Ardern Jacinda: General Debate 
Ardern Jacinda: General Debate 
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JACINDA ARDERN (Labour) 
: 
 I am proud to be a member of the Labour Party which is still sticking with the aspiration of making sure that every under-20-year-old is either earning or learning. National is a Government that has given up on that aspiration as it has given up on young people. We do not see members on this side of the House walking away from something that we know is absolutely achievable. But if one listened to the Minister of Education one would think we lived in some kind of rosy utopia. One would not think there were 58000 young people not in education training or employment—58000 young people doing absolutely nothing. The Minister claims that she has the answers to everything at secondary school level. The honest reality is that the Government has not done enough to address the fact that up until just 19 years of age we have 24000 young people doing absolutely nothing. 
What have we heard from the Government to address this issue? It has had almost 3 long years to address this issue and Labour has consistently raised the ways it could address that. What has the Government given us? It has given us make-work schemes it has given us training places at the expense of other training places it has cut $140 million out of skills and trade training it has decimated the sector not boosted it as it has claimed and its last attempt was to give 1600 young people a plastic card to moderate their purchasing of products that were already illegal for them to buy. That was the grand plan. Labour has said that that is just not good enough. There is absolutely no reason why 24000 young people who are of the age where they should be in skills and trade training or education should be doing absolutely nothing. We are aspirational for young people and that is why we have produced a package that at its full extent and its full potential has the possibility of placing 24000 young people into work and into training and into trade training in particular. 
We have a plan. I have not heard a lot of commentary from members on the other side of the House about that plan. They know that we have fully addressed the scale of the issue and it is enormous. That is why it will take an extra $250 million investment. The Government cannot claim that it is the same as its package. If it was it would not cost $250 million to address. Not only have we set out what the plan would look like but also we have set out how we would pay for it. It is a far bigger difference than what the Government has done in the past three youth unemployment packages. It said that its last one would cost roughly $25 million. There was no detail. It said that youth transition would just come out of baseline. That is not possible. There was no detail and it is time that the Government was taken to task on the lack of detail it is giving the media the public and this side of the House. 
Labour’s plan covers four areas. In relation to secondary schools we said we would boost Gateway to make sure an extra 500 young vulnerable people are given access to industry-based training while in school. We have said we would keep trade academies because we acknowledge that they are doing good work but we need more. We would overhaul Career Services because it is not serving our young people well. We would make sure that the Youth Transition Service was nationwide. No school leaver should leave school without a plan for further training education or employment and under Labour they will not. We have listened to the Mayors Taskforce for Jobs as opposed to the Minister who bullied them browbeat them then ignored them. On skills we would ensure that instead of 9000 young people getting the dole a subsidy would go to employers directly to give them an apprenticeship. It makes no sense to pay a young person a dole payment when we could be giving them skills and trade training and an apprenticeship on the job and the industry has welcomed that. It has welcomed that because it knows that we are investing long term. We will invest in a subsidy for 12 months because that is how long an apprentice costs an employer. Not only that we will ensure there are 5000 more training places and Maori trade training Pasifika training and mentoring for each. There will be a boost to the Conservation Corps. 
And most important we acknowledge that none of this matters unless they have jobs to go to. Members on the other side of the House do not think the Government has any role in creating the economic conditions for job creation. Well we do. On this side of the House we have created an end-to-end plan that is robust and that members opposite have been unable to pick a hole in other than to accuse us of continuing to aspire to get young people earning or learning. I am proud of this plan. It gives young people hope and now it is time to vote for it.