Bennett David: Estimates Debate — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBennett David: Estimates Debate — In Committee[Sitting date: 30 July 2013. Volume:692;Page:12072. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DAVID BENNETT (Chairperson of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee):It is a great pleasure to talk about Vote Employment. I just want to recognise the very fine Minister in the chair the Minister for Social Development who has done an excellent job in this area. Minister Bennett has I think taken a really impressive approach to the portfolio and to trying to get people into work in very difficult times. I know that on the streets of Hamilton people often come up and say they are very impressed with that Minister’s approach and with the work she is doing.Sue Moroney: No they don’t—no they don’t David.DAVID BENNETT: And Sue Moroney on the other side gets the opposite comments from the people on the street who are not impressed with her approach to this issue at all. That is true—that is true. But this recession which the world has seen has been acknowledged as one where there have been serious employment issues around the world. We all hear the horror stories of—Colin King: Spain.DAVID BENNETT: —Spain and places like that where—Chris Auchinvole: Greece.DAVID BENNETT: Greece yes; that is another one. You hear stories about 60 percent or 40 percent of people under 25 being unemployed—huge numbers. Whole swathes of countries are unemployed and you can actually see that there is a movement. Europe is losing a generation of young people. They are moving because they see that there is no future there—there is no employment. That is a terrible situation for any country and any individual to be in.Being in employment is so important for people’s self-worth for their understanding of their future commitments for their ability to support a family and for their ability to do all the things that are so important—to buy a house in Auckland even. Employment is a huge dynamic in our individual communities and in our individual lives. So for a country like New Zealand to get through the recession remarkably well and do it in such a way that we have managed to carry through as many employment opportunities as we can for our young people and all our citizens is something very special. It is something that I think this Government is very proud of and it should be. It is an important part of our economic and community focus.The Opposition will make noise about the employment issue as always and it will bring out its statistics and say: “Well hey look at the statistics. They are so bad. Why aren’t you doing something about it?”. Well it is a long-term game. A lot of those statistics and a lot of the issues revolve round bigger issues such as education training and those kinds of opportunities. They do not change in 1 or 2 years; it takes many years to get people into the right education formats and to understand that their future employment opportunities are linked with their education and the results they get as they progress through the education system.So the Government has been very careful to look at all those issues and not to look at them from just one perspective. We are looking at them from an education perspective we are looking at them from an employment perspective and we are looking at them from a benefit perspective as well to encourage people into work and that is a crucial part of that process. We have also looked at all those issues from an economicperspective and we have provided infrastructure opportunities so that jobs were there in the most difficult of times. When the private sector was not building and was not investing in the infrastructure of New Zealand the Government did and through its major projects it provided a lot of employment.We have also taken a very strong approach to employment through our future vision of New Zealand looking forward. We want a strong stable economy that looks forward to the education and economic opportunities that the world will present in the next generation or so in this region. It is important for our young people to feel that they have got opportunities for employment and that is something that we have been very much aware of. So I think that in total we have taken a very balanced approach to employment. It has been difficult and I do not think anybody would dispute that in these times internationally when there has been a lot of tension in the world employment market. But New Zealand has been remarkably resilient through that process.