Employment Standards Legislation Bill

I move, That the Employment Standards Legislation Bill be now read a second time. I thank the members of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and its chair, Jonathan Young, for their hard work and consideration of the bill. I want to also add my thanks to the hard-working officials providing support both to the committee and to me behind the scenes. I think they have done an excellent job. I also want to thank all those who made submissions on the bill. The bill has come back from select committee in very good shape. The select committee has recommended that the bill proceed with some amendments, which I am in support of.

Although much of the public discourse on the bill has been about zero-hour provisions, this bill does much more than address that issue, and I want to touch on those matters first. There are very important changes to paid parental leave included in this bill, which deliver on my party’s 2014 election promise to modernise and extend paid parental leave.

Part 1 of the bill remains largely as it was at introduction, although the committee has made some useful changes that will improve the clarity of the bill. The definition of “primary carer” has been tightened to ensure there is no misinterpretation. A primary carer, if not the biological mother or her spouse or partner, is a person who takes permanent primary responsibility for the care, development, and upbringing of a child who is under the age of 6 years. The outlined provision in Part 1 has also been revised in response to feedback from some submitters about the complexity of the bill.

I also requested that the committee consider the proposal to extend the parental leave payments for parents of pre-term babies, following discussion with ACT leader David Seymour. The proposal reflects the extra and unexpected time the parents spend in the hospital with the baby and away from work, and the delay in establishing bonding and settling the baby into the home environment. The committee agreed that eligible persons should receive an additional week’s parental leave payment for each week of prematurity, from 37 weeks, and additional keeping-in-touch hours, the extra paid parental leave up to an additional 13 weeks. I want to thank Mr Seymour for his contribution to this very important amendment.

Part 2 of the bill amends the Employment Relations Act. The changes introduce broad new accountability provisions around knowingly and intentionally committing breaches of employment standards, measures improving record-keeping requirements, and the overturning of the statutory obligation on the Employment Relations Authority and the Employment Court to send employment standards cases to mediation. No substantive changes have been made to Part 2 of the bill but, again, the committee’s consideration of submitters’ comments has led to minor improvements in their clarity and workability. Legislative guidance has been added to clarify how to meet the new requirement to have a record of both the hours worked each day and the pay for these hours. This requirement is necessary for the correct calculation of, and demonstration of compliance with, minimum employment entitlements. Some other minor changes have been made to the provisions, overturning the statutory obligation on the Employment Relations Authority to send employment standards cases to mediation.

I want to turn now to the provisions to address what are known as zero-hour contracts. These attracted the most comment from submitters. Most submitters opposed the proposals, particularly relating to availability provisions, on the grounds that they believed they legitimised the very practices the bill attempts to stop. This is quite wrong, in my view. It does, however, underscore the difficulty that arises when there is no clear definition or shared understanding about what zero-hour means. Zero-hour is a type of employment that requires the employee to be ready, willing, and available for work when work is offered. Sometimes this obligation is paired with an exclusivity clause that also prevents the employee from working for others, even when the employer has little or no work to offer. It is the equivalent of being on call all the time, without being paid anything to recognise the demands that poses.

This is distinct from casual employment, where there is neither obligation on the employer to offer work nor obligation on the employee to accept it. Casual agreements have been a part of the employment relations landscape in this country for a long time. Some in this House may be concerned at the increasing casualisation of the workforce, but these changes are not aimed at eliminating casual agreements, which I believe have a place in our employment relations landscape.

A number of the submissions highlighted a range of ways we could better achieve these objectives. In my view, the committee has taken a sensible and pragmatic approach to the concerns raised by submitters, and the bill is in better shape for it. Under the amendments, employers must have a genuine reason, based on reasonable grounds, to include an availability provision—that is, a provision requiring an employee to be available for work. It must be in the employment agreement, and must provide reasonable compensation for that availability. The bill provides guidance to employers and employees on both of these requirements. Compensation for shift cancellation will also have to be reasonable, and the bill provides guidance on this as well. The committee has also clarified the provisions relating to wage deductions by adding that if an employment agreement contains a general consent to a wage deductions clause, the employer must consult with the employee when the employer wants to make a specific deduction. Finally, to give employers more time to make the necessary changes to the employment agreements, particularly those employers with large workforces, the original 6-month transitional period to amend existing individual employment agreements is extended to 12 months.

After the committee reported back to Parliament, there was a strong backlash from some, who claimed that rather than eliminate zero-hour provisions, the bill had entrenched them. I absolutely disagree with that assessment but felt that, for all the hyperbole, the gap between where we were and those views was not as large as the drum-beating would suggest. So, after discussion with the Council of Trade Unions and others, I am prepared to make further minor changes to the clauses around availability and the definition of reasonable notice, to close that gap. I acknowledge the input of the Council of Trade Unions and also that of Iain Lees-Galloway, and note that Labour has publicly indicated that, with those changes, it can support the bill through its remaining stages. The changes made to the bill—

💬 Sue Moroney: That’s a stretch.

—I am quoting the press release—both recommended by the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and in the upcoming Committee stage, reflect a careful consideration of submitters’ comments and a shared desire to improve support for new parents, strengthen sanctions on non-complying employers, and eliminate zero-hour clauses. They make the bill clearer and more workable. With those changes, I commend the bill to the House.

Let me be absolutely clear. Labour does not support this bill in its current form. As it was reported back from the select committee, we felt that far from eliminating zero-hour contracts from the law, it in fact entrenches them in the law. That was our view at first reading. We were prepared to take the bill to the select committee to try to work through that. Despite our best efforts and despite the fantastic submissions that we received from a variety of submitters, representing both workers and employers, we were not able to get the National Party MPs on the select committee to support our amendments that would eliminate zero-hour contracts, rather than entrench them in the law. When the bill was reported back from the select committee, we announced publicly that we were withdrawing our support for it. We do not believe that it gets rid of zero-hour contracts. In fact, we believe it entrenches zero-hour contracts. Nothing has changed so far.

What has changed is that the Minister has reached out to us—I suspect because he needs to make sure he has the numbers to pass this bill. The minor parties certainly were alert to the issues that we had raised around the legislation. I would like to thank Marama Fox in particular for the open line of communication that she allowed between myself and the Māori Party. I would like to thank Peter Dunne for noticing when we came out so hard against the bill when it was reported back from the select committee. We have been in discussions with the Minister, and I thank the Minister for approaching us and being prepared to discuss the issues that we have with this legislation.

So in good faith—because we on this side of the House believe in negotiating in good faith—we will support the second reading of the bill. Nobody should interpret that as Labour intending to support the bill through its remaining stages, until we have seen the proposals. We have not yet seen the final proposals. We have certainly seen some indication about where the Minister wants to go. We are happy with the direction that the Minister has indicated he wants to go, but we have not seen the final proposals. So until we see the final proposals we cannot commit to supporting this bill through its final stages.

We will not support a bill that entrenches zero-hour contracts in the law. We will support a bill that eliminates zero-hour contracts completely and for good. Unfortunately, as the Minister says, we do not have a clause in the Employment Relations Act that says: “This is what a zero-hour contract is:”. Zero-hour contracts are the result of employers using a variety of loopholes in our legislation, so what we need to do is close down those loopholes. I know it sounds unlikely to many people that a bill that we say currently entrenches zero-hour contracts could, with some changes, in fact eliminate zero-hour contracts, but that is what we are dealing with. This bill, with changes, can eliminate zero-hour contracts, and if we make those changes and those changes meet our satisfaction for the test of eliminating zero-hour contracts, only then can we support the legislation.

So what do we need to see? We want to remove the ability for employers to put people on contracts where they are on call with no permanent hours. Being on call can be fine in some contexts where being on call is in addition to regular hours at work. But sitting at home on call, waiting for work and being required to come to work when that phone call comes, and therefore not being able to get on with your life, not being able to engage in other activities like joining a sports club or going and seeing your kids play at school, or indeed picking up other work for another employer—that is a zero-hour contract, and that is the situation that the legislation as currently drafted allows for.

Secondly, employers should not be able to cancel shifts at the last minute. The idea that employers can simply cancel shifts when they like should not be normalised in the legislation. We are concerned right now that the legislation is not strong enough on this matter. It does allow for last-minute cancellations and, in fact, if anything, it suggests that cancellation of shifts should be normalised and that cancellation clauses should go into every employment agreement, and we do not agree with that. We need that to be changed. Thirdly, where practicable, hours of work should be included in an employment agreement so that people can plan their lives and have income security.

Those are our bottom lines; this is not a matter for compromise. Those are the changes we need to see in order to continue supporting this legislation. No halfway houses, no watering down—we get those changes or our support for this legislation ceases. Zero-hour contracts are amongst the most exploitative forms of employment agreement in New Zealand right now, and our law allows for them. What we should not be doing is entrenching them in the law. We should be getting rid of them. We should be giving people the opportunity to have a steady income where they know how many hours of work they are going to have from one week to the next. We should be giving people the opportunity to have a life outside of work—to join a sports team, to join a cultural club, to volunteer for their favourite charity, to go and see their kids play sport, to be in a play, or to go along to their kids’ assembly. Those are the things that New Zealanders take for granted as being part of living in New Zealand. It is part of being a New Zealander. It is part of the freedoms that we ought to enjoy.

But for too many people that is not real life, because life is dictated by work. They are literally sitting at home waiting for the phone call, and when the phone call comes, they have no choice. They have got to go to work. That is what a zero-hour contract is, and that is why we want to get rid of them. It is not necessarily to do with having a perfectly constructed law. It is about people being able to lead a decent life, with a reasonable income and the ability to do the things that we all ought to be able to take for granted.

We could, on this side of the House, simply say “Sorry National, we’re not going to deal with you. Your record on workers’ rights is appalling.”—and, sorry, chaps and ladies, but it is. But we are prepared to get this right for working people. We owe it to working New Zealanders to take this opportunity to get rid of zero-hour contracts. Yes, it has come about because of the MMP Parliament that we have. This Parliament is finely balanced, and, yes, we do work with the Māori Party and, yes, we do reach out to Peter Dunne, and with a strong foundation of Labour, the Greens, and New Zealand First taking a firm position against zero-hour contracts, we were able to build the coalition on this. That is how we are doing this—with hard work behind the scenes to ensure that this Parliament, by majority, wishes to eliminate zero-hour contracts. The Government has realised it needs to be on board with that, and we welcome that.

So today we will vote for this bill. Next week we will propose changes, and I have no doubt that the Government will propose changes. If the mixture of the changes that are adopted by this House are sufficient to meet our bottom lines, we will support this bill. If they are not, we will not, and if they are not sufficient to meet our bottom lines, I implore the Government’s support parties not to cave in, not to accept something that is watered down, and not to accept a compromise, but to support our view, and that is this: it is time to eliminate zero-hour contracts from New Zealand. We support this bill at this stage. We look forward to the hard work next week, and we look forward to being able to celebrate on behalf of working people next week that zero-hour contracts are gone for good.

It is a delight to stand in support of this bill. I am very pleased to hear the Labour Opposition also supporting this bill at this stage. The definition of zero-hour contracts, and I will focus on that part of the bill—often we are talking at cross-purposes, because no one wants to have a zero-hour contract where someone sits by the phone, is not compensated, has to wait around all day with the potential of getting zero hours, and is not able to work anywhere else. That is an unacceptable situation.

This bill does not allow that. This bill is a bill that supports in all its parts the employee, whether it is to do with flexibility around paid parental leave—it recognises the changing nature of the workplace and the demands and the desirability of connecting the newborn baby with the mother. It recognises the tougher penalties and strengthens the enforcement of the labour laws, and it also compels employers to keep better records so that they can be audited and penalties increased if they are not kept to the appropriate standard.

But let me come back to the zero-hour contract. I would rather call it—or, well, I do call it—a contract where one person is on call for another. Of course, if one is on call—whether one is a medical practitioner or a coffee grinder, it does not matter—this bill insists and ensures that there is compensation for making oneself available to the employer. So that is a fundamental change in the law. The other fundamental difference is that there is compensation, again, to the employee where there is a cancellation in the shift. That is, of course, fair enough. There also must be a good reason for a restriction on the employee to not be able to work in another employer’s business or in other employment situations.

I accept that what is reasonable notice and what is reasonable compensation is difficult to understand. Mr Lees-Galloway has already talked about the need for clarification on what is reasonable. As the Minister and Mr Lees-Galloway have alluded to, there are lots of things that must be considered, and part of the consideration is, of course, perhaps the type of business that one is involved with—whether it is a very specialist business or whether it is of a general nature. Perhaps a consideration as to what is reasonable might be the degree to which the employer can foresee or control the need to cancel the shifts. So if it is foreseeable and then it is cancelled, then one should be paying more than if it were not. The nature of the employee’s work and the likely effect of a cancellation on the employee—so, again, supporting the employee in the situation—should be considered when determining what is reasonable. Perhaps the nature of the employee’s work and employment arrangements, including where the guaranteed hours of work might be, should be considered.

So there are lots of things that need to be considered when one considers what is reasonable notice and what is reasonable compensation, and I look forward to seeing the Supplementary Order Papers come through and debating that in Committee stage. I commend this bill to the House.

It is a pleasure to rise and speak on the Employment Standards Legislation Bill, finding ourselves at this stage supporting the bill—at this point, and Iain Lees-Galloway has stressed that. We have got some discussions to go. But it is interesting to note that in this piece of legislation I think the Government almost got too clever for itself. At the outset it put paid parental leave—positive changes to paid parental leave—in this bill, and some changes that it knew that the Labour Party would find difficult to support, which actually continued to have zero-hour contracts in our landscape. The Government put them together, thinking: “Hah! That’ll corner the Labour Party, won’t it?”. Well, actually, what has ended up happening is, it has ended up being a real problem for the Government because it has now got paid parental leave changes that it wants to get in before 1 April this year, and suddenly it found itself without the numbers to be able to do that, because—

💬 Hon Michael Woodhouse: Not true.

—of the shambles that it has created over zero-hour contracts. So I think, Mr Woodhouse, that is what is called being too clever for yourself, and being hoist with one’s own petard. I think that is one of the things that has occurred during this process.

I do want to briefly speak about the zero-hour contracts issue, because it is important that we get that right. If we do not get that right, then people’s lives suffer. Their family lives suffer; their ability to be involved with their community suffers; even their ability to be able to get a loan or a mortgage or anything of that nature suffers if they cannot show that they have constant work and what the value of that work is, and therefore they are not even able to take out a mortgage.

I particularly want to thank the excellent submissions that we had on this particular issue around zero-hour contracts, because I think it was the submitters—and, I think, the fine work from the Labour Party, as well—who really showed the stupidity of the way that the law was drafted as it had been put into the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. There were many, many submitters who came in on this issue, and the ones who really stick in my mind were the employers—the employers who one would have imagined were the ones who probably wanted zero-hour contracts, so those operating in the home-care sector, for example, where sometimes the scheduling of work can be a little problematic. It can be a little difficult to anticipate who is going to need home care when, and who is going to go to hospital and maybe not need someone to come to their home—those sorts of issues.

But it was those very employers who actually told the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee that they did not need or want zero-hour contracts. And that had the National Party looking pretty grim, I have got to say, because its reason for keeping some ability to have zero-hour contracts in the law was slipping away before its eyes at the select committee. But still, it refused to believe it. Employer group after employer group after employer group came in and, under questioning from the Labour Party, told the committee that all they needed for flexibility in the sort of labour market they needed to deliver the goods and services that they were involved in was a permanent part-time workforce who they knew were there on particular days of the week; they needed the ability to have fixed-term contracts, which are in the law already—the ability to bring people in on fixed-term contracts for when they had particular projects on that were unusual, or particularly high demands for their product or services—and the only other thing they needed was a genuine ability to employ people on a casual basis. They did not need zero-hour contracts. And so it was the employers and the employees who came along and told us that this is a nonsense, it is creating havoc on people’s lives, and employers did not need it.

It was right there and then that National should have addressed this, but it did not. It got all the way through the select committee and the bill has been reported back, still with zero-hour contract provisions in there. And if it had listened to the Labour Party from the outset, we would have had a bill that made sense, that actually improved people’s lives, and that took people out of that vulnerable situation, sitting in front of this House, right here, right now. We do not, and I think that is very sad, because National had every opportunity to fix it at an earlier opportunity.

I now want to move on to the paid parental leave provisions of this bill, because this is the part that Labour can almost wholeheartedly support without any amendments, although we do have one to propose, and I will talk to that a little later. But the provisions of the paid parental leave are, generally, very good in this bill. It, importantly, extends paid parental leave to seasonal and casual workers, and that has not been available to them before. That provision will be available from 1 April. That will make a big difference to the lives of young children born into, probably, some of our most vulnerable working families, where the income is not regular and where the needs are generally quite high.

So I applaud the Government for that. But I do want to put on record the real story behind what I think is one of the best achievements of this bill, which I am personally very proud of, and that is the extension of additional paid parental leave to the families who have prematurely born babies. I want to place on record the real story behind that, because the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety thanked David Seymour, and, yes, David Seymour does deserve a little bit of thanking over that, but the Minister should really have been thanking Donnelle Belanger-Taylor. And, if he was not so churlish, he might have even thanked my good self for my role in this, because here is the story about how this evolved.

My bill to extend paid parental leave to 26 weeks was in danger of not progressing any further, just after the last election. In an attempt to salvage that and to do the best that I could, and that the Labour Party could, for families, I amended the bill, in the hopes that the Government members might find some compassion in their souls to support it. And I amended it in the following way. I amended it so that the 26 weeks’ paid parental leave would apply to families who had a baby born with a disability, who had a baby born prematurely, or who had the joy of a multiple birth in their family. Those seemed to me, if I was going to amend the bill at all, the most pressing needs, and so I did that. That miserable Government still did not support that; it still did not support even those families having extended paid parental leave.

However, I decided that I needed just one more vote to get that through. I could not look those families in the eye and say that I had not done every single thing possible to try to help their situations if I did not go and talk to every member of Parliament I could about securing that one vote. The person who listened to that plea was David Seymour, so, thank you, Mr Seymour. You listened with an open mind about those amendments. You told me that you would support the bill, Mr Seymour, and I was delighted about that. However, I believe that when Mr Seymour went and talked to his coalition partner, the Government, it threw its arms up in horror and said: “Whatever you do, do not support her bill. You cannot support the Labour Party bill.” But it promised instead that it would do exactly those amendments in a bill in the Government’s own name. So it seemed like, in a round about way, we were going to get what we had asked for anyway.

However, that is not the end of the story, because when the bill was brought forward—the Employment Standards Legislation Bill—it did not have that change in it at all. So in the first reading of this bill there was no additional measure for pre-term babies, babies born with disabilities, or babies born in multiple births. So I had another conversation with David Seymour, he had another conversation with the Government, and during the select committee process, one of those measures was brought forward. It is an important measure, but I do want to say to the Government that you reneged on your promise to Mr Seymour to bring in those three measures. This measure, however, will be very well received by those families—that babies born before the end of the 36th week of gestation will have additional paid parental leave, and I feel very proud of that achievement. That will make a big different to those families.

But I particularly want to say thank you to Donnelle Belanger-Taylor. It was her submission on my bill that kept me awake at night thinking about the circumstances of families when the birth had been different to what they had expected and the pressures on their families. That is an example of where someone actually brings a submission forward to Parliament and it makes a big difference. In this case, Donnelle, you are a hero for all those families who will benefit from this change.

It is a pleasure to be talking on the Employment Standards Legislation Bill. I just want to cover some of the key elements of it, and it has been a very interesting process that we have been through in the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. In essence, what this bill is about is seeking to make the workplace fairer and more productive, not only for the employer but also for the employee. As the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety said earlier, it really has three key areas that it focuses on: firstly, parental leave and payments; secondly, enhancing the enforcement of employment standards; and, thirdly, prohibiting certain unfair employment practices. I think everyone across the House is agreed that there is a need to refine and improve the situation, and it is good to hear and to see people working collaboratively on that.

Just in terms of the paid parental leave obligations, as everyone knows, we have increased the paid parental leave from 16 weeks to 18 weeks, and that is coming into force next year, but what this bill provides for is that recognition around pre-term babies. This is a really important concept. Basically, it means that for anyone who has a baby before the full term of 37 weeks, there is an additional adjustment made. So, for instance, if someone was to have a baby at 28 weeks, they would get 9 weeks of paid parental leave in addition to the existing 16 weeks at the moment, which will be increasing to 18 weeks. Secondly, we have refined the keeping-in-touch provisions for mothers who go off to look after their babies and we have clarified the rules around that. Thirdly, we have extended the definition of “primary carer”. This is a very important fact because what it means is it now recognises that it might be not only just the biological parents who are involved in the full-time care of a child but grandparents or other family members. So what that means is that these people can now also benefit from similar provisions.

The second area is around stopping unfair employment practices, and it really addresses the unfair practices by prohibiting certain practices that undermine the mutuality of obligations. In particular, it requires employers to now specify the hours of work in the employment contract with the employee, and it prohibits employers requiring employees to be available for hours in excess of those specified hours unless the employee has the absolute right to refuse that work with no subsequent penalties, or whatever, or certainly compensation is paid. There is also a requirement to specify in the employment contract what the required sufficient notice period is if you are going to cancel a shift. It is an issue that was very vexing to the committee and we considered it very appropriately, and now there is a requirement for appropriate compensation to be payable to the employee in a situation where a shift is cancelled. It also prohibits employers from forcing employees not to work for other employers. Sometimes this is appropriate if there is intellectual property and other such matters, and so there must be genuine grounds for it, but the genuine grounds must be set out in the employment agreement between the employer and the employee.

Finally, in terms of the enforcement of minimum employment standards, there are three key areas that this bill addresses. First of all, there is now a specific requirement to keep sufficient details of hours of work. We were concerned that in certain circumstances people were working much longer than their stated hours of work. What this bill makes clear is the requirement on employees to keep a record of it, because, in effect, you can work out what the hourly rate is on the basis of the actual hours worked. Secondly, and related to that, we have strengthened the provision for labour inspectors to go into workplaces and enforce these provisions. Thirdly, we have imposed tougher sanctions on employers who are wanting to breach these employment standards. Just by way of note, for individuals that fine or penalty has been increased to $50,000, and for corporates it has been increased to $100,000, or three times the gain that they may have got from doing inappropriate practices.

So I think this is a very composite bill. It is a difficult area. There are many different types of employers and different types of roles. Some people are very happy to work in a casual situation; others are not. What we sought to do was draw a balance between those arrangements, taking into account the myriad of employment arrangements across New Zealand. So I commend the bill to the House.

Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. I rise to take the first call for the Greens on this, the second reading of the Employment Standards Legislation Bill. The bill as it has been reported back to the House is quite a different beast to the one that was introduced to the House in its first reading, and by the time we get to the third reading, it may well be a different beast again. As I understand from previous speakers from Labour and from the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety, there are discussions under way to strengthen the bill, particularly in the area of zero-hour contracts.

At this stage, the Greens will be voting against the bill in the second reading because the devil is always in the detail. Although we have had some communication with the Minister’s office, our caucus maintains a strong and unwavering opposition to legislation that enables the exploitation of ordinary working New Zealanders, and this bill, as it is reported back, risks enshrining zero-hour contracts in the law. If, during the Committee stage during the passage of this bill, the Minister does introduce amendments through Supplementary Order Papers that outlaw zero-hour contracts, then we will of course support the bill through to the third reading, but, as I said, we have to see the detail first. Although I note that some Supplementary Order Papers are being developed, we have not seen one from the Minister.

I am going to just talk a bit about the submission process, because this was a very complicated omnibus bill. There were over 12,000—12,200—written submissions, the vast majority of them from ordinary working New Zealanders: union members, on the whole, who were concerned about the potential to enable zero-hour contracts. I want to congratulate those people, particularly those who are union members, on participating in the democratic process and adding their voice to this issue. I have no doubt that it is the deep unpopularity of the provisions in the bill that is triggering the change of heart in the Minister, which just goes to show that people power does work.

We also heard from employers and from peak bodies of employers. We heard a significant amount of comment about rostering and part-time workers. I have to say that there was no real appetite to liberalise employment law to enable zero-hour contracts, as many employers can already manage the peaks and flows of their businesses with part-time, fixed-term, casual, and permanent staff. We acknowledge that the bill, as reported back, has tried to address some of the issues around zero-hour contracts, like availability clauses and cancellation of shifts.

These were issues that I had developed solutions to in a member’s bill that I launched over a year ago. But I pulled it when the Minister announced that he was going to act on the issue, because I thought that we would get to a place where we would end these unfair employment practices. But this bill, as reported back, requires reasonable notice of shift cancellation and reasonable compensation if employees have to be available, which is much better than what the first iteration of the bill was. Having said that, it also includes tests about what reasonable is, which are really guidelines to the Employment Court to take into consideration when deciding what is reasonable and what is unreasonable.

I have a difficulty with making laws that need to be tested after a problem with the exploitation of a worker, when we should be making laws that prevent exploitation in the first place. These days it is basically left to a handful of brave workers and their unions to take legal cases to test our industrial relations law. In the casual workforce, accessing legal remedies is basically left up to labour inspectors. I have heard anecdotally that unless there are lots of workers who are impacted, there is not a lot of likelihood of labour inspectors being able to get out there and actually do the enforcement. You would need a huge army of them to have a look at every single one. Really, we should be looking at the ability of workers to understand, and to be able to speak up for, their rights. As an individual, though—as an individual, waiting at the end of the phone for a call for some hours of work—it is not likely you are going to stand up for them. By the time a casual employee who is waiting at the end of the phone for a call on a zero-hour contract takes any type of legal action to test the parameters of the availability or cancellation of shifts, the employment relationship is basically over.

We have heard ways in which we could end zero-hour contracts from some submitters. Some of them are just as simple as ensuring that there is a guarantee of minimum hours to be worked in every employment agreement. That would be a very good start. Incentivising permanent and regular employment is another way, and we can do that by adding a casual loading to those who are employed on an on-call basis. That is the basis of Supplementary Order Paper 150 that Clayton Mitchell, from New Zealand First, is putting forward. His Supplementary Order Paper, essentially, will load about 19 percent on to the hourly rate, which is similar to what happens in Australia. That is to cover the fact that casual employees do not get access to some of the other rights that workers have, like holidays, bereavement leave, and sick leave.

Although we do actually support some aspects of the bill that deal with the enforcement of labour standards—we think that the increase in fines is great—we are still concerned with the lack of resourcing for the agency charged with doing that enforcement. The labour inspectorate does a great job, but it is under-resourced, and one just has to look at the lack of compliance with some of the basic employment standards like time and wage records in the dairy farming sector, which has been widely reported in the media, to get an idea of the scope of the problems that they have to deal with.

We oppose the provisions in the bill, as reported back, around time and wage records for salaried workers. Yes, we need good, strong laws around keeping time and wage records, but we are concerned that—with the way it is reported back—salaried workers will lose protection. We think there is an ill-thought-out recommended change that came through from the select committee, and we did not see that there was any reason to have this dangerous provision in there. I will be putting up a Supplementary Order Paper to address that issue when it comes to the Committee of the whole House.

There are certain parts of this omnibus bill that we support wholeheartedly. Extending paid parental leave is one of them, and extending paid parental leave to the carers after the birth of a pre-term baby is also supported. I want to recognise the work that Sue Moroney has done in this area. The Greens believe that we should be making laws that support the most vulnerable in our society. In this case, those who are vulnerable are those with no guarantee of basic working hours, who are desperate for paid work, and who are on the losing side of the power imbalance inherent in the employment relationship, and that power imbalance is outlined in the Employment Relations Act preamble. On these grounds, we will not be supporting the bill at this reading, but we will consider it later down the track.

It is a pleasure to rise on behalf of New Zealand First and my colleague Clayton Mitchell to speak on the Employment Standards Legislation Bill in the second reading. Although I have not been involved personally with the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee or with all the other stages of this bill, I would like to take this opportunity to ensure that this House and the National Government understand our position on this bill and why, although we do support separate parts of this bill, we will still be opposing it overall. Although the Minister has mentioned that during conversations with the Labour Party they have come to some sort of agreement about discussions and future changes, we obviously have not seen that, and as the bill itself stands, we will still be opposing it.

The aim of the bill is, as Andrew Bayly actually mentioned as well, to make a number of improvements to the employment relations and employment standards legislation, for the benefit of all Kiwi workers. But that is actually a little bit—well, not just a little bit—quite greatly juxtaposed to the actual reality for New Zealand workers who are exposed to the zero-hour work contracts. One of the issues that I have picked up—and, like I said, I have not been involved with the process thus far—is that this is an omnibus bill, and there are parts through here that the entire Opposition actually agrees with, but the sticking point seems to be the zero-hour contracts part. I do not know whether it was mentioned or discussed previously in the first reading or during the committee’s considerations whether it would be a logical step to actually discuss this bill in separate parts. But, unfortunately, as it is—although, like I said, there are parts that we do strongly support—we cannot support this bill overall, because of the zero-hour contracts.

A couple of the parts that New Zealand First does support include the extension of paid parental leave from 16 to 18 weeks. It allows mothers with premature babies 40 hours of keeping-in-touch hours with their jobs, which is obviously quite important, and it allows primary caregivers to be someone other than the birth mother—and that can be determined by the parents. It also introduces a premature baby allowance. That is one of the vitally important periods of a baby’s life, but also of the parents’ life as well, and New Zealand First supports any improvement to that. We also support the stronger and more effective enforcement of the employment standards. This is quite a separate issue, obviously, to the paid parental leave part, but we do support and understand that that is an essential part of any employment contract.

But then we get to the zero-hour contracts. I know that they are not labelled as zero-hour contracts within the legislation, but that is what they are, in essence. Although I do acknowledge that the Minister has said there will be changes to the legislation moving forward, in the current form of the bill, that is exactly what this legislation actually entrenches. What it has got there is that it has actually included employment agreements that do not provide any guaranteed hours of work, and that is a zero-hour contract. In fact, it actually creates the availability of provisions that mean staff can be required to be available for work, at times without any guarantee of minimum hours or even minimum income, and, effectively, that is allowing zero-hour contracts. When that translates into reality for Kiwi workers who are actually on zero-hour contracts, that means they have got no ability to budget day to day, week to week, or even year to year. That includes organising their lives and their children’s lives in regard to day care and in regard to school. New Zealand First totally opposes zero-hour contracts. I note that during the select committee process, employers submitted to the committee—some employers are saying that they do not actually need the zero-hour contracts. There were over 12,000 submissions, and all bar one did not support the zero-hour contracts.

It is important to note that New Zealand First understands that casual contracts are an important part of the labour market, and that is why my colleague Clayton Mitchell has submitted Supplementary Order Paper 150. That Supplementary Order Paper is intended to create a loading on any casual employee, giving benefit to the worker and an incentive to the employer to move the employee on to a part-time or full-time contract. It works both ways, for both the employer and for the employee. Casual loadings are not a new concept but return to the situation that applied for nearly 100 years before the Employment Contracts Act 1991, when protections were given to our casual workers. Many of these protections have actually been maintained in Australia. The current situation, where employers are only to pay for liable annual leave, means that there is a systemic bias towards the employment of casual workers as it is. The Supplementary Order Paper proposals are intended to create a loading on any casual employee, giving benefit to the worker and an incentive to the employer to move the employee on to a part-time or full-time contract. The current situation, where employers are only liable to pay for annual leave, means that there is a system bias towards the employment of casual workers.

There is no requirement to load for public holidays, sick leave, bereavement leave, health and safety representative training leave, employment relations leave, jury duty, notice periods, or payment in lieu of notice. Casual workers also have no access to personal grievance protections for unfair dismissal, and, effectively, these are cost transfers from the employer to the worker. The purpose of the Supplementary Order Paper that Clayton Mitchell has submitted is to pay all casual employees a loading of 19 percent on the average hourly rate of a full-time employee doing the same or similar job as the casual worker. The 19 percent is broken down as follows: 1.6 percent loading for sick and bereavement leave, 4.4 percent loading for statutory holidays, 8 percent loading for standard holiday pay, and 5 percent casual loading. The employer will have the ability to move workers off a casual employment agreement and on to a part-time or full-time contract without paying any of the loading. There will be no penalty payments for employers who make part-time or full-time work available for casual employees.

I know that my colleague Clayton Mitchell will go into depth with the Supplementary Order Paper on his return, but what I would like to say is that, like I have stated, although New Zealand First does support parts of this bill, we do not support the bill overall, specifically because of the issues with the zero-hour contracts.

The next call is a split call between National and the Māori Party. Dr Parmjeet Parmar—5 minutes.

I am very pleased to stand and take this call to support the Employment Standards Legislation Bill on its second reading. As a member on the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee I want to acknowledge and thank all submitters for their contributions, which are highly valued. I also want to acknowledge the select committee chair, Jonathan Young, and also the Minister, the Hon Michael Woodhouse, for the work that he has done on this bill.

This bill is a very timely bill as it addresses various issues arising due to diversification of employee and employer relationships, changing work environments, and changing family needs. As we have already heard, this bill attracted a huge number of submissions. A big chunk of those submissions were actually form submissions. If I just exclude form submissions, unique submissions were still quite high. We received 1,920—or close to that—unique submissions on this bill. This bill has been closely examined, and, as a result, the select committee has made some very practical recommendations.

This bill is necessary because there are things that cannot be left to good-faith relationships between employees and employers. But both groups—employees and employers—want growth; they want to see legislation that supports growth. This bill is about supporting growth while promoting flexibility and fairness at workplaces, again for both groups—employers and employees.

From my own experience, being an employee and an employer in the past, I understand the importance of retaining flexibility, and I also understand the importance of having the ability to have mutual agreements. Yes, I want to acknowledge that I understand that there are some unfair elements in so-called zero-hour contracts, and that is why we need this bill. This bill is to address those unfair components in so-called zero-hour contracts. But this bill is not just about zero-hour contracts; this bill is also about making paid parental leave more flexible and practical, and it is also about supporting the enforcement of minimum entitlements.

I believe in fairer workplaces and a flexible labour market that support productivity, and are also about providing enhanced protection to employers and employees. It is not about focusing on just one group, employers or employers; we need both groups. Employers need employees to run their businesses, and employees need employers because they create employment. It is about retaining flexibility but also providing certainty to both groups, employers and employees.

This bill is also about supporting the enforcement of minimum entitlements for which employers will be required to keep a record of various things related to employment so that they can demonstrate compliance to minimum entitlement provisions. Also, the recording of various things related to employment like wages, leave, holidays, etc. will be made consistent in other employment legislation so that it is easy to establish compliance.

This part of the bill is mainly for businesses that are not compliant. We want to see that those businesses comply, and if they do not comply there will be financial penalties, and the seriousness of the breach will be reflected in those penalties. I can fully understand that feeling of power imbalance between employers and employees that has come through quite a lot. That is why this bill is also about having two-way communication between employers and employees. Things that are agreed to will be in the agreement, like the number of hours—if they are agreed they should be in the agreement. Also, an availability provision should be in the agreement.

I quickly want to touch on paid parental leave, because this bill is also about paid parental leave. It is making it more flexible and practical. The bill is also about extending the parental leave entitlement to a wider group than biological parents and formal adoptive parents. The other great thing about this bill is the keeping-in-touch hours for employees on paid parental leave. Overall, it is a great bill. I support this bill and commend it to the House. Thank you.

Neither of the Māori Party’s two members in the House were able to sit on the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee during the passage of this bill, and so we have relied on the collective workings of the parties involved and their efforts to ensure that workers’ rights are being upheld—something that we were gravely concerned about.

💬 Pita Paraone: Particularly Māori workers.

Particularly Māori workers—actually, all workers. So, when the bill came out of the select committee we continued to have some concerns that the issues had not all been addressed to our satisfaction. Hence, we began a dialogue between ourselves and the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety to raise those concerns. We sought some good-faith bargaining—I guess you could call it that. We sought some advice from the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions, and we worked with other people to ensure—

💬 Hon Simon Bridges: Hey, who started this great bill?

That is right. We started to ensure that we were taking workers’ rights into consideration, and to make sure that we could do what we could to help move things along.

There are a couple of things, like the zero-hour contracts that everybody has been talking about. I had a couple of sons work under zero-hour contracts, and they did quite well under those zero-hour contracts. They were casual contracts with no guaranteed hours but their holiday pay was seen in it. They negotiated those contracts themselves, and when the time came when they had proven their worth, one of the sons took a fixed-term contract, and the other stayed on a zero-hour contract because he got more money. That is wonderful, and that is lovely, but I also have a number of nephews and nieces in the Wairarapa who also worked to zero-hour contracts who did not have the same security in their jobs, so we raised the issues with the Minister.

We come to the second reading, and the Supplementary Order Papers that we have seen, which propose some changes, are not where we wanted them to be. However, we have now sought assurances from the Minister that the issues we have raised have been addressed, and that, through the Committee stage, that Supplementary Order Paper will come with the support of Labour in the work that it has been doing. So I would like to acknowledge that here, because I think that is important.

Given that, and given the good faith bargaining that we have been talking through with the Minister, we are happy to take him at his word that these things are being addressed. We have seen the draft of the Supplementary Order Paper, and though it is not here today in this reading, based on that and the notion that our issues will be addressed through the Committee of the whole House—is that what you say?

💬 Grant Robertson: Yep.

💬 Iain Lees-Galloway: You’re right.

That is right. That is the one. Given that they will be addressed at that stage, we are happy to support this bill at its second reading and we look forward to seeing that Supplementary Order Paper come to the House.

On that, we also just want to mention the paid parental leave. Previous to this bill, paid parental leave was only for parents and formally adoptive parents, and paid parental leave has now been increased to recognise whāngai parents. Parents who, in a Māori way, are able to whāngai a child without a formal adoption process—that has now been recognised under this bill, and we want to acknowledge the Minister and the select committee for ensuring that that has been there.

This has been difficult, and people have received flak over the zero-hour contracts and the rights of workers. What we want to make sure is that people who may not have the capacity to negotiate a contract with an employer are able to get support, able to get some guaranteed hours, and are able to ensure that they are adequately compensated if those hours fall over and they cannot get work.

I come from a family of shearers. We know what it is like to be rung up at 4 a.m. and told: “No work today.” If you do not work, you do not get paid. We understand what that is like, and it is very difficult. It does not offer security to a family who has children and dependants to feed if they do not know how much income they are going to get in the week.

We are happy that the Minister has sought to address those issues. We acknowledge the work of the select committee and the parties involved to get it across the line, and we look forward to the Supplementary Order Paper coming to the House and offer our support to the bill thus far.

Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. I rise to take a call on this, the Employment Standards Legislation Bill, on its second reading.

As stated previously by my colleague Denise Roche, we are unable to support this bill at this stage, because the bill that is in front of us, which has come out of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee, does not do what we were told it was going to do. I do understand that negotiations are happening at the moment behind closed doors and there is the possibility that something will come to the Committee of the whole House. It is disappointing that the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety and the Government were not able to hear the submissions made by the 10,000 submitters and to see the reason at that point of the process to return a bill to this House based on that evidence, and that there has to be a process behind closed doors—which means we cannot support this bill at this stage.

At the heart of our position is the fact that the Minister, when this bill was introduced, told us that this bill would prohibit zero-hour contracts. In actual fact, what it does is etch zero-hour contracts into our legal and social landscape. There is, at the moment, a question over the legality of zero-hour contracts, and this bill will establish them as valid in our laws.

I do want to point out in this context that the Government is currently a really large part of the zero-hours problem because it allows those non-jobs to be listed through Work and Income and it has not ruled out cutting somebody’s benefit if they refuse to take a zero-hour contract. When welfare legislation was going through this House last year and submitters raised concerns about sole parents with young children being forced into these insecure zero-hour jobs, the Government said, and the advice back was that “Well, we’re not going to rule those jobs out and say that they’re unsuitable in this legislation because that’s going to be dealt with through today’s piece of legislation.” And then what comes back to the House is something that actually enshrines that.

So that has a cascade effect right throughout the system, and these contracts are a disaster for most people. They mean that people go from week to week not knowing how much will be in their pay cheque. If you imagine trying to budget—to pay your rent, to be able to put food on the table, and to make sure your kids have got what they need to get to school and be at school—and not knowing how much money you have coming in, I think you can understand why so many people are passionate about this issue and want to make sure that our law clearly prohibits these zero-hour contracts, as promised by the Minister when it was introduced.

This situation is particularly bad for sole parents and people with mental health issues who are trying to get back into work. So when the Government is saying that its main response to poverty in this country is to get people off welfare and into work, this kind of legislation becomes critically important, because, actually, their welfare and the meaning of work hinge on the quality of the work. Work does not provide benefit if it is that insecure; it actually causes harm.

It was interesting—I got to sit in on some of the submissions on this bill and heard from some security guards who are currently working outside Work and Income offices, contracted by Armourguard—to hear that their hours are deeply casualised to the point that they may get only 3 hours of work one week and then potentially they are working full-time another week. Their employer, Armourguard, is on record as saying that was due to the “unpredictable nature of workflows.” Work and Income offices are open for set hours; there is nothing unpredictable about that. But that is the balance of power in our employment situation at the moment.

It is workers and families who are paying the real cost of this. We need legislation that makes it absolutely clear that that is unacceptable. At the moment this legislation will require those workers to take a case to court. That is not good enough, and we cannot support it at the moment.

I rise on behalf of the ACT Party in support of this bill, and I want to address my comments largely towards the paid parental leave part—a part that I am particularly proud of—but I also want to make a few comments about employment law and some of the speeches that we have heard, more generally.

My first job was working at TDC Sawmills in Whangarei 60 hours a week—40 hours during the daytime and 20 hours at night for $7.50 an hour, pulling 12-inch by 2-inch boards, six metres long. I doubt that many of the members on the other side of the House have ever worked that hard, particularly those who attended King’s College. One of the interesting things I learnt from talking to my colleagues there was that the only thing that improves the condition of the working man, or woman, is not this House making statutes to ban a particular arrangement and take away their options. The only thing that helps is the offer of a better job somewhere else—that is, employers competing to offer higher-productivity jobs to people with growing amounts of skill.

In the time I worked there I saw a number of people move on and take exactly those options. Sadly, from the tone of the rhetoric that we have heard in this House this afternoon and throughout this debate, what we have discovered is that this House puts in place many, many restrictions on the contracts that people can be entering into. And make no mistake, those restrictions do not make the working person any better off, because every time we put a restriction on the contracts into which people can enter under employment law, all we do is make people ever more cautious about being willing to enter into those contracts in the first place.

The people who want more and more restrictions on employment law contracts—well, typically, they themselves have never gone out into the market place and tried to hire good people. They have never stayed up at night doing their compliance, trying to find enough money to pay the wages bill, paying their workers, and then paying themselves—only if there is enough left over for the employer. That is the reality for many New Zealanders, particularly in small businesses, which has not been heard tonight. As this House, once again, moves to tighten up employment law, it does no favours for the employer and, ultimately, no favours for the employee, because you cannot legislate better jobs, you can only ban certain employment arrangements.

I want to turn to a particular clause in this bill that, as we heard from Sue Moroney, I have had something to do with, which is paid parental leave. I believe very strongly that the role of the State as a provider of social insurance is extremely important, but it should be offering insurance against unexpected outcomes. For the overwhelming majority of us, having children is not an unexpected outcome. Having a baby born pre-term—that is an unexpected outcome, and that is something that I believe the State should offer compensation for to help people through that time.

The provisions that I have helped negotiate in this bill, as we heard earlier from Sue Moroney, say that if you have a pre-term baby you will be able to receive additional paid parental leave to the extent that that baby is born earlier than the expected 36 weeks. That is a compassionate welfare State addressing truly unexpected outcomes, which I support. I do not support the relentless extension of paid parental leave, which amounts to a massive wealth transfer for, mainly, political purposes.

None the less, I am proud of what the ACT Party has done to improve this bill. I would like to thank the honourable Minister Woodhouse for the role he has played, and also Sue Moroney for her passionate advocacy throughout the process of forming this bill to date.

Normally, I am quite in agreement with the last speaker, David Seymour, but I have to differ on a few little points about the importance of this House and setting some context around employment relations. I think there are some important things that this Parliament can do to safeguard the rights of workers and I think that is an important part of any Parliament. The members of the Labour Party over there are trying to trivialise the situation of work, and we know that they are still trying to work out what work actually is in their environment. It is great to see the members over there in such a good mood when they are coming to the end of a week.

This bill does deal with some important issues that have been in the work environment for a number of years now, especially around the paid parental leave scheme, which is something that there has been a lot of debate around.

💬 David Seymour: The member hasn’t disagreed with me yet.

Ha, ha! You do not want me to go back and disagree. The paid parental leave scheme has been something that both sides of the House have debated over a number of years. During that process, a number of arrangements and extensions to that scheme have actually come into place, and this bill builds on that and develops and provides more opportunities for the paid parental leave scheme to be extended—not only extension in its obligations but also in the protections that it gives to parents. I think that is something that all members of this House see as very important for the future of our country, going forward.

The main provisions in this bill around paid parental leave have been canvassed quite strongly by all members of the House. There are some important parts in relation to caregivers and the 12-months and the 6-months changes, and also, as some have talked about, the pre-term babies—they are important changes there, and something that we do agree on, with that member—but also the eligibility for certain occupations and self-employment and employee status. So that is an important part of this bill.

There are also other changes to the Employment Relations Act. Members on the other side may disagree with those changes, but those changes are very important, especially some of the changes around the Employment Court, which I am sure those members will be very interested in going through.

Then there are further charges in regard to the Wages Protection Act, which is part of the legislation as well. That is around the zero-hour contracts, which many members have spoken about, in regard to paid parental leave. It has been an issue for some years in our system. All members of this Parliament, I am sure, would want to see a result that is in the best interests of employees, in regard to zero-hour contracts, without taking away the need and the ability for casual contracts and casual work arrangements as well.

This bill covers a number of areas in the workplace. It is about providing more opportunities for employees to get more protection. It is doing that in a balanced way that enables employers to come along with it. It is something that this House can do to make a real difference in people’s working lives. It builds stronger families and communities. It is something that we encourage to go through the House. Thank you.

Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. Can I echo the sentiments and condolences to Martin Crowe’s family at this point in time. It is a sad passing of a true legend.

Whenever the ACT Party, and in particular that member, talks about employment contracts—he clearly sold himself short at his job at TDC Sawmills. My family got there, negotiated their own contracts, and I can tell you they got paid a heck of a lot more than that member right there did. So any time he is involved in these types of pieces of legislation, we are really, really concerned. However, I do want to commend his working alongside the member Sue Moroney in extending paid parental leave and, as the member Marama Fox mentioned, making sure that things like matua whāngai—those custodians, those caregivers of our babies—are recognised and that they certainly have the time to develop and grow our young people. All the research and statistics say that when you put that effort in at the beginning, it pays dividends at the end. I was fortunate enough to sit alongside Sue Moroney in Rotorua where she garnered a heck of a lot of public support for her paid parental leave bill. It is nice to see some of the collaboration across the House, and it is evident in this particular bill here.

I want to commend the workers and some of the good employers out there, because there are a lot of good employers out there. We certainly, on this side of the House, are not accusing all employers of poor employment practices. We want to highlight many of the ones that do actually pay well. They give workers, hard-working Kiwis, guaranteed hours. They pay them well. They look after them and their families, knowing full well that when that worker is happy, that worker is satisfied, the job goes well, and productivity goes up. We want to congratulate all of those good employers out there, and all of those hard-working employees, wherever they may be.

We have heard about the zero-hour contracts. I want to pick up the point made by Andrew Bayly, the member for Hunua, who talked about the exclusivity clause. He said that it is important to protect intellectual property rights. Yes, for the most part it is. But when we consider zero-hour contracts, can I reassure the member for Hunua that the 11 herbs and spices secret is very much safe. Zero-hour contracts are primarily employed in the fast-food industry. Although I acknowledge that you want to protect intellectual property, let me just reassure him that when he tucks into the KFC this weekend the secret will be safe.

Zero-hour contracts—the stance by the Labour Party is that we will support the bill at this stage. We will support the bill at this stage, in the hope that—as the member for the Green Party mentioned, when this bill first came into the House it was very different from the bill that is in front of us today—it will change again, as it progresses. We want to make sure that zero-hour contracts are eliminated. We want to make sure that people can have financial security and job security. We want to make sure that all of the workers out there are recognised for the hard work that they do.

Once again, to reiterate the position of the Labour Party, we will be supporting the bill at this particular point in time. We can assure all of the hard-working Kiwis out there that we will continue to work hard to make sure that they get a fair go in the employment relations legislation. Tēnā koe.

Thank you for this call on the Employment Standards Legislation Bill. First of all, I would like to also pay my respects to Professor Ranginui Walker. I have to say that he was one of the professors who taught me at the University of Auckland, and he was by far one of my favourite professors. I pay my respects to his family.

Labour does not support this bill in its current form. Labour is supporting this bill at its second reading, but only at this stage, and only because we are negotiating in good faith with the current Government. The Minister, the Hon Michael Woodhouse, and the National Government promised that it would get rid of zero-hour contracts. We would like this bill to actually do just that. However, the conditional support that the Labour Party is giving this bill at this stage is only because we are hoping that at the third reading the Government will definitely get rid of zero-hour contracts.

Supporting this bill at its second reading comes with three bottom lines from the Labour Party. First, we would like the ability for employers to be able to put people on contracts when they are on call with no permanent hours. Being on call is fine in some respects, but being on call all of the time, when there is no security and no guarantee of regular hours, cannot be acceptable, especially when people are sitting at the other end of the phone waiting to be called. But in many of these cases people are not actually called to come in to work. That cannot be acceptable in New Zealand.

Secondly, we would be supportive of this legislation if employers are not able to cancel shifts at any particular point. Right now we are not comfortable that what is currently proposed by the Government would allow employers to just cancel shifts whenever they like. We are not comfortable that the current Government should normalise this and put it into legislation.

Thirdly, the Labour Party would like, where practical, for hours of work to be included in the employment agreement, so that people can plan their lives with some security. We get lots of constituents in our office in South Auckland. Many of these people work in low-income jobs. Many of these people are cleaners. Many of them work in the fast-food industry. And when they come in to seek our advice and ask for assistance, many of them tell us that they do work and they do have an employment contract. But many of them do not have guaranteed hours.

Zero-hour contracts are amongst the worst form of worker exploitation in New Zealand today. Zero-hour contracts must be eliminated, and we in the Labour Party will do everything we can to ensure that this occurs. Labour has not moved an inch on zero-hour contracts. It is absolutely essential to abolish zero-hour contracts in this country. We should not, in New Zealand, allow by law for workers to sit around and wait at the other end of the line to be called, hopefully, to come in for work. New Zealanders have a right to the protection of the law, and they also have a right to expect their elected representatives—those of us in this House—to treat their rights as workers with care. They should not be placed at the mercy of legislation that would make their exploitation as workers legal. New Zealanders have a right to work and their conditions of work should be equitable and fair.

The Labour Party gives conditional support at this point to this legislation. Thank you very much.

At the start of my short call this afternoon I just want to pay tribute to Martin Crowe and note his loss. I think it is a real loss for New Zealand cricket and New Zealand society, really. He was a childhood hero of mine, and I know that there will be many New Zealanders around the country feeling this loss very keenly. I just want to pay tribute to his enormous role in the 1992 Cricket World Cup, but also his ongoing role, particularly in the development of Cricket Max, which was the precursor to Twenty20. He was an innovator and a visionary, and, not the least of which, a fantastic batsman.

I just want to mention briefly what I think is the biggest advance in this bill, and that is the changes that it makes around pre-term babies. We have already heard a reference to this by David Seymour in his contribution to the debate, and it is really an example, I think, of MMP at its best, in some ways—of Parliament, through the process of negotiation and mediation, acting on something that is important. And everyone agrees, I think, that it should be dealt with.

So what this bill does is provide extra assistance for parents who have pre-term babies. It entitles them to a longer period of parental leave than the standard 18 weeks if the baby is born prior to 37 weeks of gestation, which is, of course, considered full term. It provides for extra weekly payments, and I think, as David Seymour made reference to in his remarks, that that is what a socially just society does. It is what a society does when it enjoys the prosperity that allows it to provide assistance like that to children who, through no fault of their own, and to families who through no fault of their own—the birth lottery—are going to be placed into difficult circumstances. That is what a society that has the prosperity to spend money on that does, and that is what this Parliament is doing, and I think that that is very important.

The other thing that I want to mention, which I think is a real advance for New Zealanders, is the bill introducing the keeping-in-touch provisions. These allow employees to work up to 40 hours a week during the period of receiving parental leave payments. The bill has some safeguards around that. It provides for employees and employers to consent to that work. What I think that will do is allow people to transition back into the workforce, and that is going to be a real advance for working mums out there and for families.

We know that we have a high female labour force participation rate, but we also know that we need to maintain that. We need to make sure that people who want to work can work, but also, as this bill does—and it strengthens that assistance—provide assistance for mothers and fathers to take time off to look after their children. That is a real advance, I think—those keeping-in-touch hours provisions. This is a good bill.

I have not addressed any of my remarks to the negotiations or the ongoing discussion around zero-hour contracts. My personal view is that it is a bit of a shame that the public debate has become fixated on that too. I think the public debate has become a little bit confused about what we mean by a zero-hour contract and the differences between that and casual contracts. But I think that we are getting to a position in Parliament where we are legislating in quite a consensual way—or I hope that we will eventually legislate in quite a consensual way—to eliminate the punitive elements of contracts to which various speakers over the last hour or so have made reference. I think that will be a step forward for employment legislation in Parliament. I acknowledge the hard work of Iain Lees-Galloway on this issue. He has been a very strong and forthright proponent of his point of view on this, and he has done a good job in that regard.

This is a step forward for employment legislation in New Zealand. I believe it contains a lot of useful provisions, and I commend the bill to the House.

The question was put that the amendments recommended by the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee by majority be agreed to.