Pitched as making sure "apprentices are paid properly for their work", the Green Party would scrap the lower training minimum wage and add grants and support aimed at getting more people into and through trades training.

📋 Greens: Abolish the training wage, October 2026 →

What it does

• Abolishes the training minimum wage, currently $19.16 an hour or 80% of the $23.95 adult minimum wage, RNZ reported.
• Gives apprentices a $2,000 equipment grant over the course of their apprenticeship for tools, uniforms and course materials.
• Pays a $2,000 completion bonus to employers who actively support apprentices through their qualifications.
• Adds $30 million a year for Māori and Pasifika-led training, covering pastoral and learning support, job matching and help in a first job, and restores the centres of vocational excellence.
• Costs $117.35 million a year on the party's figures, which Infometrics verified, according to RNZ and the NZ Herald.

The debate

• Co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick said apprentice numbers were at a 15-year low and that the training wage was a barrier to people finishing their training.
• ACT leader David Seymour said the policy would make it $10,000 more expensive for a business to take on an apprentice, and National leader Christopher Luxon raised concern it would not be good for businesses wanting to take on apprentices.
• Labour leader Chris Hipkins said he had not looked at the training wage and wanted to review the evidence on its employment effects, while NZ First leader Winston Peters defended the lower rate, saying that is the way it has always been.
• ACT, by contrast, is campaigning to lower the training wage to 60% of the adult minimum wage.