Luxon rejects criticism on party's paid parental leave record

<p>National leader Christopher Luxon has pushed back on criticism over his party's record on paid parental leave, saying he's focused on the future.</p> <p><b>By Russell Palmer of </b><a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/politics/805513/christopher-luxon-rejects-criticism-on-party-s-paid-parental-leave-record" target="_blank"><b>RNZ</b></a></p> <p>National on Sunday <a href="https://www.1news.co.nz/2026/07/26/national-pledges-to-extend-parental-leave-to-30-weeks-if-re-elected/" target="_blank">announced extending paid parental leave</a> to 30 weeks, and allowing parents to take their leave at the same time.</p> <p>Speaking to Morning Report on Monday, Luxon said National had strong values of supporting families.</p> <p>"There's just no better way to 'build the future' than building stronger families, and supporting future mums and dads in the work that they do ... is just so important ... but it's also an expensive time."</p> <p>Labour had criticised the party over the policy, pointing to National having blocked an extension to paid parental leave in 2016, and saying cuts to Best Start payments, reduced funding for school lunches, and restarting pay equity negotiations had made things harder for young families.</p> <p>Luxon said he was focused on the future.</p> <p>"I'm sorry, I only came to politics in 2020 ... I don't know what happened in the past, I'm focused on the future and this is a really important policy for me and for our future and for our party and we think it's a really good thing for working mums and dads around the country."</p> <p>The ACT Party had questioned the timing of National's announcement, which came the week after Stuart Nash <a href="https://www.1news.co.nz/2026/07/22/stuart-nash-resigns-as-nz-first-candidate-over-sexist-text/" target="_blank">resigned as a New Zealand First candidate</a> after he suggested <a href="https://www.1news.co.nz/2026/07/23/stuart-nash-has-made-his-view-on-women-very-clear-nimon/" target="_blank">Katie Nimon</a>, National's MP for Napier - which Nash was looking to contest - was "the laziest", for the amount of leave she took after having a baby.</p> <p>Luxon said he could not have predicted Nash's comments.</p> <p>He said the policy was "all common sense stuff".</p> <p>"It's been on our radar. It's been planned for ages. I couldn't have predicted Stuart Nash's comments, frankly."</p> <p>He also rejected the idea the policy was aimed at getting votes from young women, saying that was a "cynical perspective" for a Monday morning.</p> <p>"It's actually about making sure we support working mums and dads across this country who are doing an awesome job raising their kids, and we want to give them more flexibility so they've got more choice about how they spend that time at home with their new baby."</p> <p>He said the party would "love" to increase paid parental leave further to 40 weeks, but "we'd need to be in surplus in subsequent years beyond that".</p> <h2>Luxon backs ACT Pharmac policy, dismisses Greens data centre policy</h2> <p>Another policy announced over the weekend was the ACT Party's proposal to lift Pharmac's budget to 12% of the total health spend by 2033.</p> <p>Luxon said National was supportive of giving more funding so New Zealanders could access life-changing medicines, pointing to the government's increase to Pharmac's budget which he said was the largest in history for that organisation.</p> <p>"That led to 66 new medicines, I think 33 new cancer medicines, helping 250,000 New Zealanders. So we know Pharmac's budget's at the highest it's ever been, but we know there's a lot more to do as well," he said.</p> <p>National would have its own policy on Pharmac funding as part of its health initiatives, he said.</p> <p>He was less favourable towards the <a href="https://www.1news.co.nz/2026/07/26/greens-push-to-pause-big-data-centre-consents-pm-calls-it-alarmist/" target="_blank">Green Party's policy</a> of pausing consenting for data centres for a year to give time to bring in stronger regulation.</p> <p>He said three data centres were expected to come online in the next year, and said officials did not expect "any of those projects to put upward pressure on electricity prices".</p> <p>"We've got projects that are building and interest that is building and New Zealand data centres can be a net positive for the economy," he said.</p> <p>"They will create jobs, will create opportunities for us. We do need some sensible rules. That does mean things like making sure additional electricity generation happens, investments in grid stability, and that they pay for transmission upgrades and those kinds of things."</p> <p>Host Ingrid Hipkiss challenged that, saying it was consumers who would end up paying for the upgrades.</p> <p>"Yeah, but Ingrid, at the moment there isn't large scale data centre investment and construction happening in this country ... it's about to happen," Luxon said.</p> <p>"You want to kill something before it's even started and actually even even arrived here? So I'm just saying to you we've got some sensible rules that we're actually getting officials preparing advice on."</p> <p>He said the government would have common-sense rules in place ahead of increased investment in data centres.</p> <p>"We are an attractive place [for data centres] because we have some competitive advantages with high renewables, cooler climates, and political stability - that makes those investments attractive."</p> <p>He said New Zealand was "last cab off the rank" and should not get left behind.</p> <h2>Polling points to risk of list losses</h2> <p>Luxon was speaking as National was also at risk of losing some of its top performers.</p> <p>The party got 28.7% in this month's RNZ-Reid Research poll, which would give National 36 seats in the House, down from its current 48 - or 49 if you count the vacancy recently left by Judith Collins.</p> <p>Its strong performance in the electorates in 2023 means it has just five list MPs: Nicola Willis, Paul Goldsmith, Gerry Brownlee, Melissa Lee, and Nancy Lu.</p> <p>Willis, who is running as a list-only candidate, was not concerned that she may not get back into Parliament.</p> <p>"No, I'm not concerned at all, because National has a vision for the future. We are fixing the basics, we are building the future, and the policies that we will set out to the New Zealand public will see our polling increase.</p> <p>Similarly, Lu was confident, saying "absolutely" when asked whether National would get enough of the party vote to see her return.</p> <p>Goldsmith, who contests the Epsom seat held by ACT's David Seymour, was not sure whether he would be back in Parliament on 28.7%.</p> <p>"It depends on a whole lot of factors. But I'm sure we're going to do a lot better than that."</p> <p>Hutt South MP Chris Bishop has said it would be "highly unlikely" he would retain his electorate seat on current polling.</p> <p>Victoria University associate professor of politics Lara Greaves said there was not much else National could do to protect its stalwarts, other than boost its party vote.</p> <p>She believes National will hold most of its electorates, which has its own problems.</p> <p>"That creates a bit of an issue for National long-term, and a structural issue in the way that their party is run, because if they're going to hold these electorate seats, they're not going to be able to bring in very many people from the list over time, and that's going to mean that it's just going to be all the more important for their kind of stars, their kind of more experienced MPs, to have these safe seats."</p> <p>With the <a href="https://www.1news.co.nz/2026/06/30/explainer-what-are-the-opportunity-partys-policies/" target="_blank">Opportunity Party</a> banging at the door of 5%, there was a risk that even fewer list spots became available.</p> <p>"That 5% that Opportunity gets has to come out of everyone else's party vote, or the percentage of the House they're entitled to through list seats and their electorate seat makeup. So it does impact the larger parties more in terms of their allocation of seats," Greaves said.</p> <p>Labour leader Chris Hipkins said it was a problem all of National's own making.</p> <p>"National's facing this conundrum because they've completely failed to deliver on the promises they made New Zealanders."</p>