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Unions Berate ‘Radical’ Law

It is the most radical labour legislation to go before New Zealand’s Parliament this century

Derek Round writes from Wellington
employer or industry associations or negotiate on their own behalf.
Work will be covered by a range of employment contracts which can be individual or collective.
Only annual holidays, public holidays, maternity leave and the NZ$245 (US$160) weekly minimum wage will be enshrined In law.
Almost everything else including meal breaks, penal rates, overtime and health and safety provisions will be up for negotiation.
Opportunities for strikes and lockouts will be restricted and the role of the Labour Court limited.
But both workers and employers will still be able to take a case to court to decide if a contract has been breached.
Prime Minister Jim Bolger says his government wants to give New Zealand an industrial relations system that will be more responsive to the needs of modern industry.
"It ought to be obvious that the old system of industrial relations_too centralised, loo crude, too confrontational—is a key reason why the New Zealand economy has per-
formed so badly," he said in a recent "State of the Nations' speech.
Years of feather-bedding, overmanning resistance to new technology, poor work practices and union demarcation disputes had inflicted huge additional costs on New Zealand producers, he claimed. "The result is measured in lost market opportunities, lost production and lost jobs," Mr. Bolger said.
For 17 years in a row New Zealand had traded at a loss with the rest of the world, with overseas debt almost doubling in the last six years and currently growing at NZ$80 million (US$52.8 million) a week.
The hard truth is that we cannot go on borrowing Ihe savings of other countries to fund one of the world's most generous welfare systems, and cover for the failings of our
poorly performing economy," Mr. Bolger said.
Labour Minister Birch argues that the rigidity of the New Zealand labour market is a fundamental cause of the country’s slow growth, low wage levels and high rate of unemployment, currently approaching 9 per cent.
“A more flexible labour relations system is crucial to our economic development," Mr. Birch says.
But union leaders sec ihc new labour legislation as simply a move to smash the power of the unions.
"What is really taking place is a full-blooded attempt to stack the odds in favour or the meaner employers," says Sue Piper, head of the big civil servants' union, the Public Service Association.
The government is clearly on the side of our most back-
ward-looking employers who want to whittle away union strength so they can force down wages and conditions.'
In support of this view union leaders point to a recent report of the Business Roundtable, an influential organisation representing some of the country's biggest employers, which says real wages must drop 3.9 per cent for unemployment ■ to be eliminated.
The unemployed, currently numbering over 200,000 in a population of 3.4 million, should be able to "bid themselves into jobs by temporary wage reductions which make them attractive for employers to hire," the Business Round-able says.
The only basis for pay increases was shortage of labour In specific categories and locations. Productivity increases did not justify wage increases if labour was in abundance.
Council of Trade Unions president Ken Douglas says: This legislation spells the end of a New Zealand where you earn a fair wage no matter where you work, where those with more strength support those more vulnerabel."
The legislation is not about individual choice or Individual rights, he says, adding: 'It gives total powers to employers to impose what they see as appropriate to their particular workplace."
Mr. Birch rejects claims the new laws could lead to the operation of sweatshops in New Zealand as "fearmongcring" and argues they will lead to higher wages in the long term. Workers are still protected by the statutory minimum wage of NZ$245 a week, he says.
industrial law expert Dr. Alexander Szakats says the individual freedom the new law purports to be advocating is an "admirable principle" but does not work in industrial relations.
Most workers have no individual power to bargain about pay and conditions,” he says. Take it or leave it, and join the ranks of the unemployed."
With the increase of employers' power, workers would need more protection and assistance and this might incfcase union membership, Dr. Szakats says.
The new law does not prohibit unions and if they provided the required services they could increase member ship.
— Depthnews Asia.