Bennett David: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBennett David: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 13 February 2014. Volume:696;Page:15917. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]1.DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East) to theMinister of Finance: How is the Government’s economic programme supporting stronger regional job growth?Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Associate Minister of Finance) on behalf of theMinister of Finance: As the Minister said yesterday one of the Government’s priorities is building a more productive and competitive economy and that is starting to deliver results. Last week’s household labour force survey and quarterly employment survey showed that 66000 more people were employed in 2013. Of the 12 regions used in the household labour force survey employment increased in nine of them: Auckland Waikato Bay of Plenty Gisborne-Hawke’s BayManawatū-Wanganui Wellington Canterbury Tasman - West Coast and Otago which incidentally was up by nearly 11000 which will please everybody except the Opposition. Across New Zealand actual employment growth in the 4 years to December 2013 was 139000 jobs. That is pretty close to the Treasury forecast made in Budget 2010 and is a fairly consistent picture of recovery reaching across the country.David Bennett: How is the improving economy impacting on job growth in different sectors?Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Of the 16 different industries measured by the household labour force survey employment rose in 11 including manufacturing which does debunk another myth often heard around this building. There is no doubting that the high New Zealand dollar is a challenge for exporters but the January Performance of Manufacturing Index which was released today shows manufacturing has now been in expansion for 16 consecutive months which is weirdly precisely the exact same time since the Opposition announced the start of its inquiry into a manufacturing crisis. I quote from the Performance of Manufacturing Index today which says that manufacturing punched above its weight regarding job growth in 2013. It accounted for 13.5 percent of jobs added in the New Zealand economy overall last year which is more jobs than were added in Australia in the same period.David Bennett: How do New Zealand’s latest labour-market statistics compare with Australia’s for the same period?Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Our overall employment numbers stack up well compared with Australia’s. We have had very close numbers of unemployment with Australia and I have been advised within the last hour that Australia’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate in January was 6 percent which matches the New Zealand rate for December which was also 6 percent. At the same time many more people as a percentage of the labour market participate in the work market in New Zealand than in Australia. Australia’s participation rate is 64.5 percent compared with the New Zealand rate of nearly 69 percent. That is the second-highest on record. So New Zealand’s increasing participation rate is consistent with the higher levels of confidence that we are seeing which are encouraging people to have more opportunities in the job market. We are seeing significantly higher employment in New Zealand than in Australia.Rt Hon Winston Peters: How is giving a $134 million - plus contract to a foreign Kansas company over a Hamilton aircraft company—to use the words of the question—part of the Government’s economic programme supporting stronger regional job growth and what did National MPs Bennett and Macindoe do about this atrocity? [Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: Order! The Hon Steven Joyce—either of those two supplementary questions.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I think it is important for the member to note that economic policy does not stand alone in any particular area but actually we have to boost confidence and competitiveness across the New Zealand economy. That means actually ensuring that New Zealand Government expenditure is the best it can possibly be and that it meets the requirements of a particular contract. If the member is suggesting that we ignore those things then very quickly our economy would go backwards and the sorts of positive results that we are now seeing would disappear out of the New Zealand economy. But I am familiar with that approach from Mr Peters.David Bennett: What proposals has he seen that are likely to impact on future employment growth?Mr SPEAKER: The Hon Steven Joyce in so far as he has ministerial responsibility.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Employment growth comes when someone has the work available to justify hiring another person and they have the confidence in order to do so. The recent growth in confidence and employment in the New Zealand economy is closely linked. The Government has more than 350 initiatives under way—Andrew Little: You don’t know what you’re talking about.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I think you are in the dangerous territory there Mr Little. The Government has more than 350 initiatives under the Business Growth Agenda that are helping businesses grow because that is how employment grows. I contrast this with policies that would put a chill on industries that would cause their hiring intentions to freeze and companies themselves might not even survive—for example if you nationalise the electricity industry or double the cost of the emissions trading scheme on households and businesses or if you impose new taxes on every single business in the country.Hon David Parker: Is the Minister aware that manufactured exports outside the primary sector are down again in the latest period and are still down below where they were when he took office?Hon STEVEN JOYCE: No. I appreciate that the member likes to pare away at the different types of manufacturing. The difficulty we have is that he is always removing primary sector manufacturing which of course is things like food processing forestry products and so on. He always like to remove bits to desperately try to find a way of talking down the New Zealand economy.Hon David Parker: I seek leave to table the latest Statistics New Zealand figures—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Those statistics are freely available to all.