PSA Media Release Header

11 July 2013

Democracy the winner in passage of state sector legislation

The Public Service Association says the passage of state sector reform legislation with significant changes, is an illustration of parliament’s select committee process working at its best.

The Bill, which represents the largest reform of state sector legislation in more than 20 years was introduced by the government to support its Better Public Services programme, and today passed its third reading in parliament.

The PSA was concerned that the Bill posed a threat to the employment rights of many thousands of public and state sector workers through changes to redundancy provisions, Government Workforce Policy Orders and the delegation of some agencies’ statutory functions or powers.

It raised those issues in a substantive submission to the select committee, backed up by a number of personal submissions along with 1500 form submissions from members.

PSA National Secretary Brenda Pilott says “the select committee and officials listened to and worked with submitters, took their concerns on board and changes to the legislation were made.”

“The end result is that some of the more unfair aspects of the Bill in terms of its impact on the pay and conditions of the public sector workforce, have been mitigated. It was true democracy in action.”

However she says “while the legislation is now better than it was when it was first introduced, we cannot give it unqualified support as it still restricts public service workers’ access to compensation when made redundant and failed to consider a proper redeployment scheme.”

The Bill also attempted to address issues around the fragmentation of the public sector by encouraging more shared services and a more joined-up approach.

“Some useful foundations have been laid but the legislation did miss an opportunity to make significant improvement around the organisation, structure and employment policies of the state sector. There is still a lot of work to be done and it’s something the PSA has been inviting discussion and debate on,” says Brenda Pilott.

The PSA says it is disappointing that there is no Treaty of Waitangi clause in the legislation given that the principles of the Treaty are included in other foundation pieces of legislation relating to the government and the way it does business.
ends

© Scoop Media