National tragedy —Mr Rowling

Press, 21 October 1980, Page 3

National tragedy —Mr Rowling

PA -■ Wellington Next year would be critical for New Zealand, the Leader of the Opposition (Mr Rowling) said yesterday. The nation was in an economic trap, he told the Waterside Workers’ Federation conference. Inflation was doubling prices every five years, and though it had declined slightly, it was still a level above that of 1975. Unemployment was rising month by month-and was right on target to reach 300,000 by 1985, regardless of what the Minister of Labour (Mr Bolger) might say. “It .is a national tragedy, and I'use the word national advisedly,” Mr Rowling said.

“Our children are leaving school to go on the scrapheap and there just aren’t enough jobs throughout the country for our people, especially our young people.” The Planning Council, “not noted as a hotbed of radicalism,” had estimated that New Zealand needed 25,000 to 26,000 jobs a year. That was about the total number of jobs created over the last five years, Mr Rowling said. “In other words, the coun-

try has generated only one job for every five needed, and we now have a tremendous backlog . ■ ■ Until we get some economic growth back, employment will continue to deteriorate.” •Mr Rowling said that growth must be largely in the labour-intensive areas. The Government’s largescale growth programme would provide only 3700 jobs over a period when New Zealand would need more than 200,000 jobs. That was a mere 2 per cent of the actual demand. "Where are the other 98 per cent jobs going to come from?” Mr Rowling asked. “It is obvious that this Government has no idea.” Mr Rowling said Labour saw the promotion of economic growth resulting in a growth in employment, as its main priority. There was also total confusion about the Government’s industrial policy. “The right arm does not know what the left foot is doing,” Mr Rowling said. “The Prime iMnister goes away without telling his Minister of Labour that one of the biggest employers in Auckland is closing one of its major factories.

. “The truth is the Governiment has no restructuring ipolicy worthy of the name.’ Mr Rowling said it was time that the Government — “now that it is back in the country, or is it?” — realised that confrontation was not good government. “What New Zealand needs now is a declaration of what the Government’s aims actually are and how it proposes to achieve them,” he said. “It is obvious that its (the Government) only aim is to hold on to power at all costs — and we are paying the cost,” Mr Rowling said. In an attack on the Southdown freezing works management, Mr Rowling said that they looked on their workers “merely as beasts going down a chute.” He said he had never been more shaken in his political career than by the attitude of that management to workers out of jobs through the Southdown closing. “They simply did not give a damn,” he said. The Shop Trading Hours Amendment Bill was another example of the Government’s trying to “ram its ideological hang-ups down the throats of an industry,” Mr Rowling said. The bill, which the Government says will be law by Christmas, will allow shops to open from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Saturdays. “We have canvassed very, very carefully the workers and the retailers in the industry, as well as the membership of the Labour Party, and there is no doubt that the industry is against it,” Mr Rowling said. Only about 5 per cent of those who expressed a view were in favour of the Government’s proposals, Mr Rowling said.