Gosche Mark: Holidays Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
Gosche Mark: Holidays Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:621;Page:16254] 
Hon MARK GOSCHE (Labour—Maungakiekie) 
: 
 It is somewhat of a pleasure to speak after that member has sat down and to remind him about productivity and efficiency because I understand that the National Party policy is to get rid of 4 weeks’ annual leave. Did that member move a Supplementary Order Paper into this House to test that? Did Dr Wayne Mapp National’s latest industrial relations spokesperson get up to impress his leader who has promised if National is elected next year to get rid of 4 weeks’ annual leave? Did he? No he did not. He was probably asleep at the time and forgot. The National Party is so confused about its position on these matters that it did not even have the wherewithal to put up an amendment to this bill saying that it does not want workers to get 4 weeks’ annual leave. Why did Dr Wayne Mapp not do that if he is so productive and efficient? Why did he not follow his leader’s lead and propose it as National Party policy? Maybe it is because National is not really sure that it could get away with that. It did try to take 50 percent of workers’ wages off them when they went off sick. 
Dr Wayne Mapp does not portray the real situation for those freezing workers that he spoke of. We asked the Business New Zealand representative when he came before the committee whether he lost 50 percent of his wage when he went off sick. I am still waiting for the answer because he mumbled and jumbled around and said that if Business New Zealand required him to be productive and have such an agreement then he could expect to maybe lose that sort of money. But he was an ex - meat industry representative and he did not tell the committee that he lost 50 percent of his wages when he went off sick for a day. He proposed and the National Party proposes to get rid of the law that states that people who go off sick get the same amount of earnings as they would if they had been at work which was the law in this land for as long as I was in the workforce up until National changed the law. 
So it is quite rich for the National Party to say that workers are getting paid a heck of a lot more when in fact the evidence that I heard was that they got up to 50 percent of their normal daily pay taken off them if they should go off sick. Let us be clear about that—the National Party is proposing to take the fourth week of annual leave off workers in this country if it should ever be elected. Dr Wayne Mapp forgot to put that amendment forward last week. And it is saying that if workers go off sick under a National Government they will lose 50 percent of their pay for the pleasure. 
 That is good to be able to go out and tell the workforce of New Zealand because Dr Brash is on record as saying that we need to do things to keep New Zealand workers here instead of have them go over to Australia and create a skill shortage in this land. In Australia of course they have had 4 weeks’ annual leave for about 30 years. Workers also get their sick pay paid to them as per what they would have earned. But the National Party solution to a skills and labour shortage in New Zealand is to make it even worse for workers. Well on that basis there is no point in discussing the matter any further in a debate such as this because the National Party’s lunacy speaks loudly and people can understand it.