Mapp Wayne: Employment Relations Law Reform Bill — In Committee 
Mapp Wayne: Employment Relations Law Reform Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:620;Page:16152] 
Dr WAYNE MAPP (National—North Shore) 
: 
 One of the points that my colleague will no doubt raise as a point of order is what looked like it could be a direction to the Chair. I would like to think that is not the case. 
The Minister I believe has actually misrepresented the part and the reason why he has misrepresented it is that he says it is a simple change and one does not have to notify approvals through the  
Gazette. 
 But what he did not say was what it is actually all about. It is about a whole range of so-called education programmes set out in section 19G which was inserted by this Government into the Health and Safety in Employment Act. Section 19G is headed: “Minister may approve occupational health and safety training”. 
On the face of it that seems perfectly reasonable. It is actually a cover because what the clauses enable is union-based occupational training. Section 19G is referred directly back to section 72 of the Employment Relations Act. That section is all about union education courses. Union education courses are a sop I guess to the unions—and thus to the Labour Party—because what the clause enables is millions of dollars of training to be undertaken at the expense of the employer. In fact there is a table in the Employment Relations Act that sets out the number of hours that unionists are able to take for this training. That is what clause 97 is really all about. 
The Minister may pretend that the clause is just about the removal of a notification provision but actually it is a secrecy provision. No longer does it have to be publicly notified. No longer is it subject to review by the Regulations Review Committee of this House because that would be the implication of it being notified in the  
Gazette 
. It could be just a secret agreement between the Minister and the relevant unions under the Health and Safety in Employment Act. 
I spoke in my last contribution about issues relating to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi. Are these kinds of training programmes going to make specific reference to the principles of the treaty which will now be a compulsory part of codes of behaviour for employment agreements between public sector unions and district health boards? That is what is going to be the case and this is a way whereby secret training will now be undertaken at the cost of the employer to boost union funds. Firstly it will be done to give the unions more money and secondly funnel that money to the Labour Party which will use it to campaign in the general election. Whilst the Minister may pretend and try to convince the public that it is all quite innocent it is in fact very surreptitious. It is a secrecy provision so that the Labour Party can get up to its nefarious games with the unions to boost its own funding. 
Hon David Benson-Pope 
: Another conspiracy theory! 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: I am not surprised that Mr Benson-Pope a Minister in the Chamber tonight who is actually very slippery—he was trying to stand on the head of a pin in question time today saying that things are not what they are—would be supporting secrecy clauses because secrecy clauses are all about what is called in American politics: “Follow the money”. This clause is all about following the money. There will be secret provisions secret deals between the Minister and unions for trade union education at the cost of employers. Unions get paid for it with special provisions in Department of Labour allocations—$10 million and another million dollars announced today. I wonder how much of that ends up in these special programmes funnelled through to the unions and funnelled through to the Labour Party. It is all part of Labour’s election campaign.