Locke Keith: Employment Relations (Probationary Period Repeal) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Locke Keith: Employment Relations (Probationary Period Repeal) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:665;Page:13035] 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 Mr Garrett has a point. We should be moving to a broader dress code. Perhaps as a transition we could have a 90-day probationary period where people wear ties and then after that they can go without ties. In reply to Tau Henare’s comments I say that the question is not whether we have trial periods or probationary periods; it is a question of what type we have. The type that Tau Henare referred to in the past was the type— 
Hon Tau Henare 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. We have just come out of Maori Language Week and I would not mind if my name was pronounced Tau “Hen-a-re” not “Hen-ah-ree”. 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: Thank you for that. I ask members when referring to other members to try to get the correct pronunciation. 
KEITH LOCKE 
: My point was that Tau Henare’s position was similar to what the Greens and Labour have been arguing. In the past there have been—and even currently there are—some probationary periods that are fair ones where after a certain period an employee can transfer to permanent employment. If that employee is not transferred there are appeal procedures and the unions can be involved etc. as they were in the days past that Tau Henare referred to. 
What are the Government’s arguments in favour of keeping this 90-day period? The first is that somehow more people are hired when in fact the research on the legislation since its introduction provided by the Department of Labour says that it could not be stated categorically that trial periods had created extra job opportunities. That is common sense really because employers hire according to need; they do not go down the track of scratching their heads for 10 minutes about the quality of employees. 
Secondly the Government argues that more young people will get jobs in this way too. It is true that young people often have fewer CVs and find it more difficult in the job market. David Bennett went on about the fact that that was what the bill was all about and that the present legislation was giving workers a chance. In fact the situation with fair probationary periods that exists now in certain industries and that existed in the past before the current legislation came in does allow young people to have a go. In fact when there is an unfair probationary period where the employer has the arbitrary right to fire at any time without any reason there is a charter for bullying in effect. The employer does not need to provide any care for employees because employees can be sent down the road at any stage. Carmel Sepuloni mentioned the case in the  
Dominion Post  
of Alison Murray who got a job as an art valuer for Dunbar Sloane. She was not even given a desk to work at and later on was just fired arbitrarily. 
This legislation is also a charter for a greater level of sexual harassment in the workforce if the employer has arbitrary power over a new worker for 90 days. It is also a charter for dividing the workforce between those who are established and perhaps in the union and new employees who will not dare to join the union because a lot of employers are anti-union and would sack the person if they showed a great interest in joining the union. So the legislation will divide the workforce and that is bad for morale. It is much better to have a united workforce. In fact a unionised workforce in my experience is the most confident and productive workforce particularly if it has a good relationship with its employer. 
Kate Wilkinson the Minister of Labour said not to worry about all that because employers would act in good faith. Well we just cannot operate on that basis and we have plenty of examples where employers have not acted in good faith in that respect. If we generalise the 90-day period as the Government says it is intending to do that will have a lot of ramifications for the workforce. It will make workers much more reluctant to shift jobs because they will not be certain that they will not be sacked in the first 90 days. Migrants will be more reluctant to come to this country because they could come here and then their jobs could go down the drain overnight. So I think this bill should be passed because it will reverse a very bad piece of legislation from the National Government.