working group in that area won’t even report before the next election. They’ve kicked it into the long grass. Seven years of KiwiBuild, a reset, and then a working group kicked into the long grass. I say, in the words of Megan Woods—and this is what she said at the reset of her retreat last week—“This is actually about calling time on something that hasn’t worked.” Well, I say let’s call time on this Government, because it’s not working either.

Hon PEENI HENARE (Minister for Youth): Tēnā koe, Madam Chair. Thank you very much. First and foremost, can I take the opportunity to welcome the Leader of the Opposition back into the country. He must be slightly disappointed to come down here for a keynote speech and only find no more than nine fellow MPs to support him.

I want to acknowledge, first and foremost, as we look at this particular part of the Estimates debate, the role around Oranga Tamariki. Firstly, can I acknowledge the voices across the country who have expressed themselves with regard to Oranga Tamariki. They want our young people to have a safe and good and prosperous upbringing, and we support them in that. Madam Chair, you will find in the Estimates a clear commitment from this Government with our tamariki. We want to make sure that our young people grow up safe in Aotearoa and are our number one priority. All New Zealanders want to see fewer kids hurt; they want to see more of our tamariki loved and cared for. Under the last Government, we found lots of talk around legislation for Oranga Tamariki but, actually, no support and no delivery—no action.

We remember much raved about change in the legislation, but, actually, where the rubber meets the road, there was a failure. This Government has come in to make sure that that failure no longer persists, and we do that by making sure that our relationships with iwi aren’t simply a memorandum of understanding, because that’s not good enough. A memorandum of understanding does not look after our tamariki. Strategic partnerships that allow iwi, hapū, and NGOs to be involved in the caring and the upbringing of our tamariki is where it’s at, and this Government has delivered on that. We are recruiting more families to look after our people so that our young people don’t move into the institutions that have been pulled through huge debate over the past number of months, with regard to the care of our young people in State care. We are proud about the work that Minister Martin is doing with Tūhoe, and we are proud of the work that she is doing with Ngāti Kahungunu, first to front the issue, and, second, to actually put in place the kinds of resources that will make sure that the aspirations we have for our young people are met.

Speaking of young people, I want to now turn to one of my portfolios under Vote Social Development, and that’s for youth. We wanted to make sure that there was no division when we look at the way we care for our young people. We don’t want to say that once you’ve met a certain age you’re no longer part of the strategy. We want to make sure that children and young people are a part of the strategy, and that there is a coherent one for them moving into the future. I’m proud that as the Minister for youth development, we have grown our partnerships through the partnership board with communities far and wide. We made it clear from the outset that we wanted to have key focus priority groups for the Ministry of Youth Development. We understand we want opportunities for one and all, but I’ve made it clear to the officials, and in the work that we’ve done with regard to the Estimates, that we must focus on the key groups within the youth population that have for too long fallen through the cracks. We know who those groups are—Māori, Pacific people, women, ethnic migrants, rural communities. We also know, too, youth with disabilities, and one that I’m passionate about is rainbow youth.

We’ve managed, in the Estimates, to commit dollars to make sure that as this country grows, we also grow the awareness amongst mainstream Aotearoa of the rights and the aspirations of the rainbow youth community—and that’s important. That’s to make sure that we don’t just support the sector but we actually grow the understanding across this country so that they can help support the sector too and they can help support the aspirations of our young people. We’re committed to doing that.

We do have lots of challenges; there is no shadow of a doubt about that. We talk about KiwiBuild. We talk about Oranga Tamariki. We talk about the aspirations of our people. We know that in the long run, what we are doing is actually making sure that the long-term vision for our people is clear. Their aspirations can be found in this Estimates debate, and their voices can be heard in the issues that relate to them. I’m proud that on this side of the House, we’re taking it seriously. Enough rhetoric, it’s time to put the hard work in.

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): So it’s called the KiwiBuild reset, but, as the Hon Simon Bridges said, it should be called the KiwiBuild retreat. Surely there has never been a more well-pronounced flag-waving policy, from any political party, that has floundered so badly as this.

We should have seen it coming; we always predicted it was all over. We knew it wasn’t working well when after 18 months, it had only delivered some 70 houses, and many of those were just purchased and had been sitting in developer lots for quite a long time, unable to sell. We should have known it was coming, because even though Mr Twyford had set himself up as a bank of last resort for developers, the product was not coming through.

What was worse is we knew that there were subdivisions where houses were suddenly labelled as KiwiBuild homes that could have previously been bought off the private market for a price that was less than the KiwiBuild cap. So what we saw was, in fact, a KiwiBuild programme that was escalating the price of so-called affordable homes in New Zealand.

When we looked at the Budget documents, there was not a mention of it—not a mention of it—anywhere in any of the Budget documents. So for quite some time, the Government has known that this was a complete failure of a policy.

What did we get in the reset announcement? What are the new initiatives that are coming through? Well, there’s no detail—none at all. There’s nothing that would give anybody in this country any confidence that there was going to be a greater supply of land, for example, or affordable housing. Those details, apparently, are going to be filled in later.

When a crisis occurred in Christchurch some years ago, there was an immediate move by the then Government—the National Government—to make land available for houses. At the stroke of a pen, in conjunction with local authorities, 43,000 residential sections were created immediately. Was there ever a real crisis for housing in Christchurch as a result? No, there wasn’t. Whole new subdivisions sprang up very, very quickly, put in place by the private sector. What it shows is that if there is the opportunity to build, the private sector will build. The problem always has been accumulating the funds that are necessary to get into housing.

The only good thing that comes out of the reset is the lowering of the requirements around deposits. The only limitation on that is that it is now strictly limited just to the KiwiBuild product. So that doesn’t help young people who want to go and buy somewhere of their own choice somewhere else. It doesn’t help people getting into a second-hand home, second-owner homes. It is very, very limiting. So there is nothing in this new reset that is at all exciting.

It’s no wonder the Prime Minister didn’t turn up to the event, because there was nothing, really, to announce other than that the target itself had been dropped. We know that this is a Government that is very good at dropping targets—very good at dropping targets.

Then we look at the contribution from the Green Party to this reset: apparently, some kind of rent-to-own scheme. Well, we know that the former Minister, Mr Twyford—the architect from the start of this doomed policy—asked his department over 12 months ago for some kind of information about a rent-to-buy scheme. Who knows what it was that was proposed; we don’t, because we haven’t seen it—it’s not in here. It’s not in the Budget documents; there is no provision for it. But what we do know is that the official information was that it would help a very small number of people.

And why is that? It’s because this Government has gone out and said it won’t sell any existing State homes. So you can have people who’ve lived in that State home and paid the rent all the way through for 25 or 30 years. Calculate that against the capital value of that home and they’ve paid for it—they’ve paid for it. But they can never own it under this Government. There is no opportunity for them, in those often advanced years, to get anywhere near homeownership.

What I would say too is that if we are going to have a rent-to-buy scheme, wouldn’t it be most sensible to look at the areas where there is least demand for State homes yet a number of empty State homes, which we see throughout the country?

MARAMA DAVIDSON (Co-Leader—Green): Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I’m quite pleased to pick up on the theme of housing as the previous speaker, Gerry Brownlee, just finished on. I will start from the essence that housing should be a human right, and that we know in this House—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: No one’s arguing that.

MARAMA DAVIDSON: —that everyone simply needs a home. Mr Brownlee has just commented that no one’s arguing that, and I’m going to pick up on this and drill down into it a little bit more. An understanding across this House that everyone needs a home is a core public good, especially right now in light of the waiting lists for public housing that we have got, and in light of the level of unaffordability that we have reached that has consequently put Work and Income and income assistance lines into perspective—into our conscience—that has driven and contributed to the highest levels of homelessness that we have ever faced, and that is also continuing to see an over-presence of unhealthy homes. We just, I think, a few weeks ago, saw research from the Otago University that linked unhealthy homes to children’s admissions to hospitals. We still have this continuing. So I start with that premise: people simply want—like all of us—to be able to put down roots in their community, in an affordable home that keeps their family well.

I think I’ll start with, after I’ve outlined some of the big challenges that we are facing, the Vote Housing and Urban Development, and that it mentions in the committee report that we saw an increase of 40 percent of the number of applicants on the public housing register. My understanding is that the household list is now over 12,000 on the public waiting list—that actually equals over 70,000 people. So for me, this highlights an urgent and large-scale need to increase public and State housing builds, especially right at this time. I would hope that we could get a cross-Parliament mandate to not just rely on the current model of redevelopment, which still relies on some of the land sell-off offset to be able to fund ongoing State houses. I simply point out that we are in a situation where a large and urgent upscale of State housing builds is certainly a decision on the table amongst all of us at this time.

I start with that conditional position, I suppose, and I then go into picking up on the delivery of the Greens’ confidence and supply priority, which saw the progressive homeownership initiative, the $400 million allocation—a reallocation decision made in Budget 2019—to commit that Budget amount to that supply and confidence priority. I absolutely appreciate working with Minister Woods and Minister Woods’ office in being able to announce that commitment.

It is very important that we take good time to design and come up with good models, and that is why we will look forward to the further details on that before the end of this year. What myself and the Minister have already signalled is that we have got well-established community not-for-profit housing providers who have already been doing this work and showing us that it is possible to be able to build affordable housing to allow those families currently not even hoping for a chance to not just pay off somebody else’s mortgage but actually put down some security and roots of their own to look to having the choice, at least, of owning a home. I again condition that, that this is not at the expense of public and State housing; that this is seen as another important difference that a Government lever can make to assist along the continuum—[Bell rung] Madam Chair? Thank you, Madam Chair; appreciate that—as part of being able to make a huge difference in allowing for more people currently who have given up their hope of owning a home to actually be in a position that, you know, some New Zealanders have the privilege of being in, many of whom require family assistance to even think about putting down a deposit, for example, or having some assistance to apply for a mortgage. When those people who are able to hold down rent at this time have stable but not high incomes, have no extra ability to save for a deposit, then we can put up both Government-backed and working with community housing providers and iwi, for example, to be able to provide that assistance that only too few have got at this very time.

I want to, in this situation, acknowledge Metiria Turei and the longstanding work that she championed to be able to put up this progressive homeownership type of initiative and long fought for, right back to the policy announcements in 2015 or 2016 or so, and it pleases me that we are seeing this come to fruition. It’s one of the proud policy achievements that I’m very, very pleased to be able to keep working on and keep pushing through.

What I then wanted to move towards is that I mentioned before that we have seen a link between damp, mouldy housing and hospital admissions for young children with respiratory infections. I welcome and worked excitedly with Minister Twyford on the healthy homes guarantee, improving our minimum standards towards homes that allow people to feel secure that it is not going to make their children or their elderly people sick. We are continuing to hear stories of people having to miss work, children moving from throat, ear, and nose infections through to rheumatic fever. We are still facing unacceptable conditions when it comes to far too much of our housing stock in this country. I welcome and hope that we will see progressive and urgent enforcement of the healthy homes guarantees that we have worked on, and, you know, I’ve been very public and clear that the Greens would like to see a warrant of fitness for these minimum standards so that in future votes we might look at how we would set up investigators and assessors to be able to—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): But we’re not debating that; we are debating the Estimates in front of us.

MARAMA DAVIDSON: Thank you, Madam Chair. So that was looking through the Estimates for vote housing, still continued.

I hope this is OK—it’s related in vote housing that we then also go to Vote Social Development. I talked about housing unaffordability, and then I wanted to go into Vote Social Development. It is absolutely interconnected when it comes to people’s incomes, and even the Social Services and Community Committee noted that the Welfare Expert Advisory Group recommended an increase to main benefits of between 12 to 47 percent, and that this would make an incredible difference to helping to bring down living costs—or helping to meet high living costs, I should say—and to helping contribute to stability and dignity for people on low incomes. Again, the Greens have been very clear that we support the recommendations of that committee, that Welfare Expert Advisory Group, and that in the committee’s report—I’ve lost the actual page, but it said, from memory, that the committee noted that it does not yet have a plan in the details of when the recommendations from the welfare report are going to be put in place; that the Minister did relay that the Government is working on a three- to five-year plan to respond to the group’s report. I continue to look forward to that plan of how we are going to make a big difference. Again, when you’ve got people like the business leader Phil O’Reilly on mainstream media—who was on the expert group—championing an increase to main benefits because this will also allow not just for dignity but for cash moving around in communities, the Greens absolutely agree with that leadership. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): I would have thought that when the Green member spoke to this Estimate, there might be some attempt to fill out the missing parts of the KiwiBuild reset announced recently. It just confirms what a total retreat it is by the Government from providing affordable homes in New Zealand.

Where the member spoke about the $400 million allocated for some kind of subsidy on deposits for new homebuyers, let’s just look at that for a minute. Well, if that was to be shared on a 5 percent basis across the country for people buying KiwiBuild homes or homes that are inside the KiwiBuild cap, as I think we heard would be the case in the House this afternoon, then that would be around about 8,000 people or couples or families that might get a loan over the period of time that that $400 million is committed for. But here’s the problem—here’s the problem. The annual cost of that loan added to a mortgage, even though that part’s interest free, would mean that up to $500,000 capital commitment—$800-plus a week to buy the home.

Now, tell us here how that is affordable for any family in this country that is considered to be at the lower end of society, people who are doing great work out there, families that are contributing a lot to the country but not earning as higher wages as they might like, having to rely on things like KiwiBuild, which they presumably voted for because they were excited by that policy, only to find out that even after the reset, even after the failure of the 100,000 houses in 10 years—that’s 10,000 a year; in actual fact, in 18 months they got 258 done, and I’ll come to that in a minute, because many of those aren’t sold. Even after all of that belief and a reset, they find that the best they can expect is to stand in line to get a subsidy on a mortgage or on the deposit for a mortgage that becomes a loan, albeit interest-free, but still have to come up with about $800 a week to afford the home, particularly if they’ve got more than a couple of kids and they’re looking to buy a three-bedroom home, where the upper cap is $650,000.

These are big hurdles for people that the Labour Government said they would overcome. They haven’t. Is there anywhere in the reset or anywhere in any of the Estimates that might suggest they’re dealing with the issue of land supply? I spoke before about what had to be done in Canterbury. It works. It makes a difference. But over there, there’s this sort of philosophical view that the Government must not do that and that the Government must do all of the building, or it could negotiate with the private sector to get building done in the Government’s name, even though we’ve seen a complete failure of that concept through the KiwiBuild programme. There are developers out there right now who own some of those 258 homes that have been built so far that have got themselves protected by a $200 million underwrite from the Government. So even though the market is saying these homes are not what’s required, not what people want, the Government has said to the developers, “Don’t worry; right here in the Budget documents, there’s $200 million for the Government to subsidise or guarantee or underwrite the KiwiBuild price.” The joke is that many of those houses were built prior to the scheme even starting.

Then, there was the claim in the House today by the housing Minister that—what was it—25,000 first-home buyers bought houses under their Government. Under what scheme? Under HomeStart. Well, when did that start? Not in the last 18 months—let me make that clear to the House. It’s a previous Government initiative. There was also the claim that this Government has built more public housing than any other Government in New Zealand’s history. When did all those start? The vast majority—the vast majority—were during the term of the last Government.

Then, we come to this: “We’re making houses more healthy. We’re giving people a better environment to live in.” Well, why is public housing exempt—exempt—from the—

Marama Davidson: It’s not exempt, Gerry. They’re not exempt, Gerry. Come on.

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: —insulation rules that are now being faced by the private sector? The member for the Green Party screws her face up and says that’s not true. It is true. Public sector housing does not have to comply the same as private sector housing does, and I think that is an utter disgrace. Then, of course, we’ve got the heating expenses due to come—a good thing. Social housing should comply as well.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Minister of Housing): Thank you, Madam Chair. I thought it was time to take a call and clear up some confusion that seems to be reigning, particularly from Mr Brownlee. One of the things that Mr Brownlee has talked about in the two calls that I’ve been in the Chamber to hear him take was the lower deposit rates, which he acknowledged were a good thing, but he seems to be suffering under the misapprehension that these schemes can be applied only to KiwiBuild houses. That is not the case. In the same way that the HomeStart grants and the Welcome Home Loans could be used on any home in the past, these can—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Yeah, with a cap.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: —also be. There has always been a cap, Mr Brownlee, around those homes. So I think that any idea that these can be applied only to KiwiBuild—I think the member can assure himself and sleep easy tonight knowing that they’re not going to apply only to KiwiBuild homes.

One of the other things that I’ve been hearing from members of the Opposition a lot in the speeches—I heard it from Mr Brownlee; it was certainly in Mr Bridges’ speech: calling this retreat. I’d just like to spell out for members of the House that fixing the housing crisis is not an easy task. We’ve never pretended it is. The party that was previously in Government should know that, because they tried and failed. Now, actually, some of their members are more willing than others to acknowledge this. We’ve had Chris Bishop come out in the last couple of weeks and say that one area where we could’ve done better is housing. Indeed, Simon Bridges said there was actually a housing crisis under National, although he does say it’s hard to be perfect on everything. Well, they certainly weren’t on housing. But in the appropriation that we are examining here, there are a number of things that start the process of addressing a housing crisis, which we have in this country.

First of all, I would like to talk about the KiwiBuild reset and the $2 billion that is appropriated for this Government to be active again in the area of housing—something that hasn’t happened in several decades in New Zealand—and the scale of which we have seen Governments throughout our history who have seen they have a role to play in introducing more New Zealanders to the opportunities of homeownership.

So one of the things that I am absolutely proud of as a Government is that we have had the courage to say, “We need this to work better for New Zealanders.”—that we’re not going to just stay bloody-mindedly going down a certain track because we said it three years ago. What we’re going to do is we are going to make the necessary changes to help more New Zealanders into homes. What I want to know from the Opposition is the money that is under this appropriation that we are talking about—there are 534 affordable KiwiBuild homes currently under construction, 1,546 homes that have been contracted, and a further 8,363 houses that have been committed. Is the Opposition saying they are going to walk away from these homes? Is the Opposition going to say they’re going to stop these homes being built? I would like to know what the answer is to that. On this side of the House, we have made the necessary changes. KiwiBuild is a lever, and to mistake it as a target is a mistake we made and why we have had the courage to reset that.

One of the things that we do want to track are the changes that the private sector are delivering based on this policy. What we are seeing are more and more developers understanding there is demand in the affordable housing sector, in the affordable end of the housing market, and they are starting to deliver houses at these and below the KiwiBuild maximums. When I drive around my home town in Christchurch, I see billboards for home and land packages for $460,000. I see things on Facebook for $415,000. This is the first time the market is starting to believe again that there is going to be demand in the affordable sector.

Now, Mr Brownlee did say that he didn’t see in the appropriation or the reset anything about land supply. Well, I’d like to reassure you again. You can stop being so stressed, Mr Brownlee, because this is a stream of work that is under way by the Hon David Parker. Again, we know that the previous Government tried it for nine years and couldn’t get it across the line. Reforming the Resource Management Act was something the previous Government failed at and something that we have made a commitment to deliver for New Zealanders. Along with that, we also have the work under way by the Hon Phil Twyford around the urban development authority, and this is about providing shortcuts for people to be able to get—[Bell rung] Madam Chair?

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): I call the Hon Megan Woods.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Thank you. And this is about making sure that we do have that land. The Opposition seems stuck in a rut. They think all that you have to do—because it’s what they did in Government—is free up land and, magically, affordable houses—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: It worked.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: —will appear. No, Mr Brownlee, it did not work. You had a target of 39,000 houses under the special housing areas. You delivered 3,100, of which 100 could be classified as affordable. The previous Government failed to deliver for New Zealanders affordable—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Yes, but the previous Government doesn’t actually feature in the Estimates debate.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: No, but we can compare that to what is in the Estimates.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): You can do that, certainly.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Thank you, Madam Chair. Now I would like to move on to another area that has been brought up: the appropriation around public housing and the issue of waiting lists. We have had speakers question why it is that we have an ever-growing waiting list for our public housing. Well, I would like to draw the committee’s attention to the number of public housing spaces that we are building and we are delivering. Now, there’s been a suggestion that these were all planned by the previous Government. This simply is not true. All of the large-scale developments that we looked at when we came into Government—we have put additional public housing places into them, because they are a priority for us.

So when I look at—not the 1,600 we have delivered this year alone—the 2,200 public housing spaces that this Government has delivered for New Zealanders, I am immensely proud. When I reflect on that appropriation, I think of the fact that we have seen, in our recent history, the previous Government finished with 1,500 fewer public housing spaces than they started with. But not only that, there was the opportunity cost that they did not build any either. So let’s do the back-of-the-envelope on that. If 1,600 spaces had been delivered over the nine years they were in Government, plus the 1,500 fewer we ended with, we’d have 14,000 extra public houses in this country. That is our entire State house waiting list. So I think it is important for all of us to reflect on that—that we are a Government that is prioritising housing.

We are making sure that we are addressing homelessness. We are making sure that we are putting in the work that is required to get people into stable housing. We’ve seen the announcement by Ministers Faafoi and Sepuloni around the work that we need to do in terms of stabilising tenancies so that we can get more people into rental properties and that they stay in them. That is one of the critical things that we need to do in the fight against homelessness, and one this Government is committed to. If we work right through that continuum, we’ve got a large body of work around how it is that we can stop paying to put people up in motels, which I know was an emergency measure that the previous Government had to come up with because they had failed in the area of housing.

We had people living in cars. But we are not content for that to be the future for too many of our people and we have committed to a programme of work to put in long-term solutions. There certainly weren’t any waiting for us when we came into Government. We had to come up with it. So in terms of the homelessness we went through, we are a Government that is absolutely committed to social housing, not selling them off but actually adding to them every year, and that is fundamental to what we are doing in addressing housing issues in this country.

We can be proud, on this side of the House, that we are committed to expanding opportunities for homeownership for New Zealanders as well. Not only have we made the changes around lowering the deposit required in a Welcome Home Loan with a HomeStart grant but also we are putting $400 million aside for progressive homeownership.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: What are the conditions?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Mr Brownlee asked for some conditions around that. Well, Mr Brownlee, progressive homeownership is something that’s been up and running in this country for a while. I don’t know if you’ve ever been and visited one, but it can operate in a variety of ways. If we look at the model that the Housing Foundation operate, that is shared equity. If we have a look at some of the other schemes like Habitat for Humanity around rent to buy, there are a variety of conditions. The number that we have said that we will help through this $400 million is between 2,500 and 4,000 families a year over four years. This is substantial, and this is a game-changer.

ANDREW BAYLY (National—Hunua): Thank you, Madam Chair. Well, we waited and we waited and we waited, and I think we’re still waiting, Madam Chair. Nine months in—you know, five postponements, and, of course, we were waiting for those targets. Guess what! No targets. In fact, this has got to be the biggest anti-climax from any Government for so long that most people can’t remember. This is absolute damp squib - type of material. It is unbelievable that we’ve had a Government in power for over 20 months who have delayed and obfuscated and mucked around, only now to finally come to the realisation they can’t deliver it. They’ve mucked around and now they come out with a pronouncement saying they cannot say how many they’re going to build.

I’ve just listened to the Minister talking before, talking about all the stuff that she used to give us a hard time for, and certainly the former Minister of Housing and Urban Development, the Hon Phil Twyford, who used to say those rejoinders like, “You can’t live in a consent.” Well, in fact, that’s just what I’ve heard. I’ve just heard the Minister talking about how many houses are being built—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Planned.

ANDREW BAYLY: Well, where you can’t—and planned. You can’t live in a plan. You can’t live in a consent, and that is the issue. When this Government, this New Zealand First - Labour - Greens Government, made this wonderful pronouncement prior to the 2017 election that they were going to build those 100,000 homes over 10 years—you know, it’s one of those pronouncements that you think can sound great, a fantastic sound bite, wonderfully worked out by some PR agency, but unfortunately you actually have to do a bit of work to make it happen. Well, haven’t the turkeys come home to roost.

It’s no surprise, because for these types of things only God can make pronouncements like that—that we’re going to build 100,000 homes over 10 years—and actually do nothing about it. This is the issue—this is the issue. This is a Government that does not know how to implement. It’s good on the rhetoric but poor on the detail. And here we are, 20 months later, 258 houses—a miserable, poor outcome. Unfortunately, we actually wanted them to build houses. New Zealanders want us to build houses. We all recognise that, and the more houses we build, the better. But this is a Government so inept at implementing and planning, it’s in fact—another word for it—incompetent. The reason it’s failed is—I think that a good analogy is a CEO going into a boardroom and saying to all the board and the management team, “We are going to triple sales over the next three years—triple sales over the next three years.” Everyone in that room would be asking questions like “What products are we going to sell?”; “How are we going to manufacture them?”; “How are we going to distribute them?”; “How are we going to price those products?”; “Do we have enough staff to build them?”

Those are all the types of questions that you would have got in a business world. That’s the type of thing that this Government should have done back in 2017. But, unfortunately, no one in that Government sought to ask those hard questions. That just shows how inept they are. We’ve got New Zealand First saying, you know, that they’re the pragmatic, business orientated party, yet they didn’t ask any questions. They didn’t. It’s all show and no doing—no doing. That’s the problem. So in the context of this sector—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Speaking of context, it would be nice if you just mentioned the Estimates at some stage.

ANDREW BAYLY: Right.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Explain the $200 million underwrite.

ANDREW BAYLY: Yeah, and the Estimates—that’s right, Madam Chair—it’s huge things. If you talk about the 2 billion bucks, if you’re going to build the $2 billion, spend it on these homes. Why aren’t you dealing with some of those issues that any business person would have asked themselves: where are we going to get the shortfall of people to build those homes? And I haven’t heard any of the Ministers, either the Minister of Housing or the Minister for Building and Construction, talking about it. In fact, all this Government’s done over the last 20 months is—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Is it going to be better in the next 20 months—12 months?

ANDREW BAYLY: No, Mr Brownlee. It’s going to get worse, because this Government’s going to rip apart the only organisation that’s good at training apprentices, the Building and Construction Industry Training Organisation. They are going to get ripped apart. So we’re now in a situation where we won’t have the people. We’ve got issues with consenting—heard nothing about that. We’ve heard nothing about promoting new products and technologies, and we’ve heard nothing about off-site manufacturing.

Hon JENNY SALESA (Minister for Building and Construction): I would like to address some of the issues that the last speaker, Andrew Bayly, has spoken about, especially as it pertains to building and construction. So I’ll focus on Vote Building and Construction initially, and then I’ll touch on housing.

We are tackling long-term issues in building and construction. When we came into Government, the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment told us that we were short by 30,000 skilled people in the sector. We know now that in five years—what we’re told is—we will be short by possibly 80,000 skilled people. This is what we were handed by the previous Government. But we’re tackling those long-term problems. It is one of the reasons why we are ensuring that as we procure—one of the things that we have done in Government, and this was launched by the Prime Minister in April of this year. We know that we cannot address this issue on our own in Government. Yes, we’re going through legislative changes in terms of the Building Act 2004, because there are long-term challenges there too. We have been landed with all sorts of issues in the building and construction sector, but in the previous Government, they actually didn’t tackle those issues. We are.

One of the things we’re doing in procurement, and Cabinet has approved this, is as we procure the $41 billion that we procure in Government, we will ensure that we are taking on people to train them, because this is our way in Government of ensuring that we try to level that playing field. We know that only about 10 percent of industry is taking on people to train right now. This is something that our procurement guidelines, which Cabinet has agreed to, will ensure: that we in Government—because we have that lever—are utilising that lever to ensure that we train more people.

In terms of the number of houses that we have, I will go with the words that our Minister of Housing actually said earlier on. We are building over a thousand public houses a year. If the other Government had actually built 1,600 public houses per year, that would be 14,400 public houses. We wouldn’t have such a huge waiting list in terms of all of the folks that are homeless right now. We are here as Government to deliver. We’re here to build and to ensure that more of our people actually get into homes. We are a Government that is delivering and making sure that we have the houses, that we train up our people, that we ensure we utilise our own procurement processes to train more of our apprentices. We are indeed looking out for New Zealanders.

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

Hon LOUISE UPSTON (National—Taupō): Thank you, Madam Chair. This is, of course, the Estimates debate for social development and housing, and I’m going to focus my comments this evening on social development. It is $28 billion per annum of taxpayers’ money, so I do think it deserves a bit of attention in this—this in the year that the Prime Minister has, quite blatantly and repetitively, said is the year of delivery. So what has Labour delivered? An increase in 15,500 job seekers, an increase of 17 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds on benefit—an increase of 17 percent—and a 43 percent increase in benefit advances. Now, those are people that are going further into debt under this Prime Minister’s watch. That’s 172,000 benefit advances, but not just that: half a million hardship grants, and the largest reason—

Simon O’Connor: How many?

Hon LOUISE UPSTON: —half a million—is for food.

So this, supposedly, is Labour’s year of delivery, but what’s even better is one of the Government’s own partners, the Greens, have called Labour out for their failure to deliver for those New Zealanders who need them most. That’s before, of course, we go into the KiwiBuild debacle and the complete retreat of the 100,000 houses. There were many Kiwis out there waiting for those houses to be built, because they knew that was an opportunity for them and stability for their family.

But let’s have a look at a couple of the examples that came out in the Estimates hearing. One of the beautiful ones is Mana in Mahi. Again, the Prime Minister launched it over a year ago, and there were going to be 4,000 places. These are those 18- to 24-year-olds in which I’d said there was a 17 percent increase on benefit—27,000 New Zealanders in that age bracket. Anyway, they launched, with big fanfare, 4,000 places in Mana in Mahi. Oh, less than a year later, it’s a bit of a reset, sounding a bit like KiwiBuild—sounding a bit like KiwiBuild. It’s down to 2,000, and it’s down to 2,000 in four years—oh, but, by the way, of the places that are already there, they’ve got a drop-out rate of 32 percent. This is a Government that is failing to deliver for the very New Zealanders who need them the most. These are young people, 18 to 24, that absolutely—we want them in work, we want them in opportunities, because that’s where their brighter future comes from. So not really the year of delivery for the Prime Minister.

But let’s have a look at the hardship grants. Half a million hardship grants have been given out and the majority of them for food. So what does that tell you? That tells you this is a Government who was having blatant increases in the costs of living for hard-working New Zealanders. So rents are up $50 a week on average, petrol prices—man, don’t even get me started on petrol prices, because that is a significant reason behind why people are getting half a million hardship grants in New Zealand—and, of course, food. But what is the Government’s answer? Oh, they’re going to change the way that the benefits are indexed, and you get excited because you think maybe they’re going to do what the previous Government did under the wonderful Minister Anne Tolley and they’re going to lift benefits. No—not going to do that. What did we end up with? Eleven dollars a week on average per household in 2023. That was their big announcement for families who are currently doing it particularly tough. So it’s not really the year of delivery.

The Prime Minister always talks about how her Government’s a kind and caring Government. Well, actually, it’s not. It is not, because the very New Zealanders who need them the most are being failed by this Labour Government. Children in poverty—8,000 more children living in benefit-dependent homes in the last year, 8,000. We know if a child is in a benefit-dependent home, they are 60 percent more likely to be living in material hardship. That’s an outrage, but that’s these results. That’s the results that this Government’s delivering for New Zealanders. I don’t think it’s much, and I don’t think it’s much for vulnerable New Zealanders who need them most.

What they could’ve done is picked up the social investment approach, which actually targets support to those individuals and families who need it the most. They have the data, they have the information, they have the ability to actually deal with the underlying causes of dysfunction, and they haven’t even done that. They haven’t sorted out and given assistance for their day-to-day issues.

Hon TRACEY MARTIN (Minister for Children): Kia ora, Madam Chair. Thank you very much. It’s a great privilege to rise and speak in the Estimates debate, because what it talks about—it is interesting, and I acknowledge the member who’s just resumed her seat, the Hon Louise Upston. I don’t doubt some of the figures that she’s put out. I do doubt the reason behind them that she’s articulated, but I don’t doubt some of the figures, because what this Government brought to the people of New Zealand, many of them who were desperate—who were desperate—was actually hope. The reason why the waiting lists grew for housing was because they knew that under the previous Government—I know in Warkworth, for example, home builders in Warkworth just used to tell people, “Don’t bother putting your name down on the waiting list for housing under a National Government, because they’re not going to provide you with housing.” The reason why people have come out for food finally is because they know that this Government will make sure that it is provided to them. They were hopeless under the National Government, and the National Government was hopeless at supporting them, but now they have hope, and we’re actually seeing the depredation left behind after nine years of a Government that cared more about dollar signs than they did about people.

But I want to talk about Oranga Tamariki. I want to talk about the work that was begun by the expert advisory panel in 2015 and the legislation that was put in by the honourable member in the Chair, by the commitment made by this country to change from a child crisis service to a child protection service. I want to acknowledge that the expert advisory panel always said that the work begun by my predecessor, the Hon Anne Tolley, and picked up by myself was going to take a minimum of five years. The expert advisory panel also said that it was going to take a Government that was prepared to invest the dollars needed to truly support change—$1.1 billion was invested by this Government into the change for Oranga Tamariki. We have entered into strategic partnerships, making sure that we have recognised the responsibility of the chief executive under section 7AA. I will put it on the record: I believe every chief executive in Government should have a 7AA clause that they are responsible for and accountable to.

So as we move, we now have four strategic partnerships working with iwi in that prevention and early intervention space. The $1.1 billion committed by this Government to the change needed—

Brett Hudson: Could the Oranga Tamariki Minister be talking about working with iwi? Because they don’t see it that way.

Hon TRACEY MARTIN: —for a true child protection service in this country. Mr Hudson probably doesn’t really care, but there are a lot of people who truly do care. The reason why $1.1 billion was invested by this Government into the operating system of Oranga Tamariki was because we need prevention and early intervention, as recognised by the previous Minister, and as recognised by the previous Government, actually—not sure whether Mr Hudson was up to speed on it, but it did come out of the previous Government.

Prevention and early intervention with systems designed to support families—and so we come full circle. It was recognised that the families of New Zealand, before they reach crisis, need to be supported by their Government. That is why this Government makes sure that they do get food parcels when they don’t have food to put on the table. That is why this Government says, “Come out and make sure we know if you have housing issues, because we’re going to do our damnedest to make sure that we can support you.” We are going to work with iwi and hapū and urban Māori organisations to make sure that there are services designed and delivered by Māori for Māori. We’re going to work with our ethnic communities and our Pasifika communities to make sure that before they end up in crisis, where Oranga Tamariki has to step in and actually work with them to place their children into the care of others—remembering that at least 70 percent of the Māori children in the care of Oranga Tamariki are still with whānau but are supported by Oranga Tamariki—that still is not the preferred option for this Government. We want to stop our families coming into crisis, and in this Budget, that is exactly what we invested in.

It was predicted, and requested by the expert advisory panel. It was acknowledged by the previous Government. This Government had the hutzpah to say, “We’re going to put our money where our mouth is. We’re going to”—

Brett Hudson: No, no. Putting other people’s money where their mouths are.

Hon TRACEY MARTIN: —“invest in our children. We’re going to invest in our families.” Mr Hudson is currently taking issue with the fact that we’re investing in our children and our families, but this Government does not resile from it. No matter how many times Mr Hudson shouts out that we should not be investing in prevention and early intervention, we will continue to do so, because we will continue to make sure that we fulfil the vision of the Hon Anne Tolley, of that part of the National Government that actually knew there needed to be change, and thank goodness Mr Hudson wasn’t there, because, obviously, he would have been unsupportive.

Hon KRIS FAAFOI (Associate Minister of Housing (Public Housing)): Just for those who are watching at home, I just want to reflect on some of the contribution that was made by the last speaker from the Opposition, Louise Upston, because it has become clear to me over the last three or four months that the Opposition doesn’t care about facts. It is trumpeting a lot of misinformation and has gone full Trump in its desperate efforts to try and discredit a lot of the good work that this Government is doing, and the one example that I would like to bring to your attention is that Louise Upston said that there were originally 4,000 places in Mana in Mahi and we’ve backtracked that to 2,000. That is an out and out mistruth. She knows what she’s doing, and—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Order! Order! No, you can’t actually accuse a—

Hon KRIS FAAFOI: OK. Well, that is not correct, and everything you hear tonight from the Opposition—I suggest everyone at home who is listening to this take it with a grain of salt, because I would like to give credit to my colleague the Hon Willie Jackson for the Mana in Mahi programme, which started out as 150 places. We’ve increased it to 2,000 places, not what Louise Upston said, where we’ve scaled back from 4,000 to 2,000. That is the extent of the desperation from the other side of the House, where they would blatantly go out and misinterpret or put misinformation out there to make the good work of this Government that we’ve done in the last 24 months look bad. But I think getting called out by that is one of the only ways that we can counter that.

So I’m really looking forward to the rest of the contributions from the members on the other side of the House, to see what other misinformation they may be putting out there, because I want to give those people on that side of the House one figure that you cannot argue with, and that is 3.8 percent unemployment—the lowest unemployment in 11 years, lower than it was in the previous nine years of the National Government, and you cannot argue with that. We are making sure that people have got jobs and are able to support their families, because we have delivered the lowest unemployment rate—3.8 percent.

I am proud that we are tackling the long-term issues, and one of my recent, new responsibilities is around housing, and we are doing an excellent job of ensuring that public housing spaces are available for New Zealanders that need it. We inherited a position where the previous Government was selling off State houses, not building them. The waiting lists are growing, and we are building more houses, and we’ve got a goal of 6,400 more public houses over the next four years to ensure that people have a safe, warm and dry, and affordable home to live in. In fact, that’s 1,600 on average per year, and in the previous 12 months to June, we overshot that mark by about 700. So we’re doing an extremely good job of building homes faster and making sure that they are affordable homes for New Zealanders to live in.

So what did we inherit? We inherited a housing crisis that the previous Government said, and it promised around special housing areas, that it would build 39,000 homes. What did they deliver? Three thousand homes, and only 100 of those homes were affordable homes. That is a fact, and let’s see what they say on the other side of the House, as opposed to what this Government is doing, and delivering those 6,400 homes to make sure that those people who desperately need a home are going to get it. We aren’t a Government that is going to sell off State houses; we are a Government that is going to build State houses. We are not a Government that is going to sit back and watch foreign investors come into New Zealand and ramp up the prices of those houses and make those houses unaffordable to Kiwi first-home buyers. So we have already, in our first 24 months, ensured that foreign buyers cannot buy homes here in New Zealand unless they want to build, and add to the housing stock.

This is a Government that is focussed on the long-term issues for New Zealanders, which is why my good friend and colleague Megan Woods, in the reset, is doing things to make sure that homeownership is more realistic for New Zealanders, by giving them some assistance. I have been with her over the last couple of months, talking to community housing providers, talking to banks, talking to those in the sector to make sure that New Zealanders have a better pathway to homeownership, and we are dealing with the issues that the previous Government ignored, which means that waiting lists are going up and will probably get worse before they get better. But we are doing something about it, when that previous Government did absolutely nothing.

SIMON O’CONNOR (National—Tāmaki): Oh, I’m quite excited about this. I’ve been up and down like, I don’t know, a yo-yo for the last, well, few hours. Look, if delivery by this Government was based on rhetoric, working groups, spends of money which achieve nothing, and empty promises, then I am the first on this side of the House to admit the Government is delivering, for, indeed, that’s all it has. Everything else, anything of substance, has been, and continues to be, an absolute, utter failure. This was incredibly, incredibly clear when we went through the Budget documents and the Estimates discussions, particularly around social housing, which I’m the spokesperson for, but right through the social development side of things.

In fact, even some of the facts that the Minister supposedly just put on the table make absolutely no sense. First-home buyer rates are as high now as they ever have been, regardless of any changes to foreign buyers. In fact, the other side of the House knows darn well that, actually, first-home buyers had been doing quite well, thank you very much, for many, many years. Those percentages have not changed. The area where the real challenge has been is homelessness, transitional housing, social housing, and beyond, and this Government has delivered absolutely nothing. When you went through the Budget documents, that was absolutely evident. [Interruption] The Minister scoffs, and I will actually touch on one thing they are delivering: it’s a cash load of money, which is just a sign of failure.

But, fundamentally, in homelessness, the Labour Government is just doing what the National Party did: more money into Housing First. Thank you, National. That was something we introduced. So thank you, Minister, for continuing that. We’d love, at some point, the recognition to come to this side of the House to say, “Thanks, National. You introduced that.” It would be jolly decent of you.

In the social housing space—other colleagues have touched on it—there was the absolute failure of KiwiBuild. It was an absolute bribe to the public of New Zealand in an election period—100,000 homes over 10 years—which has absolutely, fundamentally, not been delivered. That was very clear. We knew it was coming. Amongst other reasons, all the rhetoric changed. The Prime Minister couldn’t even mention the K word, “KiwiBuild”. But in the Budget documents, it was very clear it was all being wiped away in fact. In fact, on Budget day, as we moved into urgency, what we saw was a new piece of legislation slid in. Nice little Māori name there, Kāinga Ora, where KiwiBuild, Housing New Zealand, and HLC were all just going to be all blended in together, just to fudge it all quite nicely.

Hon Carmel Sepuloni: It’s a “Nice little Māori name”.

SIMON O’CONNOR: So let’s have a look—yeah, Kāinga Ora. So very interesting, because it’s gone under the radar of most New Zealanders, deliberate as it was. Huge failure. Then we had, of course, the reset. I think of it as the great retreat. A reset, I said, certainly around KiwiBuild. Now there’s just a target to build as many houses as we can. Well, sort of, I don’t know, news, perhaps, to this House: every Government’s target is to build as many houses as they can, as quick as they can. What a massive, massive retreat—massive, massive retreat. There’s a huge talk about the houses that have been built. Well, you can’t correlate that with the fact that the housing register, the number of families waiting now, has over doubled in 18 months—in 18 months. It’s doubled. It’s over 12,000, and, as I said to some people the other day, it’s easy just to get, sort of, caught in the statistic. That is 12,000 New Zealanders who are struggling, and what is the answer from the other side? Rhetoric, and absolutely nothing.

In fact, that’s not fair to say just rhetoric, because the other thing we discovered when we were going through the Budget documents is that the amount of money that this Government is budgeting for emergency social housing grants is about to go through the roof—about to go through the roof. That is an admission of failure in black and white in the document, because if it was true that this amazing—well, supposedly amazing; I shouldn’t mislead the House—Government was going to solve the social housing crisis, house those 12,000 people, solve everything, then why is it that in the social development budget, over $118 million has been budgeted, and $120 million in subsequent years, for emergency housing grants? Bear in mind we spent about $27 million to $30 million in the last year. This is a blatant admission of failure by the Government that not only do they have no solutions other than throwing some cash around—and by the way, New Zealanders, that’s your taxpayer cash—they’ve got no solutions. When they talk a huge game about all these houses they’re going to build, why is it that they need over $120 million a year more?

Hon CARMEL SEPULONI (Minister for Social Development): Can I start on a positive note and say that it’s a privilege to be able to present to the Social Services and Community Committee as the Minister for Social Development and also the Minister for Disability Issues. Can I thank the select committee for the questions and, I guess, the interrogation which really is the Estimates hearing. But it’s a good opportunity for us to be able to talk about what we’re doing and why we’re doing what we’re doing.

I might just reflect on Simon O’Connor’s words where he said that we should be thanking National. Well, can I just say, Mr O’Connor, that, clearly, given the housing crisis that we encountered when we came in, and the fact that we even have an emergency housing special-needs grant in the first place—those would be two things that we would need to thank the previous Government for. Because of the fact that there was so much inaction over nine years, we have been left with a system where so much has been neglected and it’s our responsibility to fix that up. So we do take that seriously.

We heard from the other side about the housing pressures, and we certainly feel that in the welfare space with our social security system. Wherever there are large numbers of special-needs grants given out, by and large, they are given out in areas where there are housing pressures. So in response to the people who come through the welfare system, it is important that we do have a cross-Government response to respond to all of the needs that they encounter. Housing, by and large, is the biggest cost, expense pressure, that many of the households who are in the welfare system experience.

Can I say that what we put through this Budget and we spoke about at Estimates really did build on the Families Package from last year. That was a $5.5 billion investment, money that went into the pockets of low to middle income households, and they were in desperate need of that investment. So reflecting on that, of course, there was the Best Start payment, because this Government is about investing in our children. We saw the winter energy payment—that goes to almost or just over one million New Zealanders every winter.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): That’s not actually in this. Come on, let’s focus on 2019-20.

Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: Many other—many other—positive things came out of the Families Package, but this year we built on that. This year, what we saw, finally, was the removal of the discriminatory deduction from benefits for sole parents who didn’t name the other parent of the child. This benefits around 12,000 sole parents, with around 24,000 children in those households. On average, they will be better off with that one shift by around $34 a week.

We also saw the historic and systematic change to our welfare system which was the indexation of main benefits to wages, which will see over time benefits continually increase. We need to remember that what has happened is that because they haven’t been fixed to the Consumers Price Index, they haven’t kept up, so people in beneficiary households have been left behind.

We also saw the investment towards work that this Government has focussed on. Firstly, with the lift of abatement thresholds for those on benefits who work, in line with minimum wage increases, which will ensure that those that work can keep more of what they earn, and will benefit around 73,000 low-income individuals and their families. Also, what we’ve seen is a refocus back on to work, through the Ministry of Social Development and our Work and Income offices—an additional 263 front-line staff who will be focussed on work—because we know that the vast majority of people who come through the welfare system, of course, need stabilisation of their financial situations but also do want to work, and they just need that support to do so. Unfortunately, under the previous Government there was a steady decline in the work focus because there wasn’t that investment in the space that those on benefits and through the welfare system needed.

On top of that, I’m really proud of the fact that we’ve invested an additional $26 million over the next four years in Oranga Mahi, which will see a focus on those with disabilities and health conditions who face additional barriers to employment getting the support into employment that they need. We need to remember that in our welfare system—and this is overlooked all too often—around 52 percent of those on main benefits have a health condition or disability, or are caring for someone with a disability or a health condition.

Hon LOUISE UPSTON (National—Taupō): Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m pleased to take another call. I want to respond to the accusation that was laid by Minister Faafoi about the facts that I provided in my earlier contribution. I just want to give credit to the Ministry of Social Development and their quarterly statistics, to the Minister that’s just resumed her seat, Carmel Sepuloni, and to the Prime Minister for the figures that I used in my contribution. So, of course, benefits statistics come from the quarterly statistics—you might like to read those, Minister Faafoi. For your information, that does show 15,500 people increased on job seeker benefits in the last year. He thinks that’s boring. I don’t think taxpayers will think that’s boring, particularly when you use this House to allege incorrect information.

The Prime Minister’s quote, when she launched Mana in Mahi, “Thousands of young people will be given the chance to gain valuable qualifications”—you might want to read this in case you haven’t already. “Thousands of … people will be given the chance to gain valuable qualifications and meaningful work”. Here we go, a few paragraphs down: it’s going to start with 150 people and be up to 4,000 in a year’s time—in a year’s time. That year’s up. Oh, guess what! The number’s reduced to 2,000. So check your facts out, Mr Faafoi, before you make accusations in this House. There are 8,000 extra children in benefit-dependent homes—your own ministerial colleague. Check your facts.

MAUREEN PUGH (National): Thank you very much, Madam Chair. It’s been a very interesting and spirited debate on the Estimates for this year for one of the big ticket items of any Government, the social sector. It does deserve a good hearing, which we have seen.

In the social development and housing sector, we have a raft of votes including arts, culture and heritage, sports and recreation, vote building and housing, Oranga Tamariki, Pacific peoples, and social development, within which are a number of other portfolios like social housing and Vote Women.

The year 2019 was named the year of delivery. Apart from the original announcement about 2019 being the year of delivery, I don’t think I’ve heard it mentioned again. As we look through these Estimates, it’s actually clear to see why, because this Government is actually failing to deliver on their own policies in their year of delivery.

The Estimates show, and over time we have seen this, that the more and more you throw money at a particular policy area, unless it is delivering actual outcomes, all you’re doing is wasting money. That was a very clear message that I received when I became an MP. That was when we started talking about social development. Because we have got such an enlightened group of people on this side of the Chamber, we realised that the more money you threw at an organisation that wasn’t producing outcomes—it was clear there needed to be change, and so was born Oranga Tamariki. Billions of dollars are spent in this field, but what we needed was the change for those members of our community who needed it the most so that they got appropriate and timely support, while always noting that our children were always to be at the heart of this organisation.

So it’s very good to see that the Estimates do still continue to support Oranga Tamariki, but we have heard many times during this debate about the waste of billions of dollars that we have seen invested into KiwiBuild. Again, it’s one of those areas that has not been delivered on by that Government over there, and it has not delivered the relief that was promised for those wanting to access affordable homes. Now, National is a party that supports homeownership. We can see that there is need for support for first-home buyers, but even though KiwiBuild was held out to be the saviour, this has not been delivered.

I’ve heard in these debates today the criticism of selling off social housing, and National did sell off social housing, but what they’ve failed to explain in that rhetoric is that, actually, those social houses were sold to social housing providers. Those social houses are still tenanted by the people who need social housing. The difference is the social housing providers wrap the support around their tenants that they need and deserve. So it is a complete package now. We don’t just send them away, put them in a State house, and walk away and forget about them, and that is what I mean by throwing more and more money at a policy and getting the same results. Unless you do things differently, you are always going to get what you always got, and I have to pay tribute to those NGOs that have gone out there and provided that social housing support for their tenants.

I’d like to turn my attention to the Minister who came to the meeting for the Estimates around the seniors. We heard that the Minister was very keen to create a position called the commissioner for seniors, but that, again, remains something that this Government has failed to deliver on.

What I’ve found really revealing about the lack of delivery from this Government was that in June this year, the president of Grey Power, who was also disappointed in this Budget, said “It is obvious that the wellbeing of seniors is well down the list of priorities of the current Government, with absolutely nothing for seniors.” Then he went on to say “The pre-election promise of the appointment of an aged-care commissioner”—promised to be announced in the first Budget of a Labour-led Government—“has been ignored. Meanwhile, seniors continue to suffer and make headlines for all the wrong reasons.” Again, another very disappointing outcome from this Government.

Hon CARMEL SEPULONI (Minister for Social Development): I know that we don’t have much time left in this debate, so I thought that I’d just say a few words to close. I just wanted to really start by saying that what will be evident in this debate tonight, and through the Estimates debate in general, will be that this side of the House is looking to tackle the long-term challenges that we face as a country, that we’re looking ahead 30 years and not just three, and that we’re taking seriously the future of New Zealand and New Zealanders.

Before, I was talking about the focus that we have now in the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) on work—a focus that was missing with the previous Government—and I really wanted to just expand on that a little bit. We have said, right from the beginning, that where people are able, we want to support them to be learning, earning, caring, or volunteering. It’s a much more fulsome approach to New Zealanders, if you ask me, and an approach that will ensure that we don’t end up with the same churn on and off and on and off benefit that we saw under the previous Government.

The investment in work so far is really starting to show off, and, in fact, the investment overall with regards to how we treat people at the front line who come through MSD offices. Just the other day, I was at the Māngere MSD office. They’ve gone from having 300 appointments a day to 180—180. Now, how they have done that is by making sure that when people come to them for support, they traverse their circumstances and they give them all of the support that they need, so they don’t have to go three or four times just to get the support in the different areas that they need it.

Then, what that means is that by doing that, they’re able to be much more proactive, once they’ve stabilised someone’s financial situation, with respect to the work focus. So the site manager there was telling me that now, they’re freed up to be able to make proactive phone calls to the people that have come through, just to follow up to see whether or not they have been getting the support into upskilling and training and work that they need. That is the culture shift that we were after as a Government.

That side of the House has alleged that we were all about being soft on beneficiaries, but, actually, what we know on this side of the House is that the punitive approach that has been taken for far too long over the last nine years is not what worked. In fact, treating people with dignity and respect, working to stabilise their financial situation, and then working with them where they’re at to get into meaningful and sustainable employment is what New Zealanders want.

So I’m very proud of the achievements that we’ve made to date in the MSD space. I’m looking forward to many more, and can I say that with some of the information I’ve seen recently, we can expect a lot more good news in this area. Thank you very much.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): The time for this debate has now expired.

A party vote was called for on the question, That Vote Arts, Culture and Heritage, Vote Building and Construction, Vote Housing and Urban Development, Vote Oranga Tamariki, Vote Pacific Peoples, Vote Social Development, Vote Sport and Recreation, and Vote Women be agreed to.

Ayes 63

New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8.

Noes 57

New Zealand National 55; ACT New Zealand 1; Ross.

Votes agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That clauses 1 to 10 and Schedules 1 to 5 be agreed to.

Ayes 63

New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8.

Noes 57

New Zealand National 55; ACT New Zealand 1; Ross.

Clauses 1 to 10 and Schedules 1 to 5 agreed to.

House resumed.

Bill reported without amendment.

Report adopted.

Bills

Remuneration Authority (Members of Parliament Remuneration) Amendment Bill (No 2)

First Reading

Hon IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety): I move, That the Remuneration Authority (Members of Parliament Remuneration) Amendment Bill (No 2) be now read a first time. I nominate the Education and Workforce Committee to consider the bill.

The Remuneration Authority is an independent body responsible for setting the remuneration of key public office holders such as members of Parliament, judicial officers, elected local government officials, and the Governor-General. For all positions except members of Parliament, the authority sets remuneration by taking into account criteria set out in the Remuneration Authority Act 1977. MPs’ pay is a matter of considerable public interest, and the Act has been amended a number of times over the past 10 years. Most recently, in 2015, Parliament amended the Act to remove the authority’s discretion and introduce a formula that linked MPs’ salaries to the percentage increases in the average weekly wages of public servants. It’s worth noting that the Remuneration Authority has no discretion in setting the proposed increase, as the increase is determined by a formula set in law. This formula has resulted in unacceptably high percentage increases to MPs’ already high salaries compared to the previous criteria-based approach.

Since the 2015 changes, MP salary increases have ranged from 2.46 percent to 4.06 percent per year compared to average increases of 1.7 percent in the four years prior to the 2015 changes. In absolute terms, the dollar increases since 2015 are also higher. Given the level of pay MPs receive relative to the average wage in New Zealand, a high percentage increase can result in a significant increase to the total amount that MPs are paid. The repeatedly high annual pay increases under this formula call into question whether the settings for determining MPs’ pay are fit for purpose.

Members will recall that last year, the Prime Minister announced a freeze on MPs’ pay, which was implemented by Parliament, because the increase at the time proposed under the formula was unacceptably high. As part of that pay freeze, the Government reviewed the mechanism for determining increases in MPs’ pay. Officials consulted the authority to test options and to ensure that any proposed changes would be fit for purpose.

The Government believes that the current system for setting MPs’ salaries is unfair to taxpayers and must change. The Government has introduced this bill to address the issue of disproportionate increases in MPs’ total remuneration by restoring the legislation to its pre-2015 position and returning discretion to the authority.

The bill amends the Remuneration Authority Act 1977 and the Members of Parliament (Remuneration and Services) Act 2013 to establish a new process for how the authority sets the salaries of MPs. The bill restores the authority’s discretion to determine MPs’ salaries based on criteria. Other public office holders whose salaries are already adjusted based on the criteria have received smaller pay increases than MPs. The authority favours this criteria-based approach and considers that this would equip it with the flexibility to take into account changing circumstances or changing requirements of roles and would be the most durable system for setting MPs’ pay. The bill restores the requirement for the authority to consider the value of the personal benefit arising out of entitlements when setting MPs’ salaries. This requirement was removed in 2015, and the authority did not support its removal.

The bill requires the authority to make this year’s determination of MPs’ pay under this restored system. Finally, the bill links the authority’s reviews to the electoral cycle so that the authority would conduct one review after each general election and would set MPs’ pay for the entire term of Parliament, specified on a year-by-year basis.

I’d like to briefly comment on how these changes fit with the Government’s wider plan. The Government is committed to ensuring that all New Zealanders share in our economic success. Wages are starting to rise as a result of the Government’s policies, meaning more New Zealanders are sharing in the benefits of economic growth. Figures out in August show average ordinary-time hourly earnings of $32.37 an hour were up 4.4 percent from a year ago—the biggest rise since June 2009. The minimum wage has gone up to $17.70 this year. This is benefiting approximately 209,000 workers, lifting wages throughout the economy by $231 million per year and making a big difference for working families. For a full-time worker, this means an extra $48 a week before tax—enough to make a real difference for working people.

Those changes have ensured that working people in New Zealand are receiving fair wages. We need to ensure that those of us who receive the highest earnings remain in touch with those increases and those rates of pay for ordinary working people. This bill responds to the disproportionate growth in MPs’ salaries and will ensure that in the future, MPs’ salaries are reasonable and justified in relation to the increases received by working Kiwis. I commend this bill to the House.

BARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki - King Country): In August last year, after the Remuneration Authority proposed a 3 percent increase for the year to 30 June 2019, the current Government announced that it proposed a pay freeze and a review of the formula setting for MPs’ salaries. It said that MPs’ salaries had risen at a rate out of proportion with wage growth for most of New Zealand. We understand that MP pay is always a contentious issue. In August last year, we supported the Government’s bill to freeze MP pay and a review taking a look to see if there was a more fair way to set it which the public thinks is appropriate. The Remuneration Authority (Members of Parliament Remuneration) Amendment Bill (No 2), introduced on 28 August 2019, is the result of that review, and we look forward to examining the proposals in this bill at select committee, where the public of New Zealand will have the opportunity to have their say. We support this bill. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

JAN TINETTI (Labour): I’m delighted to take a call here tonight on the Remuneration Authority (Members of Parliament Remuneration) Amendment Bill (No 2). Knowing that this bill has such a long name, I’m not going to take very long here this evening on this particular call. But I’m excited, too, that this is coming to the Education and Workforce Committee as a bill. I think it is, as the previous speaker, Barbara Kuriger, has just said, a result of the work that has been done around MPs’ pay. I’m looking forward to our select committee examining this further and looking forward to the submissions that we have coming forward and having a really, really good in-depth look at it. We are wanting to create a more productive and sustainable and inclusive economy in this Government, and this bill fits in as part of that work plan. With that, I’ll leave it at that, and I commend this bill to the House.

SPEAKER: The question is—

Clayton Mitchell: Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: Clayton Mitchell.

CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): Whew—I thought I was going to miss my call then. It’s the quick or the dead around this place.

SPEAKER: Well, the member needs to call.

CLAYTON MITCHELL: Oh, I did. I was up on my feet when I looked across the House and saw nobody rising. So thank you very much, sir. I will only be taking a quick call on this.

Look, the Remuneration Authority (Members of Parliament) Remuneration Amendment Bill (No 2) is a very pragmatic bill, and it’s great to hear our National colleagues across the House that support this bill. It’s going to be a very interesting select committee process as this bill goes through. Just in the six years that I’ve been in Parliament—or almost six years—we’ve had two wage freezes, which I think has been necessary. As the Minister has pointed out, the formula that has been created previously actually created a larger than expected increase on the salaries of MPs. To freeze these wages over these two separate times was a pragmatic approach. I think it was muchly appreciated. But also, in 2009, wages were frozen by a decision made by the members of Parliament because, of course, we went through a recession. It’s very hard to justify in this House—you know, working on behalf of all New Zealanders—that we were going to get an increase of 3 percent but the rest of New Zealand were on their knees feeling that pinch.

So this bill will enable future freezes as well, but it does two things. The bill makes two major changes to the system of setting MPs’ pay. Firstly, it returns the discretion in pay setting to the Remuneration Authority, without the use of a formula. Like other public office holders regulated by the Remuneration Authority, MPs’ pay would be set in accordance with some factors, which are outlined inside the bill. The other thing that it does, which I think is quite important, is that the MPs’ pay will occur once every three years, at an election cycle, and then be looked at annually throughout that term as it comes through. So those are the two major changes.

But I want to dispel a couple of myths because of the amount of people that talk to me out there and say that, you know, it’s terrible that New Zealand politicians, when they finish up a couple of terms in Parliament, get their salaries paid for the rest of their life. That’s absolutely not true. They said, “Oh, I thought you only get 80 percent of your salary.” I said, “No, that’s not true either.” It did happen many, many, many moons ago. I think that was stopped in about 1992, wasn’t it?—I think, from memory. It might have been—

SPEAKER: Yes, it was. I remember it well.

CLAYTON MITCHELL: Yeah, 1992. To dispel another myth, for those people tuned in at home listening, we don’t get 10 percent flights on Air New Zealand for the rest of our lives either. So thank goodness for that opportunity some people say. Great to see those sorts of things tidied up.

But I think in the select committee process we’re going to probably hear from a number of submitters. I’m sure we will hear that some submitters think we shouldn’t be paid anything at all, and that may be true for some members of Parliament; maybe they shouldn’t be paid anything at all. But in actual fact, I think the majority of New Zealanders feel that the pay needs to be in accordance with other likeminded work that is done—the hours and the commitment and the outputs that are happening. I just want to also underline, before finishing off my contribution, that it’s been great to be part—over the last two and a bit years—of working towards lifting up our minimum wages, working towards helping out those people that are the most vulnerable workers in society to have a $17.70 minimum wage. Working towards that $20 per hour over the next two years is absolutely vital in providing that we can add value to those hard-working New Zealanders, and I feel like we’re contributing well and truly to the wellbeing of all Kiwis.

So we will be supporting this bill. I want to acknowledge and thank the National Party for their support moving forward, and we look forward to this bill getting to select committee so we can hear from submitters. Thank you, sir.

Hon JAMES SHAW (Minister for Climate Change): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Here we are again: a group of members of Parliament attempting to avoid the embarrassment of riches that occasionally accidentally shower down upon us once every few years—trying to correct for mistakes made by the last Parliament on this matter. I imagine, Mr Speaker, as you’ve just pointed out remembering the changes in the early 1990s, that you’ve been through versions of this debate many, many times over. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could actually work out a way to get it sorted and not have to deal with it every Parliament?

I had the dubious pleasure of being in the Parliament in 2015 when we debated the last set of changes that were pushed through under urgency, which pegged MP remuneration increases to the Public Service rate. I have to say I said at the time that this is what would happen—that we would end up with even faster rates of increases if we pegged them to the Public Service rate than we would if we’d pegged them to the median rate, because that’s the way things happen. And that is actually what happened. So here we are attempting to unwind something that we pushed through under urgency in 2015, when you then had a group of members of Parliament attempting to unpick a piece of algebra late in the night, none of which made much sense. The inevitable thing happened, and here we are attempting to fix that by restoring the law to the way it was prior to 2015.

I want to commend the Minister Iain Lees-Galloway for the work that he has done across the House to get us to this point. He will know that the Green Party has quite strong views about MP pay, and I will state them again for the sake of the House, because we are supporting the bill because it is an improvement. It does reverse the error that was made in 2015, but it doesn’t do what we would like it to do. The Green Party believes, and has believed for a very long time, that what we should do is peg MP remuneration to the nominal change in the median weekly income of all New Zealanders according to the household labour force survey (HLFS)—not the percentage but the actual nominal amount. What that would then do is it would give members of Parliament a really crystal clear idea of what is going on out there in the rest of the country in terms of the movement in people’s actual real lives. If you want the House of Representatives to be representative, I think that one of the places that you could start would be for MPs to have an awareness, in very real terms, of what changes are going on in the median weekly wage.

One of the things that should change about this bill, in our view, would be to remove the clause that says that MPs’ pay cannot go down, it can only go up. If you peg MPs’ pay to the nominal change in the median weekly wage according to all income sources, according to the HLFS, then MPs’ pay could go down, because actually the median weekly wage has in times past gone down. If we are going through tough times as a country and the median wage goes down, I believe, and the Green Party believes, that, actually, MPs’ pay should also go down to reflect that. It gives us a sense of reality about what’s going on in the world.

So those are changes that we would like to see to this bill. We will be supporting it through the House, but we would be very keen in the subsequent stages to engage in a debate with our colleagues across the House about what we think is a measure which would both, in very real terms, tie us to the average Kiwi, the average New Zealand family, but also, I think, help to close the gap, because you have to understand that members of Parliament are in the top 2 percent of salary earners in the entire country. As long as we keep getting percentage increases, that gap only increases—it just gets bigger and bigger and bigger all of the time between us and the average. So if we were to say “Well, we’re going to tie our remuneration to the nominal changes.”—not the percentage increase but the actual cash amount and the changes in the median wage—then what would happen is that, over time, our salaries would flatten out and the gap between us and the median would start to close. Again, I think that that would give us a better sense of reality.

To give you an illustration: at the moment, a backbench MP earns just under $165,000. If our proposal had been in place since 2011, a backbench MP’s pay would be $11,000 lower than it is today: just a nudge over $150,000. Therefore, obviously, the gap would be closer to the median than it is today. So I think that that is a proposal that we have debated a number of times and that we have put to the House, and we will put it to the House again through the various stages of this bill. I think, given that Parliament consistently does seem to get it wrong on this issue, but given that nobody else is around to change the law on this other than Parliament, actually, we would like that proposal to warrant serious consideration.

So those are the changes that we’ll be looking for. As a number of other speakers have mentioned, there is a change in this bill that we think is a very good idea, which is the idea of shifting from annual changes to simply one per parliamentary term. We think that that makes a lot of sense. It means that if it does come up for debate, it only comes up for debate once every three years rather than every year, and you don’t get into the kind of silly situation that we’ve had of freezing and then debating and then changing the system, and then finding out that that didn’t work, and then freezing them again and going through the whole goat rodeo and wasting an enormous amount of time on behalf of the relevant Minister who has been saddled with the task of attempting to unpick this, at least for this parliamentary term until we go at it again next parliamentary term.

So, again, I just wanted to say we are supporting the bill. We do think that the system that was in place prior to the changes in 2015 is better than those changes that were introduced in 2015. However, that system itself was flawed, and we would like to see further changes to the bill and to the way that MPs get paid, and we think that that would only be fair. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Bill read a first time.

Bill referred to the Education and Workforce Committee.

Bills

New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill

Second Reading

Hon SHANE JONES (Minister for Infrastructure): I move, That the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill be now read a second time.

First I want to acknowledge, on behalf of my colleagues, the efforts expended by the Finance and Expenditure Committee in bringing the bill back. I think this is a rare event where both—if not all sides of the House, then certainly the National Party will join with us in ensuring that this bill passes expeditiously. I want to spend a wee bit of time just elaborating and reminding us what the purpose of this bill is, and then I will identify the refinements that the select committee have served up to us. But, as I said, the leadership of the select committee went through a slight change during the course of the bill’s evolution, and I want to acknowledge both of those chairs, given that I too, in the past, used to chair that illustrious, most senior select committee in Te Whare Pāremata, otherwise known as FEC.

The bill enables us to create the commission which will provide independent expert advice on infrastructure so that we can effect better infrastructure outcomes and improve the wellbeing of New Zealanders. This actually follows on from at least 12 years where within Treasury, obscurely located, was an infrastructure committee. Gallons of ink were spilt and energy was spent and verbiage littered various parts of the Treasury environment, but it was not until this Government was formed and a clear commitment was announced to move forward and actually establish an independent infrastructure commission. Of course, the Leader of the Opposition claimed credit for it and said that he was going to—that’s Mr Bridges—deliver on such an outcome. Well, I’ve saved him that problem. I must acknowledge the efforts of the Hon Judith Collins, who—actually it was the Leader of the House, oddly enough, who suggested that I create an opportunity to engage with the other side of the House. The Hon Judith Collins and the Hon David Bennett, they came and met with me and, indeed, they had some sensible suggestions as to who should sit on this body. So it’s not really a matter of gross partisanship.

The challenges are substantial. Obviously, its contested space as to how much additional money we should allocate to building roads, and where those roads should be located. We currently have a small body of work underway as to whether there are more sophisticated ways to meet the fiscal costs of ramping up road construction, but that really is in the area of the senior transport Minister, and at the appropriate time, no doubt, he’ll talk about that. We also have challenges which, no doubt, will be brought closer to home to local government leaders as the Hon David Parker’s water policies are further consulted on—both capital-wise, institutional, and human capital—in terms of dealing with our Three Waters challenges. But for fear of ensnarling myself in a local government election and having to choose sides between John Tamihere and Phil Goff, I see considerable virtues in both of them and downsides in both of them as well. Although I must say, unfortunately for me, it was Mr Goff who had to defend me in a colourful lapse of judgment several years ago, but that’s all in the past now.

During the course of this bill’s development we engaged extensively with the sector. We also took trips to Australia—I certainly took one trip to Australia—and, although I feel slightly awkward saying it, we did borrow from what they have achieved in relation to getting better infrastructure outcomes by having their own independent commission. What the sector told us, and I’m sure they told the other side of the House this as well, was that in the absence of integrated investment decisions across local and regional and central government we are selling ourselves short. There’s a lack of visibility in terms of a long-term pipeline, and the scale of the projects are not well understood. In my view, a number of these projects should be built with a blend of private and public capital. A number, also, should be highlighted and signposted well into the future so that the civil construction sector—which, sadly, doesn’t employ as many of my Māori whānau as it used to and it’s progressively relying in some cases, indeed, certainly with Fletchers, on an enthusiastic group of migrant workers, not exclusively, but largely, from the Philippines. I belong to New Zealand First and I’d like to see my own nephs and, indeed, my Pasifika irāmutu—nephews and nieces—taking those jobs. Hopefully, the existence of this entity will provide long-term planning and the ability of our institutions to serve up suitably qualified men and woman to actually deliver on infrastructure outcomes.

There were a few testy areas with local government but, given that we’re central government and the sovereignty of Parliament trumps local government, they, in the end, were brought to heel. Some of them unwisely thought that they shouldn’t be required to provide information to the infrastructure commission—that was short-sighted and very parochial thinking. That problem’s been dealt to. There were other concerns pertaining to the protection of commercial information and, indeed, the super fund, the Cullen fund, and ACC, they did reflect some anxieties that where they are involved in infrastructure projects they wanted their commercial interests protected. They needed reminding that they actually belong to the Crown. Although the ambitions of their directors and their executives is to stray far from the Crown, the genesis of those organisations is traced back to here. We hold the obligations of upholding the political sovereignty of the nation, not those independent bodies. They are creatures of the Crown so, naturally, they will comply with the law.

So if I just round up by reminding us that at the end of the day, the infrastructure investment decisions that this board will provide advice on—higher quality of surveillance in terms of what’s happening across the economy—it will always rest with Cabinet Ministers. I think that is important. A number of politicians in this House did approach me that are we not usurping the role of democratically elected politicians who end up being Ministers, that they should have the privileges—I suppose—of putting into place their manifestos that they’ve been out and tested through the electoral process. So it’s important that whilst this body has high quality, credentialed people, at the end of the day it’s the politicians that will make the call.

So we will be ably served by Dr Alan Bollard, the chairperson. His name should need no further explication in this House, although he did attract the attention of my leader, the Rt Hon Winston Peters, because apparently he was the treasurer, or the Secretary of the Treasury. I tend to regard the Hon Grant Robertson as the treasurer, but for some strange reason he’s not called the treasurer. Jon Grayson, an Australian, he will be the chief executive—a high quality civil servant who earned his stripes over there in Australia. David Cochrane, a well-known senior lawyer who was trained, I am told, by Walter Iles—a paragon in the history of parliamentary drafting and who drafted many a piece of legislation. I first came across him in the days of the David Lange Government where, for a mercifully short period of time, I worked for Geoffrey Palmer. Then Raveen Jaduram, who is one of the best CEOs of Watercare. His name was promoted by a host of Aucklanders and some, unfortunately for me, sit on the other side of the House. Sarah Sinclair is the single person that was retained by the earlier committee. Stephen Selwood—although he has a reputation as being something like a canine creature that barks at every passing car—deserves to be there because he’s been an advocate for better infrastructure outcomes for Aotearoa for a long period of time. We should work with people who may from time to time irk us, but such is the mature responsibilities that lie upon my shoulders. The final person is Miss Sue Tindal, a very experienced banker and someone that I’m confident will continue to enjoy the confidence of both sides of the House. I commend the bill to the House.

ANDREW BAYLY (National—Hunua): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to be talking on this New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill in its second reading. It was a good summary from the Hon Shane Jones; I especially like the comment about delivering, because on this side of the House, we do know how to deliver stuff. That’s the important thing: to be able to actually not just have a plan but to actually put it in place—it’s called execution. It’s called actually doing what you say you’re going to do.

So, as you know, National is supporting this bill, because, as the Minister did acknowledge, the genesis of this bill actually was with National. I think it is good that the House comes together to work our way through this bill as it progresses through the House, because infrastructure is such a fundamental issue for the New Zealand economy. In some ways it’s probably one of the most important issues for Governments, because if you’re talking about economic development, one of the ways to facilitate growth is actually through judicious and careful expenditure in the area of infrastructure—at times we do it well; at other times we don’t. I think this bill and the resulting commission will go some way to doing this.

Just in the context of Government expenditure on infrastructure, we all think about the roading issue. At the moment, one of the most disappointing things is that we spend about $3.3 billion a year, and at the moment we’re about $800 million; so we’re dreadfully underspending our roading budget. But the level of rail investment; water and waste water, which is primarily around local council spend, but huge costs to the economy; corrections; schools; defence; digital; and social investment—and all those things are part of what is under the jurisdiction of Government. I think the way that that’s delivered and procured and funded is absolutely essential towards underpinning a successful economy here in New Zealand.

I think that’s the issue we have at the moment: an absolute lack of clarity around what is the future workflow of infrastructure. It’s interesting, the Minister talked about Fletchers. A little while ago, about 18 months ago, I went to see Michele Kernahan, who, at that point, was running the Fletcher Building construction component, and she was saying how all the people that we—and I say “we”, the construction industry, and largely funded by the Government, of course, a lot of those people have left Christchurch to go to Australia, because there was an overwhelming infrastructure boom going on, and as it is right now, in places like Victoria and New South Wales. And because we did not have a clear pathway of what the new projects were, a lot of those people have already left our shores. Australia’s recently announced a $100 billion infrastructure spend, which, of course, is a flag to every large infrastructure builder and funder around the world that they are serious about doing it and putting in place the right mechanisms to make it happen.

So New Zealand competes in that market place. Financiers, particularly, have an option of where they want to spend the money and where the perceived risks are and where the continuity of projects is. I think that’s what the key part of the formation of this infrastructure commission is about. So the principle objectives are to focus on developing broad public agreement, a long-term infrastructure strategy, enabling coordination of infrastructure planning, and, thirdly, providing advice and best-practice support to infrastructure projects. So that’s all very good, and I think it will go a long way.

But I don’t think we should just blindly assume that this is going to be the panacea for all our ills. Probably the biggest issue with the commission is that it is purely an advisory function; I personally think that’s a mistake. I think the ability of the commission to do its work effectively will require more than just being seen—

Hon Shane Jones: Bring forward an SOP! Will the caucus support an SOP?

ANDREW BAYLY: —as a strong advocate. It is a very important—thank you, Minister—aspect that there are times when this needs to show absolute leadership, and have the ability to monitor and to be able to go back into projects and to make sure that best practice is occurring. I think the sophistication or lack of procurement in New Zealand is quite an issue. So that is a key aspect of that.

Finally, I just want to acknowledge the good quality appointments that have been made. It is Raveen Jaduram, Minister; he is the CEO of Watercare, and a very well-known person. But I think, generally, the board being put in place is very professional. I think that one of the crucial changes that the Finance and Expenditure Committee made was to encompass local government infrastructure in the planning going forward; it was a very important aspect. On that basis, we’ll be supporting the bill.

Hon PHIL TWYFORD (Minister for Economic Development): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to be speaking in support of this bill. I want to acknowledge the excellent work and the leadership of the Hon Shane Jones in bringing forward this work. It’s good to see that the bill has been able to attract support from across the House.

I think all members will be well aware of the productivity-enhancing benefits of well-chosen infrastructure. I think there are three examples I want to cite: transport, which is a hotly contested area of infrastructure policy right now, but I think we would all agree in this House, no matter our differences about priorities and particular modes, that transport infrastructure can play a key part in not only connecting regions and providing a supply chain for our export and import economy but also well-chosen transport infrastructure can make our cities work and can make them economically efficient.

The three waters are critically important. My colleague the Hon Nanaia Mahuta has got a huge reform project under way, working with local government to tackle long-overdue problems in the provision and delivery of water services across the country. You know, without good infrastructure investment for the three waters, our cities and towns cannot grow. It’s a major impediment to their development if the ability to lay down the pipes for the three waters is not there.

The other really great example, I think, is broadband. There’s no question that the unbundling of Telecom’s old monopoly under the Clark Labour Government and the successful roll-out of ultra-fast broadband has had a transformative effect on our economy. I’m happy to give credit to the former Government for the ultra-fast broadband roll-out. But those two elements—the unbundling of Telecom, and ultra-fast broadband—have led to the development of one of our most successful, fastest-growing, and important industries, and that’s digital technologies. It’s an incredibly important industry for the future of New Zealand.

I want to just also consider for a moment the history of infrastructure provision, which, I think, it’s kind of worthwhile remembering that for the best part of three decades, as New Zealand’s economy went into a decline through the late 1960s, there was some stagnation through the 1960s and 1970s, the kind of crisis of the mid-1970s, the very tumultuous time for the 1980s and 1990s as we went through a couple of decades of painful economic adjustment; all through that time, successive Governments stopped investing in infrastructure as they struggled to get the Government accounts into order.

By the time of the turning of the millennium, the early 2000s, the Clark-Cullen Government was in power, this country faced a massive infrastructure deficit because of successive Governments failing to invest in the transport system, in hospitals, in schools—you name it. What we saw under Helen Clark and Michael Cullen was that they turned the taps on. As the Government books got back into order, they started investing massively in hospitals and schools around the country. They started—for the first time in a long, long time—investing in the roading network and in public transport in Auckland, with the highly successful Northern Busway and major upgrades to the Auckland rail system.

Now, it’s true that, in spite of our different priorities, the Key Government continued investing in transport; mostly in a handful of very, very expensive urban expressway projects. But I’m not going to dispute the value of some of those projects. The Waikato Expressway started under Annette King, and will be completed under this coalition Government; delivering fantastic road connectivity to the people of the Waikato. The Key Government continued it, and our coalition Government—with a different set of priorities but nevertheless a greater than ever commitment to delivering nation-building, 21st century infrastructure for this country that is absolutely vital to future proof our economy and to set it up for the growth and prosperity that we all desire for it. We have embarked on a huge programme of schools and hospitals investment and a different mix of transport projects, but nevertheless we see the importance of really good investment in transport.

But now it’s time for this country to take a smarter approach to the way that we think, plan, and invest in infrastructure, and that’s what I think is great about the work that the Hon Shane Jones has done in this area. He is drawing on, with this bill and with the establishment of Te Waihanga, the infrastructure commission, the best of international thinking and practice from Canada, from Scotland and other parts of the UK, and from Australia at a federal and state level, where arm’s-length, somewhat independent public agencies have been established to build a policy space for thinking about infrastructure, one step removed from the hurly burly of partisan politics—a bridge to the private sector to try to tap into the creativity, the thinking, and resources in the private sector, to build a long-term pipeline of investment, and to try to build consensus around the strategy and the underlying principles behind a long-term infrastructure plan.

That, I think, is a very valuable endeavour, and I want to acknowledge the very helpful advice and influence that we were able to garner from the Australians: a number of the state—they call them i-bodies—infrastructure bodies, and Infrastructure Australia, the federal organisation, who were willing to share with us their experiences. They’re all structured slightly differently, they’ve got a slightly different mandate, but they all share the goal of having an arm’s-length, non-partisan body to build expertise and to develop the long term strategy for infrastructure investment.

The big tasks, I think, that Te Waihanga will be grappling with: what is the pipeline? As we compete in an Australasian and an international market for expertise, for skills, and indeed for investment, we have to build a multi-year pipeline that gives the market certainty and allows people to plan and allows the firms, particularly in our domestic and Australasian market, to build the capability that they need. We need to strengthen our analysis and sharpen our thinking around productivity. It’s easy to waste vast amounts of money building infrastructure that might sound good or look good or be an attractive option for a politician to announce and cut a ribbon, but we need to be much more ruthless and disciplined about analysing the relative and comparative productivity effects of different kinds of infrastructure. That, in a capital-constrained country like ours, is the most important thing.

The other thing I want to mention that will undoubtedly be part of what the infrastructure commission grapples with is how we get the best out of public-private partnerships (PPPs) and public-private cooperation. The debates of a decade ago about PPPs and whether they were a good thing or not are largely redundant now. Capital has never been cheaper. We can borrow almost at zero interest for 30 years, for 50 years, so there is no need any more to reach for elaborate, complex private sector financing arrangements, because it’s very easy to borrow for the right projects. The challenge that this generation faces for infrastructure is how to generate the revenue to pay off the debt, to service the debt. That is the thing that we have to grapple with, and it’s my hope that the commission will be engaged in that debate. We have to find new ways of generating the revenue to support these kinds of investments, and there’s a number of places where that revenue can come from, but the debate has well and truly moved on from the preoccupation with private financing arrangements that were such a feature of infrastructure policy debates a decade ago.

I’m pleased to hear from the select committee that there was an overwhelmingly positive response to the bill from submitters and a couple of minor tweaks to strengthen the information-gathering powers of the commission, and applying those powers also to local government, because it’s very important that local government and central government—that we aggregate their infrastructure work and see it as one public sector.

LAWRENCE YULE (National—Tukituki): It’s my pleasure to take a short call in support of this bill, and while I acknowledge a lot of what the last speaker has just said, I’m not sure the Minister has actually cut too many ribbons in this term because we actually have to build some things. But anyway, this is all about funding, it’s about contracts, it’s about workflow, and as we go through all of that, we should use international experience, and this bill actually does that. I’ve travelled to other jurisdictions and other countries where this is well used, this concept—in Australia, in the UK—and what they found is that it gives enduring efficiency not only in the raising of capital but also in the way that that capital is spent.

I’m pleased to see that some changes have been made in the Finance and Expenditure Committee. I’m pleased to see that local government has been almost completely brought into this from the information-sharing proposal. There are grounds where it can be refused, and that was covered in the select committee, but it’s important that this is done in a partnership.

If we look at New Zealand, we’re a small country. We have a small tax base by international terms, yet we need infrastructure that’s first class, whether that is in transport, water, and even some of the infrastructure that will be required for climate change adaption into the future. As we do that, we need to make sure that we are getting the best advice, the most independent advice, and we’re making the right decisions.

So for us to reach pretty much universal agreement in the House I think is a mature result for this Parliament and I think will serve New Zealand well into the future. Some of the lurches we may have had from political sways from time to time may vanish, and New Zealand will be the beneficiary. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Dr DEBORAH RUSSELL (Labour—New Lynn): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. As the chair of the Finance and Expenditure Committee, I’m delighted to be able to report back on the process that happened in the select committee and on what people said to us during that process on this really interesting bill. I wish to begin, however, by a reflection on how well good infrastructure planning serves us, and it comes from my own electorate of New Lynn, with the construction of the transport hub in New Lynn.

Looking at old photos of New Lynn, the train tracks run right through the town centre. It was a particularly, sort of, grubby little train station, I suppose, and not much used. But quite a few years ago now, the Auckland City Council and the New Zealand Government got together and worked really hard on what a good transport hub for New Lynn would look like, and spent a fair amount of money doing it. But they sat there and they thought about the long-term needs of the area, about what would serve the area best, and they came up with a plan for transport, which now involves an excellent train service, which is somewhat undergrounded so it doesn’t interrupt the traffic flow, and it’s linked in to a transport hub where all the buses come to and fro from that transport hub as well.

So as a result of good planning—in fact, excellent planning—in the New Lynn electorate, we have bus routes that link into a train station which takes people in and out of town. This transport hub is situated right by supermarkets and the shopping centre, and as a result of this, it’s an area where people want to live. People are very happy about living in apartment buildings near the transport hub, or in quite intensified dwellings, simply because the transport and the infrastructure is there. So it has become an ideal for really good urban planning, as to what can be done when people think ahead about how to design around transport and living needs with really good infrastructure. Having said that, it highlights to us the importance of infrastructure planning and why it is that we really do need to engage in thinking about our infrastructure long term and not just on a piecemeal basis—you know, a road here, a bridge there, a train track there—but, in fact, integrating them all together so that they work for all of us.

It goes even further than that. Building train stations, building roads, building water pipes, building all the infrastructure we need takes an enormous amount of resources. It takes capital, obviously, but it takes machines, it takes workers, and it takes actual physical products like concrete and the like. It takes the expertise and the resources of the construction industry, and that industry has for a long time said that they cannot operate on a boom and bust basis. They need the long-term horizons so that they can plan.

A construction firm that knows that for the next few years it will be engaged on building a piece of motorway but then, a few years after that, they might move on to building another piece of motorway elsewhere—that they can take their skills and move along a planned sequence of projects—is a firm that can take on workers long term, that can guarantee its workers’ jobs, and that can plan its own expansion on an ongoing basis. So as well as serving the needs of ordinary citizens as we use the infrastructure of this country, this bill, this infrastructure commission, will also serve the needs of the construction industry. So it’s a very good idea, and it’s good to see that it’s being supported across the House.

The bill itself has come out of the select committee with very little change. We actually, really, as Mr Yule has just said, did some work with some of the issues around local government. Otherwise, the bill is little changed. So what I thought I might report to the House on is some of what the submitters said about this infrastructure commission. Virtually unanimously, they supported the infrastructure commission. They had issues that they wanted to fix up, they had suggestions, and they had tweaks, but nothing substantive or major. So let me read some of the words that came to us from the people who submitted on this bill.

Watercare, who looks after the water supply in Auckland, said that they were “pleased to have this opportunity to submit on the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill … and is broadly supportive of [the] Bill.” They were delighted to see it in place and thought it was going to work well for us. Civil Contractors New Zealand said, and I quote, that “CCNZ strongly supports the creation of the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission.” They had some changes, some tweaks that they thought would help, but they were very, very supportive of the overall idea of the infrastructure commission.

The New Zealand Superannuation Fund came and talked to us about the infrastructure commission, and their words—the Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation—are that “The Guardians supports the purpose and intent of the Bill and the establishment of the Commission.” They wanted to see this in place, and they thought it would do well for New Zealand. The Property Council of New Zealand came and talked to us as well. They are perhaps not always known for being completely in line with Labour Government policy, but this time they were. They said, “We would like to commend the Government on proposing the introduction of the Bill for the proposed new Infrastructure Commission to take oversight of New Zealand’s infrastructure planning.” So the Property Council was very supportive of it too.

The Employers and Manufacturers Association came to the party as well. They said, “The Employers and Manufacturers Association … Northern has been a proponent of the formation of a New Zealand Infrastructure Commission for a number of years and has supported the efforts of like-minded organisations, such as Infrastructure New Zealand, in advocating for the creation of this organisation.” A little further on in their submission, they say “The EMA is strongly supportive of the formation of the Commission and supportive of the current direction and intent of the Bill.”—and on it goes.

The Auckland District Law Society says that “The Committee welcomes the establishment of a Commission dedicated to reviewing New Zealand’s infrastructure needs.” Transparency International submitted on the bill, and they said, “[Transparency International New Zealand] applauds the infrastructure bill’s establishment of an autonomous entity to co-ordinate, develop and promote infrastructure in order to improve the wellbeing of New Zealanders.” Local Government New Zealand said, “[Local Government New Zealand] recognises and appreciates Government raising this issue as a priority and looks forward to further engagement on infrastructure planning and provision.” Infrastructure New Zealand said that they support the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill, and, of course, they welcomed the opportunity to provide feedback—and on and on it went.

As I said, it was virtually unanimous support from submitters for this bill. They had some changes they suggested, some tweaks. Some of those we took on board in the committee, some of them we didn’t, but the overall support for the bill was very, very firmly there.

As other speakers have said, the one substantive change we made to the bill as a select committee was to bring local government into the information-gathering powers. It’s really important for the infrastructure commission to be able to get information from the entities that it’s going to be interacting with to be able to understand what local governments are planning on a long-term basis, to be able to understand what central government is planning, and from there the infrastructure commission itself can develop its own plans and its own recommendations for what New Zealand should be doing in terms of developing infrastructure.

We’ve been quite careful about how we constructed those provisions, because, of course, there are times when some entities do need to withhold information, but that is in a very limited set of circumstances—the sort of circumstances that might be covered by the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act. It’s trying to strike a real balance between protecting the needs of local government but also ensuring that the infrastructure commission can actually do its job.

As you might expect with such a united view from submitters, the select committee itself was fairly united in its views on this infrastructure commission. I enjoy chairing the Finance and Expenditure Committee. One of the delights of the committee is that even when some members of the committee may not agree with the policy intent of a bill, they will nevertheless grapple with the nuts and bolts of it and try to make it a better bill. In this case everyone agreed with the policy intent of the bill. The submitters agreed with the policy intent of the bill. It is a fantastic bill, and I look forward to the infrastructure commission being established to support development and wellbeing in New Zealand.

Hon AMY ADAMS (National—Selwyn): Madam Speaker, thank you. I’m happy to take a brief call in this second reading debate on the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill. While I’m no longer part of the Finance and Expenditure Committee, I was during the initial consideration of this bill.

The previous speakers are right: National does support this legislation, and why wouldn’t we? It’s our policy. It was in our policy document for the last election, and this Government is so bereft of ideas that, two years in, all they’re doing now is recycling our policy, our legislation, and this infrastructure commission bill is just one of them. How typical of this Labour Government. They had no ideas of their own, no infrastructure projects, so they’re trying to hide behind setting up the commission—which is a good idea, but it isn’t a substitute for actually building infrastructure. That’s what this Government is failing to do.

So by all means set up the commission—we support it; it makes good sense; it was our policy—but, for heaven’s sake, build some actual infrastructure. Build some fibre. Build some roads. Build some irrigation. Build some water systems. Build some actual infrastructure. Don’t just talk about it, don’t just announce intentions, don’t just set up bureaucracy; actually get on and do it. That’s my message to this Government.

How interesting that here we are, two years on into this Government, and they are still filibustering their own legislation—that we support—because they are so bereft of actual ideas, actual policy, and actual plans. They have nothing to do, nothing to talk about, but steal our ideas and set up bureaucracy. So this is good as far as it goes, but it is not a substitute for building the infrastructure that New Zealand needs and deserves.

Hon JAMES SHAW (Minister for Climate Change): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s always a pleasure to follow the Hon Amy Adams, absolutely off the leash there with her criticism, saying how typical it is—the freedom of the back bench to be able to say what is on one’s mind—of this Government to put in place policies of the last National Government. How typical it is of the Opposition to not have put in place their own policies in the nine years when they were in Government, leaving it instead to us to do it, because they, frankly, did nothing over the nine years that they were in Government.

This is a policy that has been around for a while—this proposal for an infrastructure commission has been around for a very long time and it was ignored by the previous National Government until the point when it appeared that they were about to lose power, at which point they adopted it. So it is up to us to put it in place and I want to acknowledge the work of the Hon Shane Jones and all of the background work that he did with agencies to develop this proposal and to bring it to the House to get it through first reading and some of the changes that have come through in select committee.

I just wanted to start by coming back to the problem definition: why it is that an infrastructure commission is important. Partially this is in response to some of the things that Amy Adams was just saying about, on the one hand, it was a National Party policy but, on the other hand, why bother, somehow. It is because we do have an issue in New Zealand with construction companies bouncing from project to project without a great deal of predictability, without a good sense of what’s coming down the pipe and therefore not recruiting permanent workforces, not investing in those workforces, not developing the capability, leading to the kinds of situations that we’ve seen over the last few years where you had construction companies actually falling over during a construction boom—one of the strangest phenomena ever. A time of just tremendous activity in the construction sector and you would have companies falling over. Part of that is because of the nature and unpredictability of the sector. So it is really important that we seek to address that, and that is one of the key reasons why we’ve got that.

That has also, of course, led to higher costs than necessary, because with that lack of predictability companies have been focusing very much on the near term, maximising their immediate revenue because they don’t know what’s coming next. At least with this idea of having a 30-year infrastructure strategy, it does allow all players in the sectors to start to build up that capability but also to get a forward sense of what their revenue is going to look like, so we hope that that will lead to some stability in prices as well. I think that one of the key things that this infrastructure commission will be developing is that 30-year strategy and the pipeline that comes with it and that ability to plan for this sector.

Now, I wanted to respond to something that Andrew Bayly said in some of his comments earlier. He referred to the fact that the commission is advisory and felt that it should have a bit more grunt and a bit more independence. I just wanted to say that it is important to retain the principle of parliamentary supremacy and the idea that actually there is still a role for Parliament and for the executive to have a say in where this comes out. There’s a parallel actually in the Climate Change Commission that we’re also developing, where there is a very strong move from the Opposition to make sure that that is an entirely advisory body as well, for much the same reasons. So I think that if we’re setting up two commissions, a Climate Change Commission and an infrastructure commission, you need to, sort of, say “Well, you’ve got to have some consistency between those in terms of the advisory versus executive nature of the powers of those commissions.”

I just wanted to draw attention to one of the clauses that has come through in the bill, which I’m really delighted about, and Lawrence Yule in his contribution made a point about it. As we build the next generation of infrastructure over the course of the next 30 years, we need to be mindful—and this is particularly important for local government where Mr Yule has a strong heritage—of the need to build infrastructure that is adaptive to the effects of climate change and also helps us to meet our emissions reduction targets.

I want to acknowledge again the honourable matua Shane Jones for having included, in the bill, clause 11 where it says, “When … advising on current and future infrastructure needs, or the priorities for infrastructure, the Commission”—and then it moves, under paragraph (b), “must have regard to long-term trends that impact on, or are impacted by, infrastructure, including (but not limited to) … (iii) matters relating to the mitigation of the effects of climate change (including through reducing emissions of greenhouse gases) and adapting to the effects of climate change;”. So it’s actually expressly written into the bill, which I think is a very important clause, because what it means is that as we’re developing this forward strategy we’re not going to create a new generation of hard infrastructure assets that will ultimately become actually, quite literally, sunk assets, because we will need to be mindful of things like threats, like sea-level rise, coastal and river basin inundation, and other changes as a result of climate change. So I wanted to say that this is important because it futureproofs the commission and the kinds of decisions that it will be suggesting to Government as it goes about its work. I do again just want to acknowledge the honourable matua Shane Jones for his foresight in having included that part in the bill.

So, Madam Speaker, on behalf of the Green Party, we have supported this proposal. It is not a new proposal. It could have come around a bit earlier and maybe some of our construction sector would be in better shape if it had. But, as they say, the best time to plant a tree was 30 years ago. The second best time is today, and that’s what we’re doing when it comes to the infrastructure commission. I commend the bill and I commend the Minister for his work on the bill. I commend this bill to the House. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Hon David Bennett: Madam Speaker?

Ian McKelvie: Oh, Benno, you take it.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Sorted?

Hon David Bennett: Yeah, I think so.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): The Hon David Bennett.

Hon DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East): OK, Madam Speaker. I’d just like to acknowledge the Minister as well. I think Shane Jones has done an excellent job with this bill. He has been very open with the other parties in this House to look at the board that he is putting on that infrastructure commission. So I’d just like to thank him for the way that he has conducted that. I think he’s done a pretty good job of keeping it bipartisan around the committee for that board, and I think that’s a good start for the bill.

The bill, basically, is just a replication of the New South Wales legislation in this area. The Labour Party has just photocopied it really and brought it to this House—[Interruption] Oh, the New Zealand First Party, but that’s probably pretty good for them to actually photocopy something and bring it to the House. It’s probably a step up from their usual antics in their usual legislation. But, you know, it does have one problem, in the bill, and, as was talked about by that last member, he said “parliamentary supremacy”, you know. That, basically—to all those people out there that aren’t Greens supporters and aren’t of that ilk—means that this room, basically, can override the rules that are in there, just for their own political convenience. You may say, “Oh, who would do that infrastructure? You know, this is something we all need for everybody.” I’ll give you a great example and I’ll give you one example, and this is a great example to show you what a failure this bill would be under this Government. That’s the Waikato Expressway

I just want to start off with that. The first thing I want to say is that we heard on the other side that their Annette King started the Waikato Expressway. Now, I was a new member of Parliament, and when I first came into this House one of the first things I went to was actually a cutting of the ribbon on part of the Waikato Expressway that was up the north, up there by Rangiriri. They had to do it probably about three times afterwards, but they still cut the ribbon there. Annette King cut the ribbon and she said, “This is a great thing for the Labour Government. Look what we’ve done.” I thought “Yeah, I don’t know if the Labour Government actually did do this.” So I went back and it was actually started under the previous National administration, because anybody that has driven that road knew that it took about 10 years to build it. It’s like the Southern Motorway going into Auckland, which should have been finished last year and still hasn’t been finished, and that’s what happened up in Rangiriri. We had this part of the road that actually had started under National. There was no Labour involvement at all apart from cutting the ribbon at the end. The Labour Party couldn’t cancel the road either, because it had already been started by the time they got in. So that was what happened.

Now, let’s take a step—about three years after that, the National Government is elected and we promised to finish that road, which is the four sections and the $2 billion promise, and we delivered it. We delivered that road. We have done that, but it gets worse. The Labour Party came in and stopped the next stages of that road. The road from Cambridge to Piarere was actually approved by the board of the New Zealand Transport Authority in July of election year 2017, and the Labour Party came in and told the board to revoke that decision. They used political impropriety to go in there and change the decision of that board. That is what happened, and that road was gone. But we’ve got this magical train which carries 160 people and costs $90 million a year as a result, and everyone is very happy in Hamilton for that crazy train that’s diesel and is going to make a big difference, isn’t it, to 160 people. It’s actually $570,000 per person if you add it up. We could buy them a house in Auckland each instead of having to get them on that diesel train, which takes two hours to get you to Papakura, which is going to be really helpful when you actually want to go into the central city. So that’s a great investment!

But that’s what happens when you get lefties running infrastructure, because they take away the good stuff and they put in a lot of silly ideas, and that is what is happening with this bill. All the infrastructure that had been started through New Zealand has been stopped, and because of parliamentary supremacy, we’re going to see this continue, and this bill will be a white elephant under that Government, because all it’s going to do is sit there and wait for this magical train in Auckland that they’re trying to build that they can’t even work out how to contract, let alone start. That will create what I call—if you want to do big words like, what is it, parliamentary supremacy and all that—the infrastructure development deficit that will come to this country in the next two years. What is going to happen when all those roads finish in 2020, which is when the Waikato Expressway was due to finish but because of these lefties in there it’s now 2022 and lucky to finish then—[Interruption] No, it’s true. All the workers have left and the companies are holding back because they know they’ve got nowhere else to send their staff, so they’re dragging them out, and it’s going to be 2020—

Hon Meka Whaitiri: Rubbish!

Hon DAVID BENNETT: Oh, it’s not rubbish. Go talk to Waikato-Tainui and see what they say. The reality is that that is what is going to happen under this bill. It will get lost as just a blanket bill with no actual infrastructure development, because over that side they’ve taken away the next level of infrastructure that was planned and approved in New Zealand and put in place one gleaming, big train in Auckland which they can’t even get off the ground.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): The next call is a split call. I call Tamati Coffey.

TAMATI COFFEY (Labour—Waiariki): Thank you—[Member’s microphone malfunctions] Thank you, Madam Speaker. Thankfully, I know how to work a microphone. It pleases me greatly to be able to stand here and take a short call, albeit, on the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill. This is the second reading of this bill. It’s a necessary piece of legislation. It’s been sitting on a shelf for a good nine years, so under this Government we’ve decided that we’re going to take some action on that, and for that reason it came to our Finance and Expenditure Committee. We’ve been sitting through the submissions for it, and I want to thank all of the people that submitted to it as well.

Just glossing over the reason why we’re doing it, it is, obviously, to create that autonomous Crown entity which is going to coordinate, develop, and promote an approach to infrastructure and services that result from infrastructures that will improve the wellbeing of New Zealanders. At the moment we’ve got a bit of a haphazard approach, and for this reason, that was why the submission that I listened to the most actually came from the New Zealand Māori Council, who came forward with their submission and said the Māori economy is big and it’s growing, and for Māori to be able to properly participate in this country, we need the support of infrastructure to be able to make things work. So Māori being landowners—we own water, we have rights to airspace—we actually have a vested interest in making sure that the pipeline of infrastructure is working for us as partners in this land.

As it has been in the past, there’s been a lot of confusion, as was pointed out by the New Zealand Māori Council’s submission, about exactly where infrastructure sat. Sometimes, you might find Māori landowners or organisations, entities, going to the council. Sometimes, they get told that, no, it’s not council; it’s actually regional council. Sometimes, they show up to the Ministry for the Environment thinking that they’re going to the right place to be able to do their developments, but, actually, the place that they should be going is the New Zealand Transport Agency. So anything that can help to simplify what infrastructure looks like in New Zealand and that pipeline, to create certainty by creating that commission, is going to be of great benefit to Māori.

There was a submission that they put forward as well to actually have a Māori commissioner involved in the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission. We talked about the idea of it, but it actually didn’t make it through, not for want of trying but the feeling around the room was that the commission would be able to look after Māori interests. I guess this is something that we will monitor as the commission evolves, and as it moves forward we’ll be making sure that, actually, it is responsive to the needs of Māori landowners and incorporations as well that are very active in the economy, albeit the Māori economy as well.

In the past, there’s been a severe lack of integrated investment decisions across central and local government. That’s what’s led us to this place now. The lack of visibility, the lack of pipeline, the lack of scale—all of these things have left us in a worse place and actually encourages the work that is being done.

The bill is establishing the commission. It’s been designed to address the flaw in the current approach to infrastructure in accordance with those from the infrastructure sector, and I probably should do a little shout-out to all of those people that work in infrastructure around New Zealand that do do the hard yards that came and presented to the select committee as well. There was a lot of work that was put into this, not least, actually, the establishment of the commission and the commissioners as well. It was on 21 August that the infrastructure Minister Shane Jones actually announced, at the Building Nations conference in the geothermal paradise that is Rotorua, who exactly the new board were going to be. So Dr Alan Bollard as chair, Jon Grayson chief executive, David Cochrane, Raveen Jaduram, and Sarah Sinclair will be pioneering this work—sorry, also two more, Stephen Selwood and Sue Tindal. I wish them the best of luck in their endeavour. This is a good bill.

IAN McKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I’ve had my lunch cut twice on this already tonight, so I won’t need to say very much, but I guess one of the interesting things I find about this is that I’ve lived through five—well, I was going to say five Labour Governments; haven’t got to the end of this one yet, but it won’t be long, and five National Governments, and I’ve never seen one of them take a blind bit of notice of a recommendation of an infrastructure commission. Interestingly, having said that, I then listened to Shane Jones, who spent his whole speech talking about how these infrastructure commission recommendations—they’re wonderful, but, of course, we’re elected and we’ll do what we want when we get here. I then listened to James Shaw doing the same thing. So I’m a little cynical as to whether this will work.

I certainly support this. I think it’s a very good piece of legislation, it’s a very good idea, and it would give some stability in New Zealand to a contracting industry which, frankly, is fragile, has always been fragile, and has never had a constant stream of work in front of it. So I think the greatest advantage of this bill will be to give that contracting industry a stream of work in front of it and give our communities some stability when it comes to what it should expect of its infrastructure going forward. In other words, I think if it was to work properly—and it won’t—it would preclude Governments from constantly changing the direction that happens in New Zealand.

We’ve seen, interestingly, the Local Government Act 2002 try to do exactly the same thing to local government—made not a blind bit of difference because, effectively, the Parliament kept changing its mind about how the local government bill should work. So whilst we set a train or a path in place for local government, we then kept on changing it. So you get no certainty in life, and our poor old ratepayers and taxpayers get no certainty in life either, and one of the great advantages that this sort of piece of legislation, were it to be adhered to, would create for us is some certainty in life for the people that pay the bills.

I won’t speak for long. I think this bill is a good bill. I think a lot of what was talked about in the Finance and Expenditure Committee has been talked about tonight. Deborah Russell, as she always does, gave us a very complete view of the world from the infrastructure commission’s perspective and, in fact, summed it up pretty well. So whilst I certainly support the bill, I’m extremely cynical about the potential for it to work—in fact, I don’t think it will. Thank you, Madam Speaker. That’s my lot.

Hon JENNY SALESA (Minister for Building and Construction): Thank you so much, Madam Speaker. Kia ora e Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori, and I’d like to first of all acknowledge and thank the Hon Shane Jones for all of his work in making sure that this bill has reached the House. As I say here tonight, I heard from the Opposition, talking about how this is their policy, and how this, apparently, is their work. But the Opposition were in Government for nine very long years, and, even if it was their policy, they did not implement this New Zealand Infrastructure Commission within that time. What I’ve read, in terms of the select committee report, is that industry have been saying for a very, very long time that this is an idea, having an infrastructure commission, is something that we should implement.

What I’d like her to say is that we, on this side of the House, have listened. We’ve heard industry. This bill will deliver to the sector what they have been asking for for a very long time, which is to have an infrastructure commission. So this bill will establish Te Waihanga—the infrastructure commission—and it will provide independent, expert advice on infrastructure. It is really important to have these functions, because, right now, we are looking at a lot of infrastructure deficit. We only have to look at our roads, and, especially if you live and work in Auckland, just how congested the roads are. If we had had an infrastructure commission like this a number of years ago, and if there had been a strategy, a vision, and a plan, we shouldn’t, actually, be where we are in terms of our roads.

If we’re also to look at housing, there are a lot of places where we should actually be building a lot of houses, but we know that before houses can be built in certain places, they need the infrastructure first. So again, this is why this infrastructure commission is so vital. I’m glad that there is agreement that this work is needed, and that we should have the plan, and the structure that this infrastructure commission will do in terms of a strategy. But this is something that should have been done, and this is, of course, through successive Governments. It is not just the previous Government that hasn’t had this vision to implement this infrastructure commission. But I’m glad the Hon Shane Jones has taken it on, and is moving forward with this infrastructure commission.

I’d also like to thank the Finance and Expenditure Committee, the chair of the select committee Deborah Russell for her work, as well as all of the hardworking select committee members. I’d also like to thank the previous chair of the select committee Michael Wood, who began this work.

Michael Wood: Good speech.

Hon JENNY SALESA: Ha, ha! Thank you. But I also would like to say what some of the select committee submissions have actually said. Infrastructure New Zealand, for instance, they said, “We are pleased with the degree of scope provided to the Commission to provide advice on the full range of issues and opportunities facing New Zealand infrastructure over the long term.” Infrastructure New Zealand supports this commission, and the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill. We also have Local Government New Zealand (LGNZ) giving their full support to this legislation. LGNZ, I quote, “recognises and appreciates Government raising this issue as a priority and looks forward to further engagement on infrastructure planning and provision.”

Another example is from Beca Ltd. When they made their submission, this is some of the things that they said: “The Bill clearly outlines how the infrastructure commission will bring strategic focus to New Zealand’s key future challenges and opportunities, as well as provide leadership in prioritising infrastructure and services that improve the wellbeing of all New Zealanders.” I really look forward to the work that this commission will do. One of the things that it, actually, also will do is, first of all they’re looking at strategy and planning, and then they’ll be looking at delivery. The other thing that this commission will do is it will also be listening to the Minister in terms of directions from the Minister. They will publish their long-term capital infrastructure plan, and we will then have the opportunity to look at what the commission is doing, have our comments on it, and this is something that is sorely needed by Aotearoa New Zealand. I really commend the Hon Shane Jones, and the select committee, and this Government for their work on this. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

HAMISH WALKER (National—Clutha-Southland): Most of it’s been spoken about tonight. I’ll just take a brief call, but I just want to acknowledge my previous National member’s contribution, Ian McKelvie. Ian, I’m not cutting your lunch tonight. I’ve only been here a couple of years, but I know not to cut someone of your standing, of your stature—I am not cutting your lunch, and you’ve been doing an excellent job, and I appreciate all the personal support you’ve been giving me, and the farmers out there, Ian.

Just three points I’d like to make this evening. Firstly, you only need to look at the Waterview Tunnel to see how important infrastructure is. I don’t particularly spend much time in Auckland, but, when I do get there, if I’m not visiting my colleagues, my hard-working Auckland MPs, I like to get out of there reasonably quick, to get on the plane back down to Southland, back down to those wonderful farmers down there. But you only need to look at the Waterview Tunnel, how well that’s been working, and all the taxi drivers I do talk to when I’m in Auckland tell me how appreciative they are of the previous National Government, of what they did there, how it’s just speeding up traffic. A little concerned about the Labour members’ contributions that they believe in infrastructure, yet they’ve stalled seven projects across the country. They’ve introduced petrol taxes in Auckland, yet the Minister’s not saying or determining how those petrol taxes are going to be spent.

Also, I want to acknowledge one of my colleagues Tim van de Molen. The Waikato Expressway goes, mostly, through his electorate. He’s been doing fantastic work in this space, launched a wonderful petition, but it’s incredibly disappointing that the extension of that expressway has been cancelled. It’s incredibly important that, for farmers, for producers of this country, we can get their goods to the market as quick as possible, especially if it’s goods like crayfish, or goods that only have a certain shelf life.

Thirdly, I just want to acknowledge the panel members that have been appointed. Some of them have made some very good comments in the media, especially around PPPs—public-private partnerships—and why they work. If you look at evidence across the world, they do work. They deliver projects on time, to high quality, and for a lower price, because they’re held to account. I commend this bill.

Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a real pleasure to speak last on this bill, and a special pleasure because of the great cross-party support we’ve got for it. It is a great piece of legislation that the National Party didn’t quite get round to passing in their time in Government. But the good thing about it, really, is it’s one of a raft of measures that this Government is taking that’s looking out beyond three years and, in fact, here 30 years. Along with the Kāinga Ora—Homes and Communities Bill, the zero carbon bill, all pieces of legislation that are looking out not just three years, not just 10 years, but out for generations to come.

I heard only today on the radio Infrastructure New Zealand talking about the pipeline effect. What this does is stops that kind of chit chat, that kind of oppositional approach saying “The Government needs to fund more infrastructure.”, and says “Let’s give it to an independent body who will actually tell us what the pipeline is and whether this lobbying is accurate or inaccurate.” We don’t want to be making big decisions about New Zealand’s infrastructure simply on the back of what is essentially political game playing

There’s $42 billion that this Government’s committed to five years, and that’s fantastic, but we need to be able to plan out 10 years, 20 years, 30 years as well to give certainty to the industry, to give certainty to our vocational training so that we make sure we’ve got the people on the ground, the expertise, the resources, but also to stop bottlenecks. I’ve seen bottlenecks in Christchurch. What they do is they escalate prices, and there’s profit taking, and it’s not good for anyone but a very small group of people. We want to make sure we have great infrastructure, and we spread that around.

So this really is about wellbeing. It’s not just about roads. It’s about water, but it’s also about things like digital infrastructure as well, to make sure that our communities are well connected, not just in the cities but right across the country, right down the West Coast, Haast, all of those all nooks and crannies of the country, to make sure that everyone’s well connected.

It’s great to see the improvements that the committee made to the bill under the great chairmanships of Deborah Russell and Michael Wood. Also, drawing in information-gathering powers of local bodies so that the commission can be as well-equipped as possible to look at the information and make careful, considered decisions, balanced decisions that aren’t short-termist, aren’t dictated by political cycles, aren’t dictated by the Government of the day—I recognise the cross-party support for this bill—but will look out for generations so that the infrastructure upon which this country is built, upon which the wellbeing of its citizens is built, is well-planned, well-funded, and well-built. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Bill read a second time.

Bills

Education (School Donations) Amendment Bill

In Committee

Part 1 Main amendment

Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): Thank you, Madam Chair, for this opportunity to take this call on the Education (School Donations) Amendment Bill in the committee of the whole House.

Part 1 actually is the whole basis of this legislation. In Part 1, there are two sections, as the bill was originally introduced, that are inserted: 79A and 79B. Proposed new section 79A is about setting up the discretionary grant for boards, and 79B is about the effect of non-compliance with earlier discretionary grants. So it sets the conditions around compliance and non-compliance. As I said, this is the basis of this whole legislation, because the basis of this legislation is to alleviate the pressure that parents feel because of schools going out asking for donations, which are voluntary.

During the select committee process, we were informed about Supplementary Order Paper 303 that the Minister of Education has tabled. This is to make a change. This is to insert two new sections after section 79A. These are 79AA and 79AB. In this contribution I would like to focus on 79AA, because this is actually going to create a lot of confusion to the business of this whole legislation. In this section, actually, the Minister is wanting to get the flexibility to provide exemptions to mandatory conditions. So what the Minister wants, through a notice given under this section, is to enable boards and schools to be able to go out and seek voluntary donations for some specific activities.

So as I said in the start, the purpose of this bill is to take away that financial pressure that parents feel because of that school donation that is asked by schools, though we understand it’s voluntary. Schools were really concerned. They were saying that they won’t be able to take part in this scheme because this amount that is going to be allocated per student is not going to be enough for some activities like school camps, because school camps are quite expensive. It’s not like 100 percent of students going on school camps pay that voluntary expense, but what happens is that all students are taken on those camps, and in most of the cases the expense is actually paid by the school board.

So I believe that the Minister has actually responded to that through the Supplementary Order Paper, but what has happened is that through this, the Minister has created more confusion. Now, the confusion is at two levels. First, the bill was quite clear that if somebody gets this discretionary grant, they cannot go out and seek voluntary donations. Now, we understand that even if schools seek this discretionary grant, they can still go out and ask for a donation for certain activities, so that creates confusion at one level.

The second level of confusion that is being created, and this is after I have spoken to a number of schools—they want to fully understand what the Minister considers is a camp and what is not a camp. We understand and we know that for any curricular activity, schools should not be seeking voluntary donations, but for any non-curricular activities, schools are able to seek these voluntary donations. So when a school camp is taken—and I, personally, and some schools also believe that they want to make the most of that. For example, if a school camp goes to a beach, there is a lot of opportunity for students to learn about the nature around that beach—that is, how sea water reacts with rocks around that beach—or any of the other things that are there, which can be considered as an extracurricular activity. So how do we tell schools to split that activity while they are on a camp?

Here, the schools are really wanting to seek some clarification. I have spoken to some schools in Mount Roskill, where I am based, and they’re quite concerned about this exemption. As I said, this is actually going to create a lot of confusion. Before, we knew it was clear, but it wasn’t enough. Even schools that are in decile 1 to 7 didn’t want to opt for this option, and now the Minister is really keen to see that they become part of this scheme, so he has tabled this Supplementary Order Paper 303, which actually is creating more confusion.

Clearly, the Minister doesn’t understand what is needed, and the Minister is not on the right track, so we do not support the Supplementary Order Paper. We believe that the Minister should take some time to understand what the needs are, and how the Minister actually responds to that should be based on the concerns that schools are raising, and not just based on what the Minister thinks is the right thing.

So a half-cooked policy through this bill was put forward, and then a Supplementary Order Paper comes. That is also not satisfactory. It’s quite sad to see that the Minister thinks that this bill is going to resolve this issue.

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): I suspect that the issue that the member Dr Parmjeet Parmar just raised around what the definition of a school camp is may come up a little bit, so I thought I’d be happy to enlighten the committee that the Gazette notice that I intend to issue under this section—assuming the House passes Supplementary Order Paper 303 and the bill as it’s been reported back from select committee with those amendments, I intend to then issue a Gazette notice that defines a school camp as any curriculum-related activity where students are expected to stay overnight as part of that activity. I think that’s relatively straightforward. I think the example that the member raises clearly would be covered by that. I don’t think there really is any ambiguity. I think the school knows what a camp is and what a camp isn’t. A day trip is not a camp, because students don’t stay overnight. If they stay overnight, then it’s a camp.

ERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): Thank you, Madam Chair. This is a fantastic example of a bill in this transformational Government’s year of delivery. It’s an excellent example of how they are failing to keep their promises and how this is absolute, utter rubbish that this is their year of delivery.

I do wonder if the Minister of Education is going to get up again and tell us that it’s another one of his promises yet to be delivered on, because he knows very well that he promised all parents in New Zealand that all school donations would be done away with, but what we’ve ended up with is not that at all. In fact, what we’re going to see is that probably most children in this country will end up still having to pay a school donation.

It will be very interesting next year, in 2020, when those invoices start coming to parents and they say, “But, hang on a minute, Chris Hipkins, prior to the last election, promised New Zealanders that if they were in Government, in fact, school donations would be scrapped. And then we remember some bill going through, and we thought that would happen.” What they don’t realise is that the detail of the bill is it’s only deciles 1 to 7 schools, so all of the 8 to 10s are out, including everyone in my electorate, but then also those schools who actually decide that, in fact, they’re going to be losing out under this bill—which will be quite a few, I imagine—and, in fact, will still ask for donations.

What I would like to start with is also just to talk to the Minister about school camps, because there are many school camps for especially younger children—because I have a seven-year-old, and he goes on a camp, and it’s not an overnight camp. It is a whole day, and—you know what?—then they go home and they go back the next day because they’re too young to stay overnight. That’s a school camp.

So here we’ve got already a problem because of rushed legislation, because this Minister has to put up a Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) at the last minute because he didn’t do his work—this Government didn’t do their work—and rushed through a bill under urgency and then had a truncated process in which we only had 13 days for people to put in their submissions. We got about 139-odd, but there would have been a whole lot more had they had more time. It just goes to show that process does matter, and, in fact, if we had had a better process, we wouldn’t have to have this SOP brought by the Minister at the last minute because he didn’t do his job.

I’d also like to talk about inequality, because 95 of the 139 submitters said that all schools should be able to get rid of school donations under this bill, and that’s a lot. It’s a big proportion of the submitters.

I want to talk about inequality, and I want to ask the Minister directly, because the ministry, we know, has been doing a huge amount of work about the decile system and getting rid of it and replacing it with a much better model. The Minister knows that very well, and yet here he’s bringing a bill to the House which ties us to a system that we know doesn’t work. It doesn’t know exactly where children are in need; it guesses where they are. We know a better system is needed. The ministry is doing work on it. The Minister agrees that we need to do work. In fact, we’ve had a working group come back and even tell us that that’s what’s required, and yet here we have a bill that’s tying us to a system that we know doesn’t work. I’d like to hear from the Minister why it is that—probably, I would say, in the next few years—we’re going to be having to change this legislation to get rid of any reference to decile, because we know very well that it’s going to be gotten rid of.

As I said, the problems with this bill are, firstly, the process—it was rushed; most of the people who came to submit to the select committee said that they needed more time and there would have been a lot more submissions—there are gaping holes in the legislation, and that’s evident by the fact that we have this last-minute SOP, because we know the Minister didn’t do his work; and then, of course, we have the fact that this whole bill is a massive let down to parents who are expecting that next year they will turn up to school and not have to pay a donation, and, of course, the cold, hard reality will hit them that, actually, this Government, instead of being transformational and in their year of delivery, has in fact reneged again on one of their main promises: that parents won’t have to pay donations any more. That is a massive let down.

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): I think the lesson for that member Erica Stanford is: before you come to the House and accuse a Minister of not doing their homework, it pays to read the bill that you’re speaking to, because suggesting that we’re going to have to come back here and amend it to remove any reference to decile would have a legitimate point if there was a reference to decile in the bill. In fact, there isn’t.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 303 in the name of the Hon Chris Hipkins to clause 4 be agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the amendments be agreed to.

Ayes 63

New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8.

Noes 57

New Zealand National 55; ACT New Zealand 1; Ross.

Amendments agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That Part 1 as amended be agreed to.

Ayes 63

New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8.

Noes 57

New Zealand National 55; ACT New Zealand 1; Ross.

Part 1 as amended agreed to.

House resumed.

The Chairperson reported progress on the Education (School Donation) Amendment Bill.

Report adopted.

The House adjourned at 9.56 p.m.