McAnulty KieranEMPLOYMENT RELATIONS (TRIANGULAR EMPLOYMENT) AMENDMENT BILLSecond ReadingKIERAN McANULTY (Labour): I move That the Employment Relations (Triangular Employment) Amendment Bill be now read a second time. This member's bill in my name seeks to amend the Employment Relations Act 2000 to protect the rights of people who are in a triangular employment arrangement. Triangular employment involves a person being employed by one employer but working under the control and direction of another business or organisation. Now this bill has had quite the journey for I did not draft this bill; it was originally drafted by former Labour MP Darien Fenton. I want to take the opportunity to acknowledge her and the work she has done not only in drafting and submitting this bill originally but her work as a staunch Labour activist and Labour MP and I appreciate the guidance and support that she has given me through this process. Now despite not having drafted this bill it was submitted and pulled from the ballot in my name and it is an issue that I feel deeply passionate about because ultimately regardless of the type of employment arrangement that one person may have they should have access to the basic fundamental rights that the rest of us—every other employee in this country—have. In the form that this bill now takes after the select committee process this seeks to include one simple provision and access to one very basic right: the right to a personal grievance.Those workers those employees that are in a triangular employment arrangement often employed through a labour hire company or a recruitment agency are technically and will remain an employee of that organisation. Where this becomes complex is that this employee is sent on assignment to another location and is under the control and direction of that organisation and under the law as it currently stands those workers do not have access to the right of a personal grievance. We say in the Labour Party and I hope in our support parties and coalition parties in New Zealand First and the Greens that that is fundamentally wrong—that the right to a personal grievance this provision that protects workers from mistreatment should apply to these workers. It is not their fault that they happened to be employed in this particular arrangement. That was not foreseen when labour laws and the right to a personal grievance were put through legislation in this House many years ago. In the process of working towards this bill being debated for its first reading I met and spoke with many people many individuals and many organisations both employers and employees within the labour hire and recruitment agency realm. It became very clear to me that labour hire companies maintain a legitimate role in this country. I think back to my own area of Wairarapa. There is a labour hire company there that performs a very legitimate role. There are employers in bakery and wood processing and of course in bacon and ham and other small goods like that. Now all three of these are seasonal and are medium sized and at any time they could get a contract which requires them to meet and therefore in doing so to hire a large intake of employees for short-term employment. Now these employers do not have access to those which might be based in the larger urban centres like HR companies and things like that. The contract that they receive might not allow them the time to be able to screen employees or applicants themselves. So the labour hire company based out of Masterton performs a market role for them. It can provide these workers at short notice for a prescribed period of time. They are trained well and they are skilled employees. For some of them it is their choice to work in such a casual arrangement; some of them work there because they can't find alternative employment. Nevertheless this arrangement in this particular situation works as it should.So I repeat: labour hire companies do perform a legitimate role in our workplaces. However what we have seen over recent times is that the proportion of permanent employees—particularly in the larger urban centres for large employers—have reduced and the proportion of labour hire company workers have increased. This increases the issue that when these workers are working in a place that would previously have employed permanent employees these workers do not have access to the right of a personal grievance. When I was speaking to both employers and employees there was one particular case amongst those where it worked well and those where it didn't. There was one particular case that stood out to me. There was a woman who had been hired by a labour hire company for seven years and throughout that entire tenure had been placed at the same placement of work the whole time. So despite working at the same place she was never an employee of that organisation; she remained an employee of the labour hire company. At any point for no reason that employer could let them go and send them back to the labour hire company. Now I can see and in fact I'm very pleased to say that in the vast majority of instances there is no problem but it only takes one for there to be a need for protection. The example that I was given was of this woman who had been working there for seven years found out she was pregnant and was dismissed the next day. That is an absolute disgrace. In this country where any other worker under any other employment situation would have been protected this worker was sent back to the labour hire company who had no obligation to find her work and ultimately she found herself out of work. So here we are at the time 2017 in New Zealand—a woman was essentially dismissed for being pregnant. It is disgraceful and it needs to be stopped.The feedback that we've had is that the provisions within this bill the Employment Relations (Triangular Employment) Amendment Bill would have allowed that worker to have access to a personal grievance. If any employee in a triangular employment arrangement finds themselves dismissed unfairly they could now if it passes take that secondary employer the place where they are essentially employed on placement under a personal grievance to outline to the court that they were unfairly dismissed.Like I say in the vast majority of instances the vast majority of workers can go through their entire working life and not face a situation where they need to take out a personal grievance but it is there for the protection of people. I'm sure that the National Party would not like to see the right to a personal grievance stripped off workers in this country—I'm certain of that. But what I want to know is why they do not support extending that provision to workers who would otherwise in any other circumstance have access to that right.The thing is that this is a matter of fairness. In any instance where someone is employed or where someone is employing others there is a relationship there that is based on trust that is based on fairness. Just because the vast majority of people treat their workers right does not mean that we should not have adequate protections in place to ensure that people are to be treated fairly in the workplace and if they are not that they have provisions available to them that allows recourse against the unfair treatment—an unfair treatment that can extend from the smallest to the most grave which of course is the example that I gave. We amended this bill through the select committee process as a result of the submissions and many of those submitters that I have contacted subsequent to that have said that the amendments in this bill have made this much more acceptable to them as employers and employees within a triangular employment arrangement. I acknowledge the work of those on the Education and Workforce Committee. I thank them for working with me. I'm very pleased with the way that this bill has worked out and I stand here and hope that in passing this bill we can continue on this track of ensuring that all workers in this country are entitled to fair treatment.