Bidois DanDAN BIDOIS (National—Northcote): This bill is payback for Labour's union mates. They waited nine long years grinding their teeth and now that Labour is back in here it is they're back and they want Labour to scratch their backs. The unions have certainly scratched the Labour Party's backs plenty through donations through campaign volunteers and they even helped pick the former leader of the Labour Party the Hon Andrew Little.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! We're on dangerous ground here. When the member sits down I want him to turn to page 49 of the Speaker's Rulings and read 1 through to 7. I just want to give him a gentle warning around making accusations of the nature that he's just said.DAN BIDOIS: OK understood Mr Assistant Speaker. I will continue. This bill does nothing more than appease the unions. It's a bill that does everything to empower the unions and nothing to empower the workers of New Zealand.Now let me walk through the purpose of this bill which states very clearly that this bill aims to restore minimum standards and protection for employees" and there are a suite of changes to promote and strengthen "collective bargaining and union rights in the workplace". Now what I have as a question is: what is it in our system that makes them think that they need to change such a great system? We rank fifth in the world for labour market efficiency according to the World Economic Forum. We rank sixth in the world for the cooperation in labour and employment relations. We rank about 16th in the world for the flexibility of wage determination. Does that sound like we need a change? Absolutely not.What about the minimum standards for employees that are actually listed in the bill? I see a lot of new rules for unions but very few minimum standards and better conditions for workers. Workers have voted overwhelmingly against this bill. As my colleagues have mentioned 83 percent of the New Zealand workforce is not in a union. In 2017 we had about 350000 people in a union and that's down by 500000 since 1991. I've spoken to businesses like McDonald's—large hardworking businesses that employ close to 10000 workers—and only 10 percent of them are in a union. Nothing that even the previous Labour Government did has changed the trend towards declining membership and nothing that this Government will do will in fact reverse that trend even further.What about protection for employees and rest and meal breaks and conditions? The question that I have is what is the best mechanism to improve conditions for workers? Is it to empower the unions or is it to in fact empower employees? The feedback that I've had from the business community is loud and clear. They are worried. They're worried about the uncertainty and small to medium sized enterprises (SMEs) are worried in particular about the extra costs that this adds on to their businesses and the risks that we face because we're putting our gold-standard labour market at risk. They're being told what to do by the bureaucrats in Wellington and these bureaucrats don't even understand their industry. They don't understand that most SMEs are very hardworking and good employers who take care of their employees. It's going to be harder to remain profitable with this legislation and remain competitive.Now we in the National Party did a survey of businesses—several thousand in fact—and 70 percent of the businesses that we surveyed said employment law changes are going to be most concerning. The feedback that I've had from businesses in my electorate is that these changes are simply not necessary. They're taking us backwards—Kiritapu Allan: You don't need to read your speech. Just give your speech—tell us what you think.DAN BIDOIS: —and not forward. All right let me tell you what I think about some of the provisions in this bill—firstly the 90-day trial. I just got back from my electorate and talked to a big company named Thermosash. It's a big employer—it's 600 workers that work there—and they're one of the largest subcontractors in New Zealand. You know what they said to me? They said that they use the 90-day rule to hire youth workers and with that they will no longer be able to do so under this provision. What about rest and meal breaks? Well I've spoken again to McDonald's and no one disagrees that people and workers need rest breaks. What we disagree with is the flexibility in which they occur particular to different industries. For example in the fast-food industry sometimes customers come in and you're busy and you can't take a break. Now under the rules of this new law workers are able to go off site without any notice.What about the horticulture businesses I hear you ask? Well again the horticulture season goes up and down and they need a degree of flexibility in their workforce for rest and meal breaks. Again the risk with these rest and meal breaks is that it doesn't have a degree of flexibility. What about this compulsory multi-employer collective agreement (MECA)—Kiritapu Allan: You've got no bloody clue.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! Sorry. Can we calm down? I'd really like to hear this speech.Kiritapu Allan: Oh God really?ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): No. I'm on my feet. No good calling out to God to help you.DAN BIDOIS: Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker. Let me get back to the important aspects of this bill. So we are talking about this compulsory MECA opt-out provision. Yes there's been a Supplementary Order Paper that's been tabled today by the Minister but again if your employment is signed up to a collective agreement then that gives union representatives unfettered access to the workplace. Again businesses that I've talked to in Auckland in Northcote and Porirua are upset about these changes. What about time off for union activities? Again this is going to add extra compliance costs to businesses in the area.So National in this part of the House is opposed to this bill. We don't think that these changes are needed. We already have one of the most flexible efficient and desired labour markets in the developed world. The New Zealand that I want to live in in the future is one where our labour markets are indeed flexible where we give Kiwis the opportunity to work when they want and how they want where our employment framework is fit for New Zealand and fit for the future of this country in terms of rapid change in technology and development.We have to understand that 90 percent of the businesses in New Zealand are small and medium sized enterprises—Hon Andrew Little: No it's not. Fifty percent of them don't employ anybody.DAN BIDOIS: —and 10 percent—well that's a small and medium sized enterprise sir. Ten percent of those are in fact what we define as large businesses. I also want an employment framework that is simple and worker-centric not union-centric. There needs to be an empowerment of our workers and this bill does nothing to empower workers. All I see is a bill that empowers unions. Now these MECAs are a silly idea and the New Zealand that I want to live in is one where we don't have these MECAs where businesses in the area of Northcote don't dictate the living wage for businesses in the Coromandel or Porirua or the Hawke's Bay. We need a flexible employment framework for New Zealand's future. We need unions that really—quite frankly the New Zealand public have voted with their feet overwhelmingly in favour of no unions and the employment framework that we want to see on this side of the House is a place where no unions are around; where in fact the power is given to the workers of New Zealand rather than to the unions. Thank you."