Wednesday, 8 February 2012:

• 4.30 pm Tracey Martin, NZ First
• 4.45 pm Andrew Williams, NZ First
• 5.00 pm Richard Prosser, NZ First
• 5.15 pm Brendan Horan, NZ First
• 5.30 pm Denis O’Rourke, NZ First
• 5.45 pm Asenati Lole-Taylor, NZ First

Thursday, 9 February 2012:

• 3.45 pm Mike Sabin, National

Tuesday, 14 February 2012:

• 5.00 pm David Clark, Labour
• 5.15 pm Andrew Little, Labour
• 5.30 pm Megan Woods, Labour
• 5.45 pm Rino Tirikatene, Labour

Wednesday, 15 February 2012:

• 4.15 pm Mojo Mathers, Green
• 4.30 pm Steffan Browning, Green
• 4.45 pm Julie Anne Genter, Green
• 5.00 pm Jan Logie, Green
• 5.15 pm Denise Roche, Green
• 5.30 pm Eugenie Sage, Green
• 5.45 pm Holly Walker, Green

Thursday, 16 February 2012:

• National Party members (order TBA)

As the new MPs complete their speeches, I’ll add a link to the video clip. If you’re a bit impatient, you can find them on www.inthehouse.co.nz

There was never a crisis in ACC. It was hit by the global financial downturn and revaluation of existing claims liabilities, leading to deficits. But the problem was not a structural one, and ACC would have returned to surplus even without the levy hike. ACC was already back to a $2.5 billion surplus in 2009/10 before Smith’s levy hike had taken effect.

But don’t get too excited about the levies falling just yet. If National are re-elected, all Kiwis will end up paying more to get less from ACC. Smith has effectively announced the wholesale privatisation of ACC if National gets half a chance. That means money that should go into providing cover for injury victims will go into the profit lines of Aussie insurance companies.

Smith has confirmed that if a National-led government is re-elected, their ACC privatisation agenda will be expanded from only covering workplace injuries to also include injuries sustained in car accidents, around the home, or even on the sports field.

National’s privatisation plans will effectively bring an end to what has been our world-leading system of universal, no-fault, 24/7 cover for accidental injury. Under National, if someone sustains an injury, they can look forward to spending weeks or even months arguing with different insurance providers about who should cover it.

It’s still not clear what problem National are trying to fix here. Independent studies have clearly shown that ACC is among the cheapest providers of accidental injury cover in the world. New Zealand employers already pay on average half of what Australian employers pay, yet National wants to replicate the Australian model.

The choice for New Zealanders is now crystal clear. If they want to keep our system of universal, no-fault, 24/7 cover for accidental injury, then they will need to vote for a change of government.

There is a certain symmetry to Labour launching a policy to get young Kiwis into work on the same day the National government signed off on a deal to buy a bunch of new electric trains for Auckland from overseas, rather than build them locally here in New Zealand. I think it’s great that Auckland are getting much needed investment in their public transport infrastructure, but why aren’t we cashing in the potential to create somewhere around 1,000 new jobs and add up to $250 million to our GDP?

The link between these two announcements actually runs a lot deeper than highlighting the contrast between Labour, who want to create local jobs, and National, who want to export them overseas. When I speak to a lot of the tradespeople in my electorate, I’m reminded just how many of them did their apprenticeships at the railway workshops, the post office, the car assembly plants, or the freezing works. With the exception of the railway workshops, that now employs a fraction of the staff it once did, all of those big employers are gone.

Those tradespeople are now sole traders or work largely in firms that employ fewer than 10 people. Taking on an apprentice is something they’re more than happy to do. They learned their trade on the job and they’re more than happy to give future generations the same chance. But it’s a huge commitment financially and a lot to ask of such small businesses. That’s why I know they’ll welcome Labour’s plan to convert the dole into apprenticeships subsidies.

A lot of people have remarked to me in the past how crazy it is we pay a young person to sit at home on the dole but we won’t provide some financial support to those willing to take them on and train them up. Well Labour is going to do something about that. Our Youth Skills policy is one that I’m very proud to campaign on. Our plan to get thousands of young Kiwis into work, education and training is in marked contrast to National’s plan to give a couple of hundred young beneficiaries a pre-pay purchase card.

So while baby-sitter John devotes his time to worrying about how young people spend their pocket money, Labour is focused on providing them with a meaningful vocation and hope for the future. Oh, what was that about nanny state again…?

While they claim they are still committed to the goal of having 90 percent of our electricity generated from renewable sources, most of their actual plan heads in the other direction.

We have an abundance of renewable energy sources in New Zealand. We could be world leaders in renewable energy. Instead the National government want to focus on extracting more fossil fuels like gas and oil.

It’s a short-sighted approach that does nothing to insulate us from the inevitable price increases that are on the way, not to mention the damage it will do to our environment.

National trumpets the fact that the amount of electricity we’ve generated in the last few years from renewable sources has increased, never mind the fact that it’s rained quite a bit. What happens when we get another dry year? We need more wind, more solar, more local generation, and more of a focus on energy efficiency.

It’s great that the National government have at least said they agree with the 90% renewable target put in place under the last Labour government, but we need to do a lot better if we’re going to meet it.

53 percent opted for a capital gains tax while only 31 percent of respondents wanted to see state assets sold. Even amongst National’s own supporters, one in three prefer the policies that Labour is promoting.

National’s sales pitch for asset sales hasn’t convinced anyone. Kiwis know that once the assets are sold, they’re gone forever. They also know that the shares will probably end up being owned overseas, and we’ll be waving goodbye to more and more of the profits.

John Key’s assertion that it will be “different this time” rings a little hollow when even his own Finance Minister publicly admits there is no way they can stop the shares ending up in foreign ownership.

This election is a clear choice between owning our own future or selling off whatever is left to the highest bidder and becoming tenants in our own country. Labour’s got a lot of work to do over the next three months, but I’ll be proud to be out there campaigning under the banner of a party that’s willing to make the bold calls and do what’s right for the future of our country.

But that’s the reality. We can complain about it, or we can get out there and redouble our efforts to promote the ideas we believe in. I want to be part of Labour government after this year’s election because I think we’ve got the best ideas for turning our economy around, giving hard-working Kiwis a break, and securing a brighter future for our country.

I hate comparisons between politics and sport, but there is one analogy with sport that I do find useful from time to time. In politics, as in sport, it’s important to “leave it all out on the field”. We compete fiercely with our opponents, we think our ideas are better, and we think we’re better able to manage the challenges we face. But we should never forget that our opponents are also driven by decent intent, however misguided we may think that they are.

Nobody is entitled to power, or to claim ownership of a particular constituency. In a democracy, it’s a right that has to constantly be earned. Likewise, I think it shows total contempt for voters to declare the electoral race all but run before the starting whistle has even been blown. There are still three months to go before polling day, and I, along with my colleagues, intend to campaign for the ideas and values that Labour represents right up to the last hour. This one is too important.

After 3 years of John Key’s government, the number of people leaving NZ to move to Australia is at its highest level in 10 years. 46,436 people jumped the Tasman for good in the 12 months to July. By contrast, only 14,807 made the jump back the other way.

Remember what John Key said in his 2008 campaign opening speech?

“Do you want more of the same? The same directionless economy? The same political games and distractions? The same loose management of your money? The same excuses, buck-passing, and the same failure to deliver real results?”

Let’s compare the 9 years of Labour government with 3 years under National. Under Labour we had record low unemployment, more people in the workforce than ever before, more people in tertiary education than ever before. Under National unemployment has sky rocketed and tertiary education funding has been slashed.

As for political games and distractions? This from a PM who walked out of Question Time to avoid answering questions from the Leader of the Opposition. The same PM who backed Rodney Hide, then Don Brash, and has now done a dodgy deal with John Banks in Epsom. The same PM who paid PR firms to get him on Letterman. The same PM who won’t be interviewed on Morning Report but will happily take patsy questions on The Edge…

But of course the state of the economy isn’t National’s fault. Their failure to deliver any meaningful financial relief to those on middle and low incomes isn’t their fault. Youth unemployment isn’t their fault (and in less than a week it’s gone from being John Key’s biggest issue to being a problem that’s ‘overstated’). Now, what was that about “buck-passing”?

In 2008 a major re-write of the Police Act was passed by the previous Labour government. It’s a big and complex piece of legislation and mistakes were made. Under the law, if someone is discharged or found not guilty of a crime, their photographs and fingerprints have to be destroyed by Police, but if they are found guilty, they’re kept on file.

Inadvertently, the law was changed to prevent the Police retaining the photos and fingerprints of young people where they were dealt with by the Youth Court rather than the District Court. In other words, even if the young person was found ‘guilty’ by the Youth Court the Police would have had to destroy their photographs and fingerprints.

This needed to be fixed under Urgency because once the mistake was publicly known young offenders who had been convicted using identifying information the Police had stored could have had grounds for appeal.

The Bill that Parliament is currently passing effectively restores the status quo. It reverses a law change that was made by accident, without debate, without select committee scrutiny, and without anyone even knowing it was happening.

The Green Party and the M?ori Party are voting against the Bill currently before Parliament. Some of their arguments are based on process; that Urgency creates bad law and the Bill deserves select committee scrutiny. As I’ve noted above, on balance I don’t accept that in this case and think there is a legitimate case for Urgency.

But some of the arguments being raised in opposition to the Bill raise wider policy issues. I agree that these are legitimate debates, but this is not the appropriate time to raise them (I would also note that when the substance of the law was being debated, neither the Greens nor the M?ori Party felt sufficiently strongly about the issues at the time to even speak about them and that part of the original Bill was passed unanimously).

As I’ve said, I don’t like the use of Urgency to pass laws in a hurry without proper debate and scrutiny. It should only be used in exceptional circumstances. In this instance I think Urgency is warranted.