'THE NATION'

PANEL DISCUSSION presented by STEPHEN PARKER

Response to PHIL GOFF interview


STEPHEN Joining our interview with Phil Goff this morning is Chris Trotter and Barry Soper, but first Chris you have the floor.

CHRIS TROTTER – Political Commentator

Well I notice you drew attention Phil to your background as a working class boy in Roskill. You’ve succeeded of course Waikato cockie's daughter in Helen Clark, and I just wonder why you haven't gone harder on the class question over the last 18 months, because it seems to me that if you look at the way the Nats rebuilt they discovered they were in a red neck between 2002-2005 and they rebuilt their base, why hasn’t Labour rediscovered it's inner red.

PHIL Well I'm not a class warrior, but I do believe very strongly and fervently in what I spoke on earlier this year, and that is that this country has gotta be run for the many, not the few, and what really makes me angry is where I see two sets of tax cuts that really benefit people on my income level, while people in my electorate, middle and lower income people are struggling to make ends meet. What really worries me is when I know that in my electorate 37% of the Maori and Pacific boys are out of work, that’s a disaster for New Zealand, those are the sort of things that we're campaigning on.

CHRIS Why aren’t you driving a wedge between working class I and the Maori elites? I noticed you mentioned New Zealand First as a possible coalition partner, are you leaving that role to Winston Peters?

PHIL No look what I said very clearly at the time of the Emissions Trading Scheme was that this was a shabby deal, a dirty deal that benefitted the incorporations but would do nothing for the ordinary Maori working person who like Pakeha people will be paying more taxes to cover the cost of pollution, and the only reason that the Maori Party backed away from what they'd said in the Select Committee is that they were bought off, that was shabby and I opposed it, and I opposed it strongly.

STEPHEN Do you think Winston's going to be back on the stage?

PHIL I don’t know, that’s up to the electorate.

BARRY SOPER – Newstalk ZB Political Editor

Would you like him to be back on the stage?

PHIL Oh again that’s up to the electorate I don’t choose who the electorate might elect to parliament.

BARRY But didn’t Winston Peters embarrass you in government? I mean there were many things that he did behind the scenes as I know that you would have probably gone along with, and one was this Declaration on Indigenous Rights, now as I understand it was Winston that basically said no you're not going there and the Labour Party swallowed it.

PHIL Not so, that is absolute…

BARRY Well I was told by a very senior member of the Maori caucus.

PHIL Well the very senior member is wrong, and I'll tell you why it was wrong, was we made that decision long before Winston was a coalition partner of the Labour Party.

BARRY What about customary title for Foreshore and Seabed, that was the other thing I was told that Winston …

PHIL Oh yeah customary title yeah he put forward some proposals there that were part of getting the vote to get the change in that ….

BARRY So he hardly helped you did he?

PHIL Oh look Winston's got his good points and he's got his bad points, like most politicians, probably like you and I Barry.

BARRY Well one thing that you did to, we know Duncan Garner's view of you is Prince Charming but…

PHIL Thank you Duncan I really appreciated that. I hope my wife was listening at that time.

BARRY What does make Phil Goff tick?

PHIL I think a passion for New Zealand as what could be a really great place to live. You know today we're all wearing this red poppy and it's the people that went before us that laid down their lives for this country, so that we could have the peace and the stability we have today, and we look at the chances that they gave us, the chances I got from the first Labour government, a working class kid, getting an education, getting a degree at university, and I think those people made this country a better place and I think I owe this country that same thing.

BARRY Do you think you left your run a bit late though, I mean I know you had a tilt at Helen Clark early on?

PHIL No I never had a tilt at Helen, but did I leave my run too late, no, I've been in parliament since I was 28 years old and I've been fighting for the things that I believe in ever since, in the different capacities that I've had.

BARRY Can you really achieve though the top job, the top political job, because you're not making any traction?

PHIL Well I disagree, I'm in it to win in 2011, we're rebuilding our party, we'll have new policies, we'll have new candidates, and we've got a set of principles, we're not a weather vane party, I'm not a weather vane leader, I don’t go with which way the polls go at a particular time, there are things I passionately believe in, I will stand for those things, I will fight for those things, and I will line those things up with what ordinary New Zealanders feel will be good for them.

STEPHEN Phil you're not a weather vane leader but you're 18 months out from the election and consistently you’ve been polling 20 points behind, I mean what do you actually think is the problem?

PHIL Well I think as it was on the programme before, John Key's been a very smooth, very slick politician, he's got an eye for the photo opportunity, he polls regularly and he responds to those polls. Those are his strengths, his weakness is that he doesn’t believe firmly in any particular direction, but he's made promises to New Zealand that he hasn’t fulfilled. Violence was gonna disappear, last year was the worst year ever, unemployment, the Job Summit was gonna have the answers, did nothing, he wasn’t gonna raise GST, he broke the promise and he raised GST.

STEPHEN I'm glad you mentioned tax cos there'll be a budget and there will be tax cuts, and you're promising to put the upper rate…

PHIL What I'm promising is that the vast majority of New Zealanders are the people that we'll be working to benefit, the middle income earners and the low income earners, not just the people at the top. What is right about these tax cuts, that has a Cabinet Minister getting 240 dollars a week extra as a result of cutting that top tax rate, and the average working person Chris getting five dollars, what's right about that.

CHRIS So why not make the top tax rate as high as it is in Sweden, why not redistribute wealth with a little more passion than happened you know in the past?

PHIL Well let me say about redistributing wealth, what we did is we looked after people, we looked after families, Working for Families that lifted 130 thousand children out of poverty, I'm really proud of that, that’s one of the things that I think we did best as a Labour government.

CHRIS What about the fact though that those families were supported by the State rather than drawing their income primarily from their employers, that surely is part of the problem of 240 million dollars a week that the government now is expected to pay?

PHIL Well they were tax credits but that’s basically what Working for Families was, but we also made sure that the lower income people, the people on the bottom regularly got the minimum wage put up, and I'm proud of that as well, seven dollars up to 12 dollars.

STEPHEN Sorry to stop you there Phil but we're out of time, but thank you very much for joining us on the programme.

ENDS

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