Twyford PhilHon PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): Thank you Madam Chair. I want to speak to clause 4 Repeal of this Act". It is a very simple provision that states "This Act is repealed on the close of the 28th day after the date on which it comes into force". I just want to focus on the fact that this is pure and simple a repeal. It wipes clear the Fair Pay Agreements Act 2022 which was a genuine attempt based on a lot of discussion a lot of policy work a lot of analysis consideration of a lot of evidence to address the problem of entrenched low pay in this country to stop the race to the bottom by means of a national framework of sector bargaining and minimum standards.Now because this is just a repeal and nothing else there's nothing being put in place to replace the Fair Pay Agreements Act. It's the status quo ante. My question for the Minister is: is that enough for you? Was the status quo ante an acceptable situation? I'm keen to know whether or not the Minister is happy and content with the state of affairs before the passing of the Act and whether or not the Minister accepts that low pay which is entrenched in a number of industries and occupations in this country is a problem or not. I'm genuinely interested to know the Minister's view on that.Given that there's no regulatory impact statement (RIS) for us to discuss tonight I'm also interested in the departmental disclosure statement. It states that the objective of this bill is to revert to the previous framework where employers and employees or unions representing their members have more flexibility to agree their employment terms.So if that's what this all turns on it's the flexibility to agree the terms of employment. And given that we don't have a RIS I'm interested to know what the Minister's evidence base is for the assertion that underlies this whole exercise—that it will deliver greater flexibility. If that's the view that the Minister has if that's the prime motivation for this new law then what is the flexibility we're talking about? Is it the flexibility for employers to lay down conditions and rates of pay to new workers that they take or leave? Because that is the reality when people are not bargaining collectively and in many of the industries that have lodged applications for fair pay agreements there is very little substantive collective bargaining. That's why low pay and poor conditions are features of those industries.There are workplaces and there are firms that are unionised where bargaining goes on. But there are swathes of the economy where there is no significant collective bargaining and when a worker shows up to seek a job they get a "take it or leave it" offer. Now that's a very flexible situation for the employer but it is not flexible for the employee particularly when times are tough in the economy and competition for jobs is intense. So I'm really interested to hear from the Minister whether or not that is her conception of flexibility.I want to share some comments from someone I spoke to—CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): If the member could come back to Part 1—he's starting to stray.Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well I want to share some comments about the repeal of this law from someone who won't get a chance to come along to a select committee and tell this Parliament how she feels about the repeal of the fair pay agreements. Jackie who is a cleaner at a very large corporate facility in South Auckland told me that she really hoped that fair pay agreements would make things better. She said "We get sick at work and we've run out of sick days. We can't afford to go to the doctor because we simply can't afford to lose a day's pay." She hoped that fair pay agreements and more bargaining across the industry actually would improve those kinds of conditions."