Family too far away for Napier mum

Don Brash has been dining out on Rosemarie Edwards' story for a year, but yesterday he got to hear it himself at the Napier grandmother's home.
Rosemarie had been waiting at Hawke's Bay Airport for her daughter and grandson to step off a plane a year ago when she spotted the National Party leader.
Lamenting to Dr Brash about the number of New Zealanders who had remained overseas during that chance meeting, Rosemarie later wrote to him and invited him for morning tea.
Rosemarie said yesterday the current situation was not good enough and she is now hoping National's proposed cuts, in both tax and compliance costs, will bring the three of her four daughters, who now live overseas, back to New Zealand.
Of her grandson, she said: "He's Australian and he should be New Zealand.
"My daughter's married over there. They can't afford to come back to New Zealand at the moment, the way it is.
What's going to happen? There will be nobody here."
Rosemarie, who runs a loss-adjusting company, said she was worried about New Zealand's future. She voted Labour in her youth but was now a National voter.
"We work seven days a week and at the end of the week there's nothing left because we are paying so much tax.
"The last straw from me was the Clayton's Budget we got from Michael Cullen."
She said Dr Cullen, Labour's finance minister, talked to people as though they were children.
"How dare he. It's our money and he's got it packed away in bags."
Dr Brash said Rosemarie's situation was typical of what is happening in New Zealand and claimed the wage gap between Australia and New Zealand had doubled in the last six years, from $5000 more in Australia to $10,000. It would continue to grow under Labour.
"Over the past two years I have met with thousands of people who find that a family reunion now requires them finding their passport," Dr Brash said.
"We have a comprehensive plan to help start turning the tide. We'll have a tax policy that gives an incentive to work hard - 85 percent of taxpayers will keep over 80 percent of every dollar," he said.
Dr Brash said National advocated a return to hardworking New Zealand values, lower taxes and less waste, and was committed to mainstream New Zealand.
"Unlike Labour and the Greens, we are not prepared to concede defeat to Australia. We are not prepared to see the gap in incomes continue to widen. This is a Bledisloe Cup test we must win."
Wendy Meade, of the Art Zone shop, gatecrashed Dr Brash's lunchtime walkabout by thrusting a telephone in his hands.
On the other end was a radio presenter, who had been urging listeners to put him in touch with Dr Brash.