8. Question No. 8—Social Development and EmploymentHon LOUISE UPSTON (National—Taupō) to the Minister for Social Development and EmploymentQuestion No. 8—Social Development and Employment8. Hon LOUISE UPSTON (National—Taupō) to the Minister for Social Development and Employment: Does the Minister agree with the Prime Minister's statement on 5 November 2020 that we cannot rest on our laurels and we want to see more New Zealanders obtain work which is why we are prioritising the roll-out of the flexi-wage scheme prior to Christmas"?Hon CARMEL SEPULONI (Minister for Social Development and Employment): Yes I do agree with the Prime Minister. We do want to see more New Zealanders obtain work. That is why it was good to see 27000 people move off benefits into paid work in the December quarter. We are seeing the outcomes of our strong economic plan with recent data released by Statistics New Zealand showing record high for jobs in construction while unemployment fell from 5.3 percent to 4.9 percent. We are doing better than our economic forecasts which projected an unemployment rate of 6 percent. This is because of this Government's decisive actions to date to keep people connected to their jobs and support businesses and households through the COVID-19 pandemic. We will continue this work through the expansion of Flexi-wage. We've taken some extra time to get this expansion right and we'll be announcing those details on Thursday.Hon Louise Upston: When the Prime Minister said about the Flexi-wage extension "We want to be in a position to assist businesses to take on workers over the Christmas New Year period if they can rather than waiting till after the holiday period." why did she not bother to tell the Prime Minister she couldn't deliver it by Christmas?Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: We want to take the time to get the detail right. As I said it is a relief that we saw the number of exits off benefit into work in the December quarter—27000 which was actually up on the year before. We've got a number of initiatives in place that don't necessarily just start with the expansion of Flexi-wage but the expansion of Flexi-wage will be an important part of this Government's suite of initiatives to address unemployment in this country and to keep New Zealanders in jobs.Hon Louise Upston: How many of the 213006 people without a job and on the jobseeker benefit would have had a job by now if she had delivered the Prime Minister's promise to have the Flexi-wage extension in before Christmas?Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: It's important when you roll out any initiative that you do get the details right. We've taken the time to do that. The Flexi-wage expansion will be announced on Thursday and as I said it is good to see that exits off benefit into employment in the last quarter were higher than the same quarter in the year previously.Hon Louise Upston: Does the Government consider it a failure that over 68000 people are now on jobseeker benefit compared to a year ago and if so why did the Government not prioritise supporting those people into work and out of hardship? Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: We have experienced an unprecedented event and that is COVID-19. Internationally countries are experiencing higher levels of unemployment. It was heartening to see that our unemployment rate had dropped to 4.9 percent despite predictions and even the forecast numbers around the numbers of New Zealanders who would be on benefit at this time are lower than anticipated. We are doing everything that we can and as I said we will continue to make sure that we support New Zealanders to stay in work.Hon Louise Upston: Why after six months since the Prime Minister first announced the extension to Flexi-wage do New Zealanders still not know the details of the policy that Jacinda Ardern considered to be one of her top priorities to deliver before Christmas?Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: We will be announcing the detail of the expansion of Flexi-wage on Thursday."