Coddington Deborah: Holidays (Four Weeks Annual Leave) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Coddington Deborah: Holidays (Four Weeks Annual Leave) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
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DEBORAH CODDINGTON (ACT) 
: 
 I rise on behalf of the ACT party. We oppose the Holidays (Four Weeks Annual Leave) Amendment Bill. It is a bit of a farce as we have already heard. 
This situation is really interesting. One of the things one does when one comes into Parliament is hope to have a member’s bill drawn in the ballot so that one can follow it through the process and hopefully get it enacted. Members work hard we see the bill through a select committee and we do all sorts of things. All members would think that one of the last things that a member in charge of such a bill should do is be here at the conclusion of its passage through the House. If a member really believed in the spirit of his or her bill that member would be here to see it go through. I think it is very sad when we see a member’s bill go through the House and obviously the member in charge is not concerned enough to be present. It is a bit like a baby being left out in the cold or left on the bus. 
It is also interesting to hear that New Zealand First is now competing with United Future to be the poodle of this Government and that both parties would raise taxes. It was interesting to hear New Zealand First today finally admit that it would raise taxes if it came into Government because that is what it would have to do to pay for all the things that it agrees with Labour should be put through. 
 In a way we really have nothing to fear from this bill. We know that 4 weeks’ annual leave has already been put into the Holidays Act with the proviso that it comes into effect on 1 April 2007. But a number of things are a real problem here. Firstly it is not constitutionally sound for one Parliament to bind the next Parliament. That is the first error we have here. The second is that the Prime Minister went to the Business New Zealand conference and promised that under her Government there would be no 4 weeks’ annual leave provision. Then the Prime Minister was lobbied by the Council of Trade Unions. It is usual practice that the Council of Trade Unions writes legislation these days; if we look at the submissions it puts in and at the legislation that comes out the other end we see that it is the same word for word. What do we do when we are between a rock and a hard place? We try to satisfy both elements. 
Also we do not have to worry about the 4 weeks’ leave provision because there will not be a Labour Government in April 2007. There will be a National Government with the ACT party there to ensure that the National Government repeals this legislation. In a way we could say that the Prime Minister did keep her promise when she went to the Business New Zealand conference and said that under her Government there would be no 4 weeks’ annual leave provision because that is what will happen. 
The ACT party says it is up to individual employers to decide how much leave their employees should have—4 weeks 5 weeks 6 weeks or 8 weeks. At the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee the majority of employers—in fact all the employers who came before the select committee—set out how they already give longer leave periods to their long-term staff or senior staff not just to management. At Stagecoach the majority of bus drivers already get 5 weeks’ annual leave. 
One thing Peter Brown said that was correct was that if this Government really cared about low-paid workers and was not just doing this as a sop to voters it would have brought that provision in right now instead of delaying it until April 2007. 
Also if the Government really cared about low-paid workers it would have allowed through ACT’s recommendations to the select committee whereby people who were given 3 or 4 weeks’ leave would have the ability to trade one or two of those weeks for cash. We heard about factory workers who cannot enjoy their family life because they are so far into debt that they cannot take a holiday and they cannot stay at home with their families because it causes enormous family stress. All that they would like is to be able to go to their employers and say they have all of this leave banked up and can they please trade it for cash so that at least they can start managing their debts. No they cannot. 
It is not the role of any Government or the State to interfere in family life until things go wrong until laws are being breached until people are being abused or until contracts are being abused. It is not the role of the State to interfere with families and say that they should have a better work-life balance. That is the spirit of this legislation. The Government has gone into that most personal area and said that it does not agree with the way people organise their families and life and that this is what it thinks people should do. That was the reasoning behind it not allowing low-paid workers—or any workers—to trade accumulated weeks of holiday for cash. This know-all bossyboots Government has said that people should not have the money and that they must have a holiday. It has condemned hundreds of thousands of families to misery because of that attitude. Why should workers not be able to trade leave for cash? 
If the Government thinks 4 weeks’ leave is so good why not make it 6 or 8 weeks? Why not allow just 4 weeks of work per year and let the rest of the time be a holiday? The Government knows that is totally ridiculous and if it knows that it also knows that it is not up to the Government to dictate to employers how much leave they should give their staff. 
The ACT party is pleased to see the demise of this bill as it will be pleased to see the demise of this Labour Government come the next election which we all suspect will be much earlier than the Government thinks.