Cosgrove Clayton: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Cosgrove Clayton: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
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Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 This is a serious day in the parliamentary calendar. It is a day when the Prime Minister of the land sets out his vision for the country. I think Speaker Lockwood Smith made a good point when he said at the beginning of Mr Key’s speech that many New Zealanders were waiting to hear the speech. I would go further. I say that at least 168000 New Zealanders may well as we speak today be hanging on every word of Mr Key’s speech. They of course are the 168000 New Zealanders who do not have a job. They may well at 2 o’clock have tuned into this Parliament hoping to hear a vision hoping to hear a plan hoping to hear some idea or some solution that would alleviate the personal and family turmoil that those 168000 New Zealanders go through every day because they do not have the dignity of work. I suspect that both the Speaker and others are right. There are 168000 people out there without a job today who hoped—and their hopes have been sadly dashed—that this Prime Minister would provide a vision and a plan. 
What we had from the speech of course—other colleagues have touched on it so I will not—was a whole host of re-announcements. There were re-announcements about the infamous Kopu Bridge—the 11th time it has been announced—and re-announcements about the Youth Guarantee. Kate Wilkinson as the Minister of Labour sat with me on a Canterbury Television programme not 1 week ago. When she was asked when we would have the Youth Guarantee she effectively said she could not guarantee the Youth Guarantee that she had guaranteed before the election. There was a re-announcement of that. 
You see National members talk about economic growth and they are right to do so; every MP in this Parliament wants greater economic growth. But economic growth in itself is a means to an end. Everybody wants economic growth because it is a means to an end. But the key point is what the end is and what the vision is. What did this Prime Minister articulate that he wanted New Zealand and New Zealanders to look like if we achieve what we all want—which Dr Bollard made some comments about—which is economic growth to the levels where we can help those 168000 New Zealanders? The end is about a vision. The end is about saying what sort of country we want. 
The only thing we heard from the Prime Minister was a rehash of the pre-election slogan: “I’m ambitious for New Zealand.” I am sure he is; I suspect we all are in our own ways with our own definitions of what that means. But I would have liked as would the 168000 unemployed New Zealanders the Prime Minister to get up and articulate what being ambitious for New Zealand means. Does it mean that he has a plan to train people? In that speech all we heard about was Job Ops and Community Max which take 5000 of the 43000-plus unemployed 16 to 24-year-olds and give them the minimum wage for 6 months. They are doing something but they are not actually gaining skills or proper skill training like apprenticeships; when Labour left office there were 14000 people in trade training. The Government gives them 6 months’ work takes them off the books and tries to hoodwink people by saying they are not unemployed and that it is doing something with them. That is the means. What is the end? The end is that at the end of the 6 months there is no job and the employer might employ them. But do those people have a skill? Are they closer to an apprenticeship? Are they closer to a piece of paper or a qualification that will lift them out of the situation they are in? Are they incentivised to go to any training? No they are not; it is a fiction. 
Phil O’Reilly whom my leader quoted spoke about the Job Ops scheme on Kathryn Ryan’s show last week. She made reference to the scheme that subsidises employers $5000 on the wages paid for 6 months. She asked whether it had been successful and whether it was logical. Mr O’Reilly who is the head of Business New Zealand said this: “The problem with these kinds of programmes is often if you make them too big they turn into a bit of make-work really. That’s the problem. So you get into you know literally digging holes and filling them in again effectively.” Mr O’Reilly pointed out a very interesting thing: he disagrees with the Government’s slapping the cap on the polytechs and the universities at a time when young people especially are trying to get into those institutions for training. He made the point that we should be opening up our polytechs especially and pumping in those 43000 young people who are on the scrap heap so that they do not go to work for 8 hours a day just to do something anything. We should be bringing them closer to a viable qualification so that when they finish their course and the economy ramps up we will not get into the situation we were in before the last Labour Government took office when there was a massive skill gap. There were no people who were trained skilled and work-ready. We do not want people who can just get up in the morning breathe walk and go through the door but who actually have the skills to contribute— 
Hon Annette King 
: Plumbers electricians. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: —plumbers electricians my deputy leader says; carpenters—all the people that we trained when we said that young people would be in training or in school; 14000 people were engaged in trade training. That is a means to an end. That is a means of creating economic growth providing businesses with viable and highly skilled New Zealanders giving people the dignity of work and reducing the number of unemployed from 168000. That is ambitious for New Zealand. I argue that that is really ambitious for New Zealand. Was there any mention in that speech of a vision about training and what we are going to do with those 168000 Kiwis who are going through a living turmoil? 
Twelve or 15 months ago of course unemployment was down and training was up. People were in training. Under the previous Government Maori unemployment was I think the lowest in our history. People had options to train to go to polytech or to go to university. It is a fact that the odd student might drink too many beers over those 3 years and waste time—we all know one we all went to university or polytech with one and there is always one around in society—but to use that fact as an excuse to start carving up and restricting tertiary education when other countries in the world are seeing that as the key to unlock the handcuffs of economic degradation is I think short-sighted. 
The Prime Minister’s speech will go down in history as the first step to economic archaeology. There was nothing about skills training in there. There were fluffy words about research and development and innovation. If the Government was serious about research and development and innovation it would not have canned what the Canterbury Manufacturers Association wanted. Amy Adams knows that because she took a barrel from that association before the election about Mr Key’s back-down on what the manufacturing science and other sectors wanted which was money for innovation and training. 
Hon Annette King 
: They cut it. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: They cut it; they got rid of it. They made that choice. I do not see that as being ambitious for New Zealand. I do not see a plan. I do not see a vision. 
Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman 
: It’s a joke. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: That member says it is a joke. I invite Mr Coleman to go to 168000 Kiwis and tell them that their situation is a joke. I know of parents in my electorate who have gone to mechanics and carpenters—businesses like that—and told them that they have taken out a second mortgage and will pay them to train their son or daughter. They say to them: “For God’s sake get them out of the hole train them and we will pay you.” They offer them the cheque up front. There is no training happening now because of course the Government has pulled the pin. 
I ask National members to define what “ambitious for New Zealand” means. I ask them to define it for us once we wander down this great economic path that seems to be encumbered by a cycleway. That seems to be the plan—a cycleway a job summit a talkfest and giving 5000 young people a job doing something for 6 months. As Mr O’Reilly says they are filling in holes. I ask National members to define what they want out of economic growth and what New Zealand should look like. I ask them to define what they mean by being ambitious for New Zealand because today Mr Key over-egged the pudding. He overhyped it and New Zealanders know it. This was going to be the big bang to use the scientific term. 
Hon Annette King 
: Big Tuesday. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Big Tuesday. We were hanging on every word. It has not been the big bang. The shameful thing I say as that member giggles over there is that after the speech we have to ask what has changed for 168000 unemployed Kiwis and what will change in the future as they lament their circumstances. They are not bludgers; they are not lazy people. Many are middle class and have never been unemployed in their life and they find this situation anathema to them. They are in a hole they want to get out it and they look to this Government to provide the means yet this speech provided them with nothing. It was hollow; it was shallow; it was nothing.