Defence (Workforce) Amendment Bill

Members, we were up to call eight; that is the Labour Party call.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. This is the first time that I’ve spoken on the Defence (Workforce) Amendment Bill. It’s an interesting piece of legislation, and one that cuts across a number of core principles across Parliament, across the Defence Force, and, of course, around the right to strike.

Some may see this as a sensible thing, logical to those who might be involved in the Defence Force, but we’re talking about civilian staff who are critical to the operation of the Defence Force. We talk about this in education and in healthcare. In fact, part of the problem at the moment, through Government and its governance of this country, is that they have dismissed the value and the views of those support staff in both health and education—and, in fact, many of them have been laid off, and we’re starting to see the impacts of that, particularly across health. In this area of defence, there is an acknowledgment that civilian staff are critical—as we would know. In fact, if it wasn’t for them, then the defence of the bases that the military staff are in would be at risk, and many other support systems that, I’m sure, the other side of the House would know better than me.

What this does is, effectively, create a private army, because the Minister of Defence herself—or it might be himself; at the moment, it’s herself—would be able to authorise, in the event of strike action, the military personnel to step in. I think we’ve seen, across the globe, the dangers of the military stepping into what we would consider civilian operations, civilian responsibilities, and in fact the everyday operations of a normal community. When that occurs, it’s often in tumultuous times and times of internal conflict, which is pretty ugly.

What we’re talking about here is that when we have civilian staff—and I would say most of those working in the defence area, in the Defence Force, would be very, very responsible people, but if they get offered a zero percent pay increase and when the military personnel might have had probably a well-deserved increase, then what option do they have? In fact, at the end of 2024, last year, they had to take strike action to get the Government’s attention.

There is a process whereby the military could step in, where there is health and safety involved, to take over those roles and continue them, but the process is vetted by Parliament. I’d put to you, Madam Speaker, that that vetting system is appropriate for a country like ours that enjoys a very healthy democracy. In fact, we should fight very hard to ensure that those protections remain in place. This piece of legislation and the passage of it hands all that power over to the Minister of Defence.

I’ll read from the regulatory impact statement here that the Minister Judith Collins has reluctantly divulged—the Official Information Act, I’m sure, with some of it blacked out here. Can I quote: “The preferred option”—because, in fact, the Ministry of Defence recommended a tighter constraint on the Minister’s powers or the changes that were to be made to the existing legislation that does allow this to happen, but with additional checks; the Ministry of Defence was more cautious, but what we had was the Minister and Cabinet overriding it. “The preferred option”—this is Cabinet’s option—“would reduce the bargaining power of NZDF civilian staff taking industrial action, when compared to the status quo.”

This is just about union bashing. On the West Coast, when we would have people step in over the union, when a strike occurred, they’re called scabs. I would never want to call any of our military personnel scabs. But this is what would occur here at the Minister’s behest. I think if we were to ever create such terrible conflict, Parliament should authorise this; not the power of the Minister herself. This bill goes about two steps too far and, in my view and the view of the Labour Party, it is unnecessary.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Look, I’m happy to take a call on this. I just want to pick up on some of the scaremongering we just heard there. This bill doesn’t propose to allow the Minister of Defence to bring in military personnel to cover any striking action. Anyone who was listening to the last speaker, the Hon Damien O’Connor, might think that was what was happening. But I just want to be clear: this is in cases where the New Zealand Defence Force’s civil staff are taking industrial action. Now, there is already power to do this in existing legislation. This is expanding that to allow for situations not just of health and safety, as it is currently, but for national security and to ensure core defence outputs can continue to be maintained through periods of industrial activity by their civil staff. That is what we’re looking to achieve here. It fixes an anomaly, where Parliament may not be sitting, and I think it is a practical change, so we support this bill. Thank you.

Tēnā koe e te Māngai o te Whare i tēnei, te Wiki o te Reo Māori. Ngā mihi hoki ki te Whare e tū nei. Tēnā koutou katoa.

[Thank you, Madam Speaker, during this week, Māori Language Week. Many greetings also to the House that stands here. Greetings to you all.]

It is absolutely shameful that we are wasting our time by debating this totally unnecessary bill that takes rights away from New Zealand workers. Once again, a bill that limits the rights of New Zealand workers has been introduced by this Government to the House, and in very interesting circumstances, I have to say, because we were questioning the Minister of Defence under her other hat, the Minister for the Public Service, and we asked her: is she considering changing the right to strike for New Zealand workers? And she was very circumspect about that. She didn’t confirm or deny the fact that she may be doing that. But then when we come back to Parliament, we see this bill, the Defence (Workforce) Amendment Bill, limiting the effectiveness of New Zealand workers’ right to strike. These are not defence personnel. We are not talking about people in our military or people who have roles in our armed services taking strike action. No, this is when civilians take strike action.

This is what’s happening in the House today. Civilians taking strike action are being limited in the effectiveness of their work by this Government, and for what end? This, as we just heard the previous speaker say, is a law that already exists. In fact, it’s one that we traversed at length in December last year when the Defence Force offered civilian workers a zero percent pay increase. Unsurprisingly, they decided to take industrial action because a zero percent pay increase is not very satisfactory when you’re going through a collective bargaining round.

What happened then? The Minister came to this House, and she put this to the House, and we debated it. Obviously, that was a big imposition on her time, because this Minister has decided that spending that time justifying the use of defence personnel, who could be doing other work that’s important in the Pacific or around the world, into civilian jobs was not a good use of her time. Instead of just allowing that to take place, we had this bill.

What does this bill, essentially, do? It extends the period of time that the Minister doesn’t have to come to this House from 14 days to 30 days. What a petty little bill—a ridiculous thing to be spending time on that takes rights away from people, makes strike action less effective, means that any Minister of any party in the future can essentially send defence personnel into civilian work. My colleague on the other side said, “Oh, it’s not any work, it has to be for these very strict criteria.” Those criteria are so broad it could basically cover anything. If the operations of the Defence Force are under threat, then the Minister can deploy other workers into that position.

It is no surprise that we are seeing this type of action by the Minister. We know the Minister is considering limiting the ability of workers in other areas to take strike action. She will not deny it. Until she denies it, I have zero faith that this is not something that is under consideration. The fact that this bill is in this House tonight actually leads me to believe that this is something that the Government is considering doing in other areas as well.

So it’s no surprise. It’s no surprise when we see a Government that has actually made it harder for people to take partial strikes, meaning it’s more likely for them to take full strikes, meaning it’s more likely for this piece of legislation to actually come into effect. The Government is taking rights away from workers. At every turn, every sitting block, and every time we turn up to this House, another right is being eroded. This time it’s for the good people who work in our civilian defence force.

This is not something we can support, and I want to really want the Government to think about why they’re here when their priorities seem to be bringing tiny pieces of legislation that extend a power for two weeks to the House, wasting our time and taking rights away from the very, very good people who work in our Defence Force who have been acknowledged in this House a number of times.

I want to use my last few seconds to acknowledge the important work of the New Zealand Defence Force. They do a great job. They shouldn’t be sent in to do the work of striking workers by this Government.

Oh, well, wasn’t that a good go! Now, this bill gives the Chief of Defence Force the authority to act swiftly while still respecting workers’ rights. It’s about readiness, resilience, and putting people first. I commend the bill to the House.

The question is, That the Defence (Workforce) Amendment Bill be considered by the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee.

Motion agreed to.

Bill referred to the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee.

Instruction to Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee