Roundup: New Zealand job summit ends

Special Report:Global Financial Crisis

WELLINGTON, Feb. 27 (Chinese media) -- New Zealand's first ever job summit ended on Friday in Auckland, with the coming out of proposals of a nine day working fortnight that would see workers undertake a day of training on the tenth as well as a co-fund between banks and the government.

More than 200 leaders of New Zealand's business sector, trade unions and community organizations attended job summit to discuss ideas to protect and create jobs as the economy was hit by the international financial crisis and ongoing recession.

Summit representatives have said a nine-day working fortnight with a day of training would see jobs retained and up-skill workers at the same time.

At a press conference following the summit, Prime Minister John Key said the government would not be paying 100 per cent of workers' wages on the tenth day but would most likely look at potentially funding the training.

He said some firms were already moving to a four-day work.

The banking co-fund could put the tax payer at risk, given the government will partially be underwriting it, but Key said there were still a lot of details to be worked out.

Key said delegates and the public will be able to keep up to date with government work on the proposals by the Job Summit website.

Fisher Paykel Appliances chief executive John Bongard told the conference his group proposed the cabinet "stop making unnecessary rules".

He said tourism was also a key area to focus on with current forecasts predicting a 15 percent drop in numbers visiting New Zealand and representing 27,000 lost jobs.

After a day of intense debate in Auckland, the country's banking bosses came up with an offer of a joint fund with the government to help financially distressed firms through short term equity injections.

The move came after Reserve Bank Governor Alan Bollard took the unusual step of publicly warning the banks that they should not underestimate the anger in the corporate sector about their behavior since the global credit crunch hit international financial institutions.

Key said the idea of a joint fund was one that had come solely out of the day's work and the government would look at it.

Finance Minister Bill English said there was "some head room" in his late May budget for the new ideas.

Bollard told the summit he was ready to lower interest rates further if that was necessary to combat the impact of the international recession.