Hipkins ChrisGENERAL DEBATEHon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister for COVID-19 Response): I move That the House take note of miscellaneous business.One year ago today the Government launched the COVID-19 response package—a $12 billion response to what is arguably the largest global and economic shock any of us will have seen in our lifetimes. Mr Speaker—Madam Speaker now. That was a very quick shift Madam Speaker! A year ago we were facing very very uncertain times. Nobody knew what the true extent of the scope of the COVID-19 economic shock was going to be but we did know one thing and that was that as a Government we wanted to back New Zealanders through it. We wanted to keep Kiwis in work. We wanted to get them back to work. We wanted to make sure that people weren't put out of work as a result of COVID19. And that is what our response was based on. We wanted to make sure that we kept COVID and we drove COVID-19 out of New Zealand and we kept it out of New Zealand and that is what we have been focused on. We made the decision as a Government that we were not going to make the problem worse by trying to cut our way out of it which was the course of action pursued by the last Government after the global financial crisis. We made a decision that we were going to take a different path and the results speak for themselves.New Zealand is bouncing back faster because of the actions of this Government. Manufacturing is up relative to what it was before COVID-19. Building and construction is up relative to what it was before COVID-19. To quote the International Monetary Fund (IMF) divisional chief Harald Finger who said New Zealanders had a very successful response to the COVID crisis and a better recovery than most other advanced economies."—that's the IMF saying that about New Zealand and other countries are looking on and wishing that they were in the position that we are. The latest Crown accounts show that our books are in much better shape than had been forecast and that is something that we can all be proud of. Our credit rating has been upgraded. New Zealand is doing well in our response.But I want to highlight something that I am particularly proud of and that is the work that we have been doing to keep people in work and to get them back into work and particularly in the areas where we have skills shortages. After the global financial crisis the number of people in apprenticeships and in on-job training and training through our polytechs plunged and we suffered for a decade—for a decade—because of the skills shortages that created. We were determined going into this economic shock that we were not going to repeat that mistake. That is why we launched the Targeted Training and Apprenticeship Fund to provide fees-free training that has seen over 100000 New Zealanders training in those areas where we have skills shortages. It's why we launched the Apprenticeship Boost because we know when the economic going gets a bit tougher apprentices are often the first ones to find themselves out of work and we did not want to see that happen. As a result of the Apprenticeship Boost not only have we kept people in apprenticeships apprenticeship numbers have grown. In the second half of the year last year we signed up roughly double the number of apprentices as in the second half of the year prior to that. That is a sign that our Apprenticeship Boost scheme is working. Contrast that with the global financial crisis when the last Government were quite content to sit back and bank the savings from having fewer apprentices.That is one of the things that is holding back New Zealand—and the fact that we do not have the skilled workers to meet the needs of business throughout New Zealand. Their answer on the other side was simply to answer all of those problems through migration. We need to do a better job of training our own training the people that we have in New Zealand to fill the jobs that we've got available. That is what we have been focused on as a Government and the results are starting to show. Yes we still have some skills shortages that we rely on people coming through the border to fill in the short term. We've seen 4000-plus essential health workers coming through the border to help out our health system in a time of crisis and we will continue to make sure that those we need to come through the border for our economic recovery are able to do so. But it is also important that we don't simply use that as the easy way out—that we make sure we're providing training opportunities for Kiwis so that they can get back into work so that young Kiwis can train in skills for the jobs of the future. That is what our Government is focused on. We are absolutely committed to supporting New Zealanders through the recovery to building back better and to keeping COVID-19 out of New Zealand so that our economy can thrive where so many others are suffering."