Don’t hold your breath

In the battle of bland versus boring, bland and boring won the election!

National and their partner/s will move quickly to remove some of the ideological based legislation that Labour brought in. Fair Pay Agreements will be scrapped; the restraint of trade bill will be dropped, and the 90 day trial period looks set to be extended to all employers.

Proposed changes to maternity leave sound sensible, and are sure to be supported by Act, given that the changes allow parents to have more say over who needs leave and when – all being about individual choice.

You’d have to be incredibly optimistic to think the minimum wage is going to move in this term, which does have an ideological basis to it. In the fantasy land of Act, we all have equal opportunity to better ourselves, and so if you want to earn more money, get more skills and do it.

Act, more than National, want to make various changes to how the Employment Relations Authority (ERA)works. Some ideas are plainly stupid, such as requiring decisions from the ERA within a month. They can’t meet the current timeframe of three months, so reducing that timeframe will achieve nothing.

But I would love to see accountability for ERA members. For example, the ERA member most successfully appealed within their three-year-term should not have their employment renewed. As it is now some ERA members are successfully appealed far more than others and yet somehow retain their position.

I won’t hold my breath.