Nash takes second look at ‘shonky’ contracts
Revenue Minister Stuart Nash has asked the Inland Revenue Department to ‘‘check again’’ whether contracts through which it will be provided with casual staff by recruitment company Madison Recruitment are legal.
The extraordinary request came amid a claim from Wellington employment lawyer Barbara Buckett that the contracts – which offer workers no certainty over the length of their employment, hours, wages or place of work – were ‘‘legally dubious’’.
That has been denied by Madison Recruitment, which says it sought independent legal advice and understood the contracts and accompanying work briefs were fully compliant with employment legislation.
Inland Revenue selected Madison to provide ‘‘contingent labour’’ to the department from September, replacing an existing contractor, Salmat.
But Unite Union said dozens of call-centre workers who had been employed by Salmat to answer calls for Inland Revenue had quit after seeing the new contracts.
They state that workers would be employed on a temporary basis by Madison, with hours and pay only agreed prior to each ‘‘client assignment’’ and with ‘‘no guarantee of continuous work’’.
The contracts also require workers to agree that Madison might be unable to give them written confirmation of their hours or pay – or details of where they would work or what they would do – even after they started an assignment, because they would vary and be ‘‘short term’’.
One worker who had been employed to work in Inland Revenue’s offices on Hawkestone St in Wellington since November, Ben Chipping, said the new contract was the worst he had seen.
Another said she felt as though she had ‘‘been treated like I am nobody and my skills mean absolutely nothing’’.
Buckett said that, in her view, the contracts were ‘‘legally dubious’’ and appeared to be trying to defeat the bundle of rights people had under common law.
‘‘I think they would have a lot difficulty standing up. My of question is: Why would a statefunded body try to get into something that is really quite shonky?’’
The contracts also ‘‘sat uneasily’’ with the Employment Relations (Triangular Employment) Amendment Bill currently going through Parliament. This bill was designed to ensure people’s contracts were with employer’’, she said.
A spokeswoman for Nash said he was aware of concerns raised by Unite Union.
He had been advised by Inland Revenue that the contracts were not ‘‘zero hours’’ contracts and that Madison’s contract with the tax department required it to their ‘‘real comply with employment law. But she said Nash had asked Inland Revenue ‘‘to check again to be sure the contracts comply with the law’’.
Madison Recruitment said in a statement that it had sought independent legal advice and understood that the employment contracts and the job brief that accompanied them were ‘‘fully compliant with the minimum entitlement provisions of New Zealand employment legislation’’.
The firm said it updated its agreements to keep pace with any law changes, and was working with Inland Revenue to provide ‘‘an agile and flexible contingent workforce solution’’.
Asked to comment on whether it was reasonable to expect relatively low paid workers to agree to work that offered them no security over their wages or their hours or place of work, Madison said there was demand from candidates for assignments of varying duration.
‘‘The majority of these assignments we fill offer attractive pay rates which are above both the minimum [wage] and living wage.’’