CTU MEDIA RELEASE 07 March 2007

Nats Industrial Policies: Business As Usual

"National's new softly, softly approach to industrial relations masks their policy approach which is 'business as usual'," CTU president Ross Wilson said today.

"The CTU is interested in the policy detail and it is clear from Kate Wilkinson's speech today, and our discussion with John Key last week, that nothing in the 2005 National Party policy has changed," he said.

"The vital challenge facing New Zealand is how to lift the country out of an entrenched low wage culture, and build wages as part of a national skills and economic development strategy," Ross Wilson said. "The National Party is still focussed on the low wage New Zealand we are working to leave behind."

"It is extraordinary that National is still promoting a law change that would expose more than 700,000 working New Zealanders to unfair sacking and discrimination every year," he said. "Wayne Mapp's 90 Days bill was resoundingly beaten last year in Parliament, and we have moved on."

"After National themselves highlighted the wage gap with Australia at the last election, we have yet to see what specific steps National would take to lift workers' wages."

"There is a demonstrable need for substantial strengthening of the Employment Relations Act to protect low paid workers, and we will continue to put that case to all political parties."

ENDS

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