Chorus subbies’ petition sets out revolt against ‘21st-century slavery’

Less than four months after Chorus promised to ensure all its subcontractors could earn a ‘‘decent living’’, a group of linesmen have launched an online petition, accusing the company and main contractor Visionstream of reducing pay and ‘‘not keeping to the rules’’ in their contracts.

The Telecommunications Contractors Association of New Zealand, which is understood to have been set up by a group of disgruntled subcontractors in November, said a new contract offered by Visionstream in July had put them on worse terms.

Because contractors had to invest tens of thousands of dollars in their businesses and buy Chorus-branded vans, they were tied down into ‘‘21stcentury slavery’’ by Chorus and Visionstream, according to the petition which had gathered 1887 signatories less than day after its launch.

‘‘Many contractors have gone under due to the reduction of codes during the last contracting period, without consultation as per the signed contract,’’ the petition stated.

‘‘As contractors we carry all the risks in the telecommunications industry. The contractor carries any risk which can occur on the Chorus network to anything that can go wrong in the customer premises.

‘‘Yet the payment to the contractors does not even try to match these risks which we bear.’’

Visionstream’s new contract reduced some pay rates by 63 per cent and forced contractors into carrying out unpaid work, it said.

Visionstream said it was aware of the petition. ‘‘In July this year Visionstream issued new contracts to all its contracting partners in New Zealand. The main change was the inclusion of a new code of practice, developed in consultation with Chorus. The code of practice is aimed at the protection of worker rights, including sustainability, conditions and the ability to work in New Zealand,’’ it said. Visionstream had concluded a review of rates for copper network technicians following ‘‘significant consultation’’, it said.

‘‘Our UFB contracting partners are and will have the opportunity to be involved in the review of their payment rates, and the next stage in that process is for the review to be shared with Chorus,’’ it said.

Chorus spokesman Nathan Beaumont said the commitments Chorus made in April remained, and said it was ‘‘working hard to make changes’’. ‘‘We will provide a very fulsome update in September when everyone can make their own conclusions about the progress that has been made.’’

E tu¯ union organiser Joe Gallagher said he had met with the association, which he estimated had a few hundreds members, and said the union was trying to support the group and encourage their members to back a class action lawsuit that an Australian-owned law firm has said it intends to bring against Visionstream. ‘‘It is the same old story – all the cost and pressure is laid on these guys.’’ Gallagher agreed conditions for subcontractors had got worse since April. ‘‘Chorus said they were going to do a lot to straighten the practices ... and I haven’t seen any evidence of that so far.

‘‘When they say they are going to make sure people have enough to survive on – those contractors haven’t got enough to survive on.’’

One subcontractor who spoke to Stuff in June said the situation was getting ‘‘worse every week’’.

Chorus promised to improve conditions after the Labour Inspectorate reported widespread exploitation of migrant subcontractors carrying out work on its ultrafast broadband network, which led Chorus to commission a report from a financial services firm which concluded that Chorus and contractors Visionstream and UCG had failed to protect 1600 mostly-migrant workers from exploitation.