Chris Hipkins says it's important to look beyond school attendance headlines to what's behind the numbers.
The Government's unveiled plans to improve reporting of attendance data and bring in a traffic light system of interventions for truant students.
It will also release new public health guidance about when a student is well enough to go to school.
The Labour leader told John MacDonald that there's a group of kids who are absent more often than previously, but for good reason.
He says parents are more inclined to keep children home when they are sick than they were previously, and that shouldn't be criticised.
He also said that the Government will be able to meet all of its 2030 targets because they aren't very big.
The nine goals include shortening emergency department and elective surgery wait-times, raising school attendance and slashing youth crime.
The coalition also wants 50,000 fewer people on the job-seeker benefit and to reduce households in emergency housing by 75%.
Hipkins said the targets are realistic, but they're missing a lot of detail.
He says that, for example, the emergency department targets fail to address why so many people show up to hospital with an avoidable illness.
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