Seymour DavidDAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of ACT in opposition to the Holidays (Increasing Sick Leave) Amendment Bill. This piece of legislation more than anything else shows the priorities of this Government. We've just rushed through a bill under urgency to deregulate pill testing—and a fine initiative it is—now when it comes to employment and business and jobs and growth the Government is rushing through legislation to increase the regulation and costs put on people who choose to employ. That is the priority of this Government in a nutshell here under urgency plain for the people of New Zealand to see. It also shows the way this Government approaches problems. This Government is not interested in growing the pie it's not interested in productivity growth; its solution to every problem is redistribution. They never see the opportunity for New Zealanders to do more stuff smarter with more investment capital and better technology. All they see is the opportunity to take what exists and give it to people who they think are more likely to vote for them. It is a sad and sorry way to lead a country.It's worth revising what people who seek to be employers have gone through over the past sad 13 years because employers are not some sort of cash cow for the policies that the Labour Party front bench used to fantasise about as they ran student unions in their youth. They are actually people who assemble investment capital and an idea for a product or a service and customers and if they do that successfully they can make payroll every second Thursday and make sure that jobs actually exist. That's what employers are. But employers have a big numerical problem in this country. There are only 154000 of them five percent versus employees of which there's 50 percent—interestingly the same percentage that voted for the Labour Party. This excellent opinion piece by Geoff Neal says here's why it's getting harder to employ New Zealanders. He says take the last 13 unlucky years that employers have faced in 2007 the Labour-led Government lands a triple blow to business. Number one an extra week's annual leave puts up employers' staff costs 2 percent in an instant. Then it says KiwiSaver employers have to pay 2 percent of someone else's retirement later increased by a National Government to 3 percent. Then in 2007 the adult minimum wage goes up a dollar an hour actually a 10 percent increase in one go. How many businesses can do a 10 percent increase in productivity to pay for that? The fact is they can't. All the way through from 2009 to 2017 minimum wage increases were at least somewhat achievable through productivity growth at 25c to 50c per year. But it didn't mean that the National Party wasn't prepared to Mondayise Waitangi Day and Anzac Day. That's just another 0.2 percent on the costs of employing people in this country just another little smidgen that gets added on to the cost of people who assemble capital and products and services and customers to provide jobs. But hey it all adds up.In 2018 with a new Labour-led Government the minimum wage goes up again by 5 percent in one go. Then in 2019 it gets worse again a 7 percent increase in the minimum wage by $1.20; new domestic violence leave policies which say that employers—not ACC not the taxpayer—are somehow responsible for paying for the public benefit for those who are harmed by those close to them to be able to have respite. Why anyone would put that narrow tax on to employers to achieve a wider public good is a question anybody who knows anything about public policy will never be able to answer sensibly. They weren't finished in 2019. Then they went and got rid of the 90-day trial for people who had the temerity to employ more than 20 other New Zealanders. These are the kinds of costs that have been put on to the Government on to employers by this Government and the last one and the one before it. This bill comes at the end of 13 years of people who seek to employ their fellow New Zealanders having additional costs loaded on to them for purely political purposes. And here we are in 2020 looking into 2021: what does this Government have in store for people who have the temerity to give other New Zealanders a job? Well we're going to see another 6 percent increase to minimum wage. How many employers can get a 6 percent increase in productivity every year to pay that? I wish there were more but sadly there isn't. It's simply unsustainable. Another week's sick leave another public holiday. These are the things that are going on to the costs faced by employers. And people wonder why we're not getting productivity growth when it's all been sucked up in redistribution for political purposes by a Labour Party that just doesn't get what it takes to create investment jobs and growth. What about this bill before us? Well I looked earnestly at the regulatory impact statement that was put on the table with a minute's notice by the Minister because it couldn't be here because this Government is so—how do they say?—ass about face they're running to stand still and keep up. Does it say anything about a problem to be solved that New Zealanders don't have enough sick leave? Well we look at the summary of the problem and proposed approach does it mention anything? The closest it gets is—if you go through to I think page 3 it says if you look at the statistics the Wellness in the Workplace Survey actually 35 percent of workers surveyed said they'd gone to work sick down from 49 percent seven years earlier. A problem that is solving itself but no analysis of what the costs and benefits of the policy are. No justification except for this—here's the justification we've heard from the Minister here's what we see on the regulatory impact statement—it's all about COVID. Well well haven't this Government heard the advice Never waste a good crisis."? What Government would possibly want to use an excuse of COVID that requires people if they tested positive to take off 14 days a few thousand people potentially if things get really bad. A few people might need to take 14 days off while they recover from COVID and prove they have no symptoms or infection from COVID. Instead of helping those small number of people get through COVID this Government is giving five extra days' sick pay to 2.7 million workers. Now unlike Paul Goldsmith my dad wasn't a maths teacher but maybe that's not a bad thing. But I think I can do enough maths to understand that giving 2.7 million workers—at an estimated cost of a billion bucks a year to employers—five extra days off is not a solution to a problem that may see a few thousand workers requiring 14 days off. So there you have it we live in a country where we need an economic recovery that will depend on one Kiwi offering another Kiwi a job hundreds of thousands of times in the weeks and months and years to come as we come out of COVID. We have a Government whose priorities are to deregulate pill testing and then increase the regulation on employment putting a billion bucks of costs ostensibly because of COVID-19 in a way that won't actually help people who need 14 days off for COVID-19. It comes after a 13-year litany of additional costs by the blue team and the red team put on to the cost of people who actually take the effort to assemble the capital the products the services and the customer base to provide other New Zealanders a job. People wonder why it is that the IMF says this country will be poorer in 2025 than it was in 2019. Anybody seeking the answer to that question? I present to you the Labour Government and this myopic stupid disgraceful legislation that the ACT party proudly opposes."