Key: jobs summit pointless

Friday's jobs summit is being written off as pointless by the Prime Minister.

Unions, business and opposition parties will host the summit, aimed at tackling what it calls a jobs and manufacturing crisis.

But John Key says there is no crisis with all statistics he has showing moderate growth.

Even if he was invited, he says he wouldn't go to the summit.

"I can't tell you what I'm doing on Friday but I've probably got other things to do but I just don't accept the proposition that there is a manufacturing crisis.

"It's tough for some businesses, I accept that, it has been actually for the last four or five years."

The Prime Minister's being told to get into the real world after claiming there is no jobs or manufacturing crisis in New Zealand.

The Greens want the Reserve Bank to start printing money in response to what it calls a manufacturing crisis. John Key says manufacturing growth is steady and there's been an increase in jobs over the last four years.

That is disputed by the Greens, who say the industry is in crisis.

They will be taking part

in a jobs summit on Friday to work on solutions to it.

Greens Co-leader Russel Norman 

is astounded.

 "I think the Prime Minister needs to get out more, if he goes around the country he'll find that that there's a lot of manufacturers and exporters who are in trouble.

"And if he read the paper occasionally he'd find the same thing and if he read the stats he'll find the stats back that up."

He says Statistics New Zealand figures show 40,000 jobs have been lost in the last four years, and that is just the tip of the iceberg.

"Even if he just goes out and talks to real manufacturers in the real world, the New Zealand Dollar is overvalued by about 15 percent according to the International Monetary Fund and that puts significant pressure on our exporters."

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