Speech from the Throne

Nice pomp and circumstance, in a cringy colonial sort of way, I mean, state opening of the New Zealand parliament complete with Black Rod and bewigged judges. Governor-General, now there's a dream job. You wear a hat with chook feathers and inspect the guard of honour formed by the finest specimen sailors in our Navy. Something I could get used to every day.
The new Government spelled out its policies for the coming term. As expected, lots of spending on families with children, students with loans and infrastructure projects. No tax cuts expected, rather the opposite in the guise of higher interest and mortgage rates. But what I'm disappointed about is there is no mention of a fourth week of pain annual leave, promised to us by Ms Clark if we voted her back in:

Prime Minister Helen Clark spoke to the CTU conference [Keynote Address to Council Of Trade Unions' Biennial Conference at Michael Fowler Centre Wellington Thursday, 23 October 2003] and gave her strongest signal yet that workers might indeed get an extra week’s annual holiday — but not until after the 2005 elections. She told the CTU that it was never Labour’s policy to introduce the fourth week in the present term of government "... because we have given higher priority to other initiatives benefiting workers and their families."

From: The Jobs Letter