Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill

I move, That the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Government Administration Committee to consider the bill. He aha te mea nui o te ao? He tangata, he tangata, he tangata. Just over 3 years ago on 25 July 2012 I began my first reading speech on a bill similar to this with the same powerful proverb, and 3 years later it still remains the driving force for this bill. What is most important of all? It is people, it is people, it is people. Being of Irish heritage I find myself honouring the superstition of wearing the same jacket I wore 3 years ago—that is a bit of a triumph in itself—in the hope that it will act as a good omen and bring about the same result of this bill being supported to select committee.

Although my motivation for the bill has not changed, some things have changed since we were last debating this issue. Because of my previous bill, paid parental leave has already been extended from 14 weeks to 18 weeks by April 2016. That result demonstrates Labour leading a positive and future-focused initiative that gained the support of the Green Party, New Zealand First, the Māori Party, United Future, and Mana, when it was in this Parliament. We have maintained that support for this important initiative during the most testing of economic times, and I thank all of those parties for their loyalty to the families and the children of this great country of ours.

Even though we achieved those improvements, the argument that extending paid parental leave to all for the first 6 months of life is a wise investment in New Zealand’s future is as powerful as ever. It is the strongly held belief and strongly held view of the New Zealand Labour Party that early investment and intervention is a much better option than having to spend more taxpayer money on the bad outcomes of getting it wrong. We do prefer to spend a bit of money supporting bonding between parent and baby during those important 6 months of brain development than to spend ever-increasing amounts on remedial education, unemployment benefits, mental health services, and even prisons.

The Prime Minister’s own Chief Science Advisor, Sir Peter Gluckman, had this to say on the subject: “The early years of life have a unique and formative impact on child health, development and relationships throughout life. Secure mother-infant attachment is an important predictor of resilience in later life, including high self-esteem, reduced anxiety and reduced hormonal responses to stress.” He went on to say: “Social investment in New Zealand should take more account of the growing evidence that prevention and intervention strategies applied early in life are more effective in altering outcomes and reap more economic returns over the life course than do … strategies applied later. This will require long-term commitment to appropriate policies and programmes.”

Well, we do not hear much from the Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor these days. His appointment seems to have been somewhat of a gimmick rather than a serious attempt to have research and evidence-driven policy development. But it is true that Labour also prefers to spend some money supporting the establishment and maintenance of 6 months’ exclusive breastfeeding, as recommended by the World Health Organization, than to spend an ever-increasing amount of money on the hospitalisation of children and adults with preventable respiratory and other related diseases. I am still dismayed that our own Ministry of Health refused to recognise the strong link between paid parental leave and improving breastfeeding rates during consideration of this proposal last year. Data gathered by Plunket clearly shows a surge in breastfeeding rates immediately after Labour introduced paid parental leave in 2002. I hope that the ministry will take a more enlightened approach in this new consideration under its new Minister. It is a no-brainer. That is why 99.6 percent of the almost 4,000 submissions on the bill last time around supported the proposal to extend paid parental leave to 6 months.

This proposal has always been about choice for families, and this new bill introduces more flexibility by allowing a parent on paid parental leave to return to work for short periods throughout their period of leave, in order to maintain contact with their workplace, without losing their entitlement to paid parental leave. Under this bill they could return to their workplace for up to 156 hours over a 12-month maternity leave period and still retain 26 weeks’ paid parental leave.

I acknowledge that a Government bill, recently introduced in the House, does something a little similar. However, there is one big difference. I will support amendments that the Government is proposing on paid parental leave. The Government, however, seems determined not to support mine. In an arrogant display of putting policies before people, Government members will even support proposals that I have proposed just as long as it is not done in my name or in the name of the Labour Party. Not only is this petty and churlish but, sadly, it is stopping families from getting the support they desperately need, in a timely manner. I will not put politics ahead of the needs of these families, and I strongly urge the National members to put their ideology aside for the sake of families. They have pulled every mean trick in the book to stop families from getting this support. National has exaggerated the cost. Government members have used delaying tactics at the select committee. They have broken promises they made to me as the member in charge of the bill. They have denied voting rights to an MP who attended the birth of his own grandchild. They have cast proxy votes for another party, which then had to be corrected the following day. They have filibustered, and they have even voted against the version of the bill that would have cost just $8 million. All of this to deny families—

💬 Tim Macindoe: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The allegation that a whip has cast a vote incorrectly is a very serious one. In this instance, it is quite wrong and—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! The member will resume his seat. I remember the case quite well, and it was corrected. I think I was in the House at the time.

The Government has used all of these measures to deny families the support that the majority of Parliament believes in.

Government members thought they had won when the modified bill was defeated 60 votes to 60, but they did not count on losing Northland. Within days of National losing and Winston Peters winning Northland, I submitted the bill we are debating tonight back into the ballot. And they did not count on the ballot gods—or is the ballot goddess? The ballot goddess has smiled on Kiwi babies and the bill was drawn out of the ballot just a few months after it was defeated by the narrowest of margins in a diminished Parliament. Some call it good luck, but I like to think that it is a sign that some things are just meant to be.

Shortly, we will hear Government members say that they agree with my bill in principle but they cannot afford it. When I hear that excuse, I am reminded of the powerful submission Zonta made on my previous bill on this subject when the then international president, New Zealander Lynn McKenzie, told the Government that we cannot afford not to do it. The Government’s excuse lacks credibility when it is prepared to spend $26 million on a flag referendum and $11 million on its shady Saudi sheep deal. But those expenditure follies pale into insignificance compared with the billions of dollars National has given away in tax cuts to the 10 percent highest earners since it has been in office. My bill will cost an additional $45 million next year, and there is cross-party agreement that it will save at least $28 million just in short-term savings alone, like reduced Government subsidies for babies to be placed in early childhood education centres. Well, Labour would much rather that money was spent on supporting mum or dad to stay at home with baby than paying for a baby under the age of 6 months to go to day care. All the evidence says it is better for baby and, as a mum myself I instinctively know that families choosing what works best for them will have the best outcome.

My previous bill on paid parental leave was structured in such a way that it would not reach full implementation until the Government had promised to have its books in surplus. That promise was made for the current financial year that we are in, and there is still no sign of surplus. This new bill also staggers the implementation of 26 weeks’ paid parental leave by increasing it to 22 weeks on 1 April next year and reaching 26 weeks in April 2018. This time I have full confidence that the Government books will indeed be in surplus by then, with an incoming Labour Government that has a track record of running strong fiscal surpluses. The last Labour Government ran nine surpluses in a row.

In my maiden speech I said my priority in this Parliament would be addressing issues of work-life balance. I am proud that this bill does that in truckloads. What better work-life balance to have than the sort of work-life balance that sets your children up for a happy, healthy, productive life? I am proud to commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker, for the opportunity to take this call on the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill 2015. It is quite a lengthy title but I think it is one that goes, obviously, to the heart of the bill. Although I do rise in opposition to this bill, I am not ungracious and want to acknowledge the work of Ms Sue Moroney in championing this topic. It is a very valid topic to bring to the House and I think it is a worthwhile debate.

Paid parental leave is a concept that has been part of our system and our law books only since 1987. It started with humble beginnings, with a simple mechanism to ensure that working parents were protected with 12 months’ employment in their jobs. Of course, there was not paid parental leave at that stage. It was simply a protection for their employment. In fact, we need to acknowledge the history of this topic in that it was a long row to hoe, and it was not until 2002 that 12 weeks’ parental leave was brought into our law. That was after, of course, a lengthy campaign led by a number of different bodies, but, of course, won with the establishment of the Ministry of Woman’s Affairs, as it was called back then, which led some research on paid parental leave and the benefits of that. So, as I say, it was a long row to hoe, but we are fortunate enough now to have paid parental leave in our books.

But in my mind it goes to a wider issue, and that is about also enabling equal opportunities for women in balance with what is best for baby. There are several published and documented outcomes on the benefits of paid parental leave. Of course, some of those include increased breastfeeding opportunities and all the health benefits that are associated with that. As we are aware, breastmilk is a perfect food source for baby. It is made up of the correct compound of vitamins and proteins, and because of that extra time bonding it is easily digestible for baby and helps prevent infections from bacteria and viruses. That is one of the benefits of paid parental leave.

I touched on it before—this time gives parents and mums that valued quality time to bond with baby. In some cultures they even exclude visitors. They basically keep that time, those initial few months, for immediate family members so that there is quality bonding. The family unit is seen as having the utmost importance, so they exclude visitors.

But one of the great things about paid parental leave, and certainly one that I experienced as a mother, is that it gives parents the time to connect into the community and to connect into different community groups such as support clubs and community activities. This promotes camaraderie and that community spirit, especially if somebody is isolated and away from their immediate family members.

In my case, one of the things that I got involved in was through the Playcentre Federation. There was a programme called SPACE. Albeit the first year as a first-time mum with my baby was quite a blur and I probably could have been called spaced out, SPACE does not mean that. It is an acronym that stands for Supporting Parents Alongside Children’s Education. It was designed for first-time mums. A group of about 14 of us would come along weekly, with children aged between zero and 4 months. We were all first-time mums. As those children were going through the same developmental phases in their lives, we were able to learn about that. We were able to share information and support each other through those changes, and build that camaraderie. I am really pleased that the women in that group are still part of my life today. That support network is invaluable as we move forward as mothers, and now as working mothers in our careers. Part of being able to stay in touch is, of course, the use of electronic media, which was debated earlier in the House. So I certainly support that.

But the other thing that is great about paid parental leave is that, of course, it reduces financial stress on families. That, of course, is a real help when you suddenly find yourself with a new baby. You have finished work for a time. Babies are expensive, and every little bit helps families. All of this is a great foundation to springboard the improved well-being of children as they develop into the future and achieve their hopes and dreams.

One last point about paid parental leave that I will mention is that it has been found to reduce the risk of post-natal depression in women. I just say to people out there that that is a very real illness, it is a very serious illness, and it can have devastating effects on families.

As I mentioned also, though, paid parental leave goes to a wider issue, in that it protects employment opportunities as well. It enables a person to have their position safeguarded, and, hopefully, to have their career progression safeguarded as well. Mums or dads in that case, who take parental leave and go away to raise their child and bond with them in those initial first few months, do not have to worry about the employment side of things. But also, when people go back to work after having a child, it is really good for our businesses and for our country.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! The member’s speech is particularly interesting, but I want to invite her, in the last 3 minutes, to actually address the bill. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker.

It maintains diversity. This bill goes to paid parental leave, which is a concept that basically maintains diversity in the workplace. It is better all round for our country because it promotes better decision-making and better solutions.

In respect of Budget 2014, we extended paid parental leave in this country from 16 weeks from April this year to 18 weeks from April 2016. That extension, as opposed to this bill, was brought in after considerable consideration of finances and the costs of other competing priorities and services that this Government has to provide for New Zealanders. Notwithstanding this, as the member opposite, Sue Moroney, mentioned, the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety has now worked with interested parties to extend the eligibility requirements for paid parental leave in his recent Employment Standards Legislation Bill. I note that the member opposite, Sue Moroney, is a member of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee, and I know that she will contribute to that debate well. I look forward to that also. I know that we can have a really positive outcome for New Zealand that is fully costed as well.

In respect of this bill, there is mentioned in this bill the concept of “keeping in touch” hours, but that is something that the Employment Standards Legislation Bill also introduces. As it is detailed there, it is about enabling employees to go back to work for 40 hours during the period of receiving parental leave payments. That is really important when you do have a career. Specifically in my case, as a solicitor, you can lose your confidence when you are at home raising your baby, and you are out of the profession. So I think that is a really great initiative, to allow women to go back to work to stay in touch, albeit not in those first 4 weeks because that is a really crucial time for bonding. But it enables people to stay in touch with their work, and maintain their confidence in that respect. So, look, the intent of this bill and the spirit of this bill are good, I acknowledge that, but—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I regret to interrupt the member. Her time has expired.

We have essentially heard from Sarah Dowie that this is a good bill, and that not only is it well intentioned, but it has a strong evidence base behind it. We heard a number of reasons from Sarah Dowie why paid parental leave is important and why extending it is a good idea. And somewhere in there were just a couple of words—something about priorities. This is not a priority to the current Government, and that is, essentially, what this comes down to.

Where do our priorities lie? On the other side of the House this Government has found billions of dollars for tax cuts for the very, very wealthy, the very few at the top. It has found $30 million to prop up Rio Tinto. It has found money to support Warner Bros and the Skycity deal. It has found $11 million to pay to a Saudi sheep farmer. But the Government cannot find the money for paid parental leave—to extend paid parental leave by just 8 more weeks, which actually would barely bring New Zealand into line with those who are in the middle of the pack in the OECD. Italy already has 26 weeks, Germany has over a year, the UK has 39 weeks, Belgium has 32 weeks, Ireland has 26 weeks, Portugal has 30 weeks, and Japan has 58 weeks. We are not actually talking about putting New Zealand way out the front. We are not talking about doing anything at all radical. We are talking about bringing New Zealand back to the middle of the pack.

But National has never prioritised families. It has never prioritised paid parental leave. It was a Labour Government that introduced the changes in 1987. It was a Labour Government that introduced actual paid parental leave in 2002. It was a Labour Government that extended paid parental leave twice after it was initially introduced. And on every single one of those occasions National voted against it. Tonight, despite hearing Sarah Dowie extoll the virtues of this legislation, National is going to vote against it again because its priority is not working families, and that is a shame.

I am proud to be a member of the Labour Party, which has always been consistent on paid parental leave. We will continue to be consistent on paid parental leave tonight. I congratulate Sue Moroney on keeping this issue alive and in front of the Parliament. This is something that is core to the Labour Party. This is in our DNA, and it is one of the fundamental differences between National and Labour. I support this bill and I encourage other members around the House to find their hearts, to prioritise children, and to vote with us tonight.

I rise in opposition to this bill, but before I canvass the reasons why we will oppose the bill I would like to reiterate some comments that my colleague Sarah Dowie made. I would like to acknowledge Sue Moroney, the member sponsoring the bill. Her position on this issue is very, very clear, absolutely honest, and fundamentally based in integrity. This is the second iteration of her bill. We can argue that semantically it is not the same as the bill that was recently defeated, but it none the less is still canvassing very much the same sorts of areas. I think it shows that Ms Moroney absolutely believes that there is a need and absolutely believes that we need to address it.

The main thrust of my contribution is not that as a basic proposition the idea of additional parental leave is a bad thing. It is about how much, in what form, and who gets it. Sue’s bill is all about 22 to 26 weeks for parents, which can actually be shared between the two parents of the child, but National is going a lot broader than that. We are looking at the different sorts of childcare arrangements that families might use today or might choose to use in the future. It could be argued that although no one would try to say that we are offering 26 weeks, we are offering additional flexibility and additional weeks in a different way. What we saw as of 1 April this year was an increase of 2 weeks to 16 weeks a year. As of 1 April of next year that will increase to 18 weeks.

I will acknowledge the leader and strong whip of the ACT caucus David Seymour for his very timely and well-thought-out contributions. I acknowledge some amendments he has made to the bill that is passing through the House that will see additional paid parental leave for preterm births, which is something that I know was dear to Ms Moroney in the first iteration of her bill. I think that is still relevant to the concerns that she is looking to address now. Mr Seymour’s changes, which we have adopted, will mean that for every week ahead of the 37 weeks of gestation that a baby is born, an additional week of paid parental leave will be added to whatever the paid parental leave allowance is. I think that is a very good and pragmatic change to make.

I will just hark back to a point that Mr Seymour made when he advocated for those changes. He did point out that although families choose to have children, they certainly do not choose to have children who are born premature, so they are faced with a situation they cannot plan for, and perhaps cannot address, so it is quite right that the State might look to provide some additional assistance.

In terms of what the National Party is doing, outside of just looking at extra weeks on their own, we are looking to extend Home for Life entitlements to whāngai parents, grandparents, and permanent guardians. That is something that is not addressed by Ms Moroney’s bill. We are extending paid parental leave to more workers, casual workers, seasonal workers, and workers who have more than one employer, working arrangements that are not captured in existing provisions of paid parental leave. We have already extended the parental tax credit from $150 a week to $220 a week and extended the validity period from 8 weeks to 10 weeks. We are basically instituting and looking to institute additional measures that are giving parents more choices about what is important to them.

There are some parents who actually choose to return to work earlier, and the move we have made with the parental tax credit is helping the parents who are looking to make that choice. So when I think of what we are doing, it is not about a gain or a battle between the number of weeks of paid parental leave. It is about looking holistically at the different family arrangements, the different care arrangements, and the different situations. Although Ms Moroney is proposing one thing, what this Government has done, and is doing, is different. But it is still having a very tangible and positive effect on families and their choices in raising their young families. We will oppose this bill, but I do commend Ms Moroney for her obviously deeply held views on this matter. Thank you.

I rise to take a call for the Greens on the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill, and it is my privilege to do so. We supported the previous iteration of this bill and we will be supporting this bill again. I would like to extend my congratulations to Sue Moroney for her luck of the gods or goddesses on getting her member’s bill drawn yet again. I would also like to congratulate her on the fact that her previous bill resulted in many of the shifts that were outlined by the National Party speaker who has just sat down. They are significant shifts and improvements in paid parental leave as it stands at the moment, but they did come from the fact that there was a previous member’s bill in your name.

We believe in family. We believe in the importance of allowing parents to spend as much time as they can with their kids. We know from the evidence that the first year of a child’s life is the most important in terms of the emotional and physical development and bonding with their parents. The World Health Organization has recommended 6 months’ breastfeeding as a way of improving and enhancing the physical and emotional health of children. We know that children with a parent at home in their first year have better cognition skills and fewer behavioural problems as they grow up.

That is why we are supporting this policy, because it is compatible with the Green Party policy, which is for 13 months’ paid parental leave. Although this bill does not get there, it is another step towards it. We would like to see paid parental leave for that amount of time to ensure that our kids are valued and our families are able to get by.

We have heard the members from the Government benches and how they often boast about this investment approach to welfare, but what could be more important than investing in children and their future? There are economic arguments for this. We know from the work of Nobel Laureate James Heckman that financial returns are greatest for the ages 0 years to 3 years. We know from the work done by the reliability, availability, and maintainability study that the economic net benefits, the return to investment spending on our young children, and the pay-offs per dollar invested go from between $1.80 to $17.07 per dollar investment. That is amazing.

The Harvard University Center on the Developing Child has stated that investment will “generate substantial future returns through increased taxes paid by more productive adults and significant reductions in public expenditure on special education, welfare assistance, and incarceration further down the track.” This is significant because we know that the more we invest now, the better our society will be now and in the future.

We have a chronic under-investment in children and children’s education in this country. We acknowledge the recent initiatives, but New Zealand spends roughly only more than 50 percent of the OECD average on kids. In terms of the OECD figures on paid parental leave we are well behind countries like Britain with 39 weeks’ paid parental leave, Sweden with 16 months, and Estonia and the Czech Republic, which actually have 3 years’ paid parental leave. In fact, we are behind virtually every other OECD country. We are 24th out of 25.

Of the presentations that were given to the select committee last year on the previous bill, there was something like over 3,000 submissions, and 99.6 percent of them were in favour of the bill. Twenty-six weeks is enough to support a struggling family who are dealing with the shocks that happen when a new arrival happens to them. It is that financial investment that they require in order to see them through that first crucial 6 months of a child’s life. We need to invest in those young people and in our families. We will certainly be supporting this bill.

I am pleased to speak to this Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill in its first reading. I think for many of us there is a sense of déjà vu, if you will, that we are debating this again in the House. For me, once again, I oppose this bill. Its sentiments may be noble, but I do not believe them to be correct for three reasons. One would be, I would term, practical, one prudent, and the third one philosophical.

The first reason is practical, and that is really in relation to what Governments have already done. We have had paid parental leave at 16 weeks, and in the recent Budget of the Government we have extended this out a further 2 weeks to 18 weeks of paid parental leave, which is beginning from 1 April next year. So, practically speaking, the Government is making steps and continues to make steps in this regard. We have also heard from others around how this Government reflects a National Party philosophy of not just doing a broad brushstroke for the sake of symbolic semblance and niceties but actually trying to target this more appropriately. We were very pleased in some of our changes to look at how we provide this paid parental leave, not just to the birth parents but, where situations require it—let me get the terms right here—[Interruption]

💬 Mr SPEAKER: Order! I apologise to the member. Thank you.

—to those who are Home for Life carers, whāngai parents, and grandparents, importantly. I know in my own electorate that a number of grandparents are looking after children, and there are those who are permanent guardians. I think it is important, and it has been important practically, to put those supports in place. Others have mentioned it too—I think it is very prudent around extending or providing an extension of paid parental leave for those whose babies are premature, so those born under the date of 37 weeks. I think it is a small but practicable step. It is one that certainly sits logically in my mind, and I will touch on that a little bit when I talk around the philosophical concerns that I have in and around all of this.

The second issue I raised or hinted at was around the prudency of this. A Government’s responsibility is to all its citizens—young, old, middle aged—and I think it is prudent of the Government to approach this carefully, because every new idea, no matter whether it has merit or not, has costs, and we have to figure that out. The best cost that I have been given—and excuse me having to read this, I cannot recall all the numbers—is that it is going to cost something like $378 million over the next 4 years, with an ongoing cost of about $126 million. In terms of the Government’s books, that is not a huge amount of money when one weighs it up, but at the same time it is all about trying to make the balances and the choices that are required. It is very easy for members to come to the House and say: “Oh, it’s just going to cost this much. It’s just going to cost that much.” We have to work that out, again, as a Government to be prudent. I think we have heard from Government Ministers, in particular, in other discussions that, of course, we will look to see whether we can extend this as time and prudency allows. I can see there has been a hashtag going around of the likes of “8 more weeks” and so forth, and that is fine. One can argue that point but, of course, with the debates—or how we have heard the debate structured from the other side—there will always be a call for 8 more weeks.

Finally, for me I have got some, I suppose, philosophical concerns with this. I know that time is now short. One part of it is that having a child is generally not an accident or a mistake, and so forth. It is something that is fairly normal. I am sure that there are plenty of exceptions that may just prove the rule, but by and large a social, responsible State steps in in those unusual circumstances. The other, too, is that we often hear—and it is from all sides of the House—that it is all about community. We hear that on this point—you know, that it takes a community to raise a child. It seems that that is pulled out as an excuse when money is required, but it is funny that in so many areas when the community wants to set its standards and ideals for how to raise a child, we hear “Keep out of my life. Don’t bother me.” So I see a bit of inconsistency of thinking here: if it is truly a community raising a child, then we as a community have a responsibility for more than just money to our children.

Simon O’Connor’s final contribution just threw me there for a minute, actually, because I think part of the problem with the conversation that we are having around this bill is that there are too many men like Mr O’Connor inside of it. The last statement that Mr O’Connor made with regard to this bill, which is about actually supporting babies and babies and babies, was that if you cannot afford to have babies, then do not have them and do not ask the State for help. That was the last contribution Mr O’Connor made to this debate. It just blew me away that he, on a taxpayers salary, had the audacity to stand up in this House, paid for by taxpayers, and say that “If you can’t afford to have babies, don’t come and ask me to help you out with it.”

💬 David Seymour: You can’t oppose any taxpayer spending in this House.

To get back to what I was going to start with—and the gentleman who is calling from one side is the gentleman who denied babies this amount of money the last time we were sitting at a debate on this bill. He sits there with the audacity to take credit for the work that Sue Moroney did when he sold off his vote to the National Government for a bill that it has now introduced, which was actually in Ms Moroney’s amended bill when this Government voted it down. Mr Seymour will stand at some stage and he will laud it about the place about how he will not support this bill because he has arranged to actually get some kudos from this Government for a bill that Ms Moroney actually put in this place, which the Government tricked her out of. That is what happened the last time this bill was in the House.

I wanted to actually start with where I was going to start with, which was commending Sue Moroney for her tenacity, because, at the end of the day, we will get there—“we” being the women and the men in this House who actually value babies and the relationship between them and their parents. I worry about the constant, perhaps, over-accentuation of mothers, with regard to this bill. I have some massive concerns about the fact that fathers seem to be left out of the dialogue, and I would really love for this bill to go to the select committee and to have an opportunity to talk about how we can better support fathers to be able to participate in the early years and the early months of their babies’ lives—their children’s lives. I truly, truly believe that when we get equality in the home we will finally get equality in the workplace. When men feel that they are 100 percent equal to women in the raising of their children and that they are not stigmatised in any way, shape, or form by taking parental leave to stay at home, then, actually, women will be advanced inside the workplace. So I would very much—

💬 David Seymour: Oh, maybe if people weren’t so sexist in Parliament!

Mr Seymour, if you ever have children, then maybe we would have a dialogue, but not right now.

I want to give credit to Ms Moroney. I want to give thanks to the goddess, because not only did Ms Moroney get two member’s bills drawn in a very close space of time but she got the same member’s bill drawn in a very close space of time. Therefore, it should be recognised that, perhaps, it is in the gods that this bill should go through. New Zealand First will support this bill’s referral to the select committee.

Before I close and before I sit I want to remind the House of the contribution by someone who is a Minister of the National Government at the moment—her final contribution at one of the first readings of this bill, which Ms Moroney brought through last time. It was the contribution by Maggie Barry. She said: “I am very, very glad indeed … that we are not supporting this rubbish.” That was the contribution by Maggie Barry. This is the continued contribution. It has got harder for the National Government to stand against it, because we can hear it from Ms Dowie. Ms Dowie must have swallowed the largest rat she has had to swallow so far in her political career by being forced by the National Government to stand up and take the 10-minute call at the beginning of this bill. Ms Dowie almost sold the whole thing, and yet the National Government made her stand up and take the 10-minute call in opposition. So well done, Ms Dowie—you did the job that National asked you to do. None of us believe that you want to vote against this bill, and none of us believe that this was something that you chose to do, but you took a rat for the National Party. Kia ora.

Once again, a contribution from Tracey Martin that is a bit like one of those multi-directional lawn watering machines: in every single direction, with very little coherency. First she was belittling men for even being involved in the debate, then she was welcoming me to fatherhood. You never quite know what you are going to get from moment to moment.

I oppose the bill, but I do want to pay tribute to Sue Moroney, who came to see me earlier this year and made the case for good public policy. I agreed with her and I did what I could to advance that, bearing in mind that at that point she had run out of options due to an impending veto by the Minister of Finance. So we return to the topic tonight with some mutual respect and understanding, I hope, but the fact is that in contrast to those initiatives that made paid parental leave proportional to need, and proportional in particular to unexpected need, this bill simply does not stack up.

The rhetoric behind it is, first of all, that paid parental leave derives great benefits—that is No. 1—and No. 2 is that State assistance is necessary in order that those benefits be derived. But you only have to ask yourself two questions: how many babies are born in New Zealand each year, and how many parents take up paid parental leave? The numbers are 60,000 and 26,000. More than half of babies born in New Zealand are not brought up under paid parental leave.

Then you have to ask yourself about the World Health Organization and breastfeeding. My mum happened to be a La Leche League consultant, so I am pretty well versed in the benefits of breastfeeding. Nevertheless, many women, either by choice or by necessity, do not breastfeed their children. So as soon as you start to understand that the benefits of this bill can be derived without the need for State assistance, or sometimes not at all, the case for it becomes so much less urgent.

Then you have to consider the fact that the State assistance, even if it were to be extended to 6 months, is not addressing the overall challenge that people face in parenthood. Parenthood today is an 18-plus year proposition. As many parents will tell you, it can go well beyond that, into the twenties, and the idea that you are going to make a substantial difference simply by adding a few more weeks to paid parental leave does not stack up.

On the other hand, you might make the case that there is a certain amount of political cynicism, or even opportunism, behind this bill, and you only have to look at the way—and the Labour members have caught themselves out here; they did not mean it to come out, but it came out—they said they would introduce such a bill when it became fiscally sustainable. Jacinda Ardern is listening in the Chamber. She was standing up and saying: “We introduced paid parental leave back in 2002, and we extended it in 2004”—in an election year when Labour took a major hit in the polls—“and we did that because it was fiscally sustainable because we were running huge surpluses.” Sue Moroney then introduced a bill in 2012 when the Government was $9 billion a year in the hole. So the idea that there is some sort of fiscal probity or caution around the introduction of this policy simply does not stand up to scrutiny. Labour uses the fiscal caution argument when it suits and then ignores it just as well when it suits.

I would finish on the challenge that has been made—the audacious challenge, apparently—that people should have children when they can afford it. We get the full outrage, as though that is the most extraordinary and audacious thing that a person could ever possibly utter in this House or anywhere. I just want to remind the House and put on record that if you go out and talk to New Zealanders, you will find that that is not only what most New Zealanders believe—that you should have children as you can afford to do so—but it is what the overwhelming majority of New Zealanders do. With that, I would like to conclude my remarks in my opposition to this bill.

I rise to take a short call on Sue Moroney’s bill on paid parental leave. It is a great pleasure to be able to stand up again and talk to this issue, an issue that is dear to my heart.

I was in the community working for the Young Women’s Christian Association of Aotearoa back in 2001 in the campaign to get 12 weeks’ paid parental leave. We worked very closely with the then Minister of Women’s Affairs, Laila Harré in the battle to get this through. Believe me, it was a protracted battle to get that basic provision when New Zealand was so far behind in global terms.

Sadly, 13 years on we are still so far behind in global terms, and it is appalling to be having to make the same basic arguments about the value of extended paid parental leave in 2015, particularly when last term this House went through the debate and we had well over 3,000 submissions from the public of New Zealand. Of them, 99.6 percent, I think, told this House that for them 6 months was a priority, that they had their own experience about what would work, and that 6 months was that benchmark for them.

We heard that from women, we heard that from their partners, and we also heard that from employers. Employers were telling us that 6 months was much easier to manage because when you have got a shorter time period, you actually get to that point of going “Will I find somebody to fill in when it is 3 months, or not? Will I just kind of try to juggle and get extra people to work longer or do the extra jobs to cover that time?”, and, for most of them, that is what they have been doing.

They said that if it was 6 months, it would be that benchmark to enable them to say: “OK, actually, we’ll advertise this position and get somebody else in for this time period.” That would be easier for them to manage, and that would also help people in our community get extra work and work experience to fill in in that time. Of course, most crucially—or one aspect that is crucial—it would enable the women who are going on paid parental leave to keep their job.

We heard from so many women about going into the workforce once their paid parental leave was up and actually still breastfeeding, still being up right through the night, not being able to manage, and actually leaving their jobs. That has a very long-term consequence for our economy as well as for the economy of those households, let alone the well-being of the babies, which, of course, is at the heart of the point of this bill.

We know that attachment in those first 6 months is critical. We know that the health and the development and the cognitive abilities of babies are strengthened from 6 months of breastfeeding. It is very hard to work full time and breastfeed a baby. That is just a practical reality of life.

I certainly would like to see us have much more provision in terms of supporting fathers or partners to be able to be there in that early time of life, but we also have to recognise the importance of the attachment between that primary parent and breastfeeding. That is a core part of what this bill is about, and why it is so critical that we have 6 months and nothing less.

Obviously, the Green Party policy is 13 months’ paid parental leave, and that is about enabling that time for the family and their establishment. It is not unreasonable in international terms, because it is an investment and it pays off. At the heart of our society, everything is about our people and our environment, and this is one of the small things that we could do in this House to recognise the importance of people in this country.

So the Greens are very proud to be supporting this bill yet again, and I have a skerrick of hope that this time the will of the country will triumph.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker, for the opportunity to speak on this bill in the name of Sue Moroney, the Parental Leave and Employment Protection (Six Months’ Paid Leave and Work Contact Hours) Amendment Bill. I want to first acknowledge that it is really good to see that Sue Moroney’s member’s bill was drawn from the ballot so soon after her earlier bill, so I congratulate Sue Moroney on that. But I am taking this call to oppose this bill.

As a working mother I understand the importance of paid parental leave, and there is a wide consensus that paid parental leave is important. That is why this National Government is already investing in paid parental leave. As we have heard, that investment in paid parental leave is required. We are already investing in paid parental leave, as we have already announced changes to the paid parental leave provisions in our last year’s Budget—that is, Budget 2014.

We have increased paid parental leave from 14 weeks to 16 weeks, from 1 April 2015, and we have announced that paid parental leave will be increased to 18 weeks from next year—that is, April 2016. Also, for babies born on and after 1 April 2015, the parental tax credit has gone up from $150 to $220, and the payment period has been extended from 8 weeks to 10 weeks. The Employment Standards Legislation Bill, which is before the House, is also going to make the paid parental leave provision more effective and also flexible.

The Employment Standards Legislation Bill is going to extend paid parental leave to other workers—to casual workers, to seasonal workers, and also to those who have just recently changed their jobs. This shows that we value working people, and we want to support them when they want to go away to have their babies. They should be supported with reasonable paid parental leave.

We are also wanting to make the paid parental leave provisions more flexible, so employees working for more than one employer will be able to combine their income to maximise their paid parental leave payment to the maximum cap. Also, the paid parental leave provision is going to be extended to primary carers. Primary carers are going to be not biological parents and not formally adoptive parents but other carers, those who are available to take care of a newborn. But to become a primary carer, those people should be in employment to qualify to get paid parental leave.

As a woman I am conscious that we should not underestimate women’s place in the labour market. I do not want to see any changes coming through that will damage the prospects of women in the labour market. Paid parental leave is a work-related entitlement. It is a work-related entitlement, and I do not want to see any discrimination against women because of women’s child-bearing responsibilities.

It is important that families have access to paid parental leave, that they can look after themselves and the newborn, and that there is enough time for bonding. As I said, our goal is to make the paid parental leave more effective, efficient, flexible, and also make it affordable. What this National Government is already doing is actually providing that optimal balance, to provide family-life balance and also to make it affordable.

The National Government is known for working hard for families and children, and we are also delivering for taxpayers. We are already doing what is needed, so I oppose this bill. Thank you.

Can I begin by thanking all the parties that have indicated that they are supporting this bill going through to the select committee. This debate has been all about priorities. It is all about exposing where the parties sit and whether they actually put their money where their mouths are in prioritising families and children. It is very clear to see that in the first instance the Labour Party is prepared absolutely to do that, and the Green Party, New Zealand First, and the Māori Party. I hope to also be thanking Peter Dunne at the end of this debate as well, because I am hoping that his vote will be the one that carries this bill through to the select committee.

I want to put this bill into a little bit of a wider context. This is part of a much broader policy platform that the Labour Party is bringing forward that will actually put children at the heart of our policy development process. It is part of what we call our Best Start policy that involves, yes, extending paid parental leave to 26 weeks but also ensuring all those families that Mr Seymour made reference to—the 60,000 babies that are born each year—get access to better financial support. That was contained in our Best Start policy, and this is one leg of that. So it is part of a broader policy agenda from the Labour Party to ensure that we actually do get that brighter future that the current Government used to once talk about but we do not hear them talk about much anymore. This type of investment will truly do that.

I do want to bat away the criticisms that the opposite side has made about the cost, because the truth is that it is what my grandmother would have called throwing good money after bad. What the current Government seems content to do is to keep spending taxpayer money on the bad outcomes of not getting it right in those early months, rather than spending a little bit on investing early and reaping the benefits as a society. That is a substantial difference between this side of the House and the current National Government members, who really cannot see beyond the end of their noses when it comes to investing in a brighter future for this country.

We all benefit when we get this right because it is not just about those families and those children and how they benefit; it is about the sort of society that we want to have and that we wish to have. As taxpayers, when we get this right, we all get to save money. That is what the select committee found when it last had a look at this bill, and I am sure that we will find that again.

This time round this bill is even more affordable than it was the last time I brought it before Parliament. Then I was asking for 12 weeks more; now the proposal is to simply add 8 weeks more. Yes, #8moreweeks—that is what we are after with this bill. It has become more affordable at a time when we have moved into a period of economic growth, albeit small economic growth—that is where we are.

I do want to let this House know that in terms of the international comparisons, yes, in Ireland, a similar-sized country to us—one could say, actually, that it is in a worse financial situation than we are—it actually already has 6 months’ paid parental leave, and guess what it is doing next? It has already said that it is going to extend it by a further 6 months over the course of the next decade. That is what the Irish are doing, and that is the sort of thing that this country should be doing if it is absolutely prepared to invest in children and put them at the heart of this country, as they should be.

I want to commend organisations like Plunket, Barnados, Every Child Counts, and the many other organisations that are part of the 26 for Babies coalition, because they know that this is the right thing to do. The Government, when it opposes this bill, is opposing those organisations and what they believe in. I commend this bill. Thank you.

I seek leave to table a document. It is an open letter to the Hon Peter Dunne asking him to support the bill that has just been passed. It is in the name of myself and 14,463 other signatories.

The member wishes to table a letter from herself and 14,000 others to the Hon Peter Dunne. Is there any objection to that happening?

💬 Tim Macindoe: Does she have the member’s permission?

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Well, it is a letter from her so it is not a question of permission. The member can object if he wants. Is there any objection? There appears to be none.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.