Of course Erica is right – we need more babies!
New Zealand’s fertility debate has become so culturally radioactive that even suggesting we should help families afford children gets treated like a manifesto from the 1950’s. But if the Coalition Government wants to reduce dependence on mass immigration and foreign labour exploitation, then Erica Stanford is right about one thing: New Zealand needs more babies. The real question is whether politicians are prepared to financially support working parents instead of leaving them to drown under the cost of raising children.
Parliament’s question time ended early on Thursday, with the Opposition left with an unused question at the end of the week.
But that was only after Immigration Minister Erica Stanford warned Parliament, “We’re not having enough babies.”
Stuff
I love this debate.
I’ve been arguing for over a decade now that we must increase our population rate so that we are not reliant on exploiting migrant workers and that the way you increase our population rate is by recognising the biological reality that women have babies and that having children costs an arm and a leg!
For espousing these views, I get attacked by the woke middle class feminists who claim I want a Handmaid’s Tale world where women are perpetually bare feet and pregnant.
I roll my eyes.
I think a lot of modern feminism is focused on denying the biological realities of being a woman, (except when it comes to demanding more understanding during their menopause or when a man claims to be a woman, then they’re all in), so any policy that recognises the biological realities of being a woman gets intellectually attacked and shunned.
The issue is not the enslavement of their wombs, the issue is the enormous cost of having kids that needs to be subsidised so that you have the future workers and citizens that a country requires to be a society.
If New Zealand wants more babies, it has to pay for them
If we don’t want to be reliant on foreign workers, we need long term support for having kids in the first place:
- 12 months maternity leave for either parent or family member to look after baby for its first year of life.
- Nationalise ECE so working mums and dads have free child care while they are working (why we are allowing a few Christian corporations to have a oligopoly in ECE is outrageous).
- Make education and health for children completely free and include free school lunches and breakfasts.
- When our young people do finally train for a job, reduce the student loan debt and allow bonding so that the students we do train aren’t forced to leave the country as soon as possible to pay off the student loans.
We need to support working mums and dads with a large array of structural funding that reduces the cost of having children in the first place if you want to grow your population without relying on mass immigration policies.
That talking about fertility and having babies seems to be some magical red line that we can not cross or discuss because ‘something something feminism’ is a tad tedious.
No one wants to force women to have babies, we are arguing that there is a cost to having babies and that if we want to be less reliant on mass immigration, we need to subsidise the cost of having those babies.
The real argument is immigration versus family investment
That this is so controversial is farcical.
The CoC obviously don’t value our kids when they want to pay ECE workers, teachers ,caregivers, kindergarten workers low wages and crap on pay equity.
The creation of a Nactensborn program to increase the population could be the latest wet dream of Herr Seymour. Kiwi women deemed economically valuable would be encouraged to get pregnant, by any means. Perhaps this is Brooke van Velden’s new role and is leading the way.
Maybe it’s all because the standards of New Zealand women are just too high?
she might be of more use to NZ if she stayed at home and bred more kids .Brooke has decided that is the best way she can help NZ ,but I wonder how she will cope with the inequality she has foisted on women.
Pakeha women having the false belief they can all hang out above a glass ceiling in public company boardrooms or that the country needs tens of thousands of Ally McBeals (law partners having children without pregnancy) has lowered the birthrate. In the past barren women were extended sympathy (while talked about behind their backs) now they are self choosing and celebrated!
The mothers of the baby boom received a family benefit paid directly to the mother. The low cost trad-wife incentive was removed and replaced with an immigration industry.
Part of the baby boom was because of no or limited contraception and no TV for a while as well, nature did the rest. I am lucky enough to have 3 brothers and 2 sisters with lovely parents so life was good in the 60s for us but not every family had the same experience. As Martyn said the financial cost of raising a family today makes it very difficult for many couples so it doesn’t happen like it used to.
Yes life was good in the 60s. For the majority peak pavlova paradise.
Almost zero unemployment by design.
I know of many many educated over 30 year olds..both men and women..who having a child, let alone 2 or 3, is not on their radar,simply because they’ve done the maths.
It is unaffordable and not sustainable to take a baby, through to completion of a tertiary education, unless you are a silverspooner and/or have the bank of rich mum and dad paying out for a massive deposit on a never never loan..
The rare ones i do know having babies, who are all in their 30s, have only managed to do so with big ‘leg up’ financial help….the indulged if you will.
Average house price in NZ. is around $
800,000…in the biggest city…Auckland …higher….yet we are a low wage economy. You take on a massive crippling mortgage to service that stupid cost….no nest…no babies.
Add to that the exhorbitant cost of even a basic grocery shop…corporate greed electricity prices, transport…etc etc..everywhere you turn….having babies now in this country, just like justice, is the domain of the rich.
So the 30 somethings of today are now asking themselves….do i want a life of drudgery…living week to week just to keep the head above water…or do i want to be able to live and breathe.