Death by a thousand cuts is historically a form of torture and execution originating from Imperial China. More recently in psychology death by a thousand cuts is a way in which negative change happens slowly in many unnoticed increments that it is not perceived to be objectionable. Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden continues to push this Government’s programme of reducing employment protections and entitlements incrementally.
In case it has been missed, these are some of the latest cuts affecting New Zealand workers.
Minister van Velden raised New Zealand’s minimum wage in April this year by 1.5% to $23.50 in a year when inflation is rising at the rate of 2.2%. Commenting on this NZCTU Acting President Rachel Mackintosh said “the new minimum wage rate is an effective cut in real terms and will leave workers worse off. This is the second year in a row where this Government has made the decision to cut the minimum wage in real terms”. The minimum wage has serious implications for New Zealand’s lowest paid and most vulnerable workers.
In addition, many government contracts use the living wage as the lowest wage paid to workers (such as cleaners and security guards). From 1 September 2025, the Living Wage hourly rate will increase to $28.95. Yet this government intends to remove that requirement.
By contrast, Australia is running at a slightly lower rate of inflation of about 2%, but it increased its minimum wage by 3.5% to AUS$24.95 (NZ$26.90). In commenting on the independently assessed raise, the Australian Fair Work Commission said a 3.5% above-inflation increase to the minimum wage was necessary to avoid “entrenched” lower living standards among the millions of Australia’s lowest-paid workers. The Commission’s president, Justice Adam Hatcher, said the decision would help claw back the loss of real incomes over the past few years.
The recent Budget announced that the default employer and employee contribution rates to KiwiSaver will be increased to 4%. Looking far into the future, that is likely to be a positive move for most New Zealander’s retirements. But given the huge cost of living increases that New Zealander’s have experienced, and our lowest paid workers continuing to go backwards, this is going to be a further cost to the many workers that struggle to meet day to day living expenses.
These changes will have an even higher impact on lower paid workers. In growth forecasts, alarmingly, Treasury has assumed the higher 4% contribution rates will be offset by employers through lower-than-otherwise wage increases.
Recently, this government made sudden and controversial changes to how pay equity claims can be made. Dozens of existing claims have been blocked from female-dominated workforces which are generally considered to be underpaid in comparison to those dominated by men. Those claims are in some of our most valued occupations - Plunket nurses, community midwives, hospice nurses and health care assistants, primary care nurses, nurses in residential care. Not only that, this government has raised the bar for future claims to be successful.
While the Prime Minister has admitted that the changes to pay equity laws will save the government “billions of dollars”, he now says that this was not the motivation for changing the legislation. The new Deputy Prime Minister was more forthright "I actually think that Brooke van Velden has saved the taxpayer billions, she's saved the Budget for the government and she has made pay equity workable for New Zealand women, men and everyone who wants a fair go in this country," he said.
Shame that those savings are at the expense of lower paid women in some of our most valued occupations.
The most recent attack on worker protection is now in relation to health and safety. In 2023 the NZ Business Leaders’ Health and Safety Forum produced a report on workplace safety and the toll on New Zealand workers. It reported that our fatality rates are where the United Kingdom was in the 1980s. Our fatality rate is twice that it is in Australia. But the government is now proposing to alter WorkSafe’s priorities from enforcement to advice, saying this will help address concerns about underfunding and a "culture of fear". What about continuing to improve worker safety and reduce the death toll?
New Zealand does not have to look too far back to one of our most awful workplace tolls - Whakaari/White Island. Twenty-two people died from extreme burns and blast injuries when Whakaari erupted in 2019, and many of the 25 survivors were seriously injured. WorkSafe was not without criticism in that disaster. The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (WorkSafe sits under its umbrella) commissioned an independent review that found that it knew that unregistered operators were taking tourists onto the island for five years leading up to the eruption and did nothing about it. More alarmingly, WorkSafe’s safety audits of registered operators did not assess volcanic risk, only walking hazards.
The National Party’s slogan for Budget25 was “Growing the economy to help Kiwis get ahead”. Probably a more accurate description is “At what cost to Kiwi’s, particularly our more vulnerable, is the economy growing”. Read more...