Pillay Lynne: Employment Relations Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading In Committee Speaker Recalled 
Pillay Lynne: Employment Relations Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading In Committee Speaker Recalled 
[Volume:668;Page:15414] 
LYNNE PILLAY (Labour) 
: 
 I would like to comment particularly in relation to the transitional provisions of the Employment Relations Amendment Bill (No 2) on comments made by both Carol Beaumont and Darien Fenton. We are looking at individual employment agreements and how that provision will work. Although they must be in writing we know that the Employers and Manufacturers Association will be busy pumping out those individual employment agreements to employers as we saw in the 1990s. When redundancy had to be referred to those agreements said quite clearly that no redundancy compensation would be paid. 
We know that in terms of these individual agreements it will be very much as my colleagues have said a “take it or leave it” situation. That is what National members refer to as choice in this situation. National members say that of course there is a choice. We say that workers will have no choice as to whether they accept this Draconian provision that means they can get sacked within the first 90 days whether or not they are given a reason and whether or not there is a good reason. When we say that employees have no choice the Government’s response is to say that of course they have a choice: they can either take the job or leave the job. We say that that is not a real choice. 
Carol Beaumont touched on again a possibly unintended consequence but one that from a transitional point of view will create a real problem in the future. 
That would be along the lines of an employee getting a pumped out “take it or leave it” employment agreement handed to them courtesy of the Employers and Manufacturers Association for which the employer pays a fee. Employees know that they have no choice but to take the agreement and they sign up. Things might go really well. They will work and try to do the best possible job they can. Then they make the fatal mistake of putting too much sauce on the fish or whatever. They are called in and told that in the agreement that they have a copy of they will see quite clearly that they can be sacked for any reason and the reason they are being sacked is that—well they will not be told why; they are just let go. What a funny term “let go” is. It sounds as if one is being really kind and nice as if it is a nice thing to do. 
The poor employee is let go. John Key has talked about job creation so they are sure there will be a lot of jobs they can find out there. People search and search but of course there is nothing because this Government has not created any jobs. As previous speakers have said most workers are staying in their jobs because they are too fearful to leave and because if they go to a new job they will have these Draconian conditions imposed on them particularly after this bill goes through. 
Eventually people will have to make ends meet so they will have to do something they did not want to do which is go to Work and Income. Their case manager will ask why they are no longer employed. They will say they do not know but that their employer has let them go. The case manager will ask whether it was their fault and they will say that they do not know whether it was their fault because the employer did not tell them anything. They will be told that they have to wait. Those poor people will be waiting to see whether they are eligible for a benefit—a very small benefit but something to put a bit of food on the table while they are searching for those non-existent jobs. 
I ask the Government to consider where the human rights are in that situation. We could have a situation in which a Work and Income case manager asks an employer whether the termination of a job was the employee’s fault. The employer will say to Work and Income that it was the employee’s fault and they will feel quite confident in telling Work and Income about the reasons because they have nothing to lose. We will have the ludicrous situation in which that poor person will for reasons completely unknown lose his or her job and will then be told by Work and Income—