Labour confirms national awards will be compulsory

The Herald reports:

The Government is giving assurances that industry-wide strikes will not be possible under its proposed Fair Pay Agreements, which would set minimum standards across entire industries.

The agreements represent a major change to the workplace and have been hailed by unions, but criticised by the National Party as taking industrial relations back to the 1970s.

Workplace Relations Minister Iain Lees-Galloway has assured businesses that the agreements – which could include pay rates, weekend rates, hours per week – would not allow workers to have industry-wide strikes.

“Business NZ was very concerned about industry-wide strike action, so there will be no mechanism for striking if you’re pursuing a Fair Pay Agreement.

 “The flipside is that if the parties can’t agree, there will need to be some form of arbitration to make a final decision.”

This is arguably worse than strikes. At least with strikes the employer still gets to decide whether to give in to the demands or not. What Labour is proposing is that the de facto national awards will be imposed on an industry against their will. Even if not a single employer agrees to the demands, the unions can then just go to a friendly arbitrator and get it imposed.

This is the most radical change in labour laws in a generation. The law is that all collective agreements must be agreed to by both employers and unions. This changes that – it means employers no longer need agree.

These changes are all about lining the pockets of unions, who can then increase their funding of the Labour Party.