Faafoi Kris: Employment Relations (Secret Ballot for Strikes) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Faafoi Kris: Employment Relations (Secret Ballot for Strikes) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:675;Page:21122] 
KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana) 
: 
 I thank you very much Mr Chairperson Roy for giving me the opportunity to talk to the commencement clause of the Employment Relations (Secret Ballot for Strikes) Amendment Bill. I feel like a bit of an auctioneer because first we heard that the bill should come into effect in 10 years then 15 years and now we have heard 1000 years—sold to Mr Davis. This bill should not come into effect at all. It will take considerably longer than a year to figure out why this bill is here at all and to figure out the motivation for it and what positive effect it will have on any workers who are slogging their guts out and having this measure forced upon them. It will take a considerable amount of time—more than just 1 year which is provided for in clause 2 the commencement clause—for us to sort out why this bill is here. Mr Davis talked about how on many occasions we have asked what the motivation for the bill is what the problem is and why this bill needs to be passed. It will take us considerably more than a year to figure out why on the grounds of democracy National thinks this bill needs to be passed. 
We have no problem with secret ballots. They are widespread at the moment and have been well used by unions to adjudicate whether a strike is to be called or effected. But there is some puzzlement on this side of the Chamber as to why the Government wants to make it compulsory for unions to have secret ballots for strikes to be called. 
On a number of levels it is impractical. Keith Locke in his contribution earlier talked about how difficult it would be in practical terms to organise a secret ballot for the likes of fast-food workers such as people who might work at restaurants like McDonald’s which opened in Porirua in 1976. It is also impractical in terms of the longstanding history unions have already of making sure that these secret ballots happen in order to give their members a say. 
There were a number of submissions on this bill from the Employers and Manufacturers Association and also if I remember correctly from Business New Zealand. They wanted to impose an amendment to the bill to make sure that for the vote to strike to be successful the threshold for the secret ballot would be 75 percent. Therein lies some of the motivation as to where the benefit from this bill would lie. In relation to the commencement we will need a lot more than just 1 year to sort out why this bill is needed and how it will protect the rights of workers as Mr Henare said when we were debating clause 1. 
I think it was also Mr Locke who commented on Mr Woodhouse’s contribution in which he said that he thought we should make secret ballots compulsory. I agree with Mr Locke that the bill is nanny State and it is controlling a voluntary organisation and we should not have to do that especially when at this stage as far as we on this side of the Chamber are concerned the unions that use secret ballots are using them quite effectively and fairly. So again we ask why this bill needs to be passed. Again we will need a lot more than just 1 year from the bill receiving the Royal assent to figure out why this bill is here. 
This bill in essence will enforce compulsory secret ballots on unions when calling a strike. There has already been some talk about this bill changing the very nature of the definition of a strike. A strike will not be able to be called unless a secret ballot is taken and that fundamentally changes the rights of workers in terms of their ability to take industrial action. If a ballot is not taken but strike action is called then a union could be tied up in lots of red tape and potentially big legal bills because their action could be deemed illegal. That is one of the serious dangers contained in this bill and again that is why we will need something like 1000 years I say to Mr Davis to sort out why this bill has come before the House. The commencement of this bill should not be as stated in the bill at the moment. One year is simply not enough time for us to sort out this mess. 
We have had problems with the title. Mr Henare has not admitted to the fact that he botched up the title and included workers in the title when they are not included in the primary legislation. But again the commencement of this bill should not be 1 year following its receiving the Royal assent.