Bradford Sue: Employment Relations (Probationary  Employment) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Bradford Sue: Employment Relations (Probationary  Employment) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
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SUE BRADFORD (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party is absolutely delighted with the statement made by Mr Pita Paraone just now and that the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee has recommended that the Employment Relations (Probationary Employment) Amendment Bill not proceed. We understand that with Mr Paraone’s assistance there are sufficient votes in the House to make sure the bill does not go any further today. 
This bill is a disgrace harking back as it does to the National Party’s infamous approach to industrial relations epitomised by the 1991 Employment Contracts Act. I am sure that if Dr Mapp succeeds with this bill tonight he and his colleagues will be celebrating the first step towards achieving a renewed attack on the rights of workers. I am very glad that the number of MPs who have seen the reality of what is intended by the bill is sufficient to ensure it does not survive past this afternoon. 
Although Dr Mapp’s motives are on the surface quite laudable—for example his avowed desire to help young people and the long-term unemployed get a foothold in the workforce—the real danger lies in what lurks below the surface. Under the bill as introduced by Dr Mapp employees during their first 89 days on the job would have none of the protections offered them by the current Employment Relations Act. The employer could sack the new worker at will and without notice. Dr Mapp and his supporters have said that the proposed 3-month probationary period would mean that employers who are traditionally reluctant to take on people without a good employment record or without any employment history at all would be much more willing to take the risk of doing so. 
There are grave fallacies in that argument and with the bill itself. Dr Mapp has assumed that employers are reluctant to take on those less desirable in the labour market unless they can do so on a trial basis without the protections of the Employment Relations Act. He and his supporters believe that a 90-day probationary period for all new employees would allow employers time to work out whether a new worker is suitable for the job without risking costly and drawn-out personal grievance procedures. Dr Mapp has often gone on to say that the 90-day rule would therefore help the most disenfranchised parts of the workforce—such as young people Maori Pasifika peoples and migrants and refugees—as there would be less of a barrier to their employability. In contrast the Green Party believes that it would in fact be those parts of the labour market who would suffer the most as a result of this bill going through achieving quite the opposite of Dr Mapp’s professed intentions. 
Should this bill succeed it will strip those so-called risky employees of their legal protections. Such workers could potentially number in the hundreds of thousands each year. As one commentator noted in June with almost 2 million people in our workforce at present and with every worker changing jobs an average of six times in their lifetime—often more—National’s bill could mean 300000 workers without any rights at any given moment. Another way of looking at it is that all of us could face an average of 1 to 1½ years of our working lives without the legal protections enjoyed by everyone else. 
Dr Mapp and others argue that probationary periods will increase productivity but again the Green Party believes that they will have absolutely the opposite effect. Insecure low-status workers tend to be less not more productive than their colleagues. Insecurity breeds mistrust and fear not loyalty and commitment. Human resources professionals and business advisers spend a lot of their lives trying to train managers in the art of being a good employer. Does Dr Mapp not realise that his bill would in fact undermine all their efforts? Undervaluing and disrespecting one’s employees by seeing them as a high-turnover low-cost commodity instead of honoured contributors to the business is an almost certain recipe for problems in working relationships whether the business is large or small. We here in Parliament should be doing everything we can to encourage respectful relationships based on the kinds of principles outlined in the Employment Relations Act not racing backwards to the future by eliminating rights at work for hundreds of thousands of people at a time. 
Beyond questions of fairness sound workplace management practices and basic human rights this bill is simply not necessary at all if what Dr Mapp is really seeking to do is to allow employers the option of using probationary periods in some limited circumstances. As I pointed out in my first reading speech—and as many submitters and the Government have said over and over again as well—the Employment Relations Act already has provisions for probationary periods for new workers and has had since 2000. Dr Mapp has said that if his bill were to pass the second reading stage he has a number of amendments he would like to put up. I have not had a chance to look at these amendments before this afternoon but we in the Green Party will continue to stick to the basic principle that all those in employment not just some deserve the protections offered by the Employment Relations Act. 
Even if Dr Mapp were to amend the bill by restricting 90-day probationary periods only to those in their first job—and I do not think that is what his amendments propose—I would continue to reiterate the very clear position put up in my own member’s bill to get rid of the lower minimum wage for young workers: that under-18-year-olds deserve exactly the same protections at work as the rest of us. Equal pay for equal work is a well-established principle in this country when we consider matters of ethnicity and gender but sadly it is still not the case when it comes to age. So many people in their first job are in that younger age group. 
I would hate to see the concept of the probationary period slipped in either through amendments to this legislation or through changes to my own Minimum Wage (Abolition of Age Discrimination) Amendment Bill which some employers and others have suggested recently. All employed workers deserve to be treated with equity in wages conditions and statutory protections not discriminated against on the basis of age and/or on the principle of how long they have been in the job. The bill we are dealing with today is really about stripping away the employment rights of the most vulnerable workers in the country. If it goes through workers in high-skill high-demand occupations perhaps like some of those Paula Bennett talked about would not have been affected as she rightly said. For those types of positions in the current labour market the new hire can usually hold his or her own in any negotiation with the employer. Instead this bill would have created huge damage for those who are already most at risk: the young the unemployed Maori Pasifika people and refugee and migrant workers. 
I especially acknowledge the Maori Party MPs who went through a difficult process of their own in coming to a decision on this legislation. Along with my fellow Green MPs I tautoko their ability and willingness to listen to the voices of so many of their own people who have been saying loudly and clearly that despite the bill appearing on the surface to assist with overcoming Maori unemployment in fact it would make things a lot worse for those workers. 
The Labour Party must listen to the genuine concerns of the Maori Party and of the Green Party about the ongoing high rates of Maori unemployment. The answers to high jobless rates among tangata whenua and others lie elsewhere than in this bill. Minimum wages and conditions should be higher so that people who are living in endemic long-term poverty can more easily make the transition from welfare to work. The Job-plus subsidy should be expanded and at a time of comparatively low unemployment I think we should also be looking again at things like updated versions of the old Work Skills Development Programme for some people. There should be more Government support for local economic development job creation and small business assistance in regions of high unemployment. We should not be creating no-go zones for the unemployed or trucking them 120 kilometres a day to do temporary work in places like Tai Rawhiti. Instead we should be localising economies so that rural and provincial areas are nurtured back to life rather than “hollowed out” in the fashionable jargon of today’s economic discourse. A high skill high value economy will not be accomplished by plunging all or even some new employees into 3 months of total uncertainty whereby new employers can drop them like a hot cake with no reason on their part and with no recourse on the employees’ part. 
Most of all I congratulate all the individuals unions and church and community organisations who took part in meetings marches rallies and pickets in the campaign against this bill. They knew that it was not enough just to sit quietly by and hope the bill would be defeated within the parliamentary precincts. MPs needed to hear the strength of their voices and their actions and we did—wind rain and Boobs on Bikes inclusive. The Green Party joins them today in welcoming the demise of this ill-conceived anti-worker bill. We look forward to continuing to work with them on somewhat more constructive issues in the months and years ahead. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Can I just say to the gallery that no contributions can be made from the gallery without prior permission being given by the Speaker. Any contribution made without authority is an interruption of the House and will be treated as contempt. That means that no noise at all is to come from the gallery.