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"...keep the promises you’ve made before making new ones"

Rt Hon Winston Peters
New Zealand First Leader
Member of Parliament for Northland
9 MARCH 2017

Speech by New Zealand First Leader and Northland MP Rt Hon Winston Peters

Warkworth Rotary,
Bridgehouse Lodge,
16 Elizabeth St,
Warkworth
6pm, 9th March, 2017


“It’s election year so keep the promises you’ve made before making new ones”


Jane Austen could have been speaking about New Zealand politics when in Pride & Prejudice she wrote of the two leading male characters, Mr Darcy and Mr Wickham:

"One has all the goodness and the other all the appearance of it".

Never in the political history of New Zealand has the electorate been presented with such a stark political choice.

In one corner sit the Green’s and Labour “in an uneasy marriage of inconvenience.”

In the other corner sits what was the establishment party of provincial New Zealand - National. A party which, in recent decades, has been hijacked by big city nouveau riche effete careerists and propped up by nothing less than a rag-tag bunch of Klingons.

And in the middle is of course New Zealand First.

We represent the suburbs, towns, farms and orchards that big city Auckland and Wellington forgot.

Our renaissance is because we know the secret to New Zealand’s true wealth has always come from the regions.

The regions represent the past and future secret to our country’s economic salvation. The regions are what the tourists flock here for. The regions provide us with the merchandise exports that pay for everything government consumes.

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We get it. The rest don’t. They all support mass immigration and the artificially consumptive economy. So I’ll leave you to decide who Jane Austen was alluding to when she wrote:

"One has all the goodness and the other all the appearance of it".

When it comes to reining-in immigration and the housing crisis there is only one party to trust and that is the party, the only party, which has opposed mass immigration;

Safety on our streets and in hour homes

When it comes to safer communities National’s 880 new police, mysteriously found under Paula Bennetts’ pillow, does not even come close to matching the ratios of police to population that we had in 2008, after NZ First secured in three-years flat, 1000 extra front line police and 235 back office staff.

Let’s be clear.

These extra Police are a political fix. Ask Paula Bennett where they will go and she says “it’s an operational decision”. Ask Police and they say “we’re working on it”. Does that sound like there was a sound planned business case to you?

We have been told by Ms Bennett that over the next four years “It is expected that between 15 and 20 stations will be transitioned to 24/7 in order to meet the Government’s target of 95% of the population living within 25km of such a station.”

We have news for Ms Bennett and so do the public.

They will not accept that upgrading just 6% of all current Police stations to 24/7 staffing is the best that we can expect.

It gets worse. Using official Police job data called CARD, Warkworth has suffered 822 burglaries for only 15 arrests since 2008. Burglars have a 98% chance of getting away with it here. There have been 98 serious assaults but only 19 arrests and concerning for everyone here tonight given a focus on vulnerable children – 5 reports of child abuse for only one arrest.

The Government will have you believe that 880 sworn officers over the next four years will solve everything.

It won’t because it is about 1,000 officers short.

It won’t because police officers need to eat and sleep. They take annual leave, need training, fall sick and have to attend court among other duties. Ms Bennett’s 880 extra police “in a few years’ time,” will more likely increase 24/7 policing by about 126 officers. This is reality, not this government’s policy by crisis.

So while 880 police are welcome it’s barely scratching the sides when it translates into just 126 officers, 24/7, covering New Zealand from Kaitaia to Bluff.
Most will go into the big cities leaving places like Warkworth and Wellsford seriously under serviced. Just as you are now.

When it comes to economic growth, only NZ First has policies to make our boat go faster rather than National’s obsession with immigration or the other parties writing cheques that they simply cannot cash
And when it comes to our society, there is only one party that truly believes in one law for all.

For some in our media who are obsessed with identity and diversity, if you think one law for all is racist, then I seriously think you need to read more.

These days you cannot call a spade a spade because some over paid academic has declared that saying racist.

It is gold-plated poppycock.

Westland Mayor Bruce Smith best sums up this politically-correct wowser brigade who have now targeted BYO at the Kumara races.

“Some shiny ass fella from Wellington's gone and dreamt this up and is attempting to put it in place and quite frankly it's not good enough."

If the last Labour government had come up with this plan in 2008, National would have labelled it the nanny-state gone mad.

Nine years on and the irony is that National’s big water policy announcement will likely require that nanny goats be excluded from waterways.

So let’s exclude the politically correct wowsers dreaming up ways to control society instead.

New Zealand First has a clear message. Ordinary New Zealanders going about their lawful activities pay taxes to give you the job that you have, so stop dreaming up stupid ideas to justify your existence.

It’s time for a common sense revolution

The people of Warkworth, and indeed the North, were promised nine years ago a road of national significance or a RONS – from Puhoi to Warkworth. Not one metre of that road has been built.

Here in Warkworth is a Hill Street “intersection disaster posing as a bottleneck” which begs the question, who and what was responsible for planning this?

In the Northland by-election in March 2015, two years ago, National promised a super highway from Warkworth to Wellsford.

Not one metre has been built.

There is the Brynderwyn Upgrade, which has been going on for the past two years, is still to be completed, and there has been a massive blowout in the projected costs. The excuse – “we’ve discovered geotech issues” – which begs the question who did the geotech due diligence in the first place when setting the $16m contract?

In March 2015 National promised 10 two-lane bridges and not one has been started - and seven have apparently dropped off the list.

They have not kept their super-fast broadband promise up here, nor their expanded cell tower coverage promise, which was in their 2015 By-election promise to be paid for by the taxpayer.

It’s Election Year

Minister Bridges was boasting in Parliament today of their plan to have a super highway between Marsden Point to Whangarei – to be started in 2019.

Back in March of 2015, they were telling the media that all of these projects were going to be started so if you think they are going to keep their promise on the Marsden Point to Whangarei road upgrade, you need to explain why you have such confidence against the promises they’ve never kept.

And we haven’t even mentioned the planned alternative route to SH1, SH15, which is meant to be completed by 2021 much further north.

In short they playing off parts of Northland against other parts of Northland and hitherto have not fulfilled even one promise on roading.

What is the conclusion that one is driven to on these matters. It is that they think that Northlanders are totally gullible.

As the MP for Northland my job and my colleague, Tracey Martin’s job, is to do everything we can to make this, or any government, keep their promises to the people of Northland.

ENDS

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