Bennett David: Employment Relations (Probationary Period Repeal) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Bennett David: Employment Relations (Probationary Period Repeal) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
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DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East) 
: 
 We just heard from Labour about the Employment Relations (Probationary Period Repeal) Amendment Bill. Labour’s one reason for bringing this bill before this Parliament is unemployment rates. Unemployment rates are the responsibility of the previous Labour Government. That Labour Government put New Zealand into recession before the rest of the world. It destroyed this economy through its 9 years of mismanagement. If members want to talk to the people out there who do not have a job they can tell them about what Labour did for 9 years that put them in that position. The previous Government did that. It destroyed this economy in our best times it created a recession before the rest of the world and it created the unemployment that New Zealanders live with. The National Government has been delivering jobs and trying to get this country out of recession. There would be a lot more unemployment if we had not done what we did in creating legislation like the 90-day bill. 
Members of the previous Government want to go back to the days of the past when they had the glory. Well they did not have the glory they did not use it properly and the people of New Zealand suffer now because of what the previous Government put in place. The public of New Zealand made the choice in the last election and that choice cannot be reversed through a member’s bill here tonight. It is a sad indictment of Labour that it has to use the member’s bill process to go back to the past when it could be looking forward and looking to help New Zealanders. But no it wants to go back to the past and resurrect what it had before under some kind of image of a past fleeting party rather than look forward and deliver what New Zealanders want and deliver the future they want. New Zealanders want that future. 
Kelvin Davis 
: Why do you hate New Zealanders so much? 
DAVID BENNETT 
: Labour members ask that but they put this country in recession. Labour did it. Who was in Government when New Zealand went into recession? It was Labour. Was the rest of the world in recession then? No. The Labour Government put New Zealand into recession; that is where we got the unemployment from. The one reason Labour members are using for this bill—unemployment rates—is actually the one thing that Labour left as its legacy for the New Zealand economy. Labour left us with unemployment; we had to deal with it. Labour created the unemployment and it cannot take this away with a member’s bill tonight. That is the reality of the situation and what this country has faced. 
When we look at what we need to do as a forward-thinking progressive Government we see that we want to create an environment where people get the chance the opportunity and the ability to prove themselves. What more do young people want and what more do migrant communities want than to prove themselves and to get a step in the door? They want to be able to walk into those jobs and show that they can deliver the services where there may have been barriers put up against them in the past. That is what the 90-day bill did; it gave the opportunity for New Zealanders to get that first job. It gave the people whom Labour members talk about as being the most marginalised—the young and those who do not have the experience—the chance to show their potential prove their worth and not have to go through the systems and structures that Labour deems to be appropriate. 
That party over there wants to have its systems because it believes that people are automatically entitled to have them. Those were the words of the previous speaker Carmel Sepuloni—“automatically entitled” to having such things. Labour members look upon it as if there is an automatic entitlement and as if they know what is best for New Zealanders. That is not right—New Zealanders can prove what is best for New Zealanders and we are giving them that chance to get a job. We do not say who is automatically entitled to anything; we say people should be given the chance and they should prove themselves make it work and get the rewards. What more could a human being want than to be given a chance to be given an opportunity and to be given the ability to prove himself or herself—not to be seen as automatically entitled to something under some great plan that Labour had 9 years ago? 
Labour members bring out the concepts of poverty—all of those great stories of poverty—and say that the 90-day bill created the poverty that many families encounter. That is a load of rubbish. The thing that created the poverty in this country is a Labour Government that wasted 9 years and that took away our best economic times and threw them down the drain. We are not going to do that. We are going to give people the chance we are going to deliver them the opportunities and we are going to make it worthwhile for them to take advantage of those opportunities. 
This debate goes to the heart of the difference between the National Party and the Labour Party. This is the heart of the difference between a party that cares that wants to give a future and that wants to deliver prospects and a party that thinks it knows best that wants to tell people what is right and that does not give anybody a chance. That is the point of difference between the Government and the Opposition. We are here to help to give an opportunity; Labour is there to take and direct. That is the whole political difference that this House represents and this is a House that the public has made a decision on in terms of what it wants to see. The public wants to see opportunity they want to give people a chance and they want to see a 90-day bill. We campaigned on one the public voted for it and tonight we will see the public vote through the parties in this House to tell the Labour Party again—it took Labour 2 years to get the message but it will get the message again tonight—that the public do not want to be told what they have to do; they actually want to be given the opportunity to prove themselves. That is the prime lesson that Labour should have learnt at the last election—which it did not—and now it is trying to reinvent the wheel and bring back things from the past and say it had the glory and the answers. But it does not because Labour created the problems that led to the situation we are in today. 
As we can see National will not be supporting this legislation because this bill is a movement back to the past. It does not reflect the energy and commitment of this Government. It does not reflect the ability and desire of New Zealanders and it does not reflect what is in the modern world in terms of the way that employment relations are structured. If we look at most OECD countries we see that they have longer probationary periods than this. 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: The right to be dismissed at will. 
DAVID BENNETT 
: I say to Mr Cunliffe that they have longer probationary periods. I ask Mr Cunliffe what he is saying. 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: The right to be extorted by the unscrupulous. 
DAVID BENNETT 
: Oh let us put those lines on a billboard! It is no wonder that the member will never get the votes of middle New Zealand. Those are the longest words— 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: Back to Dickens! 
DAVID BENNETT 
: Oh Charles Dickens—now we are getting the academic nature of the member coming out. That is why he will never be a success in New Zealand politics—he will never be Prime Minister. He will lead the Labour Party after the next election but he will never be a Prime Minister because he cannot relate to people. People do not want to hear about Charles Dickens; we have moved on from those days. The days of Charles Dickens were when the Labour Party was the great instructor of what could be done. We have moved on. We want to give people the chance; we do not want to put them in forced labour as the Labour Party would when Charles Dickens was in control. No National believes in our people we believe in their future and we want to give them— 
Carmel Sepuloni 
: What is he talking about? How did Charles Dickens come into this argument? 
DAVID BENNETT 
: That is the member promoting the bill. What is she talking about? She has come into this House promoting a bill— 
Hon Pansy Wong 
: It must be Andrew Little. 
DAVID BENNETT 
: Yes it must be Andrew Little texting those members. In reality this is not a time to go back to the past; this is a time when we can build a future. One of the big parts of building that future was the 90-day bill. It has been shown to be successful. It has given people an opportunity. It is something that we should enhance and deliver upon not take back. Why would another political party want to hold New Zealanders back by saying that it could determine the rules? We do not think it is appropriate to hold our people back. We think that there is a future for our people and that future will allow people to prove themselves and to give that opportunity so that they can get a job and then take their lives forward in a constructive way rather than being told that this is what they are automatically or not automatically entitled to as the case may be under Labour. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Rick Barker) 
: Before I call the next speaker I say that the next speeches from here on will be 5 minutes’ duration. I will give a bell at the 4-minute mark.