The Government has ended the year with a flurry of proposed changes to employment laws.
1News explains what New Zealand’s workers can likely expect for 2025.
An income threshold for unjustified dismissal claims
The Government will make changes through the Employment Relations Amendment Bill to stop anyone earning more than $180,000 a year from making unjustified dismissal claims.
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden announced the threshold late last month, saying it would “provide greater labour market flexibility, enabling businesses to ensure they have the best fit of skills and abilities for their organisation”.
The current law is so confusing employers are forking out billions in back pay to workers for miscalculated earnings. (Source: 1News)
“Workers who are wanting to move up the career ladder and be considered for more challenging positions will benefit from this policy,” she said.
“[It] allows employers to give workers a go in these high impact positions, without having to risk a costly and disruptive dismissal process if things don’t work out.”
Public Service Minister Nicola Willis revealed new guidance for agencies today, but not everybody is happy about the signalled shift. (Source: 1News)
Reduction in personal grievance payouts
Nearly a week after revealing those plans, van Velden said the Government would also be looking to remove remedies for poor employee behaviour or performance.
The forthcoming update to the Employment Relations Act would give more consideration to employee behaviour when awarding remedies in a personal grievance case, van Velden said.
The proposed changes include:
- Removing all remedies for employees whose behaviour amounts to serious misconduct
- Removing eligibility for reinstatement in a role and compensation for hurt and humiliation when the employee’s behaviour has contributed to the issue
- Allowing remedy reductions of up to 100% where an employee has contributed to the situation which gave rise to the personal grievance
- Requiring the Employment Relations Authority and Employment Court to consider if the employee’s behaviour obstructed the employer’s ability to meet their fair and reasonable obligations
- Increasing the threshold for procedural error in cases where the employer’s actions against the employee are considered fair.
After pioneering on the working from home space with more than a thousand remote employees in early March 2020, One NZ is calling staff back to the office at least three days a week. (Source: 1News)
Return of pay deductions for partial strikes
Meanwhile, a bill to bring back pay deductions for partial strikes was introduced in Parliament this week.
A partial strike is a form of industrial action where employees still work but either reduce their output or refuse to perform certain duties. The Labour-led government removed employers’ ability to reduce pay over partial strikes in 2018.
The coalition Government’s proposed partial strike changes mean employers could either reduce an employee’s pay by a proportionate amount or deduct 10% of their wages.
“While I recognise the entitlement of employees to strike in support of their collective bargaining claims, the disruption to public and customer services that has resulted from partial strikes should not continue without consequence,” van Velden said.
The New Zealand Council of Trade Unions (NZCTU) said the proposed law change could force workers to fully withdraw labour in an employment dispute, which would escalate those situations.
The union was also concerned the law change could punish workers who were just doing the job they were employed to do.
Changing tack on Holidays Act reform
Finally, van Velden revealed today a change in direction for the reform of the Holidays Act.
She said recent targeted consultation on an exposure draft bill indicated it wouldn’t solve the issues of the Act.
“It has become clear that a fundamental change is required to give employers and employees the simplicity and certainty they have been calling for,” she said.
Officials have now been asked to work on an hours-based accrual model for annual leave.
Business NZ welcomed the change.
“The move to hours-based accrual reflects the fact that the way we work has changed massively since the 1940s, when the current weeks-based approach was introduced,” chief executive Katherine Rich said.
“Variable patterns of work are the norm in today’s working world, and hours is the basis on which most leave is now administered.”
But Labour’s Workplace Relations spokesperson Camilla Belich said the move was a continued attack on workers.
“Brooke van Velden has dramatically dumped six years of work in an ideological attack on workers’ rights,” she said.
“With the Holidays Act being one of the biggest concerns for business, scrapping work on the legislation leaves both workers and business with no certainty over the future.
“This work was a collaboration with businesses and employees to get the settings right. The Government is once again taking us backwards because it’s more interested in protecting the rights of big business rather than working people.”
