Woodhouse MichaelHon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (Minister for ACC): It is a great privilege for me to take a call in this third reading of a bill that is going to mark a huge milestone I think in the battle for pay equity. I do so in my capacity as Minister for ACC as a funder of this settlement. There has been a small part played in that respect. But as Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety there is a bridge actually between this legislation and the pay equity legislation that I am working on now and hope to bring to the House within a very short period. I want to address some of the issues that have been raised through this bill in respect of what the future might look like. But thirdly as a former employer of care and support workers in the aged-care sector I have certainly seen up close and am in awe of the tremendous work that is done by the 55000 workers in this sector. There were a couple of comments made one of which I strongly agree with and then one I strongly disagree with. The first one was that we would not be here but for the unions. Of that there is no doubt. They have led a battle—firstly the Service and Food Workers Union E tū and then its support affiliates and the Council of Trade Unions (CTU)—to take a novel approach to a difficult problem one that resulted in what I think was one of the more intelligent and thoughtful Court of Appeal decisions that I have ever read.The second is that—and Jan Logie used these words; this is verbatim—the Government was led kicking and screaming" to this point. I would say that nothing could be further from the truth. I will explain why I say that. For a start the Government was not a party to those proceedings except as an intervener. The Government has chosen to become far more involved than it previously was. Secondly Mr Lees-Galloway said that the court said that there had to be a pay rise. Well actually that is not what the court said. All the determination did was it said that section 9 of the Equal Pay Act required that the pay should be equal for work of equal value. It was a milestone decision that led us back to the start—not quite. But after years of that process the section 9 principles process would have begun. It is my view that had the parties to that transaction been left alone it was possible for it to take years.It was not a case where the Government was led kicking and screaming. My Cabinet colleagues and I agreed that that was not fair; that that was not appropriate. It was necessary appropriate and the right thing to do to take it out of the court—and that is why I agreed with the comment Mr Lees-Galloway made—and negotiate a settlement. So that was the first thing the Government did. The second thing the Government did was it set up the Joint Working Group on Pay Equity Principles led by Dame Patsy Reddy and supported by Business New Zealand the CTU and with I thought very good support from the State Services Commission and the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment. It had the challenging task of trying to come to an agreement on what those pay equity principles and processes should be and I think it did a fantastic job.There were a couple of areas where it could not agree. Comparators is one and I will address that in a minute. But it came up with a robust process and set of principles that I believe the new bill has been highly faithful to. But I would stress—and I appreciate the feedback that we are getting already. Some of the hyperbole I think has been something of an overreaction. But it is just that—it is a draft. There will be amendments to that bill before it gets to first reading and there will be changes to it I have no doubt as it goes through that process.But I do want to touch on a couple of things that were said and particularly the belief that had the pay equity legislation that I am preparing now been in place during the TerraNova Homes and Care negotiations the settlement—which this bill gives effect to—could not have been reached. I reject that and I think with some reasons I will refute it.There are a couple of quite big areas that have been talked about through the passage of this bill and one is arrears—back-pay. The Equal Pay Act 1972 provides for back-pay. There is also a need to pay back-pay or arrears where the employer by act or omission has contrived to pay less than it had committed to or that the law requires. Both of those examples will continue and indeed if an employment agreement expires and there is a negotiated process it is often the case that arrears—because it has taken time to bargain—are also payable. None of those things will change.Pay equity is different. In a pay equity claim those conditions do not exist. The employer has paid exactly what it has committed to in the employment agreement and to which the employee and/or their unions have agreed. So I am really keen to listen to the arguments for arrears in those situations but I am not swayed by the arguments that have been made notwithstanding that Jan Logie said in the second reading that my comments were nonsense.The other area is the comparator principle. The Employment Court did consider the issue. It was asked the question: is the authority of the court entitled to have regard to what is paid to males in other industries? It went on to answer that question by saying that the court may be entitled if those inquiries of other employees of the same employer or of other employers in the same or similar enterprise or industry or sector would be an inappropriate comparator group.I read that to mean start close and if you cannot find an appropriate comparator group look outside. The Court of Appeal ultimately found that that answer was not wrong in law. The bill that we have got now—and indeed the negotiation process that gives effect to this bill—does just that. It uses a comparator within the industry but firstly it has to be male-dominated. So if there are concerns that there is some kind of tainting in an industry well it cannot be used if it is not male-dominated and the bill will I think define what that means in the future.All of that is a bit pointy-headed and some might argue not necessary or appropriate for today because today is a day of celebration. But I do want to give the House the assurance that this is a very important milestone on the journey. We have got a long way to go to achieve the outcome we all want which is equity without bias without discrimination. I am confident that we are going to be able to get there.Congratulations to the union. Congratulations to Kristine Bartlett on leading that and being the face and the name behind an important campaign. This is a very good day. I commend the bill."