Field Taito Phillip: Status of Redundancy Payments Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee 
Field Taito Phillip: Status of Redundancy Payments Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee 
[Volume:615;Page:11562] 
Hon TAITO PHILLIP FIELD (Minister of State) 
: 
 I am going to make a contribution because I have been listening to this debate and from the sound of in particular contributions made by Mr Sowry and a few others one would think that this bill is in relation to something that has not been agreed to in negotiations between employers and their workers. What we are talking about here is a situation where a redundancy package has been properly negotiated to be part of the terms of employment of workers. 
I want to take up first of all the implication made by Mr Sowry that redundancy payments would send a business belly up. Well that is just not right. What we are talking about here is in fact a business that has already gone belly up and is facing closure with the workers losing their jobs and with the employer looking at honouring what has already been negotiated and agreed to in terms of a redundancy package. 
I want to make another point in relation to some of the comments that have been made about workers having immediate access to welfare payments after a closure. In my experience that is certainly not the case. There is a stand-down period where holiday pay has to be taken into account and other moneys that have been paid out to workers have to be taken into account. In some cases there is quite a lengthy stand-down period for those workers before they get payment of a benefit or anything else. 
I can appreciate the arguments that have been put forward by some members in relation to the plight of small business. Sometimes those hard-working people have taken a risk in terms of investment. I take on board the points that have been made by Paul Adams. There are a lot of hard-working New Zealanders who make a commitment and a sacrifice in starting a business and that needs to be acknowledged. Nobody on this side denies that. 
What we are talking about is the situation that prompted this bill. It has been aptly described by my colleague Rick Barker and in the speeches made by my colleague Mark Peck and I want to congratulate him on sponsoring the bill. It is a situation of closure where a significant workforce is made redundant and where small communities in rural areas are affected. We have had some colleagues on the National side talk about farmers and their situation. Often these huge redundancies have affected rural towns and farmers. Some of those farmers who have been made redundant have been reliant on working in the meat industry during the killing season to supplement their earnings. 
I agree with the points made by Rick Barker in relation to the Tomoana Freezing Works closure but I also want to identify with the Patea Freezing Works closure because that was a classic example of a whole community that was affected by redundancy. Those workers losing their livelihoods turned that town into a ghost town. The loss of jobs and loss of income affected their children and families and also affected the whole community of Patea. Other small businesses in Patea were detrimentally affected as a result of that closure. When we talk about employers under this bill having to give workers priority where a redundancy provision has already been agreed to we are taking about the survival of small communities. A lot of small businesses in a small rural town like Patea are very much dependent on the income of workers. That is an aspect that members also have to take into account. It is not a simple question of our just viewing this matter from a small-business point of view or from a business point of view; it is also a question of how it affects other New Zealanders—ordinary working New Zealanders. Closure not only has an effect on families and children; it has a downstream effect on communities and on other small businesses in those small towns. 
That is where I think the issue of fairness has to come in. We cannot be one-eyed because nobody is not going to suffer as a result of a closure of a business. I think all people in small businesses—management as well as staff—suffer as a result of that situation and I think it is very very important to have a balanced approach to consider what is fair and what priority should be given to workers and to consider the downstream effect that I have been talking about. I think this bill has a balanced approach and a fair approach to the issue of redundancy.