NEW ZEALAND LABOUR NEWS - AIL of New Zealand

August 2021, Vol. 12 No. 7
TERRY O'SULLIVAN President, Laborers' International Union of North America; Chairman, AIL Labour Advisory Board
LORI PELLETIER Division Vice President, Public Relations, American Income Life Division; Executive Director, AIL Labour
Advisory Board
STEVE GREER Chief Executive Officer, American Income Life Division; President, AIL Labour Advisory Board
SUSAN FULDAUER Division Vice President, Public Relations, American Income Life Division; Secretary, AIL Labour Advisory
Board
ROGER SMITH Chairman Emeritus, American Income Life Insurance Company
DENISE BOWYER Secretary Emeritus, AIL Labour Advisory Board
STEVE FRIEDLANDER State General Distributor, American Income Life Insurance Company

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                                     NEW ZEALAND LABOUR NEWS

Wellington Bus Drivers Secure Collective Bargaining Deal With NZ Bus
Wellington bus drivers have accepted a new pay deal offer from employer NZ Bus, securing a substantial
pay raise and retaining conditions.

Tramways Union Secretary Kevin O'Sullivan said drivers voted approximately 65 per cent in favour of the
latest offer at a meeting on 29 July, which was closed to media.

It was the fourth offer put to drivers by NZ Bus, one of four companies that
are contracted by the Greater Wellington Regional Council to run bus
services on the Metlink network, and ends a bitter months-long
negotiation.

In May, more than 200 drivers passed a unanimous motion of no
confidence in the management of NZ Bus, and Tramways Union launched
a 24-hour strike in April after rejecting the first of four offers. The strike
was met with a lockout by NZ Bus, which was ended by an injunction in                            (Ross Giblin/Stuff)
Employment Court.

O'Sullivan said the new agreement means a roughly 8 per cent pay increase over three years from NZ
Bus. The regional council and Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency provided a wage top-up as part of the
deal, which will ensure drivers are paid at least the Living Wage of $22.10, representing a total 14 per
cent pay increase across the board.

Greater Wellington Regional Council Chair Daran Ponter said the deal would give security to commuters,
calling it "a huge relief. Not just for the regional council but for the bus drivers, management, and
Wellingtonians."

NZ Bus Chief Executive Jay Zmijewski said the deal was fair and gave the company greater ability to
recruit more full-time drivers, saying, "This is a great outcome. We want our drivers to be the best paid
and have the best conditions in the industry, and this deal achieves that."

John White, of Next Capital, which owns NZ Bus, applauded the deal, while saying Next Capital has
made no decisions yet as to whether it would sell the company.

Safer Sick Leave Starts!
Working people are celebrating paid sick leave increasing from 5 to 10 days, effective 24 July 2021.

                               Council of Trade Unions (CTU) President Richard Wagstaff said,
                               "Working people need to be able to stay away from work when they are
                               sick without penalty. The extension from 5 to 10 days sick leave will
                               significantly help people do just that.

                               "COVID-19 has proven to us all how important it is to stay home when we
                               are unwell, not just for the individual, but for the workplace and the wider
                               community. Increasing sick leave means that collectively we are all better
                               able to combat contagious illness. This is how it should be.
          (NZCTU)
"The campaign to increase sick leave was another successful campaign by working people in union.
Together we raised our voices and the Government heard us. It is good to see the Government listening
to the concerns and issues that working people raise and taking action to put things right.

"There is more work to be done to improve New Zealanders' working lives. We look forward to seeing the
progression of Fair Pay Agreements as a tangible step which will lift wages and make work better."

Sick leave increases from the anniversary of entitlement. The law says you are not entitled to sick leave
until you have had six months service with your employer. So, from 24 July 2021 the entitlement will
increase when each individual hits their 'sick leave' anniversary, and will apply to all permanent
employees - regardless of whether they are part-time or full-time.

New Zealand Labor Takes On Uber
E tu and First Union have filed a claim in the Employment Court seeking employment rights for Uber
drivers.

The claim asks the court to declare that Uber drivers are employees and
are entitled to the same minimum wage rates and leave entitlements as
other New Zealand workers.

Being an employee comes with certain benefits: your employer must pay
you at least the minimum wage, for example. You have the right to join a
union. You are entitled to sick leave and holiday pay. Contractors, on the
other hand, are their own bosses and have to sort out their own affairs.
                                                                                           (E tu)
Uber has traditionally argued that their 7000 drivers are not employees or contractors but are simply
paying to use the Uber app platform as independent business operators in order to connect with
customers.

E tu spokesperson, Yvette Taylor, said that the case is similar to others in the United Kingdom, Europe,
Australia and parts of the USA, which had ruled in favour of the drivers. "The Uber system is designed to
get around New Zealand employment laws and deprive the drivers of their minimum legal entitlements.

"Gig workers, such as those employed by Uber, are at the forefront of a new form of exploitation where
management is replaced by an algorithm built into an app, with its ability to deactivate workers without
reason and take away their income."

The union's submission to the Employment Court is likely to take some time, but First Union says the

case could be heard before the end of the year.

Housing Crisis Urgency
The Public Service Association (PSA) calls on the government to urgently re-think its response to the
housing crisis, and to fund and implement an integrated approach to housing, community and
infrastructure.

                                The union, New Zealand's largest, says a massive investment is needed
                                now to avoid passing on the cost to future generations.

                                PSA President Benedict Ferguson said, "We have over 80,000 members
                                who work in every single community in Aotearoa New Zealand. They
                                know exactly what it will take to build a healthy and thriving society.
                                Affordable housing is fundamental to our quality of life. All New
                                Zealanders should have secure, warm, dry, energy-efficient housing. No
         (shutterstock)
                                questions.

"We need a plan for communities that does not rely on the sale of Crown land into private ownership to
fund state housing. Homes for whanau should not be at the expense of future Treaty settlements.

"We need to agree, once and for all, that public/private partnerships do not work. Mahi this important must
be funded directly by government," said Benedict.

"And finally, we need an integrated approach to housing. We need to build communities, not just homes,
and they must be properly supported by internet connections, social services, libraries, pools, public
transport, water and waste pipes and all the other things that turn houses into homes and suburbs into
communities."

Air New Zealand Appointed Three New Directors To Its Board
Air New Zealand has appointed three new board directors, pending approval at the airline's annual
shareholder meeting later this year.

Chair Dame Therese Walsh said the appointments of Alison Gerry, Claudia Batten and Paul
Goulter would provide further digital, strategic and employment relations expertise to support the airline as
it moves onto the next phase of its strategic recovery from Covid-19.

Alison Gerry is currently a director at ANZ Bank New Zealand, Infratil
Limited, is the founding Chair of Sharesies and is a director at Suncorp New
Zealand. She also had previous directorships at Spark, TVNZ, Kiwibank
and Queenstown and Wellington Airports.

Claudia Batten is the current chair of Serko, a director at Vista Group and
the digital advisor to the Westpac New Zealand board. As a digital
entrepreneur in the US, she co-founded Victor and Spoils, and is one of the
founders of gaming advertising network Massive Corporation. Batten has          NZEI Te Riu Roa national
also been the North American Regional Director for New Zealand Trade          secretary Paul Goulter (NZH)
and Enterprise and a winner of multiple awards for her work supporting the New Zealand technology
sector.

Paul Goulter is the National Secretary of New Zealand's largest education union, New Zealand
Educational Institute (NZEI), and a director of the Co-operative Bank. Walsh said, "Air New Zealand
works closely with unions and will benefit from Paul's experience with unions here and in Australia over
the last 40 years."

E tu, the country's largest aviation union, also welcomed the announcement. E tu head of aviation,
Savage, said the addition of a union voice to the airline's board "signals to us that Air New Zealand is
looking to rebuild better as the aviation industry slowly recovers."

The three appointments will fill the vacancies created by the retirement of long-serving directors Jan
Dawson, Rob Jager and Linda Jenkinson.

Logging Companies Failed Forestry Worker
Dozens of workers have been killed in the forestry supply chain over the past decade.

"The forestry industry is rightly considered to be high risk," said WorkSafe's Chief Inspector Steve Kelly
amid a series of recent decisions by New Zealand's primary workplace health and safety regulator.

                                     A WorkSafe investigation found two companies were not following safety
                                     rules when a forestry worker was killed by a log at West Ho forest in
                                     Tologa Bay in 2019.

                                     The investigation found both parties had failed to ensure the work was
                                     being done safely, despite a 2018 audit that outlined the
                                     problems. "Despite issues identified in these audits being available to the
                                     companies months prior to the incident, the companies failed to take
  Families who lost loved ones to    corrective action," Worksafe said. "This tragic incident could have been
 forestry gather outside courtroom   avoided."
         (Rebeccas Macfie)
Pakiri Logging Limited was fined $468,000 and Earnslaw One Limited was fined $288,000 at the Gisborne
District Court. The companies have been ordered to share in reparations to the families for a total of
$238,000.

In a separate case last week, Richard Brooking waited outside the Gisborne Courthouse as the coroner's
inquest into the death of his son Niko Brooking-Hodgson was being held. Brooking said he was frustrated,
not only because he and his whanau had to fight five years for the inquest but also because he says "no
meaningful change" has happened in the forestry industry and people are still losing their lives.

The Brooking-Hodgson inquest comes ten years after the death of Gisborne forestry worker Ken Callow,
whose parents worked with the late Council of Trade Unions' leader Helen Kelly to launch a massive
campaign against the industry's terrible health and safety record. That forced the sector to set up an
independent review, which in late 2014 delivered a damning report and led to the establishment of the
Forestry Industry Safety Council.

In 2015 the Health and Safety at Work Act was passed, bringing in tougher obligations on companies and
directors, and stiffer penalties.

At last week's inquest the small courtroom was crowded with whanau and heavy with the grief of families
of other dead forestry workers. Brooking, who also lost a nephew in a forestry accident, spoke for the
families saying, "The amount of young men who are being killed in forestry accidents should be alarming
to all New Zealanders. Not only do we feel sorrow, we feel anger. These deaths in forestry are avoidable."

Wellington Maternity Short A Quarter of Workforce
Wellington region's maternity units are grappling with a chronic shortage
of both staff and beds.

Hutt Hospital's maternity service is short 15 out of 50 full-time equivalent
staff, while Kenepuru Community Hospital, Kapiti Health Centre and
Wellington Regional Hospital have a total of 18 full-time equivalent

maternity vacancies across their team of 77. That means Wellington
hospitals are down a quarter of their maternity workforce.

Union representative Jill Ovens, speaking for the Midwifery Employee
Representation & Advisory Service (MERAS), said short staffing
increases the stress on remaining midwives "exponentially."

Among the biggest issues are not being able to take a break and or to go
to the toilet because there is no one available to relieve them. Nurses
were stepping in to fill some maternity positions. Capital & Coast and Hutt            (Stuff)
Valley District Health Boards (DHBs) have also launched a project to work out how to better retain and
recruit midwives.

Staffing and capacity problems at Hutt Hospital's maternity unit have been under the microscope after a
baby died in 2016 and another suffered a brain injury in what the Health and Disability Commissioner
described as a "pattern of poor care." A $9.4 million upgrade of Hutt Hospital's maternity services is
underway and due to be completed in 2023.

John Tait, Chief medical officer for the two Wellington region health boards, said demand had been
increasing, along with the region's birthrate, in the past year.

In a bid to combat the national shortage of midwives, Associate Minister of Health Dr. Ayesha Verrall
announced that the Government would spend $5 million over the next three years to set up a mentoring
programme for midwives at district health boards. But the College of Midwives labeled it "a little too late."

The midwives' union's Ovens said they had also sought for midwives who stay in health board
employment to get a bonus. While the boards rejected this nationally, some boards had introduced their
own retention allowances. This was like "shifting deck chairs on the Titanic" as it led to midwives working
at health boards that paid them more.

Members of the midwives' union are currently voting on whether to settle their collective agreement with
the country's 20 health boards. If they reject the offer, hospital midwives will go on strike in August.

                                 INTERNATIONAL LABOUR NEWS

                                Scabby The Rat Can Stay
                                United States, Indiana
                                The National Labor Relations Board ruled an Indiana union had the right
                                to display a 12-foot inflatable rat and inflammatory banners outside a trade
                                show in order to boycott a business that worked with another company
                                involved in a labor dispute.

                                The board in the 3-1 decision upheld a pair of Obama-era rulings that said
(IUOE)                          displaying banners and large inflatable figures such as "Scabby the Rat"
does not violate the National Labor Relations Act's ban on threatening or coercive conduct during union
pickets and boycotts.

NLRB Chair Lauren McFerran, a Democrat, wrote that the board in those cases rightly found that the
potential infringement of a union's free-speech right precluded a finding that banners and inflatable rats
were illegal.

But Republican NLRB Members Marvin Kaplan and John Ring in a concurring opinion said that while the
conduct of the International Union of Operating Engineers local involved in the case was lawful, the

board decisions issued in 2010 and 2011 were too broad and could shield coercive activities by unions in
future cases.

Local 150 pioneered the use of inflatable rats, created the Scabby name, and has also successfully
defended Scabby in federal court. Scabby the Rat is a tool of free speech with full First Amendment
rights, and the use of Scabby cannot be limited any more than any other free speech.

Workers Win Fair Contract at Frito-Lay
United States, Kansas
For 20 days, members of Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers (BCTGM) Local
218 in Topeka, Kansas, were on strike, demanding a fair contract from Frito-Lay. The union members saw
an outpouring of support from the community. The union secured a new contract that made significant
gains for its members. Members of the local were striking over forced overtime, which the new contract
addresses.

BCTGM International President Anthony Shelton said: "BCTGM Local 218
members employed at Frito Lay in Topeka, Kansas, have shown the world
that union working people can stand up against the largest food
companies in the world and claim victory for themselves, their families and
their communities. More than 600 BCTGM members hit the streets in a
fight for a better quality of life and to have a voice over how many hours in
a week they can be forced to work."
                                                                                             (WIBW)
Food Processing Members at FG Deli in Langley, B.C. Ratify a New
Collective Agreement with Major Gains for Members Across the Facility. Canada, BC
According to United Food and Commercial Workers/Canada, UFCW Local 247 members secured a
new contract with 65 per cent voting in favour amidst very strong voter turnout.

The new contract will see most members gain an immediate $1.25 per hour increase with an additional
.50 cents added by December of this year. Top rates in each category will increase by $3.25 over the life
of the five-year contract.

Based in Surrey, B.C., UFCW Local 247 represents over 14,000 members working in various industries
and frontline sectors.

Wage Cut and Attack on Working Conditions Not the Thanks "Pandemic Heroes" Can Accept
Canada, Ontario
As reported by the Canadian Union of Public Employees, Hamilton and Niagara hospital workers are
rallying outside area hospitals, frustrated with the "lack of respect" they are getting from both their hospital
employers and the provincial government in contracts negotiations.

Provincial bargaining for nearly 70,000 registered practical nurses, personal support workers, clerical,
cleaning, maintenance, dietary and other staff who are members of the Canadian Union of Public
Employees (CUPE) and SEIU Healthcare began in June, following nearly a year and half of challenging
and risk-laden pandemic work.

23,617 Ontario health care workers have contracted COVID-19 at work and 24 have died.

The Ontario Hospital Association (OHA), the umbrella group that bargains on behalf of Ontario hospitals
in central negotiations, has proposed takeaways which would eviscerate the employment protection and
mobility rights of the workforce.

Hospital workers face a cut to real wages under provincial legislation that restricts them to a wage
increase less than 1/3 of the rate of inflation. The province has also severely limited hospital workers'

ability to negotiate much-needed increases to mental health supports like post-traumatic stress
counseling. The hospitals are seeking many concessions in bargaining.

                              "Hospital workers have held the line for patients and the people of
                              Hamilton/Niagara. They sacrificed to do that, and they were proud and
                              grateful to be able to help. They did not expect a reward. But a cut to their
                              modest real wages and the gutting of their contracts is not acceptable.
                              We expect the provincial government to walk back from its 1 per cent
                              wage cap, as the British government has just done, in acknowledgment of
                              the pandemic effort. And we expect the hospitals to pull their concessions
          (CUPE)              and to address the priorities of the workforce, particularly in the areas of
                              pandemic protection and violence." says Michael Hurley, President of
CUPE's Ontario Council of Hospital Unions (OCHU/CUPE).

Health care workers in the National Health Service in the UK were also restricted to one per cent
increases by their government. But this week the British government announced that salaries would be
increased by three per cent, in recognition of the contribution of health care staff.

"After being thanked, celebrated and called heroes by Doug Ford's government and their employer,
hospital workers are now being rewarded by being asked to make sacrifices to their wages and mental-
health supports," said SEIU Healthcare Nursing Division President Jackie Walker. "Hospital workers are
burning out and are here today sounding the alarm that if things don't improve immediately, including the
Ford government repealing Bill 124, the staffing crisis we see in our hospitals is going to continue to grow,
putting our communities at serious risk."

The Hamilton/Niagara rallies are the first of 55 rallies across the province scheduled through the end of
August. Rallies are planned at Milton, Burlington and Oakville hospital, northern Ontario and north GTA
next week. Dozens of other rallies will follow in August. A major rally is planned for September 10 in
Toronto.

Bargaining between OCHU/CUPE, SEIU Healthcare the OHA will resume in early September.

Asian Garment Workers Owed Almost 12 Billion Dollars in Wages Amid Pandemic
Asia.
Fashion United states; As fashion brands and retailers across the world return to profitability following
what has been an immensely difficult period of international store courses and plummeting demand for
fashion, for those making the world's clothing, the story is far from over.

According to a new report by the Clean Clothes Campaign, Asian garment workers are owed almost 12
billion dollars in unpaid income and severance in the first year of the pandemic.

The 'Still Un(der)paid' report estimates that workers are owed 11.85 billion
dollars for the period from March 2020 through March 2021 as employers
withheld or reduced wages and international fashion brands and retailers
canceled orders, refused to pay for goods or demanded price reductions.

The Clean Clothes Campaign said it estimated its wage gap figures based
on "all available information" such as statements from employers, industry
and worker surveys, and media reports.
                                                                                           (Flickr)
Khalid Mahmood, from Labour Education Foundation in Pakistan, said the
figure represented "an unimaginable and often irreparable human sorrow". He said this was not
happening "in just that one factory in Bangladesh or Pakistan", but "throughout the garment industry."

The report said an estimated 1.6 million garment workers were dismissed across seven countries:
Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Pakistan.

The Clean Clothes Campaign said many dismissed workers were not paid their full legal entitlements to
severance pay, and others who were put on furlough were only paid a small percentage of their usual
wages.
Workers in all researched countries, except for Indonesia, had lost pay equivalent to at least twice the
average monthly wage.

The Clean Clothes Campaign is calling on apparel brands to negotiate an enforceable agreement to
assure wages, establish a severance guarantee fund and ensure respect for basic labour rights.

The organisation said: "Such a binding agreement, to be negotiated and signed by trade unions with
brands, individual employers, or employer associations, will require signatory brands to ensure workers in
their supply chains receive their regular wages during the period of the COVID-19 pandemic, in addition to
ensuring payment of severance compensation for workers at factories that close or undertake a mass
dismissal, and respect basic labour rights."

The report builds on the Clean Clothes Campaign's August 2020 'Un(der)paid in the Pandemic' report,
which estimated that the income and severance loss for the first three months of the pandemic was in the
range of 3.2 to 5.8 billion dollars.

According to Ineke Zeldenrust from the Clean Clothes Campaign, not enough has been done to help
workers despite over 100 fashion brands joining together in a 'Call to Action' for the garment industry
since the beginning of the pandemic.

"We cannot count on brands' own initiatives or the voluntary programmes they hide behind to deliver for
workers," she said. "It is urgent that companies negotiate and sign a binding and enforceable agreement
with unions to prevent millions of garment workers and their families from being driven even deeper into
destitution."

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