Moroney Sue: Minimum Wage Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Moroney Sue: Minimum Wage Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 19 September 2012. Volume:684;Page:5411. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
SUE MORONEY (Labour) 
: 
 It is a real privilege and a pleasure to speak on the Minimum Wage Amendment Bill. I want to congratulate my colleague David Clark on his good work in bringing this bill to the House and his good fortune. In fact he has been so lucky with the members’ draw that I have invited him to come with me to the races the next time I go. He has not actually taken that offer up yet but I will forgive him because he has brought forward such a good solid Labour Party bill into this House to reflect our policy of increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour. That is in contrast to the platitudes that we get from the other side of the House. National members want to say that they support hard-working low-income people but will not do anything to help them in their plight. Unlike that Government the Labour Party is prepared to take the practical steps that will make a real difference for people in their day-to-day lives. That is the difference between National and Labour. 
I think it is really appropriate that we are debating this bill on Women’s Suffrage Day because again this is a really practical approach that we can take to support the working women of this country. Sadly what we do know and this is according to the Department of Labour itself is that 57.1 percent of females are on the minimum wage—57.1 percent of women who are in paid employment are in fact on the minimum wage. So if nothing else this should tell us that if the Government is at all serious—at all serious—about closing the gender pay gap clearly increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour would make a significant step in closing the gender pay gap in this country. 
Women are far and away the largest demographic group who are on the minimum wage in New Zealand. They actually outstrip 18 to 24-year-olds on the minimum wage. There are 56.5 percent of 18 to 24-year-olds who are employed on the minimum wage. But I want to pause and think about that just for a minute. What is it that the Government feels comfortable with that women no matter what age end up staying on the minimum wage in greater proportions than young people entering the employment market for the first time? What is it about that that the Government feels comfortable with? Certainly on this side of the House we think that is wrong and our view is shared by Judy McGregor in her role as the Equal Employment Opportunities Commissioner. Earlier this year she went undercover and did one of those minimum wage low-paid jobs in rest homes. She was horrified. In fact she called it modern-day slavery. She found that that very difficult work—physically challenging intellectually challenging and mentally exhausting work—was largely being paid for on the minimum wage. And yes it was almost all being delivered by women. 
I want to challenge the Minister of Women’s Affairs about doing something about that situation because the only work that the Ministry of Women’s Affairs is doing on closing the gender pay gap is to say that all those rest home workers should go out and get men’s jobs. That is the only work the ministry is doing to close the gender pay gap. Apparently this would all be fixed if only these women would go out and be plumbers if only these women would go out and be electricians if only these women would go into those fields because then we could solve the gender pay gap. Well I want to know who will be looking after us in our old age in rest homes. Who will be doing that work? I do not want them doing it on the minimum wage. 
One of the reasons why the Government has tried to pretend that it will not support working families in this way by increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour is that it says that will drive more unemployment. I challenge those members to go and talk to the miners in Huntly and tell them that that is the reason why they are losing their jobs. Those miners are not on the minimum wage yet 120 of them in that small Waikato town are losing their jobs because of that Government’s policies. That Government is selling State-owned enterprises in that town and that is making a huge difference to unemployment—it is increasing it significantly in the Waikato town of Huntly. So the crocodile tears the lack of policy the lack of understanding and the lack of compassion from the National Government with regard to this bill do not make sense and every New Zealander knows it. I am very proud to recommend this bill to the House.