Locke Keith: Holidays Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
Locke Keith: Holidays Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
[Volume:614;Page:10509] 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party will be supporting this bill and I am very pleased to speak on behalf of the Green Party in this title debate. This title is a very accurate one because the bill is about holidays. I find it to be quite amazing what the previous National Party speakers have said because a holiday means being able to have the choice to not work to benefit oneself by taking part in recreational activities with one’s family and to have some relaxation after the hard work of the year. The idea of a previous speaker Simon Power that somehow this bill tells people how to live their lives is wrong. This bill gives people more opportunity to have variety and relaxation in their lives and is very badly needed. I think the National Party is living in the past. We are just catching up to some of the more advanced countries in the world in respect of increasing paid leave from 3 weeks a year to 4 weeks a year. That brings us up to date with the Western European countries in particular which have much longer holidays than New Zealand has. The workers of New Zealand will welcome this legislation. Simon Power said that people want to have the opportunity not to have a holiday but to work more. I do not think that is the case at all. It would be very hard to come up with working people who would not want a holiday when they could have it and be paid for it and in that sense this is a very progressive bill. It will increase the quality of life that we have. 
This bill came about through the hard work and effort of a lot of people. Unfortunately the Labour Government initially was not very keen on 4 weeks’ leave but I think the pressure of some Labour members and others convinced it. The Green Party has very strongly campaigned for 4 weeks’ leave and we had Matt Robson’s member’s bill which kick-started the whole process. A lot of credit goes to Matt Robson for putting that bill into the ballot and following it through when it was picked out. A lot of people worked together and the various unions—the Engineering Printing and Manufacturing Union and others—were very instrumental in having 4 weeks’ leave included in the bill. The Green Party thinks that the starting date for that should be well before 2007 and we will support amendments to that effect. 
This is a very good bill. I think the provisions on sick leave are advanced too. I know from working in various jobs it was absurd that when workers were sick for one day the employer required them to run off to the doctor and get a medical certificate for that day off. They had to struggle out in the rain and sometimes the snow to get a medical certificate and then became sicker and were off work for about a month. That was a stupid provision and that has at least been loosened up by providing for 5 days’ sick leave and by only requiring a medical certificate after 3 consecutive days off. 
The provision for bereavement leave is very good too. It has been very traumatic for a lot of workers who have less than sympathetic employers that if they have had a bereavement situation they have not been able to get bereavement leave. The provision for casual workers to have bereavement leave is very good too because much of our workforce is now casualised and it is important that people can get time off work to attend the funeral or tangi of a relation and can use that leave accordingly. 
I think the accrual provision for sick leave of up to 15 days in the following year is very important as well because otherwise it encourages workers to go off sick and use up the 5 days’ leave that they have annually and we do not want to encourage that. We want workers to stay at work if they are properly well—to have that motivation—but also not to lose out on the accrual of leave. 
I think the scaremongering by previous speakers that 40 percent of restaurants will close on public holidays etc. is just stupid. The opposition to the bill—this is the strange point—in the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and I think in the House— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich) 
: This bill has been to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. The member should come on to the title please and not mind the Opposition. He should just come on to the title. 
KEITH LOCKE 
: Yes this bill is about holidays and I think it is important that we all have holidays.