Chadwick Steve: Employment Relations (Breaks and Infant Feeding) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Chadwick Steve: Employment Relations (Breaks and Infant Feeding) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:646;Page:15514] 
Hon STEVE CHADWICK (Minister of Women’s Affairs) 
: 
 I rise to speak in support of the Employment Relations (Breaks and Infant Feeding) Amendment Bill. I wish to thank the Minister of Labour for his unconditional support when approached by me and Sue Moroney to seek his support for the logic of the need for statutory protection for rests and meal breaks in the workplace. This Labour-led Government is committed to ensuring that mothers are given a real choice to return to work when they and their family are ready to do so. That choice must therefore be achievable in practice. We are also committed to seeing that children get the best possible start in life and this bill supports our ongoing efforts in that regard. I like the reserved position of the Opposition and I think the women of the country will notice that with some pleasure really. 
As an Associate Minister of Health and the Minister of Women’s Affairs I believe that 
this bill marks an incredibly important step in the ongoing effort to protect and promote infant feeding choices for New Zealand families. This is not a cynical election-year bribe; this work goes back to the year 2000 when the United Nations special agency the International Labour Organization updated its Maternity Protection Convention. Article 10 included the right for working mothers to be given time to breastfeed their children—a United Nations convention. We took note of that and began our work. 
Our work was also strengthened by the courage of Elizabeth Weatherly who between 2002 and 2003 before the Opposition spokesperson’s time in the House presented a petition to Parliament with 9000 signatures from women calling for greater protection of breastfeeding women and their children. It was seen as a fundamental human rights issue for children to be fed when they required nutrition. The petition was considered by the Health Committee which I chaired at that time. In 2005 the committee reported back to Parliament with a raft of recommendations on that petition. Those included support for a Department of Labour code of practice designed to help employers to accommodate breastfeeding in the workplace. 
So we began that work not this year as the Opposition has said but in 2005. We began to develop the code of practice and we hoped to see employers take it up as a natural work provision to provide family-friendly work environments. Then in 2007 I developed a member’s bill that required a code of practice to be developed under the Employment Relations Act of 2000 to provide guidelines on what was needed to facilitate breastfeeding in the workplace. We did not define in the guidelines how that should be done; we left that up to workplaces. That bill languished in the ballot as is the fate of many fine members’ bills. 
Today this bill builds on that work. It requires all employers to provide appropriate facilities and breaks for workers who wish to breastfeed or express milk and for it to be stored safely in the workplace—probably not in the staff lunch fridge with all the rest of the clobber that sits in those fridges but in a little fridge so it is kept nice and clean which is reasonably practical. We are taking an entirely practical approach. 
As a midwife and a mother I have been a long-time advocate of the importance of breastfeeding for mothers and their children; as the saying goes “Breast is best”. We know that breastfeeding is really important for babies’ growth development and health. It provides optimum nutrition and assists physical development and emotional attachment. We are worried about family violence so we have to do everything we can as members of this House to make sure we support mothers to be able to feed their babies for as long as possible. Breastfeeding also protects against infectious disease and it can reduce the risk of chronic diseases such as obesity—a very practical not nanny State approach to addressing obesity. Breastfeeding is also incredibly important for mothers’ health. 
This bill builds on a range of initiatives that we have led as a Government that support breastfeeding: the Healthy Eating - Healthy Action plan which supports breastfeeding for at least 6 months and puts those supports beside women and their families in order to achieve that; and the baby-friendly hospital initiative which aims to increase awareness and understanding of the benefits of breastfeeding amongst health workers in hospitals. Forty primary hospitals 18 secondary hospitals and four tertiary units in the country have now achieved baby-friendly accreditation. We have introduced paid parental leave which reduces the pressure on women to have to return to work immediately after giving birth; and we have introduced a plan of action for breastfeeding that aims to improve breastfeeding rates at a really well-coordinated local community and national level with a well-trained and an effective workforce. 
A mother’s ability to continue to breastfeed her child will add to her ability to remain at work and contribute to productivity if that is her choice. Some critics will say this bill is unnecessary but it does protect vulnerable workers and indirectly their children. This bill will make a huge difference for many women. The Human Rights Commission has previously investigated many claims of discrimination against breastfeeding mothers under the Human Rights Act as we learnt from considering the petition of Elizabeth Weatherly. In one instance the commission heard of a working mother—a registered nurse in a public hospital—who had great difficulty in being able to express her milk while on the job. She ended up feeling exhausted after her long shifts because other than having to stop and express milk three to four times daily she could not take any time for any other breaks. She had to express milk while sitting on a toilet seat lid because there was no other suitable place provided for her in that hospital. 
This House of Parliament actually was no different from that hospital. When we investigated the situation here we found many parliamentary staff had to go into a toilet cubicle to express milk and had to just save it in a staff refrigerator. That was appalling and the Labour women of our caucus set up a breastfeeding space where women could attend to their needs while they were at work if they wanted to continue breastfeeding their babies. 
The passage of this bill means that such indignities will become a thing of the past. I commend it to the House.