Fenton Darien: Minimum Wage and Remuneration Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Fenton Darien: Minimum Wage and Remuneration Amendment Bill — In Committee 
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DARIEN FENTON (Labour) 
: 
 First of all I thank members for their contributions bizarre as some have been. I think it has been an interesting debate that is worth pursuing because it is one way of getting the National Government’s views on the record. We have certainly achieved that if nothing else. 
We have heard from National members that they think it is OK for some workers in New Zealand to be paid less than $12.50 an hour. This is very much “old National”. If Mr Peachey knew his history then he would know that in 1983 the Minimum Wage Act was completely unnecessary because in those days we had national awards that set minimum wages and conditions penal rates holidays and other things for workers. It was not until National became the Government in 1990 and did away with all those things that the minimum wage became important. Mr Peachey should learn his history before he gets up and spouts about it. 
Allan Peachey 
: I’ll read the book tonight. 
DARIEN FENTON 
: I thank Mr Peachey. I think it would be good if he did. 
In this Minimum Wage and Remuneration Amendment Bill we are talking about a changing workforce. The previous Labour Government may not have passed this legislation 9 years ago; we may not have done it 15 years ago. That is because we have seen a change in the nature of the workforce whereby more and more people are being moved out of the employment relationship and into non-standard work which includes independent contracting and dependent contracting. 
I want to make it clear that this bill would not apply to Graham Scott the independent contractor employed by Bill English. He has been given permission to be paid $2000 a day. Based on an 8-hour day that is $250 an hour. The Labour Party is not asking for $250 an hour; we are asking for a $15 minimum wage over the next 2 years. All that this bill does is to guarantee every worker in the country who is over the age of 16 years at least $12.50 an hour which will move up to $13 an hour and then up to $15 an hour in 2011. I do not understand what is wrong with that. 
I will give some examples and I would like the National members in their contributions to tell me what they would do in such cases. The first example is about a pizza delivery man who is employed as a contract driver. He is assigned to work 10 hours straight with his payment based on the number of pizzas that he delivers. That ends up working out at $3.50 an hour. How do we fix that problem? 
Lianne Dalziel gave a very very good contribution in terms of home-care workers on 24-hour shifts. These people are looking after our older relatives in the community. One home-care worker was looking after a man with Alzheimer’s disease. She signed a contract with an agency stating that she was an independent contractor and was self-employed. She had to pay her own accident compensation levies her own tax and for her own travel. She was paid by the hour for the time she spent at the residence of the person she was caring for. 
I have seen hotel workers who are employed on a contract basis and are paid based on the number of rooms they clean. They have to try to get 15 16 or up to 20 rooms done to earn anything like the minimum wage. That is not right. Those are the sorts of issues that this bill is trying to fix. I will perhaps address some of the mechanisms a little bit later in the debate. 
I came across some cleaners who answered a Be Your Own Boss advertisement. It is out there—Be Your Own Boss. The cleaners bought hundreds of dollars’ worth of supplies to set up their own cleaning businesses. After working long hours they found that their weekly earnings came to less than $6 an hour. They are independent contractors they are vulnerable contractors and they are listed in the proposed new schedule 2 in my Supplementary Order Paper 4 amending this bill. 
These people do not have bargaining power. They are not the Graham Scotts of the world who have the ability to go and negotiate large sums of money for themselves. These people are trying to earn a living in a recession when times are difficult. As I said at the beginning this bill is simply about one thing which is that in this country no one should be paid less than the minimum wage and people definitely should not be paid less than the minimum wage because of the nature of their employment. 
I note too that New Zealand is falling behind on this issue. Other jurisdictions are tackling this issue and we looked at this in the select committee. Austria Australia France Norway Germany Canada and the UK are just some of the countries that have protections or specific policies. They range from recognising economically dependent workers by extending employment rights to recognising a category of workers who are entitled to a minimum wage such as in the UK. Those countries are not trying to make them into employees; they are simply paying them a fair wage. 
In this area there is both a higher end and a lower end. We have heard about the higher end. This bill is not about the higher end and as I have said about paying the Graham Scotts of the world. It is about those workers who are struggling to make ends meet and who are suffering social and economic hardship as a result. I will leave it there for now.