Today we have a labour crisis. The Government shut the borders to people coming in, but it can't stop them leaving. Photo / Getty Images
Today we have a labour crisis. The Government shut the borders to people coming in, but it can't stop them leaving. Photo / Getty Images
OPINION:
One of my best friends moved to Melbourne last year, and after six months he said he's never coming back. Like every person, he's plucked from a web of family, colleagues and old choir buddies like me.
He's the first person I thought of when I read MYOB's latest survey finding that one in five, or a million, Kiwis are "actively considering a move offshore". Not only is it sad to lose people, but also people coming and going is a real barometer for how the country is performing overall.
In the dark depths of the Muldoon years, one in 40 New Zealanders didn't just actively consider leaving, but left. Thankfully that only happened in one year, 1980. If that carried on for 40 years there'd be nobody left.
Of course, things got much better, and until Covid most of the immigration debate was about too many people wanting to be here. Too many immigrants stretch the roads and hospitals and drive down wages by working for less, was what we heard.
How things change. Today we have a labour crisis. In nearly every area of the economy, nurses, builders, fruit pickers, pilots and accountants. Businesses can't get the people to serve their customers and the workers they do have are stretched to breaking point.
I spoke to the parent of an 18-year-old earning $65,000 at McDonald's by working practically every shift it is open. How more than 100,000 people are on the dole is just one of those mysteries.
I know the labour crisis is partly caused by Covid. The Government shut the borders to people coming in, but it can't stop them from leaving. Last year we had net negative migration of 7700 people. Immigration New Zealand now has an out-of-date attitude. It is still set up for a time when keeping people out was the order of the day, but the order of the world has changed.
As populations age and vital workers retire, the developed world will be waging a war for talent. Take teachers as an example: more than one in 10 are now over 65. Part of that is better health and longer lives, but it also shows we're going to have a lot of retirements over the next decade.
Britain's Government just extended the working holiday visa for Kiwis. Photo / AP
Other countries are already at the frontline of this war, while our Government doesn't seem to know there's a war on. Britain's Government just extended the working holiday visa for Kiwis. Now it's three years, eligible up to the age of 35, up from two years until you're 30.
Australia's Government is finally making noises about treating New Zealand-born Australians better than sheep and cattle.
Despite what an adoring press like to report, those other governments are not doing this because they like our Prime Minister. They may well do, but most of our prime ministers have been well-liked overseas. One was a golf buddy of the United States President, another was nearly put atop the United Nations.
No, the real answer is that other countries get it. They see there's a war for talent. They're taking steps to raid New Zealand's talent with better offers.
That takes us back to the million people actively thinking of leaving. In the survey, people were asked how much more they could earn offshore. On average they estimated they could earn $23,000 more. That's almost dead right. The median wage in Australia is $24,000 more. When Labour took office, it was $17,400.
The gap will keep growing if we don't change direction. So long as we have a Government that throws money at every problem and hires more staff when it mismanaged the others.
This week: the Commerce Commission failed with supermarkets, so now we have a Grocery Commissioner.
So long as we have a Government that puts real costs onto people's everyday lives to pursue an ideological agenda, the gap will keep growing. People are moving to Australia in part to work in energy and minerals. These are industries that Labour is busy banning and regulating to extinction so we can get our coal and other materials from over there.
New Zealand cannot afford to sit by and watch this happen. We need to recognise that the whole dynamic of the people movement has flipped. The 2017 election was fought on too many people, the 2023 election will be fought staunching the outflow of people like my friend in Melbourne.
We need to start asking the question of each policy decision, will this help keep the talent we need here in New Zealand because the days of taking it for granted are over.
• Brooke van Velden, MP, is the deputy leader of the Act Party.
