Ministers called on to resign over Super.

Press, 15 November 1984, Page 4

Ministers called on to resign over Super.

PA Wellington Government Ministers who promised before the General Election that there would be no interference with National Superannuation should now resign, said an Opposition member of Parliament last evening.

A former Minister of Social Welfare, Mr Venn Young (Waitotara), told Parliament during the Budget debate that elderly people felt justifiably that they had been deceived by Labour members before and during the election campaign.

But the Minister of Transport, Mr Prebble, said that not one of the “pretenders” to the National Party leadership was prepared to commit himself and the party to going back to the superannuation system introduced by Sir Robert Muldoon.

From the first Budget which had introduced it, the scheme had been financed totally out of borrowing, he said.

Mr Young said Labour members had promised that National Superannuation would not be altered.

“There would be no meains test — they gave that commitment to the people and now they turn their back on it. “I want to advise the Government as strongly as I can to change its policy. It is not fair. “To those Ministers who went out and promised there would be no interference, came back here and did just the opposite — they should resign. They bring themselves, their party and this place into discredit.”

Mr Prebble said that Parliament had never voted enough money to pay for National Superannuation. “In 1975 when the scheme was introduced it took 3.6 per cent of gross national product to fund it,” he said.

. “This year it has gone to 7.4 per cent of gross national product,” Mr Prebble said.

Mr Prebble read excerpts from a copy of the draft Budget prepared for the former Minister of Finance, Sir Robert Muldoon, and offered to table it if asked by members of the Opposition.

Sir Robert had objected to the Government’s having the paper or releasing it, he said. “It must be the first Budget in the history of this country where a Minister of Finance wrote a Budget but failed to say anything about tax,” said Mr Prebble.

In the middle of a record deficit, with Government spending exceeding its income, there was no word about deficit reduction. The former Government had put heavy emphasis on reducing growth in its expenditure in the draft Budget, he said. Mr Prebble said that from 1976 to 1983, Government expenditure, as a percentage of gross domestic product, rose from 32.5 per cent to 41.5 per cent.

Sir Robert’s draft Budget had been the "status quo” Budget he had been telling people it was — it was the same "load of cobblers and rubbish” dealt with year after year, said Mr Prebble.

Mr Garry Knapp (Socred, East Coast Bays) said the

Budget was a betrayal of the hopes and dreams of generations of supporters of the Labour Party. The Budget would be a failure because it was based on the belief that everyone would be better off and inflation cured if prices went up, and that the deficit would be removed if more was spent on debt servicing, and that growth could be achieved without real purchasing power available to the people, he said. Mr Knapp criticised the Government’s surtax on income additional to National Superannuation payments. The Government had told untruths in its election campaign, and the threshold for extra tax to be paid had been set too low, he said.

The Minister of Education, Mr Marshall, said that after nine years of an “economic miracle maker,” the nation at last had a Government which was prepared to take hard decisions.

“The Government and the Minister of Finance faced a difficult task because, as nearly all the world knows, the economy was in a difficult situation. It was covered from one end to the other with sticking plaster,” he said.

The Budget had brought in a comprehensive change of direction only three months after the Government took office.

Mr Roger McClay (Nat., Waikaremoana) said the Budget was one of broken promises. The Treasury had had a free hand, he said, although he did not blame it.

“Their job doesn’t require

them to take telephone calls at the week-end from constituents confused, dismayed, and in the case of one 75-year-old lady who rang me, crying,” he said. Mr McClay said he blamed the Prime Minister, Mr Lange, the Minister of Finance, Mr Douglas, and the Minister of Social Welfare, Mrs Hercus. They had made the promises and they had broken them, he said.

“Superannuitants are up in arms. I have never received so many phone calls, letters and telegrams on any issue as on the superannuation issue. ’’They are very upset and they are very worried. They are the elderly citizens who were deceived by this Labour Government when it was campaigning on not one occasion but on dozens of occasions,” he said. Mr McClay said that the Government’s decision off who received the Family Care benefit had aroused feelings of prejudice among New Zealanders.

He had been told that some school principals were considering banning any discussion of the grant in schools.

The scheme was iniquitous and treated children in an unfair manner, Mr McClay said.

However the scheme was defended by Mrs Margaret Austin (Lab., Yaldhurst), who said it was innovative and helped those who had been badly disadvantaged by National Government policies. The debate was interrupted when the House rose at 10.30 pm.