Lees-Galloway IainHon IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety): Thank you Madam Chair. I thank members for the contributions on Part 1 so far. Members have largely addressed two issues: that of union access and of multi-employer collective agreements and I'd like to speak to some of the points raised by members on each of those issues. I'll address the first: union access. I'd point members to section 21(3) of the Employment Relations Act which states that A representative of a union exercising the right to enter a workplace must at the time of the initial entry and if requested by the employer or a representative of the employer or by a person in control of the workplace at any time after entering the workplace—(a) give the purpose of the entry; and (b) produce—(i) evidence of his or her identity; and (ii) evidence of his or her authority to represent the union concerned."And also subsection (2) of the same section says that "A representative of a union exercising the right to enter a workplace—(a) may do so only at reasonable times during any period when any employee is employed to work in the workplace; and (b) must do so in a reasonable way having regard to normal business operations in the workplace; and (c) must comply with any existing reasonable procedures and requirements applying in respect of the workplace that relate to—(i) safety or health; or (ii) security." Now those subsections are unchanged by this bill and I hope give members some satisfaction that there is no so-called "unfettered union access to the workplace".Of course union officials must present themselves to the employer and of course they must give regard to proper health and safety practices. If an induction is required to a workplace then of course the union organiser must ensure that they are properly inducted and they understand the health and safety procedures of that workplace. But of course also it is important that union members are able to give effect to their right to freedom of association and their right to get support from a union official if they are in need of that support. And if union members call their union and ask their official to come on to the workplace to deal with an employment matter or a health and safety matter then they should be able to get timely access to that union official. I think the combination of the provisions that are currently laid out in the Employment Relations Act and that are included in this bill and the Supplementary Order Paper to this bill in my name strike that right balance between giving union members access to their union officials and ensuring that employers have the right and proper ability to control activity that goes on within their workplace.I want to turn now to the question of multi-employer collective agreements (MECAs). A number of members have referenced this matter. Paul Goldsmith raised the question of multi-employer collective agreements sort of being a one-size-fits-all that are not capable of taking into account regional variations in labour markets. That is not the case. It is perfectly acceptable for a multi-employer collective agreement to include variations of pay rates or other variations that are agreed between the employer—or employers in the case of a multi-employer collective agreement—and the union representing workers who work for those employers.I'm aware that negotiations in the past for the nurses' district health board (DHB) multi-employer collective agreement did consider the possibility of regional variation such as an Auckland wage. Now that was determined not to be something that the parties wanted to explore but it is something that they were entitled to explore and there's nothing in the provisions of the Act or this amendment bill that preclude that from happening.Mr Bidois made I thought a very thoughtful contribution also on MECAs and referred to his own experience from the supermarket world. And he asked "How do these multi-employer collective agreements work on a practical basis?" And I would reference the nurses' collective agreement with the DHBs. The New Zealand Nurses Organisation has a number of multi-employer collective agreements across the different parts of the health system—20 employers employing people to do essentially the same job. Both the employers and the employees see it as a much more efficient way to deal with the terms and conditions of their work to do it through a multi-employer collective agreement that applies to employees doing the same work that is covered by that MECA across all of those 20 different employers. So that's the practicalities of how a multi-employer collective agreement works.Let me bring it back to the supermarket situation. Now Countdown has a collective agreement. I'll grant the committee that it's not a multi-employer collective agreement—because of the structure of the business they are one employer that employs people all around the country. But FIRST Union has a collective agreement that covers workers in all 187 Countdown shops across the whole country. It works well. Countdown is very pleased with it. They are very proud of their relationship with FIRST Union and it allows them to develop an enduring and ongoing relationship between the employer and their workforce to deal with matters that are not just the matters that are considered as part of collective bargaining but to address the broader employment relationship. And I know—yeah there's been tension. I have stood on the line during a lockout that occurred many many years ago when Progressive Enterprises—the owners of Countdown—locked out their workers as part of an employment dispute. But the enduring relationship goes on and both sides are very proud of it. So it can work tremendously well and it can work across the country. I do not accept that either multi-employer collective agreements or single-employer collective agreements are a one-size-fits-all approach and that they are not applicable across different parts of New Zealand because the evidence tells us that they can and do work well.I want to just address some of the matters raised by Nick Smith as well. He said that port companies will be dragged back to having MECAs. Port companies have never had a multi-employer collective agreement. There has never been a multi-employer collective agreement in the port sector. And I've heard a lot from the port companies about their concerns. I say to them: "This bill is restoring what was in place when Labour was last in Government." There is no reason to imagine that the situation would be any different. In fact through the Supplementary Order Paper we are ensuring that that point of case law—that the duty to conclude collective bargaining does not apply to multi-employer collective agreements—is now enshrined in the legislation. That makes it much clearer. I think the port companies have absolutely nothing to fear from this. And in fact I encourage them to build a much stronger relationship with their unionised members.Nick Smith also used the term "screw the scrum". Why are we "screwing the scrum"? Well I attempted to address that in my opening remarks—which included that the object of the Employment Relations Act is the statement that there is an inherent imbalance between the employer and the employee. The legislation is designed to address that imbalance and that's what multi-employer collective agreements are about. They are about giving more strength to working people; giving them the option of bargaining collectively not just within their own employer but across their industry for better terms and conditions that apply to unionised members across their industry because we recognise in this legislation—and the National Party never got rid of this section of the legislation so when they were in Government they agreed that there is an inherent imbalance between the employer and the employee. We are giving effect to that object of the Act to overcome inherent imbalance and multi-employer collective agreements are part of that."