Fenton Darien: Employment Relations Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading In Committee Speaker Recalled 
Fenton Darien: Employment Relations Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading In Committee Speaker Recalled 
[Volume:668;Page:15403] 
DARIEN FENTON (Labour) 
: 
 I want to add one important point to my very good colleague Maryan Street’s contribution to the Employment Relations Bill (No 2) which I thought was very powerful. I hope that the National Party was listening. The other fundamental thing about Part 1 of this bill that has not been referred to this morning is that we have talked about fairness but with the 90-day trial period we are denying access to justice. With this bill we are saying that people will lose their economic livelihoods without being told a reason why or being able to challenge that reason. That is a pretty fundamental thing in New Zealand. It is a fundamental legal understanding in New Zealand that if one is treated unfairly or something happens to one in other walks of life one has the right to challenge it and access justice. I think that is one of the very strong oppositions that we have. 
I want to give an example that came out this week. I know there has been a bit of discussion about the sauce-and-aioli guy but an example came out earlier this week of a farm worker. He took on a job milking cows moved to a farm cottage and took his wife and two children with him. He signed an employment agreement that had a 90-day trial provision in it. He thought at the time that there was not much to worry about. He noticed it and he signed the agreement but he thought it would not apply to him. He took his children and his wife to live on this farm. The children settled in at the local school. They really loved it and thought it was fantastic. They were having a wonderful new life on the farm. 
A couple of months into his employment he had a disagreement with his employer the farmer. It was over the way the employer the farmer was talking to one of the farmhands who was a migrant worker. He was very nasty to this guy so the worker decided to stick up for this guy which is what we expect people to do. If people are being bullied it is a natural instinct to stick up for a workmate a friend or a neighbour and that is what he did. He asked the employer: “Please do not talk to this guy like that.” The next morning the farmer came round the milking shed and said: “I’m sorry but I’ll have to let you go.” The worker asked for a reason and the employer said he did not have to tell him because he is employed under the 90-day trial period. 
The worker had done nothing wrong except stick up for his workmate—he had done nothing wrong. There was nothing he could do about it because he had signed the employment contract. Let us be clear about this: if employers get the paperwork right there will be people who get fired like this. It did not apply to the sauce-and-aioli guy because the employer got the paperwork wrong but employers will get it right and employees will be fired. I have heard from many many workers in that situation. 
This poor guy had to pack up his family leave his farm cottage where he was living and tell his children that they would no longer be going to the local school and that they were leaving. He felt a real sense of shame for leaving a community where he was just starting to build relations in. He had to try and explain to his children why they had to leave. 
Carol Beaumont 
: Very disruptive for them. 
DARIEN FENTON 
: It disrupted their lives their education and this guy’s economic livelihood. The upshot of the story is that he has gone to Australia. I know that members opposite will say that there are longer trial periods in Australia but fundamentally for him it was an issue of fairness of the impact on his children of the impact on his livelihood and of the impact on his career as a sharemilker in the future. There was an overwhelming sense of frustration and anger that we live in a country now where workplaces of fewer than 20 workers can be treated like that and we will be living in a country where every worker in the whole country can be treated in the same way. Yes apparently it will not happen; we know that. But the fact is that there are employers out there—and we heard it in the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee—who want this extension not only in all workplaces but also for it to be the default provision. They want more; they always want more. 
Sue Moroney 
: I think Kate Wilkinson does too. 
DARIEN FENTON 
: I think Kate Wilkinson does too. In fact I heard from another group of workers where four of them were working for the same firm in Napier who have been fired under the 90-day trial provisions.