Source: New Zealand First
Introduction
Good afternoon.
We are here on the seventh day of a total circus in Wellington – it boiled down to what was just an utter distraction last week.
As already stated – after days of speculation and guesswork, it ultimately was, to quote Shakespeare “much ado about nothing”.
That is not to brush-off the seriousness of the issue for National internally, but to highlight the fact that we as a collective government are less than three months away from a pivotal election and our main focus must be the people of New Zealand and our country’s future.
Throughout this week’s distraction, kiwis woke up each day and went to work, some working two or three jobs, still seriously worried about the next pay cheque, or the next rates bill, or the next power and food bill, or how to afford the basics for their family.
All too often, today’s politics has turned into some sort of soap opera, that is seen as entertainment and click-bait for media, or gotcha politics from the opposition, or personal opinions – which ultimately have no effect on the things that really matter and concern kiwis.
There is little doubt about the reasons why a majority of kiwis are disheartened by the direction our political system has been taking for some time.
None of that lessens the basic responsibility that governing parties have.
We must be focussed on what New Zealanders gave us a mandate to do – turning this country around with policies and values that will give our country a better future – driving down the cost of living, cost of food, cost of power, cost of fuel, and turning this economy around – and doing it all with stability and experience.
We in 2023 inherited an economic nightmare. But not enough government members of parliament understood that.
This pivotal election voters want to hear a clear and unified message – that we are going to win, and take New Zealand back to being a leading economy again.
Nelson Electorate
Here in the Nelson Electorate you have a number of problems – first you have a Labour MP.
Second, both Labour and National promised to build the Hope By-Pass in 2023. In short, they have both been fast on the lip and slow on the hip.
You don’t have to spend much time here to know that Nelson doesn’t need Wellington to tell you all how to live.
It needs Wellington to get the fundamentals right – hospital capacity, affordable energy, roads, port, and infrastructure – then get out of the way of the fishermen, growers, exporters and businesses that actually grow the region’s and nation’s wealth.
Take the Hope By-Pass, this is a classic case of the two old parties forward planning.
In 2024 the Nelson-Tasman regional land transport plan lists state highway six at costing $350m over the next ten years.
But they also said that the projects total estimated costs at that stage was already $500m.
The NZTA, by October 2025, had the costs being up to $1.4 billion.
Classically, the NZTA said this includes escalation, contingency and funding risk.
Whatever that means, it is just covering your backside for not getting the figures right in the first place.
Around about now one’s eyes start to glaze over. Because the current proposal is not simply one new strip of road, it’s a two-stage package including interchanges, widening the Richmond deviation to four lanes, Lower Queen Street – Gladstone road works, an SH60 section – round about, and associated connections.
Oh, and by the way, NZTA also recommends tolling to support construction and maintenance.
Then last month, NZTA said it was prioritising finalising design of the Gladstone Road-Lower Queen Street intersection improvements, with detailed design of the other stage one and stage two sections progressing when funding is available – and do you know what that means? Sometime never.
So ladies and gentlemen can we ask you a question, “how did a Hope Bypass project, that in 2024 Regional Transport planning documents showed an approximate $153 million over the first decade – with an overall estimate of almost $500 million – develop into an NZTA investment envelope of up to $1.4 billion just a year later?
Ladies and gentlemen, in the Puhoi to Warkworth North of Auckland motorway, there was massive over expenditure, in the Transmission Gulley North of Wellington, there was massive underestimation of cost, and huge increases of funding was later required even though so much of the new tar seal was defective.
Nelson can’t grow its productive economy if people and exports can’t move efficiently.
In the Nelson area orchards and timber export businesses and the like, have all been hit with high electricity costs. New Zealand First understands the connection between affordable and reliable energy, investment, productivity and retaining regional jobs.
We understand that government needs to remove barriers to productive businesses exporting and growing instead of making business harder.
Ladies and gentlemen, NZFirst is sick of the infrastructure needs of this country being exploited by certain businesses at the enormous cost to rate payers and taxpayers.
We’ve got a record of getting things done at costs and on time.
So, for the Hope By-Pass the first thing we are going to do is stop this wasteful expenditure on forward calculations and get some accountability back into the system. Enter a fixed price contract to complete the project and find ratepayers here the money to do so.
The longer we leave it the more expensive it is going to get – and we need to get it done now.
By the way, don’t forget Labour spent $280 million on light rail in Auckland and didn’t build a single meter. They spend $54 million on a Auckland Harbour Bridge cycle way and nothing ever happened.
If you doubt my record look at the Tauranga Harbour bridges, or the fact that we cancelled the exorbitant costly I-Rex contract for the cook strait ferries – saving you $2.3 billion.
The Labour Party defends their extravagant spending on the ferries, and if you want to see the Labour Party’s plan go to Tasmania right now, they have two massive ferries just like labours I-Rex project, excepting they have no maritime infrastructure and can’t use them, just like we wouldn’t be able to use ours if Labour got its way.
When they were finished with the I-Rex two ferry blow out – they had gone from $401 million for two ferries, to over $4billion.
Why? Because with their two huge ferries the infrastructure had to be rebuilt and that was going to cost four times what the ferries cost.
And yet the sausage roll eater and his crew are still defending this issue when everyone here knows better.
Ladies and gentlemen
Experience Matters
New Zealand First started our long campaign in March this year and we have been packing the halls around the country every week delivering the message to thousands of kiwis that we are focussed on two things – bold policies our country needs for a real change, and the fight for ordinary hard working kiwis against the establishment, the elites, and the status quo.
Experience and leadership has never mattered more.
We need leaders of the next government to say the things that people are thinking without fear or favour – the things that might be unpopular.
To say the things that others only talk about behind closed doors, too afraid of the backlash from the woke precious snowflakes on the left, or worse, the mainstream media.
New Zealand needs strong leadership who are not afraid to be strong on important issues.
And we don’t need weak leaders who don’t understand New Zealand values.
We can’t go on allowing the two old parties to tinker round the edges of big issues, and do nothing but manage the decline of our country.
Ladies and gentlemen, we are at a pivotal point in the future of New Zealand.
We have already announced a number of bold policies this year.
It is what we need for real change to drive down the cost of living, secure a better future for kiwis, and reinforce who we are as New Zealanders.
Some announced policies
We have announced policies to break up the power companies’ monopoly, and drive power prices down.
We have announced policies to split the supermarket duopoly, and drive food prices down.
We have announced polices to re-establish a competitive New Zealand owned state bank, to drive banking charges down.
We have announced polices to return mining royalties, created in the regions, back to the regions.
We have announced establishing a proper transparent inquiry into those who were injured by the Covid 19 vaccine – so we can find out exactly what happened, who was responsible, and publicly hold them to account.
We are going to expose the cover-up on this issue by the other political parties and so many in the establishment.
We announced our KiwiSaver policy of making it compulsory with automatic $1000 sign-up at birth. It means the day a baby is born it gets $1000 in its account to start saving.
We have announced our policy is to establish a $100 billion Future Fund that will invest in a thirty-year infrastructure plan for our country. And that’s where we are going to get the money for the Hope By-Pass from.
We have also announced that we will pull out of the Paris Agreement that is senselessly hamstringing our economy.
New Zealand has one of the loosest electoral laws in the world, and that is why we have announced a policy to ensure that by 2029 only citizens are allowed to vote in our country.
At our Campaign Launch, we announced a policy to invest $1billion to start exploring our gas and oil reserves in our deep-sea basins so we can own and export our own oil and gas.
Here we are wrestling with an international fuel crisis while we could be owning and using our own.
New Zealand has natural resources that are there, ready to be utilised to transform our country.
This is about New Zealand’s economic sovereignty and security.
And we also have announced the ‘Kiwi Kids Grant’ that will support New Zealand citizens raising their first three children, through the first three years of their lives – $5000 per child for each of the three years.
Citizenship
New Zealand needs to start viewing our citizenship as most other countries around the world do – as a privilege that comes with special and unique rights.
This does not take away from migrants the ability to move here and help build our country, from showing total commitment and patriotism for New Zealand by becoming a citizen.
We have massively allowed so many of our standards to drop.
Even the most basic of privileges and rights in any country like voting has in our country become more like an expectation for anyone, rather than a unique right for New Zealanders.
Ladies and gentlemen, why do so many ‘apologetic globalists’ act shocked and dismayed that a political party is wanting to ensure that citizenship actually means something?
Our recent policies like Kiwi Kids Grant and citizens only voting, is not anti-anything or anti-anyone. Those policies show that we value our citizenship and don’t shy away from wanting special rights and privileges to go with it.
This is about valuing our unique citizenship the way it should be – just like the vast majority of countries do.
We have many more such policies to truly change the direction and thinking of our country.
And what have the other parties announced as policies so far? More taxes, more spending, solar panels and free bus rides.
The election is 83 days away, and already the other parties are reverting to type, as they always do at election time, with no direction, no plan, and no real policy, that will give New Zealand the change that we need.
But there is a difference in this election. Kiwis are looking at what parties are offering as their values and principles in these uncertain times.
NZSIS Report This Week
As the Leader of New Zealand First and as Foreign Minister, there were very concerning announcements this week from the NZSIS director general, Andrew Hampton, regarding national security challenges and intelligence.
The warning is among those contained in the latest Security Threat Environment Report, released as the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service, saying New Zealand is confronting the flow-on effects of “the most challenging global threat environment in recent times”.
Andrew Hampton says New Zealand’s geographic isolation “affords us only limited protection from the types of threats we are talking about, whether that be violent extremism, foreign interference, or espionage.”
Attempts at foreign interference targeting New Zealand political figures at both national and local level are “occurring constantly”, with Hampton quoted as predicting that will continue throughout the election campaign.
“Unfortunately, we see attempts at foreign interference targeting political figures, both at the national and local level, occurring constantly”.
The report describes diaspora communities being subjected to transnational repression, where foreign states or their proxies seek to restrict the rights and freedoms people are entitled to in New Zealand.
Hampton describes a spectrum, from online or physical monitoring of people perceived to be dissidents, to harassment.
The threat report says New Zealand’s public and private sectors are being targeted by foreign states and their proxies to gain access to critical assets such as intellectual property and innovative technology.
“The activity cannot be described as benign. It involves state actors with a voracious appetite for any information they can leverage to gain an advantage over New Zealand or our partners.”
The report says espionage – spying – is covertly accessing protected information, and that foreign states frequently use proxies to do that.
While several states are said to conduct espionage here, the SIS names the People’s Republic of China as “the only country we have detected doing it at scale”
New Zealand First is the only party that has consistently called out the threat posed to New Zealand’s democracy through outside influences, and will continue to fight on your behalf to ensure we tighten our immigration status, strengthen our borders, and ensure financial resources are always at a level enabling the SIS and it’s agencies the capability to protect our democracy from outside influences.
This report was released by the NZSIS this week. And there has been a deafening silence from other political parties and many in the mainstream media.
This is why New Zealanders need an ‘eyes wide open’ political party like New Zealand First.
NZFirst Party Mandate
New Zealanders gave us a mandate to turn this country around after the Labour Party wasteful spend-up, achieved nothing, and put people on the “go woke, go broke path”.
We signed a coalition agreement to govern with stability and experience three years ago – and we have kept our word.
New Zealand First brings what is too often missing in politics – experience and common sense.
New Zealand First brings a commitment to New Zealand industry, to manufacturing, to jobs right here for our own people.
New Zealand First brings commonsense to immigration policy – where we allow in people that we need, not people who need us.
We believe in infrastructure before population growth, not afterwards, and infrastructure focused on fixing what’s broken, not flash upgrades and vanity projects.
New Zealand First brings traditional kiwi conservative values – where hard work should be rewarded, where job security and home ownership underpins a stable family life.
We want a country where young people aren’t worried about their family’s future, or where they see better opportunities overseas.
We are the party of social conservatism, patriotism, and nationalism. Those values are what it means to be a Kiwi – and New Zealand First is proud to not only stand by those values, but to fight for them.
This is an election where the question is simple: do you trust a cabal of woke left-wing student politicians from Labour, nutbars from the Greens, separatists from the Māori Party or the globalist consultants from Opportunity to stick up for your family and for your country?
Politics is sometimes farcical, take last week – Chris Hipkins shocked the country and held a media conference to announce that he has ruled New Zealand First out. As you can imagine it took us all by surprise.
Not least, because we had ruled Labour out in 2022, then again twelve months ago, and again every month when answering the same stupid questions from the media.
When Hipkins wasted everyone’s time and ruled us out, we said Hipkins had “severe learning difficulties”, and we stand by that statement.
Who is Labour Ruling In?
But what should be the most concerning, is that he did not rule out working with the Māori Party, and their racist separatist policies.
He did not rule out working with the Greens, and their $88 billion debt increase, or their new policy bribe to give $2.4 billion to Marae – without any external checks.
In fact, what did Labour think? They fully supported that bribe.
The Opposition Antipodean Animal Farm
Did Hipkins rule out working with Opportunity, who want homeowners to pay 1.75% of your land value every year for their home? You already pay local rates, now you will have to pay annual rent to the Government.
And what did the leader of TOP say when questioned about an old couple on the pension, who worked hard and saved all their lives, bought a house for their future and their children’s future, who would face a $20k land tax bill every year? She said, yes, they will have to downsize their house to afford it.
And do you know what that money would be used for? Infrastructure? Health? Education? Fuel security? Food prices? No.
It will be used to give everyone in New Zealand, even if they don’t have a job, a Universal Basic Income of $19,400 a year – for free, for life, for doing nothing.
Opportunity calls this ‘fairness’.
New Zealand First calls it ‘communism’.
And the Labour Party has said they will work with Opportunity.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is the stark truth. The Labour Party that you once knew, perhaps even supported, is no more.
That party is gone. All of these polices and parities they are willing to support are proof of that.
Can you imagine Helen Clark or Michael Cullen, or Bob Tizard or Peter Frazer signing up to this?
These parties on the left are not people who see New Zealand as one people, one country, one flag, one law, or people who believe in fundamental kiwi values like hard work, ambition, and personal responsibility.
These are people who believe in a separatist society, and who want to borrow, tax, and spend – but have zero economic credentials, or even vision, to deliver growth.
Chris Hipkins and Labour are willing to work with parties like Opportunity, Greens, and the Māori Party because Labour care more about the number of seats that will give them power, rather than the danger of who it is that will sit in those seats.
Challenging the Status Quo
The greatest threat to this blind ideology, to social elitism, and to the status quo, is New Zealand First.
And the country we are defending is called New Zealand – it’s in our party’s name.
We fight for the hardworking blue-collar Kiwi battler, who just wants the chance to help build a country they are proud of.
In this election, we have a rare chance to change the shape of parliament for the better, and in doing so, to reshape our country the way you want it.
We are asking you to make a choice with our future generations in mind.
Take back control from the Wellington bubble.
Take back control from those who choose to be CV politicians, where they are here one day, “no more gas in the tank”, and are gone the next – taking with them a rolodex of international jobs, speaking circuits, or book tours, looking back over their shoulder at New Zealand’s decline – which they caused.
New Zealand First, from our launch thirty-three years ago, has been battling that elitist status quo. No one can deny that. On issue after issue that needed public exposure, the rest remain silent. When others wouldn’t raise a finger, we have raised the roof.
Conclusion
Ladies and gentlemen, we are all here because we love our country, and we are proud of it.
True democracy is a rare flower in the history of humanity.
Down thousands of years living in democracy with freedom is a historical rarity.
We have inherited a free country that our forebears fought and died for, and it’s our job to preserve it.
But only if we are proud of what we have inherited can we come together and move forward to shape the vision of our country’s future.
We live in a country that, at its core, traditional New Zealand values once saw us amongst the world’s leaders – hard work, fair pay, valuing our citizenship, building a sense of community, and knowing who we are as kiwis.
We must remember, New Zealand is the beneficiary of Western values, democracy, and the rule of law. And the advancement and enhancement of those principles have only occurred in those societies that have united together as one people – and who celebrate their nationhood instead of perpetuating division.
There is a lot of uncertainty around the world and at home, but we must keep hope alive that, with hard work and perseverance, tomorrow will be better.
New Zealand First is nationalist, patriotic, and socially conservative values that we fight for.
It hasn’t been easy – but things in life worth doing never are.
We must never forget that challenge.
We must never stop believing in New Zealand.
That is our vision and that is our mission.
To protect, to save, and to restore New Zealand’s place at the top of the world.
By putting New Zealand and New Zealanders first.
We are asking you to join us – and Party Vote New Zealand First.
Original source: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/08/16/winston-peters-the-labour-green-maori-opportunity-antipodean-animal-farm/