Employment Relations (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill

I move, That the Employment Relations (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

I’d first like to just congratulate my colleague Tracey McLellan and also my colleague Emily Henderson for the work that they did on this most recent member’s bill that has just been passed. It’s a great day in Parliament where we can all come together and support a bill which is clearly very well needed within our society. Congratulations, my friend, and I’m very much hoping to have a similar experience with my bill today.

It is an unusual situation, as the member moving a bill, when you have to come to do the first reading or the second reading or the third reading and, despite the work that you may have done obtaining support for the bill, you stand up here and you do feel very vulnerable because there’s obviously no guarantee that the parties won’t change their mind. So I do feel slightly apprehensive, but, hopefully, confident that we can make this bill law tonight.

It is great to be in the House for a third reading of a bill that will make workplaces in New Zealand fairer. It hasn’t been a straightforward journey with this bill, and certainly starting out with it, there were absolutely no guarantees that we would be here today in the third reading. Even getting to this day has been a lot of work and has been contributed to by many different people not only sitting on this side of the House but also around the House. I want to thank those people for their support for this bill and for seeing how what is quite a simple change to the law may benefit New Zealand workplaces.

It is, as I said, a good day when we can come together to support legislation. Even though we have different politics, despite sometimes a very different vision we have for New Zealand, sometimes we do come together, and I hope that today we can do that again.

This process started in March last year with this particular bill, and so you can see how long it has actually taken to get to the third reading. Of course, prior to that, it was an idea that came from a briefing that was done at the Education and Workforce Committee, and we had a number of submitters to that bill—including the Human Rights Commission, who had done a study into the Pacific pay gap, and one of the key things that they found was that pay secrecy in New Zealand was really hampering the progress of New Zealand workplaces. I was very interested to see that idea and I thought that it was a very parliamentary way of determining a member’s bill for action—going through the select committee process, having an idea raised, seeing the benefit of that idea, actually looking into that idea more, and seeing that this type of legislation is actually quite common in overseas jurisdictions and that it has been used successfully for fairer workplaces.

That was where the idea for the bill originally came from, and having it drawn in March last year and then having the select committee—and I want to thank the members of the Education and Workforce Committee for the work that they did on this bill. I won’t go through all those changes again. We did make a number of changes that we were able to discuss when it came back to the House and also at a quite extensive committee of the whole House stage. I was certainly put through my paces during the committee of the whole House stage, and I hope that it gave members confidence to support this bill and, indeed, the work and everything that had gone into this particular bill and the thinking behind that as well. That, I think, was an interesting experience but I’m glad that we were able to go through that.

Making New Zealand a fair and equitable country that our children expect and deserve is a job for all of us. It means continuing with programmes, not only just this bill but also looking into programmes of pay transparency, also looking at tackling ethnic and disability pay gaps as well as gender pay gaps and genuine pay equity regimes. We have more work to do in this area.

I also want to just spend a bit of time saying thank you. I haven’t done this in other readings and I just want to acknowledge the work that many people have done in order to get where we are today.

I want to acknowledge two very strong women—Jo Cribb and Saunoamaali’i Karanina Sumeo—who are in the public gallery today. When I felt I was lost with this bill, these two people were the people that I turned to. If it passes tonight, it is in no small way due to the work that they’ve done, not only to support this bill but to support the passage of legislation and policy and changes that increase equity in New Zealand. They are two real champions, so thank you both so much for your support and it really means a lot that you’re here today.

I would also like to thank union leaders like Melissa Ansell-Bridges and the Council of Trade Unions lawyer Gayaal Iddamalgoda. Gayaal is such a smart lawyer and has so many good ideas and just works so hard, and I think a lot of it goes unnoticed. My friend, I wanted to acknowledge you here tonight and thank you for being with us.

I also wanted to acknowledge some people in my office, Adena Emanuel, Keeara Ofren, and Gina Anastasiadis-Lecatsas; also Benjamin Macintyre and Matt Swann; Kate Hutchinson from the Parliamentary Counsel Office; and Kelly Harris from the Office of the Clerk. Kelly Harris is probably the smartest person in the entire precinct, and we are so lucky to have her working in the New Zealand Parliament. I want to thank her for her work and I’m fingers crossed at least one of the members’ bills that she drafted for me will actually pass into law. Thank you so much to all of those people.

I do want this bill to pass, and so I don’t want to take too much time, but I really want to implore the House that we cannot keep taking steps backwards when it comes to equality and fairness. These are things that should be bipartisan. Backward steps for women, for Māori, for Pasifika are backward steps for all of us. Ignoring inequalities has never made them go away; it has just made them worse.

So yes, this is a small bill. It implements a small change that allows people to talk about their own pay, but it is a small step forward for New Zealand. If passed tonight, it will make New Zealand workplaces fairer and more open. I commend this bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise in very strong support of the Employment Relations (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill, and I commend the member for her leadership and for her tenacity in bringing this to the House. As she said, it was a very parliamentary way of doing it—to go through, to gather all of the evidence, and to gather support across the House. I want to also again thank submitters for their contributions, and all of the staff, the Parliamentary Counsel Office, and the Clerk’s teams for their support.

I joined the Education and Workforce Committee late in the processing of this bill, but it was a real pleasure to work through it and to read through the submissions to be able to understand the evidence that really compelled Camilla Belich to bring this to the House. It is a small change, as has been explained, and without pre-considering what the vote’s going to be, when this becomes law, it’s going to be a fundamental change, because it will actually enable all employees to confidently discuss their pay and terms and conditions with anyone that they choose to, without fear that doing so may cause some encumbrance in their employment—that they might have some negative impact or repercussions as a result of doing that.

Hopefully, this newfound kind of ability—some may not have even realised was a problem for them, because it is something that widely happens. However, I know that a lot of people are aware of those secrecy clauses in their contracts, and that makes them unwilling to discuss and disclose, and it does lead to that fear of some sort of reprisal should they discuss it. That fear leads to a bit of a feeling of unease and a little bit of mistrust, and it can perpetuate inequality.

We actually saw some of the international evidence; it’s quite compelling. So in the United Kingdom, legislation actually required that large employers actually publish their gender pay gap data. What that then did was it led to widespread internal reviews, pay adjustments for women, and a reduction in unjustified discrepancies. Sometimes, there might be a reason that somebody’s paid more than the other, and it may not be because of gender, but where you can’t justify why there is a discrepancy, then you should rule out gender as a reason. Once they did that, effectively shining the sunlight of transparency onto discrimination, it prompted real change.

That also happened in the United States. About 19 States and the District of Columbia have banned employer retaliation for pay disclosures; we haven’t banned it, but we’re, effectively, making it not work. When they did that in California, the transparency laws, effectively, narrowed the gender pay gap, and it, effectively, narrowed for gender but also minority groups, because those employees were actually exposed and understood and had visibility on disparities that they may not have otherwise known about.

Australia has also recently amended their Fair Work Act to ban pay secrecy clauses, giving workers more freedom to discuss pay and empowering them to address those inequities and be more open about it. Also, the European Union is introducing a directive requiring member States to ban pay secrecy clauses by 2026, expecting similar reductions in pay gaps and transparency to transpire as a result.

In our own country, as we’ve highlighted throughout this process, the gender pay gap and other pay gaps stubbornly persist. We know that, in Aotearoa, it’s presently 8.2 percent, but there’s a difference when we look at different ethnicities. It’s 21 percent for Māori wāhine, and 24 percent for Asian, and 24 percent for Pasifika women. Also, people with disabilities face significant wage disparities as well. Submissions highlighted the injustices of unequal pay for equal work; when there is no transparency, it can be difficult for that to be seen.

I know that, within my own profession, there is a large pay gap—a gender pay gap—between men and women who have the same professional qualifications, are employed by the same employer. The reason that’s persisted is because, despite the fact that there is a single employer collective agreement now—or what used to be called the MECA, or multi-employer collective agreement—individual pay contracts still persist, and they are secret. So nobody knows what the person next to them is getting paid, except for the clinical directors—they can figure out who gets paid what. That has had a real chilling effect, knowing that there is a secrecy clause in there. It can actually really chill any discussion and can be very difficult. Unless everybody agrees to do it, then it can’t work.

So what this bill and what this law will do is it will make sure that there are exclusions, as well. We wanted to be careful where there are business relationships that also cross over with employment relationships—for example, many general practitioners are owners of their practice and may have employees who work with them and alongside them or they may have some contractors, as well. The amounts of remuneration as a result of being a business owner are not included in those discussions, so it’s not something where we think that should be a part of it.

Accountants were another example, where those in the profession are working alongside people who are also owners. There’s a difference between those people who have taken the risk, often taken out mortgages or other lending, to be able be an owner and have more responsibility in the business, even though they might, on the face of it, on the day to day, be doing a similar job. We needed to protect that.

We also felt that we should highlight that nothing in this legislation requires that disclosures about payments are made, and no one can force you to tell them what you’re being paid. It’s also not OK to just go around and gossip about other people’s pay. It’s not about third parties. This, I think, goes alongside what the Government is also doing to move towards greater transparency and addressing the gender pay gap. Previously, there’s an app and tool that’s been generated and highlighted by the Hon Nicola Grigg, the Minister for Women, which gives businesses the opportunity to work out their own gender pay gap and then to be able to use that information to be able to figure out for themselves what they need to change, and make those changes proactively. I think that reflects an expectation on our side that most employers are trying to do the best for their people, but we would also highlight that we may give further consideration in the future to further reporting. Making it mandatory is still something that could be considered in the future.

I think, based on the evidence that’s gone through from this process, it’s pretty compelling that transparency of information leads to a better market. If you don’t have an equal amount of information, if you have unequal power within the system in the ways that are sometimes set up, then it can’t work properly and it’s an ineffective and inefficient market. So something that I’ll be absolutely championing is for that greater transparency to be something that is seen within our Public Service. I think that everyone who works for the public in New Zealand should know their level of pay—within a band, at least—and it should be publicly available. People should be able to know what we’re paying our public servants for. So the intentions of this bill actually are quite profound. It’s far-reaching; we’re reaching into the global movement. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of the Greens to speak in the third reading of the Employment Relations (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill. I extend my congratulations to Camilla Belich for shepherding this bill through the House—a second bill, if this passes, and I suspect that it will. So two for two—those are pretty good odds. I just acknowledge the work that it takes to actually get this across the line, being able to engage not just with Opposition parties but with Government parties as well, to get them to see the vision and to get them to see the possibility.

It was heartening to listen to the previous speaker, Dr Vanessa Weenink, and hear that, actually, that had landed with the National Party at least. Hopefully, this is a sign of things to come that the National Party will unhitch itself from the wrecking ball that is the ACT Party and the carnage that they have been causing across the workers’ rights landscape—and just to note that such is the opportunity that we have in members’ bills where we can actually loosen ourselves from our coalition agreements and actually look at bills on their merits. So, on that, it’s good to see that progress was made.

I did sub into the Education and Workforce Committee—when I wasn’t there, my colleague Francisco Hernandez was there—to be within the discussions and to highlight to people the importance of being able to share what you’re being paid, and it is to share what you are being paid but not to put pressure on others so that they share what they have been paid. As I was going through the Hansard of the committee of the whole House stage, that point was made by the member Camilla Belich over and over and over again—in particular, with regard to the Amendment Papers that were put up by the ACT Party—to actually focus on what this bill does, which is about allowing people to talk about what they’re being paid and to allow people to disclose that information, because, often, unbeknownst to them, people are actually being paid differently, and that exacerbates all the different pay gaps, as well.

I can’t see her, but I heard that Saunoamaali’i Karanina Sumeo is here in the gallery tonight. I remember, actually, when she launched the Pacific pay gap work, and how incredibly important it was because of the disparity between Pasifika workers and non-Pasifika workers, as well. So I wanted to acknowledge that important work, knowing that this is a step forward as well. I also note Gayaal Iddamalgoda from the Council of Trade Unions and his expertise, which he often brings to the select committee.

This is a step in the right direction. It’s a step in the right direction that I think will be welcomed by workers around the country as well, particularly within the context of where we are at this particular point in time, when we’ve had teachers striking, we’ve had nurses striking, hospitality workers are about to go on strike as well, and we’ve had Public Service workers striking, as well. So having this step forward—and the member did say that it was a small step, but I would say that it’s a significant step forward—will address those pay equity gaps in a small way. Of course, people have said, and I do agree, that there is still much work to be done to address the gender pay gaps, to address the Pasifika pay gaps, and to address the ethnic pay gaps, as well, but at least we can say that, in this House, if the votes go as I think we all think they will go, that step will be enshrined in legislation.

The Greens have been supporting this legislation through the first reading, the second reading, and also through the committee of the whole House, as well. It’s with pleasure that I also commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I’m taking this call on behalf of ACT, on the Employment Relations (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill. I want to start with acknowledging the member in charge, Camilla Belich. I know that she is quite excited today and I acknowledge that, but, from the start, we have maintained our position. We did try to work on this bill in the committee of the whole House stage. I will talk about that in a bit, but I want to say at the start that the ACT Party will not be supporting this bill.

We are not supporting this bill because this bill actually falls short of doing what the member in charge believes that this bill will do. So the member believes—and some other members who are supporting this bill—that this is somehow going to fix pay discrimination and this is going to somehow fix the gender pay gap, but we know that this bill will not do anything of that sort. This bill has no substance in it to make meaningful progress in that regard, and that is why the ACT Party is not supporting this bill.

I’ve heard members from all sides speak on this bill. I’ve seen so many different perspectives. The main selling point of the member in charge of this bill has been that it will reduce the gender pay gap. That has swayed some members to support this bill, but, on this side, we are very clear, because we want to see substance. We don’t want to see any symbolic gesture in a bill or in a speech. So we are not swayed—the ACT Party is not swayed—by any symbolic gestures. We want to see substance and we don’t see that substance in this bill.

I want to be very clear here that any discussion around the gender pay gap, around pay discrimination, is very important—undeniably important—and if this bill was doing anything in that regard, we would have thrown full support behind this bill, but this bill doesn’t do that. Actually, this bill is going to create a lot of problems at workplaces for employees and for employers as well. It’s not going to solve any problem.

As I said before, during the committee of the whole House, the ACT Party did try to improve this bill. We had a number of amendments on the Table and we debated those amendments during the committee of the whole House. I won’t go through them all, but I’ll just highlight one amendment to remind members of the kind of amendments we were putting forward.

One other thing that we all know is that the gender pay gap, yes, exists, and most people—those who are affected—are in that income bracket which is, I would assume, less than $180,000. So we had to put a figure, so we decided to put that figure of $180,000. That’s why we decided to put this amendment—this was under my name—to amend this main non-disclosure section. It said, “This section applies only in relation to employees whose total remuneration is less than $180,000 per annum.” If the goal of this is to help low-income earners to see that pay discrimination doesn’t exist there, then members would have voted in favour of this amendment. The member in charge, her party, the Labour Party, and the National Party did not support this amendment.

It’s very important to note that those who earn more than $180,000 per annum—maybe there is no direct comparison. Maybe there is no fair comparison amongst those people, because those people bring some specific skills that are required by that employer. Sometimes, those people might be people who are incentivised by the employer to move from one part of the country to another or they may be incentivised to move from another country to New Zealand. So there has to be some kind of incentive for these people—those who’ve come all the way to work in a new environment and a new place. It works for both the employee, if there are incentives to take up that opportunity, and for employers, because they get those skills that are needed to expand their business to support the economy to grow more jobs. This amendment was watered down. If it was important to fix the gender pay gap, then this criteria was something that was really important to be supported, but we can clearly see the priorities are wrong for the member in charge of this bill and those who watered down that amendment.

Now, the other thing is that this bill doesn’t provide any protection for employers, because there is this risk of them breaching the privacy of some employees. If one employee takes up an issue with the employer about another employee earning more than them, then that employer will be required to talk about other employees to this employee who has taken up a case with an employer, and without explaining that whole situation about the other employee, they will not be able to explain the situation. No protections here.

What we heard instead during the committee of the whole House was that there is already a power imbalance between employers and employees. We hear this again and again. Actually, in the real world, that power imbalance doesn’t exist; that power imbalance is a perception that is being created by the Labour Party and being created by unions. Employers need employees, and employees need employers. If employees are not happy with their employer, they look for other employment. If employers don’t like their employees, they will tell them that they need to improve, otherwise they will have to move on. So it’s a mutual relationship.

This is about agreement between employers and employees. What goes in that agreement should be about what employers and employees agree between them. Once they have agreed, then this bill says that this clause should not be enforceable even when this clause is in the agreement. How could we pass legislation in this House where we are telling people to breach their agreements? The ACT Party will never support legislation like this, which is allowing people to breach their agreements. This bill is completely going to erode trust and integrity that is needed at workplaces, because this mutual relationship is about trust and this mutual relationship is about integrity in workplaces.

I give another example. There could be somebody who is a young mum or it could be a dad looking after young children at home, but, really, somebody whose skills are needed by an employer. That employer will reach out to this person and say, “Look, you come and work for us. Whatever the standard pay is, we’ll pay you that.” But the person says that because of the cost of childcare, the person instead would rather stay at home and look after their children and spend quality time. To incentivise, the employer might want to offer a bit more than some other employees to compensate for their childcare so that this person can come and work for that employer. Now, the other person might have completely different circumstances, so there are so many situations where employers and employees will have to work out a situation which works for both. This is not theoretical, because this is going to have real-life implications. These implications are really, really serious.

We have been concerned about this bill from the start, but during the committee of the whole House, as we all have seen, we did put forward a number of amendments. Those amendments were watered down and there is nowhere that this bill is going to do anything that the member in charge believes this bill is going to do.

Let’s now talk about the voluntary nature of a disclosure. Well, that is already the case, but we still have a gender pay gap and we still have pay discrimination. So this is not a solution. This is not going to do anything in that regard. What this is going to do is actually create more friction at workplaces when somebody will say no to disclosing their pay, because now people will know there can’t be a non-disclosure clause in their agreement, so they should disclose, and, if they refuse to disclose, there will be friction at workplaces.

So agreements are very important. We want everybody who signs their agreement to oblige with their agreement. If they don’t agree with what’s in the agreement, they need to go back and talk about it again so that they can fix the agreement or review the agreement if their situation changes, but nobody should be undermining the agreement they have signed themselves, It’s not just about one clause that they will be breaching, because then how can the employer have trust in them for other clauses that are in the employment agreement? There will be no trust.

Being open about salary is completely different from trying to actually say something should be in the legislation but should not be enforceable. On the other hand, as I said, it’s something between the employer and employee. The circumstances can be quite different from employee to employee. An employer and employee should be able to work out what works best for them.

As I said before, this is not going to help employees, this is not going to help employers; it is only going to help unions. We want an approach that is grounded in reason. This bill is not providing that kind of approach. That is why the ACT Party is not supporting this bill. I want to put on record that the ACT Party has stated the negative consequences of this bill from the start. That is why we will not support this bill. Thank you.

I rise on behalf of New Zealand First, and we won’t be supporting this bill.

Hon Members: Oh!

Hon MARK PATTERSON: Well, it’s fundamentally—and I’m taking a bit of flak from my own side. But, fundamentally, this is an abomination—abomination. We are torching contract law. In fact, this bill did not get past first base with us as soon as we saw—and the point that Parmjeet Parmar has just made was that you’re, essentially, allowing employees to break contract law, and where does that end in this Parliament? Are there no lawyers left in the National Party? I see James Meager over there. Were you napping when this went through caucus? Where does this end if we, willy-nilly, are just passing legislation that allows people to flout contract law—and, as you can imagine, that didn’t get past the New Zealand First caucus; in fact, it didn’t get past first base.

That doesn’t mean that the intent of the bill is not a worthy one, but even by the proponent’s own admission, it would be at best a small step to addressing the gender pay gap that it purports to be trying to address. So it is quite a leap to say that this bill would do that—you know, it looks like it’s going to become law, so, hopefully, it does have some impact, against our belief that it would.

There are many reasons. The other thing is there are some intense unintended consequences to this. There are other reasons why you may have pay differentials between employees. It’s not gender necessarily, and, hopefully, it should never be gender. But it’s performance, merit, experience—all those things come into it. Is this bill going to have the unintended consequence of a chilling effect on paying at a rate on merit? On one side, maybe it does do what the proponent says and addresses that gender pay gap, but, on the other hand, there is the very real prospect that employers will just not want the grief of the tension that this might build up on their workplace as people, willy-nilly, are sharing their pay around their place of employment. So there could well be unintended consequences.

But all of that is around the margin. Our fundamental opposition to this is the sanctity of contract law. We will not put our name next to it, and I note that the ACT Party will not, either. We’re surprised that National has, but they’ve, obviously, gone along with that on this occasion. But, hopefully, this is not a trend in terms of flouting contract law.

That’s pretty much our position. It was pretty black and white on this occasion. We have supported a previous piece of legislation, which was the wage theft bill that Camilla Belich put through. Congratulations again, Camilla, on what—well, it’s Belich versus van Velden on the employment relations front, isn’t it, as to who can get the most legislation through. I know my experience, particularly on the wage theft bill—and I said this in the second reading—is that you’re very skilled at engaging with the other parties. These bills haven’t got through by accident. Somehow, you’ve managed to get the National Party to go against all reason and contract law, but you have not moved New Zealand First on this occasion.

Thank you, Madam Speaker, for allowing me to take a call on the Employment Relations (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill’s third reading. I was actually planning to just do a short speech saying I support, and sit back down; I’d asked for permission from Camilla Belich to see if I could do that and it wouldn’t offend her.

But I will take a slightly longer call than I’d expected, to refute some of the assertions that have been made, because I’ve actually seen the impact of pay transparency on overcoming pay gaps. I’m going to say it was an unusual workplace where I discovered the power of this, because it was when I was working as an executive assistant for the Green Party at Parliament that I discovered the power of pay disclosure.

Members here will know that, broadly, there are two kinds of executive assistants. There’s the political hack kind of executive assistant who’s, like, you know, good at politics but terrible at administration. Those executive assistants tend to come from the youth wing of the political party that they belong to. I was one of those political hotshots, those young hacks, political hacks. But there’s a second kind of executive assistant, the one who actually knows what they’re doing at the job. They’re really good at the administration side of things and they tend to have two or three decades of experience in the House. I think we’ve all come across that type in Parliament.

Now, we were at a meeting of the Green executive assistants and for some reason or another, I shared how much I was getting paid. It turned out I was getting paid more than a lot of the older women who’d been doing the job for two or three decades. They were on step 2, I believe, but I was on step 3. So from disclosing the fact that I was on a higher pay band than them, we were able to take action and work with our unions, work with the Public Service Association—the mighty PSA—and approach the Green leadership at the time by pointing out the obvious inequity at play: the fact that some young kid freshly out of the student association was getting paid like much more than someone who’d had two or three decades of experience. I think that actually shows the power of what happens if you actually are allowed to talk about your salaries. I mean, I don’t even know if we were allowed to; we just did it anyway. But, you know—

Andy Foster: Never work in the private sector.

FRANCISCO HERNANDEZ: I have worked in the private sector. But anyway, that just shows the power of actually sharing—what happens if you enable pay transparency and the importance of being able to actually protect workers’ ability to talk to each other, to share how much they’re getting paid, so they can take real action and overcome the pay gaps. Thank you.

I love members’ day. I love members’ day because you get a sense of individuality in this place that you don’t get on other days of Parliament. There’s no denying that we are a whipped Parliament. It’s not an issue with our party system; it’s an issue with MMP. It’s days like today we really get a feel for the individuality and the spirit of the members in our Parliament.

I do want to transition from this to congratulating my fellow Northcote constituent Camilla Belich for what is a really good, practical bill that we will be supporting today. It is a pleasure for us on this side of the House to support this bill. This bill, to me, is all about transparency, and I do wish to spend some time, in this place today, talking about the importance of transparency, because it is important, not just in the workplace but in all endeavours: business, politics, science, technology, and the like. The previous speaker was talking about his student politics experience—which is probably the only experience he’s got. Actually, in the business world where I came from, we have this concept called the fishbowl. It’s a pretty simple concept. It’s about visualising things in terms of a fishbowl that is transparent. Business, in commercial terms, will use that because when you visualise the fishbowl and you apply a lens of transparency, everybody can, actually get on the same page and understand what the issue is and what we are going to do about it.

I’ve seen, time and time again, right across my experience, the importance of transparency in shedding light on problems and shedding light on the challenges that workplaces and companies and organisations face and, actually, on what needs to happen. That is why transparency, I think, is essential for the running of organisations. It’s essential for families. Can you imagine if families didn’t have a certain amount of transparency in them? They wouldn’t function. We would be back in a caveman-like mentality of individuals out for each other.

Transparency has a very important place in the glue and the functioning of society. It also has an important place in the functioning of labour markets. This is a field I know well, having studied and practised as a labour economist, because the—

Hon James Meager: A small “l”.

DAN BIDOIS: A small “l”. That’s right, James Meager. Not to toot my own horn, but, actually, if you look at the concept of efficient labour markets, you really want a scenario where there’s a fair allocation of resources across an economy. That’s where labour resources, teams, staff, employees are allocated depending on their—

Tim Costley: Does that include EAs?

DAN BIDOIS: It would include EAs, and it would include student politicians on minimum wage rates.

Tim Costley: Not if they’re a man in the Green Party.

DAN BIDOIS: That’s right.

You really want to make sure that they are functioning right, and transparency is essential to the functioning of labour markets—for example, if a worker knows that they are worth more to another employer but doesn’t know what they can get or so forth, then how are they supposed to better their life and their circumstances? That’s actually what we call a misallocation of resources. It is, I think, through this lens that I come to this place and say that this bill adds to the well-functioning purpose of labour markets, and that is why we are supportive of it.

But also, I do want to talk about the fact that it’s really important to realise that there’s a lot of laws that are made in this place that aren’t actually adhered to in workplaces and throughout New Zealand society. I can tell you right now that there are a lot of people out there who discuss their pay already. It already happens. It may be in their contract. They don’t even know about it, but they discuss it because it’s what they do. They discuss it with their family. If they’re about to go for a new job and they go through a recruitment consultant, the first question the recruitment consultants asks is, “What are you currently paid today?”, because that’s what the new employee needs to know in order to actually encourage them to take a new job.

Also, when you’re actually going into a new employment situation, you actually are asked those very things. It already happens, and I just don’t think we should kid ourselves that 100 percent of compliance is adhered to throughout this place. There’ a lot of people that don’t actually obey the laws as they stand, because it just is ineffectual and it’s outdated and it doesn’t work for modern society. In those scenarios, I just think we should fess up to that fact and change the law. That is what my colleague Camilla Belich is offering today.

I know there are some coalition partners here that aren’t supporting the bill, and that is fine. I’ve got friends in both parties, and got the—

Andy Foster: Keep it that way.

DAN BIDOIS: Yep. “Keep it that way”, says Andy Foster.

But, you know, I do really think that ACT should be supporting this bill. I want to just take this House through a good book that I’ve read, a really good book I’ve just finished reading by Derek Quigley. Now, Derek Quigley—for this House—was a National Cabinet Minister under the Muldoon era. He was one of the first people—

Hon Mark Patterson: The glory days.

DAN BIDOIS: That’s right. He was actually one of the few people in that caucus that actually spoke out about the destruction that Muldoon was making to New Zealand’s economy.

But I digress. The purpose of why I say what I say is because Derek Quigley went on to later found the ACT Party. I read this book by Derek Quigley. It’s a great book, by the way. The Parliamentary Library’s got it.

Cameron Luxton: What’s it called?

DAN BIDOIS: It’s called Challenging the Status Quo. Derek Quigley yes, there you go. I actually think, from reading Derek Quigley’s autobiography, that he would support a bill like this because he is all about economic liberty—economic liberty. I would encourage my friends from ACT to adhere to the core values of the ACT Party and to get on their phone to David Seymour and encourage them to do a last-minute vote change on that.

Next, I want to attend to my very good colleagues in the New Zealand First Party. They said that it’s an abomination to contract law. I just want to say that there are lots of things in our employment contracts that are frivolous—absolutely frivolous. Let me run you through things that I’ve encountered: things like place of work. There are clauses in contracts that say, “Your place of work must be this building in Auckland.”, even though, in practical terms, the employer actually ends up spending most of their time in Hamilton or Wellington, but it’s in the contract. By definition, they break the contract.

Dr Vanessa Weenink: What if their job’s a travelling salesman?

DAN BIDOIS: Exactly. Hours of work: the amount of contracts I’ve seen that said, “Show up at 8.30.”, but the employer shows up at nine.

Cameron Luxton: A forgiving employer.

DAN BIDOIS: That’s right. A forgiving employer. I only say this in general terms to demonstrate that not everything that matters is in a contract and not everything that’s in a contract actually matters. This law really tries to address that. That’s really the purpose of—

Hon Mark Patterson: Break the law willy-nilly.

DAN BIDOIS: No, we don’t want employees to rewrite contracts as well. Let’s just get on with it. Maybe my friends in the New Zealand First Party can get on the phone to their leader and just say, “Look, maybe we should rethink this before the final reading.”

It is, again, a privilege to be speaking on members’ day. I really love these days. They give us a chance to test each other and to agree with the other side, which I don’t often do, but I see a lot of good colleagues from the other side. I would like to acknowledge, again, Camilla Belich and those in the gallery who have led the efforts in this space, and the select committee, ably led by my colleagues in the National Party. On that basis, I commend this bill to the House.

It’s such a pleasure to sit here and watch happy disagreement.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I too would like to start my contribution this evening by congratulating my colleague Camilla Belich on the work that she has done.

I’ve heard it said here a couple of times tonight that this is a small change, and I’d like to refute that because I think what is happening here tonight with the passing of this bill is a very large and big step forward for gender pay equity in this country. I think, as someone that has worked in this space for quite some time now, that we’ve had leaps forward and we’ve had massive leaps backwards, but I see this as one of those big leaps forward that we are taking here this evening.

I’ve also heard this evening that this could cause unintended consequences. I’d like to say that there have been intended consequences of pay secrecy for too long in this country, and that has been keeping pay levels at a rate that has caused mainly gender inequities here, and this is dealing with this today and putting something that has been wrong completely right. I’m very proud to be standing in support of such a good piece of legislation.

I’d also like to just comment to our colleague across the House Dr Vanessa Weenink: I’ve got some good news for you. Mandatory reporting has been in the Public Service for quite some time, which is why we have seen the gender pay gap really leap down and close up in the Public Service. Adding to the fact that adding—

Dr Vanessa Weenink: Not mandatory transparency, though; mandatory reporting, but not mandatory transparency.

Hon JAN TINETTI: Yeah, we don’t have conversations across the House. I can’t quite hear you, sorry, at this stage. But let’s carry the conversation on afterwards. My hearing is not quite so good at the moment, and I’m sorry about that. But what I will say there is that that is one of the reasons: putting that sunshine on it acts as a great disinfectant to the issue that we see here today.

I don’t want to take too much longer, other than to say that this is part of a pay transparency scheme that will make a big difference to this country. The last Government did introduce or announce a mandatory pay transparency reporting scheme. Business, unions, and Government stood up and said it is time for that to come. I challenge, now, the Government of this day to make sure that that pay transparency scheme is implemented in full, and that will make the biggest difference to women’s pay in this country.

Excellent, thank you, Madam Speaker. Like my colleague from Northcote, it’s great to have an opportunity on members’ day to speak on the Employment Relations (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill especially in the third reading, and, of course, the bill is in the name of Camilla Belich. As other of my National Party colleagues have already indicated, we are supporting the bill. It would’ve maybe added a little bit more excitement if we could’ve kept it secret right to the end of the speeches, but I appreciate that might be a little bit nerve-racking for the member, so we put her out of her misery in the second slot of this debate.

This bill has been examined by the Education and Workforce Committee—not that I sit on that committee, but I do hear it’s a hard-working committee. I think that’s what every committee says, but I would commend them for the job that they have done on this bill.

Of course, this bill does amend section 103 of the Employment Relations Act. Currently in our country, many employment contracts can contain terms that prohibit employees from discussing or disclosing their pay to others, whether that be colleagues, family members, friends. These pay secrecy clauses have been permitted, and breaching them can lead to disciplinary action or even dismissal. Even without such contractual clauses, some employees still may find disciplinary action for discussing their pay. I do want to point out that the exact number of times this has happened in New Zealand is unclear, and it hasn’t really been provided in all the stages up to now, including in the select committee. [Interruption] I hear there’s a bit of heckling from the side, but that doesn’t really matter.

Additionally, this may cause a bit of disharmony in some workplaces as the reason people can get paid differently can be for a wide range of reasons, such as experience, speed, friendliness to customers, and an individual worker might not really consider themselves better or worse, but some are more beneficial to businesses than others. It can lead to some awkward conversations when you might have to tell someone, “Well, actually, you’re not as great as you think you are.” You just need to get out and have those difficult conversations, because there’s nothing that wrecks a work environment more than, actually, someone thinking that they’re treated unfairly or they’re not getting paid their fair amount. Even in that case, it doesn’t mean we should have pay secrecy in contracts, because they can also have detrimental coincidences.

Of course, one is the gender pay gap. How do we know if certain groups are getting paid differently if we don’t have that transparency? I will note that, under the last National Government, the gender pay gap decreased by about 3 percent; since 2017, that’s only decreased by about 1 percent. This is where a lot of proponents are championing this bill, not that it actually explicitly mentions the gender pay gap. As I mentioned earlier, the effects of this are a little bit unclear because we don’t really know how much impact this really has, but, potentially, it may help, and I think that’s probably what we should do.

Its core objective is very simple: to make it safe for employees to discuss and disclose their own pay if they choose to do so. As I mentioned, it will amend the Employment Relations Act to provide protection to employees who do choose to do that. They’re not forced to, but if they choose, there will be that protection. The bill achieves this by introducing new ground for personal grievances, which is adverse conduct for disclosure of pay.

I think we’re going to pass this into law tonight since there does seem to be quite wide support, except for ACT and New Zealand First, but I think we should also be very mindful that we have to be careful when it comes to personal grievances that there aren’t frivolous claims, because these can cause a lot of problems for small businesses. Hopefully, the member sponsoring this bill, at some stage, will look into that that as well.

Really, what does this mean in real terms? It means if some good constituents of the mighty Ilam electorate go to one of the many great pubs that we have in the Ilam electorate, whether it be the Elmwood Trading Company, which is one; Misceo; Tavern Harewood; Bishop Brothers; Aikmans; the Merrin Street Brewery; Avonhead Tavern; The Foundry; The Craic, The Brewers Arms, Mayor Of Ale, the Bush Inn hotel. I mean, there’s probably—

Hon Member: If you miss one, you’re going to be in so much trouble.

Dr HAMISH CAMPBELL: Yeah, if I’ve missed one, I’m going to be in a lot of trouble. But there are many great pubs in the Ilam—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: This is where they’re going to get paid, right?

Dr HAMISH CAMPBELL: Yeah, ha, ha! So when some of my great constituents go into one of these many fine establishments, have a few beers or a few wines after work, and talk—

Hon Member: Non-alcoholic.

Dr HAMISH CAMPBELL: —non-alcoholic, or low-alcoholic—about what they get paid, what their conditions are like, it means that they won’t get fired. I think that is a very important thing.

Also, pay secrecy leads to some really interesting kinds of situations, if you think about it. Of course, I have two young kids. They’re not quite at working age, except one did try and invoice me for some of the work she’d done around the house, but that’s another story. But when they are at the working age, I want them to be able to come and tell me what they’re getting paid, and I think that is kind of a normal thing that families do. So it does seem a little bit ridiculous that someone could be, potentially, fired for telling their parents what they get paid. So this does bring a little bit of common sense into the law.

Employers probably have a fairly good idea what different employers are paying, and transparency is good. So the thing is, if the employer can have a rough idea, I think it’s good that employees also know what others are getting paid.

I think I will just kind of stress that this bill ensures that these protections apply broadly. An employee will be able to discuss their pay with a whole range of different people and it protects them, but it also kind of means they can talk about a whole range of things, not just their direct pay but some of the other conditions that they may have.

So what do we consider is adverse conduct? It’s clearly defined, and that would be if someone did disclose, they can’t be dismissed; an employer can’t refuse to offer that employee the same terms, conditions, benefits, or opportunities as others in similar circumstances; and subjecting the employee to any kinds of detrimental things that would negatively affect the employment, job performance, or job satisfaction. It covers not just salary and wages but also overtime allowances, productivity-based payments, bonuses, commission, and employer contributions to superannuation and those sorts of things as well.

Of course, what we have already heard is it does exclude any benefits received as an owner of a business, because, of course, owners of businesses do take that risk. Often, many small-business owners may mortgage their house to have a business, and, of course, they’ve taken that risk and they do need probably a little bit of extra reward.

Once again, it does not create any obligation for an employee to disclose their pay, because some people don’t want to disclose what they’re getting paid, and that’s completely fine. Probably, in polite society, it’s not really considered polite to actually ask what someone gets paid. So this bill is not going to force anybody to disclose any information that they don’t really want to disclose.

Of course, we’ve already heard about the international experience supporting this approach. Other jurisdictions—including Australia, parts of Canada, the United Kingdom, parts of the USA, and the European Union—will also ban pay secrecy clauses by next year. So we are moving to address this issue and aligning with international best practice, which I think is a good thing.

I do believe that, during the select committee process, approximately 89 percent of submitters expressed their support for this bill; there was 4 percent opposing it. Submitters largely agreed that greater transparency will help with existing pay gaps. The concerns raised by opponents included things such as workplace friction, privacy implications. These were partly addressed by clarifying the voluntary nature of disclosure. I appreciate ACT is holding a different view, New Zealand First are not supporting it, and I do believe they can argue that pay is a private matter and existing labour laws offer significant protection. I appreciate that that is a view. There were concerns from some businesses about—

The member’s time has expired. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I first came across this practice of secrecy over pay coming out of Australia, and I think these things tend to come in big international waves, actually. A new trick emerges, and this particular prohibition on people talking about pay really is something that has no place in New Zealand, where we tend to try and be fair and reasonable in our employment relations. It’s absolutely fair that if I’m being paid a certain amount, I get to talk to people about that. That is a freedom of speech issue—that is about where the line stops. I think it’s an incredibly important principle that we’re adopting tonight, and I congratulate Camilla Belich on bringing it to this House and getting the agreement of the National Party to support this bill.

I just wanted to say that, as an employment lawyer, what I saw a lot was how there was no justice in pay. People who have not got a lot of confidence don’t get paid as much as somebody who is doing a job that is either the same or not as good, and I saw that over and over again play out, and I particularly saw it with women. I saw it with high-paid women who still did not have the confidence to actually demand that they were paid as much as their male colleagues, and I saw male colleagues who had been schooled in confidence from a very early age demand pay that wasn’t perhaps warranted if you looked at the productivity or the quality of their work. Now, that actually happened in my practice.

I hope that this shines a light on that situation and makes people think twice before they treat people in discriminatory ways. I commend the bill to the House.

I was looking forward to a full five-minute contribution from the member Helen White. As a former employment lawyer, I thought she would have had five minutes of material to give on this legislation, and, actually, I was even prepared to yield five minutes of my time to her if she wanted to take the full time to talk on it. But that’s OK; I’m prepared to take my opportunity on this.

It does give me great pleasure, on behalf of the National Party, to stand and speak in favour of the Employment Relations (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill. There has been robust debate just on this side of the House on the legislation. There’s a lot of collective agreement on one side, and a bit of robustness on the other side. But that’s OK—that’s part of politics. It’s all part of the game, and it’s good to have that out. Particularly on members’ day, it’s a good opportunity for us to talk about our legislation and our National Party position on the bill.

Today, we are passing the bill. Credit to Camilla Belich for shepherding it through first reading and through the select committee stage. I want to pay particular credit to Vanessa Weenink, who’s sitting next to me, who has been a big champion on your behalf, within the National Party, on this legislation as well, but you had the forethought to begin with to have this legislation and then to carry it on.

Arena Williams: Who was mean to you? I’m sticking up for you.

TOM RUTHERFORD: I’m hearing Arena Williams, but I’m not sure what she contributed to the bill. She might take the 11th speech, potentially, but we’ll just wait and see.

After thorough examination by the Education and Workforce Committee, we in the National Party believe the bill is ready to become law. We have always supported this bill—through the first reading, all the way till tonight—because it promotes fairness and transparency in the workplace. I think there’s a bit of doomsday rhetoric that’s been going around, around what this potentially might mean, but, ultimately, it’s coming back to promoting fairness and transparency in the workplace.

Let’s be clear: currently, employees can face disciplinary action for discussing their pay with their colleagues—they can at the moment. The Human Rights Commission found that 44 percent of people said they had been paid less than someone for the same job. Now, this bill’s not specifically focused on pay equity per se, but that is a flow-on effect from this legislation, without a doubt. It’s not necessarily descriptive in the title of the legislation, but that is a flow-on ramification from it.

The most common reasons that we know of why people are paid less are based on their experience, their age, their gender, and their ethnicity. What this law is going to achieve is it’s going to give employees the right to discuss and disclose their own pay rate to others without facing any repercussions. The bill protects employees from adverse conduct like dismissal; reduced opportunities, whether that’s—

Dr Vanessa Weenink: Forced retirement.

TOM RUTHERFORD: —to other roles, promotions; forced retirement, as Vanessa Weenink says; or other detriment for discussing their pay. This doesn’t force anyone to disclose it, though; it simply removes the ability for employers to prohibit it.

So let’s be really clear: just because this will come into law and it will enable people to discuss their pay, there’s no requirement for people to actually have to do it. It is a personal choice, personal responsibility. It’s one of our core values in the National Party that people know what’s best for them, and if they feel comfortable to discuss what they are earning with their colleagues in the workplace, then they can do it. But if the person sitting next to them does not feel comfortable to do so, they are under absolutely no obligation whatsoever to have to do that.

That is really, really important, because we’ve heard this doomsday rhetoric that suddenly there’s going to be mass meetings of people talking about it, saying “What do you earn, and what do I earn?”, and all of this, but, actually, that’s not the case. It’s not going to be the case at all; it’s only if you feel comfortable. There’s no pressure and there’s no requirement on anyone, and, ultimately, as we know, knowledge is power in pay negotiations. Employees need information to advocate for fair compensation for what they earn.

There are a number of other points. This is bringing New Zealand into line with other countries around the world. We like to compare ourselves with some of our close friends. Let’s look at Australia: they’ve got legislation similar to this. The UK and Canada and some US states also have legislation relatively similar to this, as well. So we’re simply bringing New Zealand into 2025 and beyond, as well.

This is a really positive step. We in the National Party believe in fair pay for fair work, regardless of your gender or your ethnicity. This is about fairness, transparency, and ensuring all New Zealanders can negotiate from a position of knowledge about their work in the workplace. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take a call on this bill. Can I begin by congratulating my friend and colleague Camilla Belich on another important bill passing through this term of Parliament. It’s been an absolute delight tonight to hear the National Party embrace the spirit of the Employment Relations Act and celebrate this bill. I even heard the previous member talk about fair pay. In fact, I almost heard him say “fair pay agreements” and wouldn’t it be wonderful for them to have a revelation on that tonight as well.

The spirit of the Employment Relations Act actually acknowledges the inherent inequality between employer and employee which is spelt out in that Act, and which comes to the heart of this bill. In my previous life when I worked as a union organiser—and I’ve told the story in the House before, but I will repeat it tonight—I used to represent female-dominated workers in retail, and in some of our largest retailers.

There was one particular retailer that despite having a collective agreement, still had a very strange pay scale that meant it was difficult to interpret what everyone was being paid. I remember visiting the site in Blenheim and talking to some of the women who told me their boss had told them they couldn’t talk to each other and tell each other what they were being paid. So even though there was actually a collective agreement in place designed to have that transparency, designed to have that fairness, the employer had still managed to find a way to instil fear within the women, the predominantly women-dominated workforce, so that those women did not feel comfortable talking about their pay. There was actually nothing in their agreement that said they couldn’t, and, at the time, I made it very clear to those women that they could and they should talk about their pay to ensure that they were all being treated fairly in the workplace.

This is a sensible bill, it’s a practical bill, it makes sense, and it’s common sense. It’s wonderful to have the National Party supporting it. It’s disappointing that ACT and New Zealand First are not seeking to be part of the harmonious actions of the House tonight, but I congratulate Camilla Belich again on another fantastic bill. I commend this bill to the House.

I rise to speak on the third reading of the Employment Relations (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill. As a Government MP, I want to acknowledge the intent of this bill, its progress through the House, and the work that has gone into it at each stage.

Now, this bill has had a clear and consistent aim, which is to reduce the information barriers in workplaces that may allow pay iniquities to persist. Specifically, this bill will amend the Employment Relations Act to protect workers who wish to voluntarily disclose their pay—now, underscore: who wish to voluntarily disclose their pay to colleagues and prevent contractual clauses that prohibit those discussions.

This bill was introduced actually quite some years ago as a member’s bill and passed its first reading in 2022. It was then considered by the Justice Committee in 2023. That committee heard a wide range of submissions from unions, to employment groups, to academics, to business representatives—and I must acknowledge some of the important people sitting in the gallery today. The committee then reported the bill back with a majority recommending it to proceed, although noting a range of reservations about its scope and practical application in reality. We are now at the third reading, finally, in 2025 and the final stage before it becomes law.

I do want to take some time to highlight the National Party and the National Government’s track record in this, and I need to place on record our longstanding commitment to addressing inequity in the workplace, particularly in pay gaps. It was a National Government that introduced mandatory pay gap reporting in the public sector. It was a National Government that legislated for superannuation payments for women. It was also National who introduced the Equal Pay Act, helped establish the Equal Opportunities Trust, and advanced initiatives like Women in Trades and the Future Directors programme. We also amended the Human Rights Act to strengthen protections against discrimination.

Under the last National Government, the gender pay gap actually reduced significantly, from 12 percent down to 9.7 percent in 2017. Since then, despite many promises and some actions, the reduction has been minimal but still successful, with the gap now sitting around 8.6 percent today.

This is why the National Government has acted, including developing a voluntary pay gap calculation tool which allows businesses across New Zealand to measure and report on their pay equity with consistency and accuracy—finally producing data that is available in the market for employers to compare, for sectors to compare, and also for employees to have a fair comparison. I have to take the opportunity now to thank the Minister for Women, the Hon Nicola Grigg, and her office, for all that work.

Now, back to the work, particularly on what the select committee have done on this bill. The select committee have worked hard to hear from a wide spectrum of voices. Some examples: unions have strongly supported the bill, noting that pay secrecy clauses often prevent women and minority groups from challenging inequitable pay.

Employer groups, however, have raised valid concerns, such as Business New Zealand, which warned of potential unintended consequences once this bill becomes law, such as tensions in workplaces between employees or workmates where remuneration reflects factors way beyond just a base salary—for example, performance incentives, experience, location, specific projects that people are working on, or other specific considerations for the specific employee that is not otherwise mentioned or widely known within employment.

The Law Society also presented and raised questions about whether this bill might interact with existing contractual confidentiality provisions in ways that may need careful monitoring, going forward. The departmental report acknowledged that while pay secrecy clauses are not a widespread phenomenon in New Zealand, their existence can contribute to pay inequities. Evidence from other jurisdictions, particularly Australia, shows that removing secrecy clauses does support pay transparency and can, over time, reduce inequities.

Now that we’ve talked about Australia, let’s look at other places too, because this is not an isolated move from New Zealand. Across the OECD countries, there is a clear shift toward a greater transparency, particularly with our pay. Australia has already moved to prohibit pay secrecy clauses in employment contracts as part of its 2022 reforms. In the European Union, countries have moved to a pay transparency directive that now requires large employers—now note: the large employers—to provide salary range information that allows workers to request pay data. In the United Kingdom, mandatory gender pay gap reporting has been in place for years, covering organisations with 250 or more employees.

Now, New Zealand should not fall behind. Our businesses compete internationally for talent. We are a migrating country, and we need workers to expect pay transparency with their remuneration as part of the modern workplace culture.

That said, a balanced approach, it is also worth keeping in perspective. This bill will, hopefully, close some gender pay gap, but I also note that pay gaps are influenced by such a wide range of factors, including—like I said a bit earlier—the years of experience, etc., but also including occupational segregation or location of work or career interruptions. As a mother, when I had to take maternity leave, of course those considerations pop into my mind and I struggle with them. Career interruptions are a part of why we have a pay gap between employees, but there are also broader societal expectations and many come into play when an employer or an organisation determine the remuneration package for any employee.

What this bill will do is to allow employees to have that open conversations if they wish—and to underscore: only if they wish—without fear of breaching their contract with their employer. I believe that this is a modest but also a very important step going forward.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank the Education and Workforce Committee; particularly to thank the member in charge, Camilla Belich, for bringing this bill to the House, and also to all the hard-working select committee members—from the top of my mind; please excuse me if I have missed anyone—and that includes chairperson Katie Nimon, Carl Bates, Mike Butterick, Grant McCallum, Dr Vanessa Weenink, Parmjeet Parmar, of course Camilla Belich before the bill, but also I believe Shanan Halbert and a number of other MPs from across the House.

Dan Bidois: Willow-Jean Prime.

NANCY LU: And thank you, Willow-Jean Prime—thank you, Dan Bidois, for reminding me—for all the work.

Hon Member: Phil Twyford.

NANCY LU: And Phil Twyford. Who else? Who else?

Hon Members: Reuben Davidson.

NANCY LU: There are many members—Reuben Davidson. There are many members, as you can see. As you can see, many members are very interested in the bill and to make sure that they have contributed to this bill.

As the last speaker on the third reading of this bill—and I know that I’m the person keeping the member in charge on the edge of her chair—the National Party will support this bill at the third reading. We do so because it aligns with our long history of advancing fairness and pay equity in the workplace.

We do recognise the limitations, and we are conscious of the reservations raised during the select committee stage, and we will continue to monitor the implementation very, very closely, but we acknowledge the transparency and fairness and equal opportunities that are in the right direction for New Zealand workplaces. I support this bill because it’s giving New Zealanders confidence that their hard work will be valued fairly.

Thank you, Madam Speaker, and thank you to the member who has resumed her seat, Nancy Lu, for that magnanimous speech about what is a bill that we can all be proud of in this House. This is an important moment of bipartisanship which extends a proud record of Labour and National women working together to advance the position of working women in Aotearoa: 150 years of that legislative history where women in this House have come and have brought bills that have slowly stepped out the rights of women to a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work.

I want to acknowledge the work of Dr Vanessa Weenink for being a champion within her caucus for that. It is not an easy thing to go to caucus and to stand up for something which is right, to stand up for a principle that we all should agree on in this House, in the face of the party politics which go on in here.

Everyone knows that it is very challenging as a member to bring a member’s bill and to seek support for this. I want to really underscore—as Nancy Lu would say—the important work that Camilla Belich has done here to bring a bill which finds that common ground. To etch out the things which all parties in this House can support, can agree on, can find something to find some good in is not easy work, and we must do it every day.

This is important work—some of the most important work that we do as parliamentarians—and Camilla Belich is the master of that. If anyone knows Camilla, they will know that this bill here, which is about protecting those workers who are diligent, who are honourable, and they are very honest, and so they are following the letter of the law—that is Camilla Belich. She is someone who gets up every day and makes sure she is doing exactly what is expected of her to serve her country and her caucus and the people she represents. This is exactly the kind of bill for someone like her that would stick up for someone who cannot raise issues at a workplace. This is perfect; this is a perfect example of a bill which we have managed to agree on tonight because of somebody putting in the work to do it. Congratulations to Camilla Belich. Congratulations to everyone who has voted for it. I commend the bill.

I declare the House in committee for consideration of the Companies (Address Information) Amendment Bill.