Phil Goff

National's election promise to close the gap in economic performance with Australia is in tatters as latest employment figures in that country show the gap is widening, says Labour Leader Phil Goff.

"Australian employment figures have soared for the fourth straight month and the jobless rate has fallen to 5.5 percent, a full percentage below New Zealand's unemployment," Phil Goff said.

"For the first time in more than a decade Australian unemployment levels over the past six months are lower than New Zealand's, with Treasury forecasts that New Zealand's unemployment will continue to grow.

"No wonder John Key this week became increasingly vague about catching up with Australia's economy, extending the time frame to 12 to 15 years.

"No economist I have talked to believes there is any substance behind National's rhetoric that the gap is being closed, or that there is any evidence of policies being implemented to achieve this.

"Kevin Rudd in Australia committed the Australian Labour Government to tackling unemployment as a priority and developed a plan and a stimulus package to do so.

"In New Zealand all we have had is the rhetoric of the Jobs Summit, and the impact of the last Labour budget which did provide stimulation to counteract the international downturn.

"The Rudd Government has boosted investment in Research and Development. The Key Government cut R and D tax credits and the $700 million Labour invested in the Fast Forward fund. Labour in Australia got serious about investment in skills and education. National in New Zealand has opted to pay people to be unemployed rather than boost skill levels," Phil Goff said.

"National has no bold plan. Apart from the cycleway, the best National has come up with is an already discredited 2025 Taskforce Report from Don Brash advocating solutions that failed in the 1990s.

"Kiwis struggling to make ends meet each week will not be impressed by John Key's platitudes that somehow things will have come right in 12 to 15 years. They want to evidence of a plan now to make things better rather than simply hoping that the international recovery by itself will bail the country out," Phil Goff said.