Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Immigration)
: It is a pleasure to speak in this Budget debate. As I listened to the member Charles Chauvel speak in the debate, I thought about what specifically his proposals were. Right through the Labour members’ Budget speeches there is a whole lot of rhetoric about lost opportunities. They say that the Government should do more, but what would those members actually have done, and how would they have paid for it? I think that if they were really interested in adding to the debate, they would have come out with an alternative budget and told us exactly how they would have paid for the huge promises that they had made. They pluck stuff out of the air. How were they actually going to pay for things like the $1 billion they promised for home insulation? It is pretty easy when Labour members are in Opposition; they can say just what they like. They do not have to put their money where their mouths are.
This was a very sound Budget. It was exactly the Budget that the public expected. It was the Budget that the public demanded. It was the right Budget for the times. I defy Opposition members to say that they would have produced a high-spending, irresponsible Budget, because, when it comes down to it, I do not think they were actually interested in seeing New Zealand’s international credit rating downgraded. That would have been completely irresponsible.
This is a good Budget. There is new money for health and education. We have put 40 percent of that new money into the health area, and we are producing stuff that the last Labour Government did not produce in 9 years of lost opportunity. Look at the $6.5 million a year that is going into funding eating disorders services. That was something the last Government talked big on but never ever delivered on. We are getting feedback from families who have family members with eating disorders. They badgered the last Government for almost a decade to do something about it. Their sense of relief is absolutely palpable.
When we talk about unfunded promises, we have just to look at what the Labour candidate in Mt Albert is saying at the moment. I would not be surprised if Labour’s senior whip had a word with Mr Shearer. He is running around saying that if Labour was in Government, it would have paid $3 billion for the, frankly, unaffordable tunnel option. Labour members know they would never have built the tunnel. Mr Shearer actually said yesterday that he accepted that the tunnel option is not going to happen, so of course he can say whatever he likes. How would those guys have actually paid for it? Quite frankly, they know it was unaffordable.
When we look at economic management, we see that those members are the people who spent $1 billion on a trainset. If we are facing economic problems, why would we go ahead and pay $1 billion for a trainset? Is that the way to stimulate the economy?
Hon Trevor Mallard: Who got the sack as Melissa’s minder?
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: If Trevor Mallard actually had an interest in contributing to the debate, rather than spending mindless lost evenings blogging rubbish on the new Labour members’ blog, he would sit down, as Labour’s associate spokesperson on finance, and draw up his plan to run the economy. Quite frankly, those guys over on that side of the House have no plan. There is no plan. What would they do? What would they have been doing in this situation? I can tell members that they would have been doing nothing different.
Hon Darren Hughes: Tell us about your strategic genius on the campaign trail.
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Well, members want to talk about Mt Albert. I tell them that there is no way that people will be voting for those guys to be back in Government for a long, long time. The feedback we have got in Mt Albert about the Prime Minister and his performance has been fantastic. Those guys can laugh about things around the country, but the reality is that the day after the Mt Albert by-election none of those people on the other side of the House will go to a Cabinet meeting. They can laugh about it, they can entertain themselves with titillating electoral tittle-tattle and stories from the campaign trail, but they will not sit on the Treasury benches for years and years. The mouth of the party, Trevor Mallard, is over there; why does he not go back to his office, sit down, type up some stuff, and tell us what those guys would be doing if they were in Government? They have absolutely no answer.
The immigration portfolio, which I am responsible for, is pretty tight at the moment; there is not a lot of money to go round. The Auditor-General’s report
Inquiry into immigration matters was released today. It shows that when those guys were in charge they could not manage the Immigration Service. It was 9 years of complete mismanagement. That comment shut members opposite up; Trevor Mallard is even leaving. There were 9 years of mismanagement by Labour of the Immigration Service, and we have had the results today. The report shows that one in five decisions that happened on Labour’s watch was of abysmal quality. When we look at the Pacific division, we see that 40 percent of its decisions were of low or poor quality. That department is just another example of a department that we have been left to sort out.
If one looks at the portfolios of health and immigration and at the economy, one sees that all that Labour has left behind is one heck of a mess, and we are left to sort out the whole thing. Labour members can laugh about it. When one looks at what has happened to the health system, one sees that Labour has left a situation in which people do not get the elective surgery they need, they cannot get access to hospitals, they cannot get operations when they need them, and the morale of the hospital workforce is absolutely at rock bottom. Frankly, it was a relief for Labour members when they lost the election. They were out of ideas and out of time, and they had no answers left for the health system.
Do members know how many questions on immigration Labour members have put in the House in the last 6 months—the whole time they have been in Opposition? How many questions have they asked about immigration?
David Garrett: How many?
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Zero. Do members know how many questions on broadcasting they have asked?
Brendon Burns: Your turn will come.
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: That is Brendon Burns over there. Apparently, he is the Labour spokesman on broadcasting. He has done absolutely nothing. Do members know how many questions he has asked in the House about broadcasting? He has asked zero questions. Do members know how many questions on tourism Labour members have asked in the House?
Katrina Shanks: How many?
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Well, I cannot tell the member that. They probably asked some questions about the cycleway.
But I can tell members that Labour members have asked no questions on immigration. Do members know why? It is because Labour members are so embarrassed about their record when they were in charge of immigration. There was a litany of poor decision-making. The Auditor-General’s report found that there was no corruption in the Immigration Service, but, quite frankly, I think Labour members are lucky that none was found. Why do they not want to ask questions about immigration? Because they were holding the reins when all the mess was going on. What we have today in the Auditor-General’s report is a litany of disaster, which Labour was in charge of. The report shows us that this Government was absolutely right to take action on the Pacific division. Forty percent of the decisions made by the Pacific division were questionable at best; many more were substandard. Only four out of 10 of the decisions made in that division were thought to be good decisions. The former Ministers over there knew about that. They knew about the problems of the Pacific division. Do members know what they did about those problems? They did absolutely nothing. So when Pete Hodgson—supposedly the Labour Party’s strategist, and I think he is its spokesman on immigration—does not get up to ask a single question about immigration in 7 months, getting up to 8 months, members know why. Those guys are running scared on immigration.
Hon Members: Ha, ha!
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I would not laugh; there are people on that side of the House who do not want those guys to ask questions about immigration. It is no coincidence that Pete Hodgson does not ask any questions about immigration.
It is the same with broadcasting. If Labour managed broadcasting so well when in Government, why does Brendon Burns not get up to ask questions in the House? I think it could be a case of his not being allowed to ask a question, because, quite frankly, Labour members are deeply divided over how to manage broadcasting. They know that their broadcasting policy, under the great Steve Maharey, was a complete failure. They saddled TVNZ—
Hon Darren Hughes: Good fella.
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: He may be a good fella, but I tell members that his broadcasting policy was a failure, and those guys know it. That is why they will not ask a single question about it. All that we get are questions about when we last spent time in Palmerston North—that sort of mindless stuff. The direction of the questions on health has been completely hopeless.
Those guys over that side of the House have lost their mojo. There are five stages of grieving. They had 3 months of denial; now we are seeing anger. Labour members are at stage two. I am not sure what is next, but it will get a lot worse for them because they are settling into the reality that the public has rejected them. They realise that they have no economic plan. All they can do about this Budget is to make a whole lot of totally unfunded promises, but there is no substance to them. Bubbling along in the background is the fact that Labour members are very unhappy with Phil Goff—I can tell members that now.
The Budget is great. It is what the people want. Labour members have no answers. We need to congratulate the Minister of Finance and the Prime Minister on a great job well done.
