They’ll be relieved commentators like it- they’re clearly trying to change the subject from the GST off fruit and veges policy only two days ago, because it's gone very badly for them.
But I'll happily play the game and change the subject for a bit.
So what they’ve announced is that they’ll fund four weeks paternity leave for the second parent, which in most cases is a dad.
They'll roll it out in stages, two weeks leave from next year, and then a third week in 2025, and the fourth week in 2026.
The truth is that our paid parental leave in New Zealand is actually pretty miserable compared to other developed countries.
We get 26 weeks at the moment, which sounds not bad- but the amount we get paid is rubbish. And when you add the two together, there are only five countries in the OECD more miserable than us.
Take what we get, triple it, and the Germans still get more than that.
We can do better, and we have to, because we need Kiwis having kids.
We need to lift our birth rate. We’re not even replacing ourselves at the moment and we’re not going to be doing that unless parents can actually afford to be parents.
Having said that, the policy falls into one of the same traps the GST policy did two days ago.
Which is that it sounds like a great idea- and then you see you’re only getting $4 a week. Same here with this, you’re only getting four weeks. That’s very little.
Also, it doesn’t undo the damage that Labour did to itself by killing Nicola Willis’ bill that would've let parents take up to three months parental leave together. You still can’t do that, you can only have a month together.
And finally, as long as Labour is losing in the polls, everything they do will be judged by whether it will win them the election or not.
And this one, again, will not.
Not enough people are affected by this, and you can tell by the fact that it only costs $35 million in the first year. Again, it's not generous enough.
But on principle, it’s hard to argue against giving the dad or second mum a month paid at home with the family.
Heather du Plessis-Allan is a journalist and commentator who hosts Newstalk ZB's Drive show.
3 comments:
So NZ is so badly off that we have to pay people to have kids. That was kind of what you said, Heather.
And the solution is not to create more wealth...or increase our productivity and efficiency...or become more open to innovation and investment....or to cut out the mountain of wasteful public spending.
It's to pay people a benefit to have kids. Sounds very socialist. Now, who pays that money again? The good old struggling tax-payer.
I'm not against benefits but you have to create the wealth to afford to pay them. As for Germany, their economy is a shadow of its former self, due in no small part to their crazy Left-leaning climate and energy policies.
i'm surprised they managed to utter the word 'paternity' without offending the ultra-left and left-green crowd :)
so what you are saying is that countries that don't pay people to have kids stop growing in population?
have you heard of the third world???
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