Lubeck MarjaMARJA LUBECK (Labour): Thank you Madam Speaker and also congratulations on your appointment as Assistant Speaker.First of all I think I would like to thank the member Scott Simpson for recalling the proud work history of our new Minister. We're absolutely proud of that. He referred to the well-trodden path via the union movement. I guess that is in stark contrast to the well-trodden path of the National Party where $100000 will do the job. Now the member talked about the fact that there was no consideration for employers in the ministerial speech when the Minister very clearly referred to the COVID-19 Leave Support Scheme. That was a scheme that was put in place very quickly by our Government to ensure that employers did have the support and the help immediately to work through the options that they needed to have and work through all of the different matters they needed to take to remain viable. Now I am very saddened to see that someone can stand up and do a speech when they actually haven't even listened to what the Minister was stating in his speech. The Minister talked about how productivity doesn't have to be one size fits all just working harder will do the job" and this is how we see that the National Party is so stuck in the mind-set of just looking at what employers might like in their view and their absolute hate for employees. This doesn't need to be a trade-off as the Minister very clearly said. Now the study in the US that the Minister mentioned showed that there was actually a lot of cost associated with people taking their germs into the workplace and consequently other co-workers get sick and that has a huge cost on their productivity. The member also made an incorrect statement with regards to the cost in the regulatory impact statement. The cost that the member mentioned is a gross cost and that cost does not take into account the fact that when someone gets sick in a workplace and goes to the workplace to spread their germs other workers will go sick as well. So that cost needs to be taken into consideration too.Now I would like to applaud the Minister for bringing this bill to the House. COVID more than anything else has shown us that it's so important that we look after our workers. It's so important that we make sure that people don't go to work sick and don't feel the pressure of having to go to work sick because that is what we see. I see Christopher Luxon on the other side of the room and I'm hoping that he will have a different story to tell and take a call on this bill perhaps—not prior to the maiden speech. We worked at Air New Zealand under a high performance high engagement workplace and perhaps the member Scott Simpson can take some lessons from one of his new colleagues because in that environment we weren't hating on employees; we were actually working with unions and we were working with employees. So perhaps that hatred of the union might get a little bit dissolved once there is a new member and perhaps a new leader in the National Party. Now with regards to businesses being aware of this productivity there are already plenty of businesses out there that have implemented sick leave policies that give workers paid time off to address their basic health needs. In Air New Zealand for example and in many of the aviation collective contracts there was in fact for a while undefined sick leave. I don't like to say "unlimited" because that would sort of imply that people just took leave whenever they wanted but "undefined" meant that the workers would make an assessment on when they needed to have that sick leave and would look after their health before anything else. These businesses they realise that what is good for their employees is actually good for the business because it's not only the employees that benefit from better sick leave provisions; it is actually the businesses. When businesses provide sick leave so that their workers can take the paid sick leave when they need they will recover properly they will not spread any illnesses into the workplace but they will also come to work healthy refreshed on top of their game and in that sense they are productive—and more productive than if they were to slog themselves into the workplace be half fit make everyone else sick and make mistakes because you make errors when you're sick. So the very short-sighted and narrow view from the National Party—you know five days' sick leave and for the rest you just have to make do with being sick in the workplace—is absolutely the wrong thing to take. It saddens me to see that they're stuck in the same rut like with everything else throwing out the same old narrative hating on employees. But I think this is a great bill. It shows its importance that our Minister Michael Wood brought this bill to the House as the first item of business and it shows the importance that our Government puts on keeping people and keeping New Zealand safe. I commend it to the House."