Minister of Labour continues to mislead

new-zealand-labour-party

Wed Jul 01 2009 12:00:00 GMT+1200 (New Zealand Standard Time)

Minister of Labour continues to mislead

Wednesday, 1 July 2009, 8:37 am
Press Release: New Zealand Labour Party

Minister of Labour Kate Wilkinson seems oblivious to the thousands of women who have been disadvantaged by her closure of the Pay and Employment Equity Unit, says Labour Spokesperson for Women's Affairs Sue Moroney.

“Today the Minister repeated her assertion that she closed the unit because it had completed its work, even though it was midway through supporting 15 polytechnics, Hort Research, the Waitakere City Council and the Teachers Council in pay and employment equity reviews,” Sue Moroney said.

"That's on top of the work the unit was prevented from doing when the Government axed pay equity investigations for school support staff and social workers earlier this year.

“The unit had clearly not finished its work and Kate Wilkinson’s continuing denials on this topic do nothing to change this fact.

“It has become clear that the decision to close the unit was ideological, as it had not been identified as a target for cost-cutting by the Department of Labour in its line-by-line review.

"It is a sham that the specific work on pay equity being undertaken by this unit has been replaced by another research group in the Ministry of Women’s Affairs.

“Given the National Governments appalling record on pay equity what confidence can New Zealanders have that this new research group will actually be effective?

"Her attempt to deflect scrutiny of the pay equity issue by complaining about my attendance at a select committee hearing looked petty and desperate

"The Government needs to accept that the work done by female dominated occupations are often undervalued and that families are short-changed when women are not paid what they are worth.

"It is clear that this Government and this Minister of Labour see fairness at work as a low priority,” Sue Moroney said.

ENDS

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