This is just stunning:
Mr Key was yesterday questioned about an employment situation where a person was offered a job paying $40,000 a year and told that the fourth week of leave would have to be included in this or the job would go to the “next in line”.
He said this would not happen because employers “would be prosecuted if they did that”.
Asked what could be done to stop employers pressuring for the swap then simply denying doing so, Mr Key said all employment relationships had to be based on “good faith”.
Forcing workers to rely on the “good faith” of their employer simply isn’t good enough. There’s a reason we have minimum standards of employment, and it’s to make sure our working lives are not subject to the whim of our employers.
It’s just astounding that when given a concrete example of how employers could abuse the law despite his promise of safeguards the best John Key could come up with was a hope that employers would act in “good faith”.
The only plausible explanation is that he knows very well there’s no real protection against abuse, and that’s part of the plan.
John Key and National have wanted to repeal four weeks’ annual leave from day one because their business backers resent having to provide you with decent leave. Don’t think that’s changed one bit. This is about normalising three weeks’ leave for a future repeal.
UPDATE: No Right Turn has an excellent piece here.
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