Crimes (Theft by Employer) Amendment Bill

I move, That the Crimes (Theft by Employer) Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It is a real pleasure to have the opportunity to speak on this very important bill in this House tonight. This bill is a simple bill. It’s a bill that addresses a problem currently in our society where those who are most vulnerable are often subject to crimes of theft. But, unfortunately, the perpetrators of those crimes go unpunished. As the first mover of this bill, Ibrahim Omer, said, “This is a tough on crime bill.” This provides greater sanctions than those that are currently in our Crimes Act and it creates new offences to hold to account employers who owe wages to their employee and intentionally do not pay them.

Now, most employers in New Zealand are good employers and would never intentionally do anything wrong with payroll or intentionally steal from their employees. Of course, this is a small minority of employers that we are talking about here. But, regretfully, there are some employers who do intentionally steal from their employees and currently are not being held to account in New Zealand. This includes actions to unlawfully withhold wages, salaries, and other monetary entitlements. We all know that this is wrong, but in an unusual quirk of history, this is one area in society where we know this type of theft regularly occurs but there are no criminal sanctions.

I want to acknowledge my colleague Ibrahim Omer, who first brought this bill to the House, actually over one year ago in the last Parliament. His first reading speech was very compelling, and the reason it was so compelling was because the nucleus of this bill and the reason he decided to bring it to the House was because of his own experience. I want to just briefly touch on some of his experiences because he is not here in the House to be able to do so himself.

When he introduced this bill, he talked about how it arose from his own experience. He said, “I came here as a refugee, and I was told that New Zealand was a paradise, compared to the country from which I originated, and a place where the rule of law will apply to everyone and where it’s there to protect the most vulnerable.” He then went on to tell a story about when he had worked in New Zealand, he’d gone to work in a farm in the Wairarapa, and he’d been bussed out there from the Hutt, and, unfortunately, at the end of doing one week’s work, he was told by his employer that his work wasn’t good enough and he wouldn’t be paid, and, in fact, it should be him who paid the employer for all the travel costs to get him out there. Now, at that stage, he didn’t know what his rights were. He said he just walked away without any pay for that week. Unfortunately, that is an all too common experience of migrants in New Zealand and vulnerable workers who do not know what their rights are.

He also said that he found out after this that the problem of intentional wage theft by employers is rife in low and casual sectors that rely on migrant labour. It’s very common for these workers to have the hours that they work underreported, leading to lower pay, or employers to argue down the work that the employee has done. It’s already against the law in almost all circumstances to withhold pay and deliberately underpay staff. But the law is regularly flouted and there are no criminal sanctions in New Zealand for wage theft.

I want to just acknowledge the story that we’ve heard today in the House and the story that Ibrahim had, where he came to New Zealand as a refugee, suffered from an injustice, which in this case was wage theft, and then became an MP in that country, only our second refugee MP to do so, and then brought a bill to this House—which, hopefully, will become law if we have the support of members of the House—in order to stop other New Zealanders from experiencing that same thing. It’s quite an extraordinary story, and I’d just like members of this House to consider that if we are like-minded in wanting to stop the practice of wage theft, we can make it an even more incredible story by passing this bill tonight.

I want to go over, briefly, what the bill does, because I think it’s important to understand why this bill is needed. Currently, the most common way that wage theft is dealt with is through civil enforcement pathways. That means no criminal conviction is ever applied to an employer who engages in wage theft. There are, in New Zealand, interestingly, some criminal penalties that apply under the Immigration Act for an employee who’s on a temporary visa. In some instances, people who are here on a temporary visa will have more rights to have criminal action against the person who conducts an unlawful theft of their wages than most other New Zealanders. We can all agree that that’s a bad situation and we’re glad that the Immigration Act provides for that, but we should also acknowledge that when those people go on to different types of visas and when they become permanent citizens, they don’t have the same rights, and this is an important right for all New Zealanders to have when they are stolen from, which is what wage theft is, and to have serious repercussions for the people who undertake that intentionally.

Additionally, often these days, people who suffer from wage theft from their employer often can’t take action against it because they don’t have the ability to afford to take civil action. Taking civil action is actually really difficult. Filing papers in a court is not something that comes easily to most people. Even a disputes tribunal is often quite difficult for people to do by themselves. So often we have a situation where wage theft is only addressed if someone is a member of a union and they can do so on a basis where they don’t have to pay for that litigation to take place. While the union should be commended for taking that action, I think, as a matter of public policy, it should be that all New Zealanders are able to hold people to account for theft that is committed against them. I think that’s an important issue.

It’s also an issue that other jurisdictions have already dealt with, such as Australia, Norway, and California. They’ve all introduced laws to combat wage theft. There are so many different cases that you can refer to in relation to wage theft to show that it’s an ongoing problem in New Zealand. A 2019 study commissioned by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) found that wage theft was one of the most common forms of migrant labour exploitation in New Zealand. Ibrahim, in his first reading speech, mentioned about three or four different cases where wage theft had been challenged through civil remedies and there were significant penalties associated with those, but, of course, no criminal penalties for the employers involved in that. It’s a very important issue and one that we can prove is ongoing

In terms of the select committee process, this bill was referred to select committee just before the last election. We had about 13 submissions, and about 84 percent of those were in support. There were some changes that we made at select committee as well. One of the main changes that we made was making sure there was consistency between this piece of law and also the Employment Relations Act. Also, we did look at a few other things to do with penalties. You’ll see in the select committee report that there’s a recommendation that if the House takes this further, maybe we can look at a stepped penalty regime, which is consistent with what’s in the Crimes Act. A stepped penalty regime is a regime where if you were to steal a lower amount of money, then you would have a much lower term of imprisonment or fine that would relate to that; and if it was a higher amount of money, it would step up higher. That’s currently what’s in the Crimes Act, in relation to the general crime of theft.

The select committee process, I think, was a useful process, and I want to thank members of the select committee who are here today who participated in that process. I think it was a respectful process, and although some of the Government members decided not to support this bill, I felt that there was an openness to make sure the bill was in the best possible shape going forward to the House. You’ll see that, in the report, we unanimously say that there were no legislative issues with the bill and also that we unanimously agreed to the changes, although the majority did not support the House passing it. I want to thank everyone for doing that and also the Ministry of Justice and MBIE for their very good, I thought, advice on this particular bill. I thought their expertise was really excellent.

In conclusion, I would encourage all members of the House to, please, support this bill. This bill does strengthen criminal sanctions against theft. It does protect vulnerable people, and it will lead to a greater sense of justice for more New Zealanders. I commend this bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

I rise today to speak on the Crimes (Theft by Employer) Amendment Bill, which has obviously been brought to the House by Camilla Belich but, to acknowledge, it was first put in the ballot by Ibrahim Omer—and obviously the process that it has gone through and your participation in that. Thank you very much, Camilla.

Just to speak to the process that we’ve gone through with the select committee: hearing from people and robustly discussing and debating the merits either way does really do justice to the process. Of course, just to speak to the bill and what it does, it’s proposing to criminalise the failure of employers to pay wages. Look, while the intention behind this bill might be well meaning—and not to discredit that—we’ve got to carefully examine whether it aligns with the principles of what are some strong National Party values, which are limited government, competitive enterprise, and personal responsibility—values that are central to a prosperous society.

Of course, this bill seeks to criminalise wage disputes by introducing harsh penalties, which is exactly what they are, for employers who allegedly withhold wages—and “allegedly” is an important point to make. While protecting workers’ rights is essential, we must not be so quick to bring the heavy hand of criminal law into areas that could be governed by civil agreements and mutual trust. That was something that was brought up a number of times when we heard from submitters—and, obviously, talking to officials. This is something that can be covered by civil agreements and then, of course, the establishment of the contract and the relationship between the employer and the employee.

One of the cornerstones of a free society is limited government. This means that the role of the State is to provide a framework for law and order but it shouldn’t interfere in every aspect of our lives—certainly not in areas where civil remedies and free enterprise can provide solutions, and in this case, they already do.

The current framework of employment law under Acts such as the Employment Relations Act and the Wages Protection Act already offers clear avenues for resolving wage disputes. Civil Courts and specialised employment tribunals are better suited to handling cases aimed to be addressed by the proposed bill. Turning wage disputes into criminal cases adds an unnecessary layer of Government involvement, one that this side and this Government would not support, in what is often a private and contractual issue. We have long upheld the principle that criminal law should be reserved for the most severe forms of wrongdoing. The criminal justice system is designed to punish intentional malicious acts that cause significant harm to society. Is an error in payroll, perhaps caused by administrative oversight or a system failure, really something we want to criminalise?

Now, to address what the member opposite has said in her speech prior: while the intention is malicious, that does not always have the outcome. The outcome is often perverse. Criminal law is a blunt instrument, and its overuse in areas better handled by civil law will lead to unintended consequences, not justice. I will speak to this now.

Our economy thrives when businesses are free to operate without excessive Government regulation. Competitive enterprise is driven by innovation, efficiency, and trust—trust between employers and employees, between businesses and their customers. This bill threatens to undermine that trust by introducing the spectre of criminal liability into what are often honest disputes over pay. In a competitive economy, businesses—especially small businesses—need flexibility to manage their payroll systems, hire workers, and navigate the complexities of running a company. This bill would burden employers with the constant fear of criminal prosecution, potentially paralysing their ability to operate freely and effectively. We are introducing a system where an honest payroll mistake could lead to a criminal record or a substantial fine.

How does that encourage a competitive, dynamic business environment? Consider a small-business owner, the backbone of our economy. Many small businesses operate with limited staff and resources, relying on simple systems to manage their payroll. Mistakes can and do happen—

💬 Camilla Belich: It doesn’t apply to payroll mistakes. It doesn’t apply to mistakes.

—errors in calculation, miscommunications, or delays in payment. These issues are often resolved quickly and amicably. But, by introducing the possibility of criminal sanctions, this bill discourages the very entrepreneurship and risk-taking that fuel our economy.

💬 Glen Bennett: We’re talking about theft.

💬 Camilla Belich: It’s the intentional theft—intentional—not a mistake.

If we want a thriving competitive marketplace, we need to encourage business owners, not criminalise them for mistakes.

Now, members opposite are talking about the fact that this is not in relation to mistakes. The point is, this actually comes down to the interpretation of the employee in the way that they put this to police when they make the complaint. It may well not be picked up by the police, but the process exists. It is a game that can be played by employees, and we cannot diminish that. By introducing the possibility of criminal sanctions—and I’ll repeat it again—it discourages the productive and entrepreneurial economy that we want to promote and support. If we want a thriving, competitive marketplace, we need to encourage business owners. Excessive Government intervention, which I have mentioned before, will stifle innovation. It’s all going to lead to higher costs, and it aims to protect by reducing job opportunities and discouraging investment.

Personal responsibility is important in this situation. It applies to employers and employees. Employers have a responsibility to pay their workers fairly and on time and in accordance with the law, but criminalising wage disputes removes the personal responsibility of both parties to resolve these issues through dialogue, mediation, and, when necessary, civil action, which already exists.

We must also consider the impact this bill will have on the culture of employment relations in New Zealand. Rather than fostering collaboration, trust, and accountability, it would create an environment of fear and suspicion. Employers worried about potential criminal charges may resort to rigid, overly bureaucratic policies that make workplaces less flexible and less responsive to employees’ needs. Let’s not forget that wage disputes are often complex. They arise, as I have said, from misunderstandings, from errors, and from differing interpretations of contracts. It is the personal responsibility of both employers and employees to work together to resolve these issues. The introduction of criminal penalties undermines this personal responsibility, and it also adds cost to our justice system, taking disputes out of the hands of people involved and placing them in the bureaucratic machinery of Government.

What we need instead is a culture where employers and employees do resolve these issues in good faith, and where we give them the opportunity to go straight to the police, how many would? If an employee believes that they have been wronged, they already have the avenues to pursue justice, and this is something we talked about at length in the select committee. The existing Civil Court system provides fair and balanced mechanisms for resolving these kinds of cases.

The proposed bill introduces unnecessary Government oversight and places undue weight on criminal punishment for what is often administrative. The Crimes (Theft by Employer) Amendment Bill seeks to address the serious issue of wage theft, but its solution is heavy-handed and flawed. We have heard from officials that this is already something solvable by civil action. It is complicated by taking it through the justice system, there is too much room for interpretation, and it is very much in line with what we believe as a Government to be an overextension of Government.

By criminalising wage disputes, we undermine competitive enterprise, and I have made this a very clear part of what I’m sharing. We diminish personal responsibility, and we are ruining employer and employee relationships. We have to be very careful not to create a society where every mistake or misunderstanding is treated as a crime. We must trust in the principles of limited government, allowing the free market to function without excessive interference. We must encourage competitive enterprise, providing businesses with the freedom they need to innovate, grow, and hire workers, and we cannot be ignorant in thinking that this would not stifle them further. We must uphold the value of personal responsibility, and we need to make sure that this is dealt with through civil, not criminal, means. Let’s focus instead on fostering trust between employers and workers, something we stand by strongly. With that, I do not commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on behalf of the Greens to support this bill tonight. As I was going through the Education and Workforce Committee report, I could see the work done by the select committee. They’d kind of come to some agreements on clarifying the employment arrangements and entitlements and trying to get the legislation into a good place, and I acknowledging the words of Camilla Belich—the work of the select committee, there.

What I did want to hear was the reasons why the Government parties—well, I’ve only heard from one Government party so far—are not supporting this bill. We heard that one of the reasons they don’t want to support this bill is because it could compromise a thriving, competitive market place; it’s an afront to personal responsibility and competitive enterprise. My first submission tonight is: you can have all of that without ripping people off—you can have all of that without ripping people off.

There was some talk also, there, around accessing civil law and using those processes in order to find justice for workers as well. But that’s expensive—those processes are expensive. If you’re a low-wage worker, a migrant worker—and some of us around the House come from some of those families—and you get here, maybe your English isn’t so flash, maybe you don’t have access to all the lawyers and all that other kind of stuff, what is your pathway to justice? What is your pathway to make sure that you get to keep the money that you’ve worked for? I think that’s something that people across Aotearoa would support, right? You work a hard day, you get your dollars, and that’s your money, that’s your pūtea, those are your wages.

I do want to just backtrack and acknowledge Ibrahim Omer from the last Parliament, who, in the first reading of this bill, detailed and talked about his own experience, his lived experience, of being exploited—his lived experience shared by many migrant workers and many low-wage workers, where there is definitely that imbalance. I do want to acknowledge Ibrahim Omer, and also Camilla Belich, who is shepherding this bill through the House at this particular time, because this is an attempt to actually rectify that imbalance—to rectify that imbalance.

One of the other phrases that I heard, there, that we need to encourage—I think the words were “the culture of employment and employee relations”. I might have got that wrong, but it was around that kind of thing. Well, you can do that by making sure that there’s stuff in place so that people can get their pay. That’s something that we also need to think about right across what’s happening around Aotearoa right now. If the culture of employment and employee relations is something of focus for the Government parties, they’ve really got to work at it. You can’t just be focusing on the whole enterprise brigade; you’ve got to be thinking about the workers.

I’ve been watching the number of jobs that have been lost just here in Wellington, around about 5,000 or 6,000 now. That’s the brain drain. They’re going to be jumping on planes and going overseas. That speaks to the lack of trust in terms of that culture. We just had Woolworths workers walk out on strike as well. That points to that lack of trust in that culture. The way that you improve that culture is by supporting bills like this. As Camila Bellich said earlier, it is a simple bill—it is a simple bill—particularly for those low-wage workers. They don’t have access to flash lawyers and civil law and all this other kind of stuff.

I want to acknowledge the differing view of both the Labour Party and the Green Party in the select committee report. At least there are some opinions that we can think about and dissect as we walk through this bill. Here, it acknowledges that there are many similar jurisdictions to New Zealand, such as California, Victoria, Queensland, Norway, and, most recently, the Commonwealth of Australia, who have in recent years passed legislation criminalising wage theft by employers. Additionally, this bill received 84 percent support to the select committee. It’s not like this is a new thing that has been pulled out of the ether; it is happening in similar-sized jurisdictions.

My question, in terms of the contributions which will follow from me tonight, is—we need to acknowledge that this is actually an issue, that there is a power imbalance between employers and employees, particularly low-wage workers and migrant workers. We need to hear, clearly, from the Government benches what is going to be done to reconcile that. What is going to be done to make sure that that balance is brought into balance?

We will be supporting this bill. There needs to be more work done around job security, around making sure that job security and all of those other sorts of issues—and part of that is, of course, supporting the Labour Inspectorate, making sure that they’re fully resourced. If there is exploitation happening, we need to make sure that the people that go out to check on that, actually finding out whether the exploitation is happening, are actually resourced to be able to do that. That is a solution that I would like to see from the Government benches in terms of addressing the imbalance between employers and employees. The Greens support this bill.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’m taking this call on behalf of ACT, and we are not supporting this bill, the Crimes (Theft by Employer) Amendment Bill, but I would like to acknowledge the member in charge of the bill, Camilla Belich. She worked diligently on this bill in the select committee.

As a member of the select committee—the Education and Workforce Committee—that considered this bill, I saw that she worked really hard on the committee for this bill. I also want to acknowledge all submitters. There were 13 submissions, out of which five submitters were heard, they presented their submission—this is by being there in person and also some via video conferencing. I want to thank them and I want to say that their contribution is highly valued. In this select committee process, it is very important for all select committee members to give consideration to each and every point that is raised by all submitters, and that was duly done. The whole select committee worked very sincerely on this bill to improve this bill. The evidence of that is that this bill has come back as an amended version of the bill.

Still, the ACT Party believes that we cannot support this bill because there are enough provisions available for the issue that this bill is trying to address. I want to acknowledge that, yes, there are some employers who exploit employees. It’s a very small number of employers and there needs to be a very strong message sent to them, but the strong message is being sent through a lot of legislation which already exists.

I know that as an immigrant myself, I hear a lot of stories from migrant people, migrant workers, those who come here having that hope of coming and working hard and making a better life here in New Zealand and end up getting exploited. That is why I want to highlight that in the Immigration Act, the penalties that are there for employers—those who exploit these vulnerable migrant workers—are quite harsh, and that is very important that we acknowledge that those kinds of penalties are already there. But, then, we have heard before from the member in charge of the bill about the difference between migrant workers versus those workers who are on other visas. So, yes, overall if I want to classify workers into two groups, that can be migrant workers and others—those who are on permanent visas here in New Zealand.

The issue here is that we are trying to solve a problem that we already have a solution for. Yes, I acknowledge there is a problem. A very, very small number of employers do have the tendency of exploiting their workers, but here it’s very important to note that generally employers are conscious of their reputation. Any kind of reputational damage is not something that any good employer would tolerate. They’ll do anything to ensure that they have a good reputation, because if their reputation is not good, then their employees will know that. The environment there will be quite toxic. Nobody would want to work for that employer if it has been found out that that employer has not paid somebody when the person should have actually been paid. The reputation of that business is really important because, if that reputation is not maintained, not only the staff that are already there in the business will leave but they will also fail to attract any more. I’m not talking about skilled; even unskilled people will not be wanting to work for that business if they hear that the reputation of that business is not good. We need to keep that in mind. Any kind of unethical, illegal activity we do not support. We want to see that all businesses are complying with all the employment legislation that we have.

Keeping that in mind, I also want to see what the member is wanting to do. What the member is wanting to do is take this issue to the next level. Instead of it going through civil court processes, the member wants to see that it goes through the criminal process, but it’s not going to make it easier for those employees, because both processes are going to be equally tedious. It’s not like the criminal process is going to be easier. If a complaint is laid with police, that doesn’t mean the police are going to give priority to this case—they have so many serious criminal issues to deal with.

As this bill is presented as being tough on crime, I must highlight that the member and the Labour Party, in the previous Government, had a very lenient approach towards criminals: they wanted to reduce numbers of prisoners in prison. This is presented as being tough on crime. Yes, it is crime if somebody’s wage is not paid the way it should be paid, but then we have legislation which is already dealing with it.

I also want to say that in this legislation, it does give consideration to when there is an individual who is an employer versus an organisation. For individuals, it says that the penalty can be of one year’s imprisonment, a fine of $5,000, or both. In other cases, the maximum penalty is a fine of $30,000. It’s not like the penalties are not imposed currently—penalties are imposed—and I have some information that I would like to share with the House here. In the 2022-23 financial year, 112 direct enforcement actions were taken. Around $1.13 million was awarded in penalties by the Employment Relations Authority. Penalties are already imposed on those employers; those who don’t comply with employment legislation. In 2021-22, 212 investigations into serious breaches of the law were completed with breaches found and enforcement action taken—$685,000 in penalties awarded by Employment Relations Authority from Labour Inspectorate cases.

It’s also important to highlight that in 2020 and 2021 there were 1,548 interventions made. These were interventions; 117 employment standards complaints positively resolved without enforcement action being required to ensure compliance. There are two levels of non-compliance. One is of a very serious nature where we know that penalties are imposed, but then there are low-level non-compliance issues which are resolved by providing advice and providing some additional information—so this is basically providing some guidance to resolve that issue. Both parties, the employee and the employer, actually would like to take up that part because ultimately what the employee wants is to get that money that they should be paid and the employer, if there is a mistake, gets the opportunity to correct that mistake. In 2022-23, almost 400 complaints were resolved in this way.

What I’m saying here by presenting this data is that the system that we have is already working and also the types of cases that the Employment Relations Authority and the Employment Court have looked at. This is about paying less than the minimum wage, making unlawful deductions, not paying wages for all hours worked, not paying for all the hours guaranteed under an employment agreement, not paying entitlements under the Holidays Act 2003, not paying employer KiwiSaver contributions, and not paying for the full notice period at the end of employment.

The question is: what is lacking? What is lacking? The system is already working, and if employers are in breach of their obligation, then there are systems available; there are provisions available. What we need is more awareness for these vulnerable employees to take up these options and to go out and seek justice. That’s why the ACT Party is not supporting this bill. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

I rise to speak against the Crimes (Theft by Employer) Amendment Bill. Just before I do, I’d just like to acknowledge my fellow Northland colleague Mark Cameron for his very emotional and touching speech today in the House—great; thank you, Mark. I’d like to also acknowledge Camilla Belich on the other side of the House for her work on this bill, and, of course, the original member who brought the bill forward, the Labour MP Ibrahim Omer. When you come into this place, it’s a great privilege to then get a bill drawn and get the opportunity to present and debate and discuss it, and you take the result as it comes. So well done.

I’d like to begin by saying that the purpose of this bill is to suddenly start turning some employers into criminals. Now, for those of us who have actually employed people and run small businesses, I’m just thinking to myself that it’s a real—when you go out to go into business for yourself, you go out there, you risk your own capital, you mortgage your house or your business—up to the eyeballs, often, to get started—and you put yourself on the line. This is something that always frustrates me. I find that those on the other side of the House seem to struggle to really accept what that brings, and the stress and strain that—

💬 Hon Phil Twyford: So stealing is OK, then? Is that right?

It’s interesting; they’re saying that theft is OK. No, we’re not saying theft is OK. But criminalising people in business, right, because they might make a mistake—and you say that that’s not the intent of the bill, but, then again, you see, this is the issue here: you talk about intent. Intent becomes, then, a debating point, right?

You’ve got this employer here who’s risked everything, they’ve employed people, and if you’re a small employer, which most employers in New Zealand are—97 percent are small-business people, right, and I can speak as one of these myself—you’ve got to be in charge of health and safety, you’ve got to be in charge of all your wages, in charge of all your compliance, running your business, and dealing with everything that comes with it, right? And you may make a mistake, and then someone says, “Well, actually, I think that was intentional.” So, therefore, you find yourself potentially caught up in the criminal justice system, right, right?

💬 Hon Phil Twyford: Do you apply that logic to shoplifting?

Christ, they really are desperate over there, aren’t they? Well, I suppose it’s nearly the end of the night; they’re allowed to be desperate, you know? Imagine the stress of that: you think you’ve been doing everything right. Suddenly, you find yourself with a knock on the door and there’s a policeman standing there. Can you just imagine how you’d feel about that, and your family is there seeing the policeman or policewoman knock on the door and say, “Actually, we think you’ve been stealing from your employees.” The stress and strain that that would bring to that small-business owner would be something that I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy, right? That is what really frustrates me with this whole thing.

There are solutions. You see, the people on the other side, it always seems to me, start from the position of “the employer is bad”. It’s almost like it’s another war on employers. It’s never-ending with this lot. It’s a war on employers, and, quite frankly, those of us who have risked our capital, and so forth, just get really frustrated by this—right?

💬 Hon Phil Twyford: “They should be allowed to steal.”

“Allowed to steal”—don’t you know there’s a law against stealing, and there are solutions?

💬 Hon Phil Twyford: “They’ve worked so hard.”

Oh, they’re very vocal on the other side of the House tonight. Am I saying something that’s upsetting them? I’m not really sure, but anyway.

Look, I just think it’s really important to say that we already have solutions here under the law. We don’t need to create more red tape, because all that’s going to do is just make it harder to be an employer—much, much harder to be an employer.

Actually, it’s interesting that the New Zealand Law Society even had some concerns. They actually had some concerns. They said that the use of “intentionally” could inadvertently lead to capture situations where employers are genuinely withholding paying employees—

💬 Camilla Belich: They said that was unfounded.

Well, this is the actual problem—right?—and that is that we do not want to—

💬 Camilla Belich: Officials said that was unfounded.

It comes down to a matter of interpretation. You see, at the moment, our court system is clogged up enough. If we’re going to put, potentially, more and more people into the criminal courts—so you’re that employer. You think you’ve done everything right. Suddenly, the police are knocking on the door, you then find yourself caught up in a criminal process, and you’ve got to wait and wait and wait, and the stress of having to deal with that and live with it is—

💬 Katie Nimon: And what that does to your reputation.

Exactly—as my good colleague here says, there is your reputation in the local community. You then go out to the market place to employ someone else. You go out to employ someone else, and, believe me, people talk, obviously. Are employees going to come and work for you if they think that you’ve been stealing from somebody else—and particularly when it’s all not proven and you’ve made a genuine mistake and you find yourself in front of the judicial system, waiting and waiting and waiting while having to deal with running a business? It’s just not good enough. That is why we are very much opposed to this bill. We actually trust employers on this side of the House.

As a farmer, I’ve had to put up with the fact that the regulators and the people on the left just don’t trust us. They haven’t trusted us for years. They keep on saying, “It’s all your fault.”, and this is another example of it where the left just do not trust employers.

💬 Hon Member: The blame game—they blame everyone.

Exactly—they blame us for everything. Well, actually, I’m sorry, but that is not the case. Employers in this country are the backbone of this country. They risk their capital. They make the difference and we are the ones who are about to turn this country around, and we will not be held up to be criminals because you might make a mistake which might be interpreted as a criminal activity—and that is what the problem is. That is why we are completely against this bill.

With that, before I finish, I’d just like to thank all the members of the select committee who were part of that process. In particular, I thank Camilla Belich, who read the motion, and I’d also like to thank the Hon Phil Twyford and a number of people who weren’t there at the time. There were my fellow colleagues on that select committee Parmjeet Parmar—[Interruption]—thank you for that—Mike Butterick, and it’s great to see you here this evening. But, actually—jeez, I just about forgot the chair. I’m in trouble now! I’ll have to get the afternoon teas for the next week or two or three. There was also our colleague Carl Bates, who was also on that select committee. Anyway, thank you. Therefore, I do not commend this bill to the House.

Tēnā rā koe, e te Pīka, otirā tēnā rā tātou e te Whare.

[Thank you, Mr Speaker, and greetings to the House.]

Before I talk about the legislation, I just want to give my sincere mihi to you, Mark. Our thoughts and prayers and karakia are with you.

I’d like to mihi to Camilla Belich for bringing this bill in. The Crimes (Theft by Employer) Amendment Bill amends the Crime Act 1961 so that if an employer refuses to pay their workers what they are owed, it is treated as theft. I’d like to also mihi to the many kaimahi throughout the motu and throughout our country who work tirelessly throughout the motu. It is already against the law for an employer to withhold wages. However, legally defining this as theft sends a clear message to any employer wanting to exploit and rip off their employees. Refusing to pay your employee what you owe them is no different to stealing money from their pocket, and it will be treated as such under the law. It also provides a clear direction for employees that they have a right to be paid what they are due and that that right will be enforced in law.

I take a short call today on behalf of Te Pāti Māori to say that Te Pāti Māori fully supports this bill. It would be a win for workers’ rights and undermine capitalist notions that the employer is above the law. Being able to charge employers with theft may have some benefit, but morally this just makes sense. Nō reira e tautoko ana a Te Pāti Māori i tēnei pire. [And so Te Pāti Māori is in support of this bill.]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’d like to acknowledge the originator of this bill, Ibrahim Omer. I think he is much missed in the House, and even though I was glad that Tamatha Paul won, his absence is still noted.

Just wanted to acknowledge the words of the previous speakers from National and ACT. I think they’re trying to create an impression—and I’d love to live in the New Zealand that they seem to think exists, in the kind of Platonic world where there is no kind of power imbalance between employers and employees. You know, most employers are good people; most employers do the right thing, and this is why this bill is so important because it’s the bad employers that don’t do the right thing that bring a bad name to the other ones. By not policing hard against those employers, we’re actually creating incentives for a race to the bottom.

The ACT speaker Parmjeet Parmar said that we were trying to solve a problem that we have a solution for, but that’s not really the case. In 2018, there were 20,000 cases of just migrant work exploitation; that’s not even covering the broader workers. That’s just migrant workers, alone. There’s been a kind of rhetoric from the other side that “Oh, well, we’ll just deal with the civil court system, OK? We’ll just deal with the normal processes; the civil court system will kind of fix this problem.”

Did the Government increase the legal aid funding so that people who are being exploited could take legal aid cases against employers? Did they increase the legal aid funding in the Budget? No, there were $3.1 million of reprioritisation, and one of the speakers quoted the Law Society earlier—I think it was Grant McCallum, the member from Northland. Let me quote what the Law Society said about the so-called reprioritisations: “We have been [very] clear about this with successive Governments now, and this year we [have] provided further evidence to show that the costs of providing legal aid are increasing, … Without fair remuneration, we will see a continuing reduction in the number of lawyers willing to provide legal aid. At a time when the judiciary is working hard to clear case backlogs, insufficient lawyers to assist the public will result in poor outcomes for families, individuals, and victims.” In the media release, they go on to talk about how legal aid is likely to be further stretched by the introduction of new offences such as those proposed in the gang legislation amendment bill.

I think that just goes to the heart of the issue, right? During question time we have Government Ministers kind of going with the rhetoric: “Oh, well, we’re the party for the working class, now, unlike you Labour, unlike you the Greens, unlike you Te Pāti Māori.” But, when it comes to bills like this, they actually expose the actual tension at the heart of their ideology and the actual reality beyond the rhetoric, which is that they’re not actually for the workers, you know? This is a very easy litmus test. Do we actually want to criminalise people who are exploiting employees? Well, the answer from the other side seems to be a chorus of, sadly, “No”.

We on this side believe in law and order—we believe in law and order. We believe in backing the blue and we believe in making sure that people who exploit their employees are rightfully punished with all the might and power of the New Zealand law. This is why I commend the bill to the House and I congratulate our comrades from Labour and Te Pāti Māori for supporting it.

Debate interrupted.