Lubeck MarjaMARJA LUBECK (Labour): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. Thank you Mr Speaker. It's a real privilege to be taking a call on this very special day today and that is because there's a lot of good stuff happening today 1 May. My colleague the Hon Carmel Sepuloni already mentioned the winter energy payment which is starting today—a fantastic support structure that kicks in today—with about a million New Zealanders protected from the cold with 22 weeks of payments to help them to heat their houses through the cold winter months.As my colleague the Hon Willie Jackson mentioned today today's a very significant day for working people because today is called May Day. It's the recognition of a day as International Workers' Day celebrated by many countries all over the world. I think it's also important to mention that it was only three days ago that we actually had the International Workers' Memorial Day. That's a day when we remember those killed or injured on the job and also the families that have to deal with the aftermath of those tragedies. We remember the people that went to work simply to earn a living and never returned from work. It's because poor working conditions kill and injure people and that's why it's so important that we do everything possible to protect workers from work-related injury and illnesses.It is a fact that unions play a vital role in this. Oh I see some people sparking up when I mentioned the U" word. I recently put a post out with regards to this and it got a bit of attention. The post actually read "There are many reasons to support unions and one of them is the clear international evidence that unionised workforces are safer. When [Opposition] MPs [say] they like a world 'without unions' they're [basically] saying they don't believe in [health and safety] for working people." Now it was in fact WorkSafe during their annual review who told us at select committee that international research shows that unionised workplaces are safer but despite that evidence from all over the world put in front of the Education and Workforce Committee members Oppositions MPs are choosing to remain in denial and that shows how out of touch they actually are with regard to working people and the situations they find themselves in on the shop floor. It shows the dislike of not only unions but actually of working people and my colleague the Hon Willie Jackson touched on this.It's evident from nine years of undermining and eroding employment legislation undermining bargaining power increasing insecure work practices for people that are trying to get ahead that the Opposition parties showed so clearly that they just don't like our working people. There were many changes made during consecutive National Governments and they actually exacerbated already existing inequality in New Zealand. Actually it's a shameful shameful statistic that New Zealand is in the bottom third of the OECD for income inequality and behind that statistic—because you can say "It's just a statistic."—are many hard-working people in New Zealand who are just trying to get ahead and provide for their families trying to make ends meet and they just can't. And that is something that this Government is clearly addressing.So today 1 May International Workers' Day we are celebrating the contributions of those working New Zealanders. We are letting them know that they actually have a Government that cares a Government that is committed to making changes for the better. One of the things that we've done is we've lifted the minimum wage to $17.70 and are very clearly on our way to $20 by 2021. This is boosting the incomes of more than 200000 workers. We've already lifted the incomes of 350000 families with the Families Package. We increased parental leave from 18 to 22 weeks up to 26 weeks by 2020. We are supporting victims of domestic violence with 10 days of paid leave per year something that the previous Government voted against and we are also progressing with our pay equity legislation. Next week on Monday the majority of the Employment Relations Amendment Bill changes will come into force and that will also make huge improvements—legislation shepherded through by Minister Iain Lees-Galloway.Unions together with working people fought and achieved a lot of the working conditions for our people in New Zealand: the minimum wage the eight-hour working day paid holiday sick leave maternity leave—you name it. The Opposition would like us to forget about that but we don't. It pays to be with a union especially because those on a collective agreement have much more chance of getting a pay rise. This Government has a lot of things to do but we're getting on with the job and improving things for working people in New Zealand."