Nats Conference has started

National’s annual conference in Auckland started at 2 p.m. today. I’ve been up since Wednesday helping set things up (I sort of act as stage manager for them).

Superb speech by Roger Sowry on Labour’s proposed employment law changes. A nice quote:

“There are no scarier words for a businessperson to hear than ‘I’m from the Government – I’m here to help – and I’ve bought the CTU with me.”

And some examples of how the law change will affect business:

“Your business uses a cleaning firm to clean the building, and they do a lousy job. You re-tender the contract and award it to a new company. Under this law, the new company is required to hire all the staff who were previously doing a lousy job of your cleaning under the same terms and conditions.”

“An electrical contractor employs six electricians and decides to sell his business. According to the new law he will have to notify all his staff when he is thinking of selling the business, thereby giving them the opportunity to leave and establish their own business in competition before any sale can take place.”

Madness!