National’s promise to increase the number of elective surgeries to 200,000 is bizarre, given Jonathan Coleman has claimed 200,000 electives are already being performed, says Labour’s Health spokesperson David Clark.

Labour’s commitment to affordable access to high quality healthcare will provide a better service for New Zealanders than the current Health Minister, who will not apologise for statements that he made that wrongly criticised hard-working staff in the Southern DHB’s Dunedin Hospital site, says Labour’s Health spokesperson David Clark.

"Today's exchange in Parliament showed how out of touch the Minister really is, revealing he was unfamiliar with statements in a letter about orthopaedic shortfalls sent directly to him by concerned clinicians.

Basic blunders and chronic underfunding revealed in Treasury documents obtained by Labour clearly show Health Minister Jonathan Coleman has lost control of his ministry, says Labour’s Health spokesperson David Clark.

“Every New Zealander deserves affordable access to quality healthcare but that basic right is being eroded by chronic underfunding and mistakes that tie up resources.

What was going through Jonathan Coleman’s head in the Health Select Committee this morning when he claimed he was unaware that an estimated 533,000 people have missed out on a GP’s visit in the last 12 months due to cost, asks Labour’s Health spokesperson David Clark.

Get ready for more cuts to health at a local level, affecting all New Zealanders, after a Budget that failed to deliver even enough for health services to stand still, says Labour’s Health spokesperson David Clark.

“District Health Boards this year needed at least $650 million to stand still but they are over $200 million short of what they need.

New Zealand’s District Health Boards are now facing a budget deficit of nearly $90 million dollars, a significant blowout on what was forecast, says Labour’s Health spokesperson David Clark.

“Labour believes health funding must grow to avoid further cuts to the sector. Instead, this visionless Government seems content to allow death by a 1000 ‘service reductions’ with stretched DHB funding putting further stress on an already stretched health workforce.

The Government's backdown on Pharmac is welcomed because previous rhetoric around the agency being adequately funded was just nonsense, says Labour's Health spokesperson David Clark.

The Government is dragging its feet while working New Zealanders are still missing up to $2.3 billion collectively owed to them through underpaid holiday pay entitlements, Labour’s Economic Development spokesperson David Clark says.

“The cover was blown on this issue in September last year yet today at the Commerce Select Committee, MBIE chief executive David Smol conceded that the Government has no timeline for fixing the problem of up to $2.3 billion in underpaid wages in New Zealand workplaces.

Todd McClay has some serious explaining to do following a move by China to put the squeeze on imports of New Zealand kiwifruit, Labour’s Trade spokesperson David Clark says.

"Unfortunately, we don't know whether Mr McClay has even asked Chinese authorities whether tighter controls imposed on kiwifruit into China are in any way related to a recent threat to impose tighter controls on kiwifruit into China. Does the Minister think the controls are just a highly unlikely co-incidence?

The Government wants to trim the process for hearing TPP submissions to get the controversial legislation off the agenda for election year in a shocking case of political expediency, Labour’s Trade and Export Growth spokesperson David Clark says.

“The Government had decided to cut back the national interests assessment process by three weeks.