Beaumont Carol: Employment Relations (Film Production Work) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
Beaumont Carol: Employment Relations (Film Production Work) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
[Volume:668;Page:14991] 
CAROL BEAUMONT (Labour) 
: 
 I rise to speak on the title of the Employment Relations (Film Production Work) Amendment Bill. I believe that we could do a better job of naming this bill to accurately reflect its content and background. I quite like the amendment in the name of my colleague the Hon Trevor Mallard to omit the words “Film Production Work” and insert the words “As Requested by Warner Bros”. As I said earlier the reason I like this idea is I think it accurately reflects the issue and the question of what is happening to New Zealand’s political and economic sovereignty. What we have seen over the last few days has made a lot of us very worried about the extent to which our domestic policies and legislation are our own or are driven by outside forces. I asked questions earlier today and I am still waiting for an answer about whether labour laws should be changed in response to domestic concerns and issues; if not on what basis changes to those labour laws should be contemplated. I am still waiting for the Minister to respond to those questions. 
Secondly I asked in what circumstances sovereign States like New Zealand have changed labour laws in response to demands of foreign corporates. Again there was no response from the Minister. The circumstances I am aware of are for things like export processing zones in South-east Asia where effectively all rights for workers have been removed. I am looking for examples of when a developed country like New Zealand has responded to the demands of a foreign corporate to change its domestic labour laws. Then of course I am seeking some assurance from the Government that it is not looking at changes to any element of our labour laws in response to the demands of foreign corporates—that it will not go down that line if some other corporate comes along and says it will do something only if the Government reduces the minimum wage or does something else. It would be really helpful if we could have that assurance. I believe that the amendment from the Hon Trevor Mallard encapsulates the concern I have about our sovereignty so I support it from that point of view. 
But I have a couple of other suggestions that might find more favour with members on the other side of the Chamber. The first of those is the “Employment Relations (Film Industry Not Really Clarification) Amendment Bill” because we have heard a lot today about this bill being a necessary clarification. Charles Chauvel and others have quite rightly pointed out that there is no need for clarification and that the law with regard to independent contractors and employees—particularly in the film industry—is well settled. The 2005 Bryson case which was heard in the Supreme Court absolutely clarified the situation. Just for the record because I know that some members opposite are perhaps not very familiar with the case I say that we are talking about somebody who was deemed in the end to be an employee. He was on the grand sum of $18 an hour. This was not a high-paid independent contractor as some have alluded to; this was a worker in the film industry on a relatively low wage who was deemed to be an employee in the end. The law is quite well settled so the clarification that was supposedly necessary is not necessary. Gerry Brownlee said that Warner Bros did not require it and that it was done off the Government’s own back whereas the Hon Steven Joyce said quite a different thing a little later. He said that the Government was responding to the requirement of Warner Bros to make these changes. Whichever way around the clarification issue seems to be a little unnecessary. 
That title might cover the clarification issue quite well but I have another title which covers an issue that my colleague Chris Hipkins went into quite well and that is the “Film Industry Stage One Bill”. I will come back to that title later but I think that this bill is the slippery slope. In just the same way that the 90-day legislation is being extended to all workplaces this law could go further too.