Kindergartens Aotearoa is appalled at the Government’s move to continue to underpay women by millions of dollars by axing pay equity legislation.

The pay equity process offered a way for low paid women workers to have their skills and effort valued properly.

“We work with thousands of children and their families every day, and we see firsthand the devastating effects of poverty – poverty that includes mothers, grandmothers, sisters and aunts working for lower wages than men in other industries,” says Kindergartens Aotearoa spokesperson Amanda Coulston “Pay equity was a key mechanism to support women out of poverty, and therefore to support their children out of poverty too”.

Coulston says this change was not signalled and nobody voted for it.

The first successful pay equity case, the Kristine Bartlett settlement for rest home workers of two billion dollars was brought in under National. That settlement has now been eroded by inflation, and the government has axed the process for it to be renewed.

Kindergartens Aotearoa calls on the government to honour the contribution made by women and to reward them fairly for their work.

Kindergartens Aotearoa represents six regional kindergarten associations across the country that operate more than 260 of New Zealand’s kindergartens, catering for 12,000 children each day, from Auckland’s North Shore to South Otago.

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