24 May 2004

Manukau Growth Rate 5.7%

Manukau's economic growth rate was 5.7% for the 2003 year, compared to the national rate of 3.5%. The strong growth reflects the healthy demand in construction, property and business services, education, health and community services, transport and storage industries.

The housing building boom, which has focused on the Botany area, has seen large increases in dwelling consents and construction jobs. Over the past six months more than 1100 new dwelling consents were issued by Manukau City Council.

The strong economy produced 7,500 new jobs over the year and approximately 500 new businesses set up or relocated in the city.

Mayor Sir Barry Curtis says the Council works hard to attract new companies and promote the benefits of Manukau both within New Zealand and overseas through its economic development agency, Enterprising Manukau.

"We have many strengths - lots of available land, excellent infrastructure and excellent access to transport links such as the airport and ports.

"I am delighted that the newcomers include foreign companies and the Council is now in discussions with two large businesses which together will create 700 jobs once they're established here". One of the projects is a new industrial park in Mangere East and the other is a US company which produces high-performance car parts.

"However I do have strong concerns over the education standards of our workforce. We are still lacking the numbers of qualified, skilled people that employers need. Our schools are still turning out too many unskilled youngsters with no or few qualifications. At a time when businesses are having trouble finding skilled staff, there are over 14,000 unemployed in Manukau. That's a real mismatch.

"It's tragic that so many teenagers leave school at 15 with poor reading and writing kills and no plans to go on to higher education. They are not getting the support they need to achieve.

"We need to ensure that that young people have the same passion to become engineers, technicians or computer programmers....as they have for rapping and skateboarding.

"There'll be few jobs for unskilled and unqualified people in the workforce of tomorrow, when even forklifts will be operated by robots. Improving education levels is essential for the city and we need to make progress fast."

ENDS

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>