KEY POINTS:
National Party leader John Key ridiculed Prime Minister Helen Clark's speech to Parliament today, describing it as "a vacuous bunch of statements" which offered no hope for New Zealanders and no solutions to their problems.
"The public aren't listening to the rhetoric any more," he said when he launched the debate on her speech and introduced the traditional motion of no confidence in the Government.
"She has recycled old policies...all she can do is tell people what the problems are."
Mr Key's strongest criticism was aimed at the Government's decision to announce tax cuts in its May budget.
He said that during its time in office the Government had collected an extra $44 billion in revenue, and only now, because it was election year, were tax cuts on its agenda.
"It has collected extra surpluses while people can't afford their mortgages and can't afford to fill up their cars with petrol," he said.
Mr Key said a National-led government would cut taxes "year after year", increase productivity, invest in research and development, trim compliance costs, reform the Resource Management Act, bring in better bail laws and introduce flexible health policies.
National's housing spokesman Phil Heatley said the shared equity scheme to make housing more affordable had been announced at least a dozen times.
The first time was in 2004, and Miss Clark had even said it would be in place by 2006, he said.
"After a four-year gestation period, what we will get is a two-year pilot programme that may address housing affordability issues for a lucky few," he said.
New Zealand First leader Winston Peters used his speech to denigrate National's record in office and said Mr Key had given no indication at all of how he would achieve the policies he had set out.
-NZPA
