Bradford Sue: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Bradford Sue: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
[Volume:615;Page:10919] 
SUE BRADFORD (Green) 
: 
 There really was a good deal to be commended in the Prime Minister’s statement to the House yesterday afternoon and I am acutely conscious that had we been listening to the equivalent peroration from Dr Brash the future facing us today would be very different indeed. Not only would we be looking at a rolling back of those gains that have been made in relation to Crown honouring of Te Tiriti o Waitangi we would also be confronting a brave new world of welfare reform that would make the 1990s look like a walk in the park. 
There is a real danger that in trying to capture the ultra-right vote from ACT National will attempt to outflank Muriel Newman and if Don Brash had his way we would be looking at the possibility of things like widespread work for the dole and work testing not only for all unemployed of course but also for single parents and sickness and invalids beneficiaries; time-limited benefits whereby after a period of say 2 or 5 years someone would not be allowed any further income support in their lifetime; and penalties for beneficiaries who have babies while on the benefit. 
These are only a few of the draconian measures mooted in National’s  
Saving the Next Generation from Welfare Dependency  
paper released last year. Although we have yet to hear of the outcomes of National’s own internal discussions on this document I have grave fears that the turn to the right epitomised by Dr Brash’s recent promotion will mean that ultimately National and ACT will be duking it out as to who can get the most votes from that part of the population who think that anyone on a benefit is merely a bludger and that if they are sick unemployed or a single parent it is all their fault and they should be punished for it. 
This threat now lurking to our right makes me more reluctant than usual to critique the Prime Minister’s plans in areas like welfare employment and housing. Labour is on the right track and the Green Party continues to be pleased to support the Government when it is doing things like for example carrying out very necessary improvements to the Employment Relations Act and doing more to support beneficiaries in a positive way into real jobs—even people who are currently trapped in the backwaters of the social security system on invalids and sickness benefits. 
I am also for example pleased that the Prime Minister has said that Labour is committed to improving the paid parental leave scheme this year. The Greens strongly supported this policy when it was first implemented and we look forward to backing its extension. We hope the scheme will be broadened to include more women in particular self-employed women and women who have worked for an employer for less than a year. We would also of course expect the Government to look at extending the leave period to the minimum international standard of 14 weeks. 
However while some women in New Zealand are doing comparatively well these days there is still structural and systemic discrimination against women. Just ask a nurse whether she thinks she is getting a fair deal in New Zealand right now. With a starting salary at just over $30000 and a top of the scale at $45000 nurses’ salaries do not fairly reflect their skills and qualifications. We want Labour to back up the fine statements made by Ministers when the nurses demonstrated outside Parliament late last year and in 2004 commit to increasing funding in the health system to address this long-term pay inequity. 
Beyond the health system we are looking to the Government to seriously look at how it can reduce the gender pay gap by introducing equal pay for work of equal value. For many years women have been told that once they are better educated they will get the same pay as men. But statistics show that education only widens the gap further. For example in 2001 women graduates with a Bachelor’s degree in commerce earned $5000 less than their male counterparts while those with a Master’s degree earned $7000 less. 
The task force on employment and pay equity has not yet reported back but we certainly hope that this group will provide a path ahead to urgently make progress on this critical issue. We hope that the Government will have the courage to take up recommendations made and where necessary legislate to ensure women are treated fairly in the workforce. Labour did it in 1990 with the Employment Equity Act and it can do it again. 
Although the gender gap widens with income the Government could also take a big step to reduce the gap and assist many low-income earners by increasing the minimum wage. Like the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions the Green Party makes the very moderate demand that the minimum wage be raised to $10 an hour immediately. It continues to amaze me that any employer politician or public servant can expect a parent to raise a family on a wage of around $8.50 or $9.50 an hour as is still the going rate for so many jobs. The Government should not be having to prop up low-income families through the benefit tax and accommodation supplement systems to the extent that it is. We would all be a lot better off if workers were paid a decent amount in the first place with the income tax generated helping boost our economy’s capacity to generate yet more jobs in businesses. 
 However while wages and benefits remain so low it is imperative that the Government reforms family assistance and family support as soon as possible. Labour has been promising such a reform for the last couple of years at least and I hope the fact that the Prime Minister made a commitment to this in her speech yesterday means that we will not see yet another Budget in the wake of which Dr Cullen and Steve Maharey say: “Sorry we couldn’t afford it this time.” Likewise if family assistance has finally hit the top of Dr Cullen’s list this time round I hope any changes will be substantial and meaningful not just a few dollars scattered here and there. I hope that we will see family assistance payments adjusted in line with the cost of living and inflation now and in the future. I hope that abatement rates are changed to remove poverty traps and that discriminatory policies that ensure families who are in and out of work are treated differently are removed. 
Some time in the next few months I expect my member’s bill—designed to introduce a universal child benefit in effect the same as the old family benefit—will come before the House for its first reading. The Green Party sincerely hopes that the Government will see its way clear to at least support my bill to select committee for consideration alongside any legislation dealing with family assistance and any other reforms to the benefit and related tax system that Labour sees fit to put forward this year. If Labour is serious about doing more to end child poverty and to undo some of the damage both it and National wreaked on this country in the 1980s and 1990s it must also get serious about at least beginning to redress some of the ongoing gaping inequities between rich and poor that are now consolidated in so many of our communities. 
The fact that unemployment has gone up as of today’s household labour force survey even ever so slightly is a signal that Labour cannot afford any complacency about the fate of families still relying on benefits for a living. With 166000 people officially jobless as of December 2003—up from 151000 in September; quite a significant jump—it is critical that the Government not only does more to help through higher family support and childcare subsidies but also has the courage finally to carry out the kinds of major reforms to the benefit system that are so badly needed amidst the administrative and ethical nightmare that is the Social Security Act 1964 and all its myriad amendments. 
On a related front I note the Prime Minister’s glowing reference to the Jobs Jolt proclaimed by Minister Maharey in August last year. While indeed many of the measures contained in the Jobs Jolt were positive it also reintroduced the concept of what we used to call remote areas and are now called no-go zones; it initiated the work testing of 55 to 59-year-old job seekers; and it also established a new regime whereby people can be taken off the benefit if they fail or refuse employer drug tests. This is despite the fact that this measure is of highly dubious legality and despite the fact that existing drug and alcohol services already cannot cope with demand in many parts of the country. 
It is highly ironic that we have a Government lauding regional economic development and talking seriously about working alongside communities while at the same time closing many rural and provincial schools and it will shortly be announcing the no-go zones—a measure that will be basically writing off designated areas as economically hopeless. The Green Party would far rather see as many local schools as possible kept alive and nurtured as they are often the last remaining beating heart of districts that have lost just about everything else in the last two decades. We would prefer to see a Government committed to maintaining and fostering local job creation rather than telling communities that there is no hope for unemployed people to find work in their district anymore. We would like to see a lot more resources go to community enterprise initiatives and small-business support than to corporates like EDS Ericsson and shonky shipbuilders. 
There are a host of contradictions in Labour’s current approach to poverty unemployment and regional development. I just hope that by the time Labour members begin making election promises for 2005 they have thought a little more deeply about what they are really trying to achieve in these areas—a New Zealand where disadvantage is solved by everyone living in a few big cities and the top of the South Island or a country where everyone gets a chance at an education a job and a living wage without the continued destruction of our rural and provincial communities in the process.