Mackey Moana: Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Paid Parental Leave for Self-Employed Persons) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Mackey Moana: Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Paid Parental Leave for Self-Employed Persons) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:630;Page:2626] 
MOANA MACKEY (Labour) 
: 
 I am very pleased to support this amendment to the Parental Leave and Employment Protection Act. Members are right when they say this amendment has been a long time in coming. It certainly has not just come out of the blue as Dr Wayne Mapp would have us believe. Of course this bill was announced before the election and even before that. When the last amendment to the Act was going through this House and through the select committee it was indicated that this amendment was coming. But as we all know it is a lot more complicated to provide paid parental leave for the self-employed than it is to provide it for those who are employed by others. 
The difference between the National Party and the Labour Government on this issue is that we have never used that factor as an excuse to do nothing. We have never said that we would hold off on paid parental leave altogether until we had covered absolutely everything. We recognised the importance of paid parental leave to parents in this country and therefore we started with those people who were easier to draft legislation for and now we have then extended it further. When we decided—as promised in the election campaign—that we would extend paid parental leave and reduce the amount of time that a woman had to be in employment before she received it we were still not ready to go forward with the amendments for the self-employed. But we put the bill to the House anyway because we wanted to put those changes in place. Here we are now as promised providing very important legislation for those in self-employment. 
Some members of the National Party love to misquote us. I do not know whether their research unit is not doing its work properly or whether they are deliberately trying to mislead this House but they always try to say that Labour members have said they would not support paid parental leave for the self-employed—that it would be introduced over our dead bodies. In fact that is not true. What we said was that we would not support a levy on employers in order to pay for parental leave—that that would be done over our dead bodies. I am sure the National Party supports that position because it would be very difficult to provide paid parental leave to the self-employed if it was paid for by an employer levy. 
It is interesting to ask whether after this debate we will even know what the National Party believes about paid parental leave. A number of members have made 10-minute speeches in which they spoke for 9 minutes and 50 seconds about how bad paid parental leave is how it is welfare and how they do not like it or support it saying it is terrible and they never supported it. Then in the last 10 seconds of their speeches they have said: “The National Party will be supporting the bill. Thank you.” I look forward to seeing members of the National Party who have been very outspoken in previous years about how they do not support paid parental leave saying it is immoral and is welfare stand up today and cast their vote for paid parental leave. Why will they do so? Because those members know that it is popular and that it is helping New Zealand families. 
If any bill shows how visionless and divided the National Party is it is this bill. Let us be clear that the National Party does not support paid parental leave. It did not support it in the 1990s—it never introduced it. People now sitting in Opposition who said then that they did not support paid parental leave will stand up today and vote for it. If any bill shows just how divided the National Party is—because we know there are Opposition members who do support it and who have come out and said they wished the National Party—[ 
Interruption 
] 
MOANA MACKEY 
: Who? Katherine Rich. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: Prove it. 
MOANA MACKEY 
: I can. There have been numerous quotes from Katherine Rich when she had her child saying she wished the National Party would support paid parental leave. Marie Hasler a former National MP urged her party to rethink its stance on paid parental leave. Members have stood up today and talked for nearly 10 minutes about how much they disliked this bill and they then went on to say they would support it. 
Pansy Wong says this is a terrible bill. Well maybe Ms Wong would like to tell us why the party she belongs to is supporting the bill if it is so terrible. I say to the National Party that if it wants to be in Government it will have to start by working out what it actually believes in and then vote according to that. I have no doubt that Mr David Bennett who will get up next will give us another 9 minutes and 50 seconds on how bad this bill is. Then he will sit down after telling us that the National Party plans to support the bill. 
Anne Tolley 
: At least they are saying something. 
MOANA MACKEY 
: Anne Tolley put out a press release that stated how bad she thought paid parental leave was and how she would never support it but today she will stand up and cast the National Party’s votes for this bill. I say to the people of New Zealand that there is a word for that and they need to think about that very carefully if they ever consider casting their vote for the National Party.