Turei Metiria: Employment Relations (Film Production Work) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Turei Metiria: Employment Relations (Film Production Work) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
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METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green) 
: 
 The Green Party will be supporting the amendment new clause 2A which inserts an expiry date for this legislation. I think that is very wise. There is no doubt that passing legislation like this which will change the employment conditions for what could be hundreds perhaps even thousands of workers who may engage in the film-making and video game - making industry over the next decades requires a great deal more public concern and scrutiny than one day of investigation. Frankly it is a constitutional outrage that this legislation is going through at all and that the Government has involved itself in dirty commercial and political deals by selling out the people who are actually very vulnerable workers. 
I am very pleased to see that an expiry date has been proposed. We will be supporting that because the country needs to scrutinise this issue. The Government is trying to push this legislation through under urgency because it is riding a political wave at the moment but once that deal is unpicked the country will see just how dirty it is and just what the consequences will be. 
It is interesting to note that on  
Back Benches 
 the other night we were talking about this issue and the ACT Party said that it was very interested in seeing whether this kind of amendment which would mean that employees could be classed as contractors and therefore lose a significant amount of their employment conditions should be extended to all workers. That is what Hilary Calvert said. She would like to see the legislation potentially extended to all workers. That is the classic extremism of that party; we would not expect anything less. But there is that ideology sitting inside the Government at the moment that has the political power to interfere with workers’ conditions in a great hurry and at the behest of others. 
I am very concerned about the consequences of this legislation for vulnerable workers and particularly for Maori workers. I would like to hear more about why the Maori Party has decided to support this legislation in particular. Let us just think about the kinds of young people whom we are talking about here—young people who want to get involved in the film industry. We can look at how well our Maori film makers have been doing. We can look at  
Boy 
 for example which is excellent in that not only was it a New Zealand story but it involved young Maori New Zealanders and their own story and the film led them to this idea that they could participate in the film industry just like anyone else. It was enormously empowering to see a film like that made about young Maori men in particular and the opportunities that the film gave them both in the industry and in the expression of their lives. 
Because of the nature of the industry those young people will generally have to operate as contractors. A young person getting into this business particularly a young Maori person will have to operate under that contractual arrangement. They are very vulnerable workers by their very nature particularly young Maori men who we know tend to be done over in terms of the education system so they will not necessarily have all the skills or information that they need to negotiate as a contractor for the kinds of conditions that would make sure that they are OK. If they are then treated like employees by the company and they do not realise that this is happening because they are not aware of their full employment rights then this legislation means that they will be stripped of things like holiday pay and sick leave. They will be stripped of the capacity to be treated like employees and when they are being treated like employees they will not have the bargaining power nor the knowledge and information that they need to negotiate their contracts to make sure those things are covered. It will be these young Maori workers and particularly our Maori men who will be suffering from this. 
Young Maori employees involved in this industry at various levels will be the ones in the future—and not very many years away—who will be affected very badly by this. So why is the Maori Party allowing the Government that it is part of to pass legislation under urgency when no Maori lawyers no Maori employment lawyers no Maori communities no Maori iwi or hapu no Maori actors no Maori—nobody—have had a chance to look at this legislation and say “This is how it will affect us.”? Young ones who are out there in the industry should be able to look at this legislation and say how it would affect them how it would injure them and maybe how it would benefit them. There is no scrutiny of the effect of this legislation on the workers who will be the most affected.