Key John: Holidays Bill — Second Reading 
Key John: Holidays Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:614;Page:10466] 
JOHN KEY (National—Helensville) 
: 
 The Holidays Bill has been quite an important piece of legislation in the New Zealand business environment. We can see that by the number of submissions received on the bill—some 4163. A lot was hoped for with regard to this bill which covers quite a complex area. Employers and employees alike demanded some help in understanding this law. Members will well understand then when I tell them that the people of New Zealand are feeling very disappointed indeed. They have been nothing short of conned. There has been an absolute con job. 
The people of New Zealand have been sold a pup by the Prime Minister of New Zealand. With the same sleight of hand that she used to sign that fake painting she is signing this legislation into this Parliament. That is right and the Labour members know it. This bill is a complete and utter con job. It is disgrace and it is no wonder the Prime Minister is out of the country while this bill is being passed. She would be ashamed to be in the House; she would be ashamed to be sitting here. The Prime Minister went up and down the country in 2002. She went from business group to business group from Wellington to Christchurch and Bluff and right up to Auckland Gisborne and Napier. She went all around the country and she said one thing. This is what she said. She looked people in the eye and said: “Under a Labour Government we won’t be signing 4 weeks’ holiday. You can put a ring around it. Don’t worry about it. Mark my words. I am an honest Prime Minister.” 
Hon member 
: You can’t trust the system. 
JOHN KEY 
: That is right. You cannot trust the Prime Minister of New Zealand— 
Jill Pettis 
: And we won! 
JOHN KEY 
: Well you might have won— 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Every time the member uses the expression “you” the member is referring to the Chair. The member must refer to the Minister or to another member in the third person. I refer the member to Standing Order 104. 
JOHN KEY 
: But that is right. The junior Government whip cried out “And we won!” The Government has used its political position to con the people of New Zealand by telling them one thing and delivering another. That is a little like Labour saying it would not be putting up taxes—except that we have had 18 tax increases. Next week the good people of New Zealand have another one rocking down the road to greet them—a 5c a litre or 10c a litre petrol tax—but that is a different issue. 
This bill has been a great form of double-dealing and double-trading. The Prime Minister campaigned on the basis of not supporting 4 weeks’ holiday and told the business people of New Zealand she would not support 4 weeks’ holiday. Despite the fact that Treasury wrote her reports telling her how bad 4 weeks’ holiday would be for the country she then went out and told the people of New Zealand it would cost only a mere $350 million. Yet the National Party through an Official Information Act request that we sent to the Minister of Labour’s office discovered a piece of paper that lo and behold told us it would cost $800 million—not $350 million but $800 million. Not only will it cost $800 million but the very people who have supported this bill as Matt Robson and others have claimed are the very people that this Treasury report told us would pick up the tab for this mad idea. I can only say that the reality is that there is no such thing as a free lunch. If the people of New Zealand are to be given another week’s holiday—in other words bribed with their own money—they will pay the price for that. That is right; they will pay the price. They will not get the pay rises they deserve. They will get an extra week’s holiday—bribed with their own money or someone else’s money—and they will pay the price. 
We have a low level of unemployment in New Zealand at the moment. We can compare it with the rate in the countries that have been quoted in this Parliament this afternoon and I would suggest that Government members go and look at what the unemployment rate is in some of those countries. They will see that in every single instance it is higher than the New Zealand rate. What we know is that when one has inflexible labour markets it is the lowest paid workers the most inexperienced workers and the young workers who miss out on jobs. I just say to members that if we had some of those people in this Parliament this afternoon and asked them whether they would rather have more money or another week’s holiday they would say time and time again that they want the job and they want the money. That is what they want: they want jobs and the opportunity to make money. I know that the Labour Party members are on one permanent holiday. They do it from womb to tomb as they head towards the retirement village. Those members are on a permanent holiday but that does not mean they have to apply their work ethic to the rest of the country. Some of us are out there trying to build a brighter and better New Zealand and we will not do it with legislation like this. The bill is very very disappointing indeed. 
I want to make specific reference to the people from the restaurant industry who came to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and told us that if this provision for 4 weeks’ holiday went through they would simply not be able to open on many of the public holidays and they would simply not be able to open for the same periods of time. It will be a case of back to the future—the good old days when tourists came to New Zealand and nothing was open. New Zealand was closed for business. That is what Matt Robson and the members who think along that line are destining the future of New Zealand to be. I prefer it the way we have it whereby we can go out and enjoy ourselves and people can make their own decisions about the holidays they want. 
While we are debating the issue of holidays with those Labour members I just wonder what the low-paid workers who will be getting an extra week’s holiday will do. They will not have the money to go jetting off to the Gold Coast as I am sure other people in the community will do. They will sit at home in a very expensive situation with their families in poverty and starving and they will be robbed of the opportunity to have higher wages by the nanny State that would not know what is good for them if that hit it in the face. That is the reality of this legislation. What a sad day this is for the people of New Zealand. If 4 weeks’ holiday is such a great idea why are we all hanging around and waiting until 2007 to bring it in? Why do we not bring it in next week if it is such a great idea? Why not? Because that would be another broken promise by the Prime Minister who seems to make a habit of breaking promises. 
I want to talk for a moment about the issue of sickness that is raised in the bill. Many of the submitters who came before the select committee told us that they demanded a medical certificate on very rare occasions really—on the odd time—but they would like to do that if they had the ability when a pattern of behaviour was emerging. The provision that the period of sickness must be 3 days before a medical certificate can be required which is now demanded in the bill was rejected by and large by every employer. It is a retrograde step. What will happen is that people who are about to change jobs and leave their employment and who may have collected 20 or 25 days of sick leave over their working time with their employer will be taking every Friday Monday and Tuesday off ad infinitum and there will be absolutely nothing that employers can do about that. That is not a positive step for people in New Zealand and I am very very disappointed about that indeed. 
The Holidays Bill like the Labour Government promised a lot and has delivered very very little—a complete sop to the unions. I am sure that Ross Wilson will be feeling very good about himself at the moment. I know that Matt Robson has the best of intentions but really at the end of the day the hard-working New Zealanders who do not have enough money to buy Christmas presents who do not have enough money to have a holiday and who do not have enough money to put shoes on their children’s feet will at least have an extra week’s holiday in poverty. What a sad outcome that is for the people of New Zealand. Let us bring on a National Government in 2005 and we will deliver the real results that New Zealanders want. Members can put a ring around that.