Auchinvole Chris: Employment Relations (Protection of Young Workers) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Auchinvole Chris: Employment Relations (Protection of Young Workers) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 05 December 2012. Volume:686;Page:7199. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
CHRIS AUCHINVOLE (National) 
: 
 I anticipated hearing Mr Tirikatene speak on his first—I think it is his first—bill in the House the Employment Relations (Protection of Young Workers) Amendment Bill. He is a man with a noble name a good lineage and an orator to behold but sadly he came up with this one which is really as someone has already suggested perhaps something that was simply drawn out that he then had to build a case around as best he could. But I was astonished to hear that the research he has done was on the Victorian era and that he finds that we have not moved forward since then. That defies imagination and it shows really the level that Labour is at—it wishes to stop everything. 
This Government is committed to increasing opportunities. I have heard this evening that 10-year-olds cannot negotiate. When I was 10 I negotiated my first contract on a Thursday afternoon— 
Phil Twyford 
: What’s happening to that accent? 
CHRIS AUCHINVOLE 
: What is that? 
Phil Twyford 
: I never know which accent I’m going to get from you. 
CHRIS AUCHINVOLE 
: Well which one would you like to hear? I negotiated without any trouble at all in Suffolk in the market place and ever since then whenever I have negotiated a position for myself it has always been as a contractor. So I do not know why that side of the House wishes to deny opportunities to entrepreneurial young people. They do exist. I was told by a colleague this evening. He showed me the top 25 young entrepreneurs. They are young they are successful and they negotiate. Why does Labour want to stifle any individual ability? 
The bill might have positive intent but it does not have positive effect and this is symptomatic of the party that is responsible for it. That is something that worries us. It worries us Labour’s current state. [ 
Interruption 
] We do. The current leadership is failing Labour. Why else would it promote a jobs bill that increase overheads reduces opportunities and reduces the likelihood of employment opportunities? When I think of the jobs I negotiated for myself as a boy brought up by a single parent they would never have been offered as employment opportunities as an employee. It did not work that way. 
I worry for Labour because this bill does not bode well for its future. It is symptomatic of its frame of mind at the moment. Far from being bright its future is looking more and more like that which befell the crew of the  
Bounty 
. The Labour members are not sure what is going to happen to them. So while this National Government is focused on ensuring that our employment relations framework is fair flexible and entrepreneurial the Opposition seems focused on internal dramas and wanting everything suppressed. I heard Opposition members speak in the meeting we had—the select committee meeting—this afternoon. Again it was: “Let’s suppress opportunity; let’s suppress entrepreneurial activity.” It is these theatrics taking the eye off the ball that lead to bills like this one. So I worry about Labour and the Opposition. 
The House should not be debating this bill. It should be as focused as the Government is on helping young people into work not trying to get them out of it. While the Opposition has shown nothing but opposition we on this side have been working. We introduced the starting out wage which will help more young New Zealanders to get a foothold on the employment ladder. That is a good one no matter what was said about it this afternoon by the other side. We introduced a 90-day trial period for new employees. Where are the complaints? Where was the raft of awful examples? It did not happen. Oops! You had two—two. And they are the first ones to surface. We introduced flexibility in the Holidays Act—not too many complaints about that other than from that party. 
Although I might not be as youthful as my colleague from Tamaki both Simon O’Connor and I understand that the last thing young workers need is a bill in Parliament that threatens to remove incentives for employers to take on young workers for short-term unskilled work by making the process unnecessarily complicated. We are approaching Christmas. I had not expected Labour to be such a Christmas Grinch as it is turning out to be with this bill. Thank you.