Prime Minister Helen Clark says the country is on a roll and that everyone should take credit. Clark: "New Zealanders always take pride in being the best in the world and first in the world. These figures are truly spectacular."

Two-thirds of the 30,000 new jobs were part-time and women took up most of these. The expansion of part-time work appears to be because full-time workers have become more and more difficult to find. ANZ chief economist John McDermott says employers are now looking at alternatives like job sharing to fill their vacancies. McDermott: "There are a lot of experienced and qualified women out there who can't work full-time because of other commitments."

Shirley, a leading social scientist who is also Pro Vice Chancellor of research at AUT, argues that New Zealand has lost its way on social policy. He points the finger at both Labour and National administrations ... and their "superficial trading of slogans" ... that has contributed to the decline in social policy over the past three decades.

Shirley says that while there have been major changes in the direction and impact of economic policy since the late 1970s, both major parties have treated social policy as an after-thought — an adjunct to economic development. Shirley: "This means discussions on welfare reform focus on symptoms. Policy makers concentrate on sealing over the cracks without addressing the underlying problems ..."

Professor Shirley says if policy makers are serious about reforming the state of welfare then they need to adopt a more holistic approach. Shirley: "That means integrating economic and social development. In contrast to the artificial separation of economic and social policy as advocated by Treasury ministers in the 1980s and 90s, these facets of development need to be combined."

Source — Press Release Auckland University of Technology 27 January 2005 "Professor Calls for Major Review of Social Policy"

Coleman quotes the New Zealand Living Standards report, which measured the living standards of working aged families in 2000. The Ministry of Social Development research team, which published this report, established the Economic Living Standard Index (ELSI) based on what people are consuming, their various forms of recreation and social participation, their household facilities and so on.

The report showed that approximately 19,000 children are living in a "very restricted" living standard. In this category they only have 10% of comforts and luxuries; have 47% of the financial problems; have 35% of the accommodation problems; and lack 22% of the child basics. The "child basics" category includes postponing visits to the doctor and dentist because of cost, using poorly fitting clothes and shoes, not having suitable wet weather clothing, not having a pair of shoes in good condition, a bicycle, books, missing out on cultural lessons, limited space for study and play, not having friends over for a meal, to stay the night or for a birthday party; all because of cost.

About 6% of all New Zealand children were surviving at this "very restricted" living standard. If you add in the next two levels ("restricted" and "somewhat restricted") then a total of 29% of all children under the age of 18 in the year 2000 were living in some degree of deprivation or poverty. This amounts to 318,000 children and young people.

Mike Coleman comments: "Since that detailed survey in 2000, there has been nothing to suggest any significant improvement. That sort of data puts us among the worst of the OECD countries. There is a nasty cluster of developed English-speaking nations (NZ, Australia, UK, USA) who have followed Rogernomics, Thatcherism, and Reaganomics and in the process severely damaged children."

Source — letter to editor of North & South magazine, January 2005 "The new middle class curse" by Mike Coleman

The campaign strategy urges the development of a specific policy for children under the oversight of a designated Cabinet minister. In order to achieve this, the campaign is pulling together a broad inter-sectoral coalition of organisations and individuals which it hopes will influence the policies of the next government.

Every Child Counts is being co-ordinated by Barnardos, along with Unicef, Save the Children, the AUT Institute of Public Policy, Caritas, Plunket, the Maori Women's Welfare League, and many other community organisations and personal supporters. It will be launched in April. For more information or to receive newsletters on the campaign contact everychildcounts@barnardos.org.nz.

Source — Every Child Counts e-newsletter no.1 December 2005

In Sweden, 75% of mothers with children under six are in paid work while in New Zealand the figure is 47%. Helen Clark would like to see the New Zealand rate of working mothers raised, but she acknowledges that matching the high in-work rates of women in Nordic countries would also mean matching their well-resourced childcare industries.

But Callister points out there are other social factors, along side well-developed childcare systems, that encourage Swedish mothers to work. Swedish fathers work around 35 hours per week. This is about the same as Swedish mothers, and they equally share the domestic chores. In contrast, Most New Zealand fathers work at least 40 hours or more each week and one-quarter of New Zealand fathers of young children work more than 50 hours per week. So while a Swedish couple with children working fulltime might do 70 hours of paid work between them, many New Zealand working couples might be at work 10 to 20 hours more each week.

Callister says it is not enough to focus just on women going into the workforce. He says New Zealand needs to have a debate about which path it intends taking with working families. He fears that instead of heading in the direction of the Swedish model — of gender equality and valuing family leisure — we may be heading for the American model of crushing overwork where 65% of couples with school-age children work more than 80 hours per week.

Source — Sunday Star-Times 13 February 2005 "A woman's lot" by Ruth Laugesen.

The study of 4,000 Australian households shows both employed and non-employed mothers of preschool-age children spend about 65 minutes per day in quality time with their children. But working mothers are more likely to do some of this before 8 am and after 8:30 pm. Craig: "Working mothers have no child-free leisure time at all while the other mothers had 24 minutes a day. And they spend an hour less a day doing things for themselves — eating, drinking, dressing, showering and grooming."

JOBS JOLT SCALING BACK

The first year annual report revealed just 1,768 beneficiaries who had taken part in a Jobs Jolt initiative had gone off the benefit. This was just a fraction of the 22,000 beneficiaries the strategy is targeting. And Jobs Jolt had not made the financial savings it was expected to. However, Maharey says it's still early and many of the Jobs Jolt results are encouraging. A recent evaluation found that 12 of the 13 programmes are on track and achieving their goal of getting more people into work. The two best performing initiatives are the Partnerships with Industry and the Mobile Employment Service, both producing close to double their budgeted outcomes.

Cyber Communities was administered by the Community Employment Group (CEG), the community economic development agency of the Department of Labour that ran into strife last year (see The Jobs Letter No 214) and was disbanded. A scaled down version of CEG, the Work Opportunities Group, will take up responsibility for surviving CEG projects from April 1 from within the Social Development Ministry.

Source — Dominion Post 11 February 2005 "Jobs scheme probe" by Anna Saunders; Press release NZ Government 3 February 2005 "Early report shows Jobs Jolt package is working" by Social Development and Employment Minister Steve Maharey; Dominion Post 7 February 2005 "A reality jolt".

Minister of Foreign Affairs Phil Goff says the move makes sense in this time of low unemployment and labour shortages. Goff: "Working holidaymakers are a valuable source of temporary labour for New Zealand, especially in the horticultural and agricultural sectors where peak demand for seasonal workers in summer coincides with the most popular time for working holidaymakers to visit. A study in 2003/04 found working holidaymakers clearly have a positive effect when they come to New Zealand by spending both the money they brought with them and the money they earned while here. The study found working holidaymakers filled the equivalent of 7,000 fulltime jobs, and spent $309 million during 2003/04, with that expenditure creating an estimated 11,000 jobs."

Sources — Sydney Morning Herald 2 February 2005 "NZ will allow backpackers to work for two years" by AAP; Press Release, NZ Government 10 February 2005 "Working holiday scheme with Germany expanded" by Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Phil Goff.

Source—The New Zealand Herald, 9 February 2005, "Britain hobbles OE workers" by Bridget Carter.

Four of France's five major unions called for protests against the reforms, saying they would sound the death knell of the 35-hour week and result in having to work longer hours without extra pay. In January, more than 300,000 workers took to the streets throughout France to defend their 35-hour work rule.

Source — Stuff website 7 February 2005 "France to press on with reform despite protests" by Reuters.