It was only at the protest on the weekend that I learned about the Nats’ plan to make us get sick notes if we take a day off work for ourselves or to look after a sick family member.
Basically, the Nats think you and I are a bunch of liars and cheats who take sickies all the time. They think that forcing us to get sick notes will scare us off and we’ll go to work instead.
What an insult to working Kiwis.
More than that, you’ve got to think about the practical consequences. How many workers who are sick will balk at the cost of going to the GP for a note and go to work instead, risking their health and that of their workmates?
And what an enormous waste of resources. Already, our GPs and clinics are over-stressed and the government is cutting funding in this part of the health sector so that Tony Ryall can produce impressive stats in the ‘glamour’ area of elective surgery. Imagine if every Kiwi worker has to turn up to the doctor two or three times extra a year. What’s that, 6 million extra visits? Ludicrous.
Apparently, the doctors are dead set against this stupid waste of resources. And they should be. I’m not going to pretend that people don’t take sickies from time to time but let’s say that 10% of sick days really are people pulling sickies, and that this law would put off half of them… would it really be worth taking up the doctor’s time for 19 other sick notes?
This is just bad, wasteful policy from a government that has no understanding of efficient use of scarce resources and thinks that workers are all scumbags who need a good kicking.
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