Just to make it clear that having a public holiday on the Monday after Waitangi Day or ANZAC day when they fall on a weekend or another public holiday, doesn’t mean you celebrate them on the Monday.
They would just be treated like Christmas, Boxing Day, New Years Day and the day after.
No great secret that I looked at the issue when in government and decided that implementing four weeks annual holiday for all every year was a higher priority. What is now clear is that the public want both and as soon as possible.
And while we are sorting out these anomalies we should sort Easter Sunday as well. It is probably the most important day on the Christian calendar, but because when we sorted our public holidays no one contemplated shops opening or people working on a Sunday it was left off the list. That needs to be fixed.
Public holidays are a part of wage bargaining ( where it exists nowadays ) so some certainty is needed.
Stronger Unions to balance the pressure from the Business Round Table group to have us all working long hour for little. are sorely needed to make for a smooth and fair maintenance of a worker consumer relationship.
Families also need more time with parents as increasing loss of parent contact with both parents working to make ends meet is a reality.
We all work too many hours and rationalisation of this means also some addressing of the inequity of reward for work across the spectrum. It has been a one way slide since WWII.
We work to live not live to work.
deleted personal abuse. Trevor
A nice, concise way to summing up the issue Trevor. Totally agree. Not sure why Key feels the need to do some research on it…oh of course, that’s just his spin for putting off a decision…
@ John. Public holidays not generally part of bargaining though sometimes pay for working ( and not working ) them has been. Slightly different issues.
@JohnW Typically for a unionist you have missed the point completely. We still have the same number of public holidays and anyone working on one of them get the provisions of the Holiday’s Act – something that can’t be bargained out of by the employer. Mondayising all holidays would add to the cost of employing someone as in 2 out of 7 years (at least) costs would be higher if we retained the public holiday status for the weekend day as well as the Monday. Increased costs of employment = less jobs! Your argument would have more weight if everyone only worked Monday – Friday but this is not the case and we now enjoy more jobs through longer opening hours in retail, tourism and hospitality as well as opportunities for flexible work through 7 day shift work in a number of other sectors. Of course we all know that unions don’t care about any of this and only want to screw the employer who is putting so much on the line to enable jobs to be created.
Trev- still not sure that you have comented against observing the stat on a Friday. As others here and the Std have commented by observing Fri we differentiate these 2 unique days to NZ from those that are Mondayised.
Also allow for those who don’t work on Mondays to better sptread the stat days. As potentially there are currently 6 days that are observed or transferred to a Monday, this out of 11, and only 1 of the 11 is Friday specific.
So why the reluctance re Friday?
I don’t get it. Why is Easter Sunday so important to 21st-century New Zealand?
Herodotus – hadn’t considered it – could be a good idea.
I know that by now appearing to switch from Mon – Fri there is potential to lose traction. But as said before it does allow some recognition of uniquess, and if in the future children ask why is it that these 2 days twice every 7 years (excluding effects of leap years) different to all the others. It would allow for a teaching experience re how they are special to NZ and why this is the case. Reinforcing those things that NZ hold dear to us. If Matariki is also recognised as a Stat day (As I think there are valid reasons for)the same could apply. So we would have 3 days + Good Friday (Which for many is still a special day) as potentially observed on Fridays and that of the 2.5 days that the shops are closed(this should be 3 as ANZAC should also be a closed day), the majority are appliacable to NZ.
If Waitangi Day or Anzac Day are Saturdays why not the Friday off? (this helps those travelling to events) If Sundays, the Monday off.
@ SHG Christian festival – isn’t it better to celebrate on the correct day. Doesn’t matter what you believe there is no harm in getting it right for those who do.
I like the idea of Fridayising too – as SPC says, if they fall on a weekend it would be helpful for travelling to events – in 2 years out of 7 anyway.
Sorry trev, but I still don’t buy you reasons for doing nothin for nine years on this and then from the luxury of opposition make a big deal about it. Especially during a recession, when costs to business are sending some tot he wall.
I work on Sundays and for me Easter Sunday is a bit of a pain – not a major one, just irritating. I’m one of the people who doesn’t work in retail, I have to work Easter Sundays. But almost everything else is closed. (And I don’t get paid extra for working that day.)
Monty we’re not in a recession, we’re in a slow down, and the Wolrd Cup of Rugby will be a panacea.
Bloody heck – I agree with you Trevor. Easter Sunday should be a public holiday. However, I’m not into the mondayisation call – in fact, if I could trade public holidays for other days the first three I’d trade are Waitangi, Monarchs birthday and Labour day. All are meaningless to me.
ANZAC Day should only be on the 25th, it’s not a day that can be changed or considered a “lie-in” public holiday.
I’ve got a suggestion. Pay attention to the shift workers instead of ignoring their hours on this Mondayisation bill. Currently everything works very well to ensure that people who only work M-F get as many holidays as possible and if the bill goes through it guarantees them all 11. I’m a shift worker who has odd days off. If a holiday occurs on my regular day off on a weekday I’m out a holiday. What? Why? Because the mondayisation only applies on moving weekend days to weekdays. For shift workers it states that if it has been your regular day off for more than 3 weeks, nothing happens, you miss the holiday. Any plans on Labour to plug this loophole as well? I’ve lost an average of 2 holidays every year due to this and if people are panicking about losing 2 holidays once every 5 years or so surely this is something to fix as well.