Street Maryan: Minimum Wage and Remuneration Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Street Maryan: Minimum Wage and Remuneration Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:654;Page:3894] 
Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour) 
: 
 I have a couple of points relating to the earlier contribution by the member Ross Robertson who has recently resumed his seat—not the last contribution because it was almost unintelligible. The speech that the member made earlier referred to the fact that the 1983 Minimum Wage Act was brought in by a National Government under Prime Minister Muldoon. It is always interesting to reflect on how selective people are about the history that they choose to repeat. 
There are two points I want to make about that statement in particular. The 1983 Minimum Wage Act does exactly what my colleague Darien Fenton outlined earlier. It was put into the context of a different industrial relations regime from the one we have now. In fact it quite specifically refers to awards collective agreements determinations or contracts of service and it talks about structures in industrial relations that existed in the 1980s but do not exist now. The other point to make is about the context of that Act. I wonder whether my colleagues can remember something else that was happening in 1983—in fact it went on from 1982 to 1984. Mr Peachey may have conveniently forgotten it. It was the wage and price freeze that Sir Robert Muldoon brought down in the middle of 1982. So to bring in a Minimum Wage Act in 1983 was almost meaningless because there was no provision for any movement during that period. It was not until a Labour Government was returned in 1984 that we saw any wage movement as that freeze first had to be taken off. Sir Roger Douglas will remember those days I am sure. 
However the other point is that the Minimum Wage and Remuneration Amendment Bill does not seek to increase the minimum wage. It simply asks for the minimum wage to be applied to contracted workers who are not currently receiving it or who can through various means not be paid the minimum wage. That simply corrects an anomaly that has emerged over time. There should not be any demur from members opposite about the need to ensure that the minimum wage is exactly that across all sectors of the economy because it ends up being the final safety net for wage earners around the country in whatever industry or occupation they happen to be. 
An additional point is that we did hear from Mr Woodhouse some of the same old arguments we always hear when we come to discussions about the minimum wage which are that any increase to the minimum wage equates to a loss of jobs and that we are taking jobs away from the most vulnerable workers instead of trying to support them. That is nonsense. Historically it has been proven to be nonsense but it is the sort of nonsense that is trotted out in times of tight labour markets and economic recession. It is constantly trotted out but we never hear it being argued in times of upward cycles of economic good fortune. The fact that this Parliament ought to be standing here collectively and jointly to support the most vulnerable workers by ensuring that there is a minimum wage below which they cannot fall is something that should be held in common by members of all parties in this Chamber. I welcome the comments of the Maori Party in that respect because they know as well as anybody does what it means for someone to be a vulnerable worker. 
This bill simply seeks to apply a minimum wage provision across contracted workers who have emerged through various kinds of industrial relations devices to fall below the statutory minimum wage. Thank you Mr Chairman.