Strange JamieJAMIE STRANGE (Labour—Hamilton East): Madam Speaker thank you for the opportunity to take a call after the Hon Paul Goldsmith did paint a rather bleak picture of how businesses are doing in New Zealand. Look we certainly acknowledge that many businesses have found it difficult during COVID but the reality is most of the businesses I talk to at the moment are actually doing fairly well. Yes there are some challenges around accessing labour at times but most of the businesses have got high levels of demand and they're doing pretty well and they're certainly very grateful to the Government particularly around the wage subsidy. I appreciate the opportunity to speak on this bill at the second reading. This bill increases sick leave to 10 days and by doing that supports workers and gives more flexibility to working families and I'd like to start on that point there. I know we have heard from a few speakers the aspect around the flexibility for families but just to share my personal story my wife and I have four children. We didn't get the memo to stop at two; we sort of carried on. But the memo didn't—Nicola Willis: Four's best—four's best. JAMIE STRANGE: I acknowledge a few others here who missed that memo but back to the bill. So we have four beautiful children. We actually had four under five and there was a period in our life when things were fairly intense. We however were fortunate enough that I was able to work and my wife was able to stay home for around about 10 years and look after the children. So the reality is when the children were sick—which the reality is you know; they often are—my wife was able to look after them. But that is not the case for many many families in New Zealand. Now for many families in New Zealand when the children are sick they've got a very difficult choice to make. The reality is that they can stay home and look after the children but they can only do that for five days per year and after that there are a whole range of contorted outcomes that take place and they have impact across a wide range of our society. When the children are over the age of five it's the same sort of situation. If the children are sick one of the parents needs to stay home because the children can't go to school. But often what is happening is the children are going to school sick and as a former schoolteacher I've seen many children in my class coughing all over kids and I know that it's just going to spread throughout the classroom. So this is a practical piece of legislation and it has a wider impact rather than just on the person who is sick themselves. I'd also like to touch on the aspect around businesses because we have heard from the Opposition that the employers—the Opposition have basically been saying that they think the employees will take advantage of this; so the employees will look to just ramp it right up to 10 days and just try and abuse the system. That is not the example that we've seen in other countries who have raised their sick leave up to 10 days and I don't believe that this will be the example that we will see here. The reality is most people are good honest people and they only take a sick day if they are sick. For me myself I take very few sick days but I do know that at any point in my life I might come across a situation where I fall upon challenging times and I do need to take sick days. I probably have taken those concrete pills" that we've heard about from previous speakers and I have gone to work sick most times and if I tease out why that is it probably comes from my childhood and it probably comes from as well—as we've heard from previous speakers—not letting the employer down. But when going to work sick you are not supporting your employer—you are not helping your employer—and that argument has certainly been made.So we've heard some very strong arguments from this side of the House across a range of areas but I'd particularly like to just highlight those two aspects around the children and around the fact that if you do go to work sick you're actually hurting your business and your employer. This side of the House certainly commends this bill to the House. Thank you."