Tim Beveridge: Businesses shouldn't have to pick up the tab for another public holiday

I've just been watching the news coverage of the cortege as the Queens coffin has been making its way from Balmoral Castle on its way to Edinburgh.

It has been stopping off in places so people could pay their respects and there's some very moving footage of just people lining the streets, not just in the countryside but also thousands of mourners lining the streets in Edinburgh. Clearly the coming days will culminate in a funeral, an event the likes of which we will have never seen and maybe never see again in terms of scale.

I was a huge fan of the Queen, an incredible life of service over 70 years. Which makes this morning point of discussion, frankly, pretty tricky. A very tricky one because the question is should there be a public holiday to commemorate this occasion? It's an unenviable decision, I think, and I think a difficult one.

And here it is. I don't think there should be a public holiday.

I know it seems to go against everything I've just said, but we know from recent arguments around Matariki, that the cost of a public holiday is in the region of $450 million to New Zealand employers, who have being through a really difficult time over the past two or three years.  

If it weren't for that, I'd have a different opinion, but I just don't think we should be expecting New Zealand businesses, small businesses, medium, large, whatever, New Zealand employers to be picking up the tab for what I think should be a personal choice.

She was a wonderful Queen and an incredible example of service to our country and Commonwealth, but in the end, I think the choice around how we all reflect on the Queen's passing should be an individual one, a personal one.

As we've seen with all the people who have been lining the streets or who are making a pilgrimage to pay their respects, their grief, and their reaction and their choice is personal, let's not require others to pay for it.

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