Anderton says that the government is effectively holding the wife or husband of an unemployed person responsible for their spouse's unemployment: "Take for example a person who loses their job because the company they work for becomes bankrupt. The Government's response to that is to attempt to force that person's spouse to enter the workforce. The spouses are to be required by the government to pick up the costs of unemployment, when those costs should be born socially."

Source - fax to the Jobs Letter 19 October 1995 "Anderton Critical of National Government Nastiness"

Source - The Dominion 16 October 1995 "Labour rejects cut benefits"

Source - The Dominion 13 October 1995 "Student hopes"

The counselling and guidance resources will become a business unit by the middle of next year, and this whole area will be subject to contestable funding in the future this means other private sector providers of careers guidance will be able to bid for local contracts. Money will be given to schools as part of their operational grants to enable them to buy careers advice and guidance. These schools will have to produce a document of good practice in career education, which will be audited by the Education Review Office.

Source - fax and research by Ian Ritchie October 1995

Under Labour, the dole would be time limited to six-months, after which people would be given work, training or access to education. No-one who leaves school would become unemployed, and the dole for people under 20 yrs would be replaced with a training wage. Labour would increase public spending on infrastructure projects like state housing, and set up a venture capital fund to encourage small businesses. It would set up set up community-based employment enterprise schemes to undertake work which is socially beneficial but could be used to employ long-term unemployed. Payment for this work would be at the equivalent of the dole. A Green Jobs Unit would be set up to encourage the creation of energy-efficient and environmentally friendly jobs, including encouraging the use of possum products. All employers would be required to develop training programmes for their workers. The cost of the Labour strategy for full employment: $125 million in the first year, $155 million in the second.

Source - New Zealand Herald 17 October 1995 "Labour pledges $155 million for jobs" by Patricia Herbert

Labour's Steve Maharey believes that `rethinking work' will be a major issue for families in the 1990s. He says that this decade has seen more parents working longer hours, working weekends, and doing more part-time and casual work. Maharey: "These changing work patterns are directly related to such problems as child abuse and neglect, home-alone cases and problems in schools. If, as a country, we are serious about raising children properly, parents must have time to do a quality job. Parents need quality time, as well as quality time to raise children properly..."

Source - New Zealand Herald 24 October 1995 "Revamp work time: paper" and Labour discussion paper "Rethinking Work" October 1995

At least three other training organisations the Society of Master Plumbers and Gasfitters, the Motor Industry ITO and the Joinery ITO have also been reported as saying that serious underfunding was throwing into doubt the future of their training courses.

At the heart of the ITO funding crisis is the government expectation that industries must pick up any shortfall in funding. The trouble is there is no compulsion on industry members to contribute funding, even though they benefit from the training. Most of the government's contribution to funding is channelled through the government's Education and Training Support Agency (ETSA), whose general manager Max Kerr told NZPA that there was no reason why industry should not contribute to the training costs, even if it meant raising student fees. Kerr: " The reality is that everybody else participating in tertiary education is contributing. Why should they be any different?"

The Labour Party has introduced a private member's bill which would allow the ITOs to ballot their membership and impose levies on industry employers where that is the majority decision.

Source - The Daily News 24 October 1995 "Industries seek cash for training" and New Zealand Herald 19 October 1995 "Lack of money puts training on the line".

"Strangely, nowhere in the entire 42 pages of the government's employment document could I find a single mention of the Employment Contracts Act, still less is key role in job creation... this suggests that few of the key figures in the government understand that it is restrictive labour laws which largely create unemployment.
"If the government was serious about further reducing unemployment, instead of dreaming up new job schemes it would press on to complete the liberalisation of the labour market which the Employment Contracts Act began but did not finish... "
— Hames on Saturday, The New Zealand Herald

Source - - The Independent 27 October 1995 "Bolger's first election salvo: A modest war on unemployment" by Patrick Smellie; New Zealand Herald 4 November 1995 "Dreaming up jobs" Hames on Saturday column.