The Employment Relations Act 2000

http://www.legislation.govt.nz

The Employment Relations Act 2000 came into effect on 2 October 2000. It sought to redress an imbalance in bargaining power by focusing on the employment relationship, rather than the employment contract. 

Section three of the Employment Relations Act sets out the following objectives:

 

The then Minister of Labour Margaret Wilson told Parliament:

‘The fundamental premise underlying the Employment Relations Bill is that the employment relationship is a human relationship, not just a contractual or economic one. Human relationships that function well and efficiently are based on mutual trust, confidence and fair dealing. That requires that the relationship is based on a reasonable equality between the parties. Employment relationships inherently lack that equality, unless the employee has particular skills that are scarce in the labour market.’

Wilson, Hon. Margaret. Quoted in Roth, P. and Churchman, P. (2000, October). New Zealand Law Society seminar paper on the Employment Relations Act 2000.

In order to achieve its stated objectives the Employment Relations Act:

The Employment Relations Act changed the way we talk about the employment relationship. Language is a powerful tool, and the words of the Act have been chosen carefully to influence the way in which we regard one another in the workplace. The Act focuses on employment ‘relationships’ and ‘agreements’ rather than ‘contracts’. The ‘Employment Relations Authority’ does not adjudicate, but rather investigates ‘employment relationship problems’.

The Employment Relations Act governs the negotiation of employment agreements, and the process by which disputes and grievances that arise within the employment relationship are resolved. There are a number of protections established for bargaining and dispute resolution, and the concept of good faith applies to everyone.

The Employment Relations Act prohibits discrimination against employees on the same grounds covered by the Human Rights Act 1993. That means discrimination is prohibited on the grounds of:

Employees who consider that they have been discriminated against may pursue a personal grievance. The dispute resolution processes under the Act can include mediation, investigation by the Employment Relations Authority, and adjudication by the Employment Court. 

The Act also provides for employees to take a personal grievance action against their employer if:

In all these cases the discrimination, pressure or harassment complained of can be either direct or indirect. An example of indirect discrimination would be a security company requiring their guards to be at least a certain height, where that height restriction was generally only met by men.

Sexual harassment is defined in section 108 of the Act. It includes behaviour such as promising preferential treatment or threatening detrimental treatment on the basis of a request for sexual favours. It includes the use of language, visual images or physical behaviour of a sexual nature that is ‘unwelcome or offensive to that employee and that, either by its nature or through repetition, has a detrimental effect on that employee’s employment, job performance, or job satisfaction’.

An employee is racially harassed within the terms of the Act if their employer or the employer’s representative uses language (whether written or spoken), or visual material, or physical behaviour that directly or indirectly:

The Act also provides for employment relations education leave. Employers must make a maximum of five days per year available to employees. The five days are shared collectively between staff to enable them to attend training in employment relations education. The rationale is expressed in section 70 as a desire to increase employees’ knowledge of the relationships between unions, employees and employers, with a view to promoting the objectives of the Act as a whole and, in particular, the notion of good faith bargaining.