That’s a wrap on the first half of the year. This month, there’s some industrial action and settlements to note, Fair Pay agreements are in Select Committee, our economy has officially contracted since the beginning of the year and I have provided you with a template for business continuity planning for industrial action. That’s a lot to take in!
As always, everything you need to know in this space has been summarised for your reading pleasure.
1. Industrial Action Activities
- 100 E tū members at ETEL Transformers took action early in June to bring an offer for Living Wage from December forward to June. The parties have now settled and ratified.
- Ongoing industrial action has commenced on 13 June by NZPFU members of FENZ. They are still responding to emergencies, and most of the partial strike relates to training and incident reporting.
- E tū members at Assa Abloy withdrew their labour for 24 hours over an increase “not much higher than CPI”.
2. Settlements
- School administrators are the latest to settle a pay equity claim with the Ministry of Education, with new rates back-dated to from 20 August 2021.
- FIRST Union members and Farmers have agreed new rates above the current Living Wage.
- DHB Allied Health employees have ratified the settlement offered with a 98% majority. A link to the offer for settlement can be found in our May Collectively.Thinking.
3. Fair Pay Agreements
Now that the Select Committee process has commenced for the Fair Pay Agreement legislation, there is a bit more noise around this. Including Business New Zealand’s challenge with the International Labour Organisation that FPAs are breaching freedom of association. Part of their campaign included information that was misleading. The ILO has declined to recommend any action from this.
4. Public Sector Pay Proposal
The CTU has put a proposal forward to the Government to consider a public-sector wide pay adjustment, covering all Government employees – doctors, nurses, teachers, public servants etc. The Government has confirmed that they are considering this. While collective bargaining would still be necessary at an agreement level, this could be very interesting to see how it pans out.
5. Just how cooked is the economy right now?
Economist Brad Olsen has written this article off the back of the March quarter GDP announcement earlier this month. He’s very straight talking and weighs up all the facts across the market right now. Kiwis are still spending but let’s see how long that will last! Numbers like this tend to cause individuals and businesses to tighten their belts.
6. Business Continuity Planning
Having read all of the above, you may be now wondering how exposed your organisation is to industrial action. We have considered the Importance of Business Continuity Planning for Industrial Action in a recent article and also provided a planning template that can be used as the basis for discussion with your business leaders.