YOUR UNION

ELIZABETH WINTERBEE MERAS WORKPLACE REPRESENTATIVE

TE WHATU ORA NELSON MARLBOROUGH DISTRICT

fifty years in the making

The 1972 Equal Pay Act’s (EPA) 50th anniversary falls on 20 October this year. Whether midwives achieve pay equity by then or not, I relish the idea of hundreds of women picnicking on the grounds of Parliament wearing 1970s clothes. Many of us, myself included, were not yet born at the time.

If my mother was alive, I wonder what she would think of the socio-political changes that have occurred since she was a newly married woman needing her husband’s permission to obtain the contraceptive pill. She died when I was 10 years old, but if she had held strong beliefs as to what she wished for my future, she might have mentioned something, even in passing. My parents were married in September 1972 - one month before the EPA was passed into legislation. Being young and newly married, it’s likely my mother was thinking about other things, but I like to imagine she thought “this is great – if I have daughters one day, they’ll be paid fairly”.

The EPA ensured pay equality (women and men doing the same job to be paid the same), but it remained unclear whether this extended to pay equity (equal pay for work of equal value). In 1986, the Clerical Workers Union tested this in the Arbitration Court, but the court lacked the authority to resolve the ambiguity of the EPA, closing the door on future claims.

The Labour government’s 1990 Employment Equity Act remedied this, allowing pay comparisons between different industries. Ten groups lodged claims and quickly established that their male counterparts were paid $100 more a week, for work of equal value.

The claims remained unaddressed, however, when three months later the incoming National government threw out the legislation. Little changed throughout the 1990s, despite the Human Rights Act stating sex-based discrimination was unlawful.

In 2003 the Labour government established a Pay Equity Unit in the Ministry of Women’s Affairs and a Taskforce on Pay & Employed Equity in the Public Service was initiated. As the 2008 election loomed, all 39 public service departments had been assessed: undervaluation ranging between 3%-35%. However, citing job evaluations as “unaffordable in the current economic and fiscal environment”, the incoming National government abolished the Pay Equity Unit and the taskforce.

My parents were married in September 1972 - one month before the EPA was passed into legislation. Being young and newly married, it’s likely my mother was thinking about other things, but I like to imagine she thought “this is great - if I have daughters one day, they’ll be paid fairly”.

THE BARTLETT CASE

In 2012, the Service Food Workers Union (SFWU) on behalf of Kristine Bartlett, filed a claim with the Employment Relationship Authority against her employer, Terranova Homes and Care Ltd. Citing a breach of the Employment Relations Act, Bartlett argued she was not being paid fairly based on her skills, experience and working conditions. Despite 20 years of experience, she was earning $14.46/hr as a caregiver, while the gardener earned $16.56/hr. Her case was forwarded to the Employment Court to consider whether the original intent of the EPA included pay equity.

Terranova argued that the only comparison needed was that of the four male workers

Left to right: Leila Sparrow, Karen Gray, Elizabeth Winterbee (all MERAS) and Sue McNabb (NZNO)

employed in the same role, stating it would be “too difficult” to make wider comparisons. In August 2013, the court ruled in Bartlett’s favour, stating “it would be illogical to use a small percentage of men as a comparator group if they are paid less because they are undertaking ‘women’s work’”. Terronova responded by heading to the Court of Appeal, and when that was rejected, to the Supreme Court, who threw out their appeal, declaring it premature.

In 2015, while Bartlett’s case was still making its way back to court, other organisations representing women-dominated professions, such as the College, began filing pay equity claims. In October, the Nationalled government announced it would seek to resolve the Bartlett case out of court. This was met with cynicism, given the government’s vested interest in employer rights and fiscal responsibilities.

Nonetheless, a Joint Working Group formed in June 2016, developed universally applicable equal pay principles, and presented these to the government. Formally accepting these recommendations in November, the government enacted the 2017 Care and Support Worker (Pay Equity) Settlement Act, settling Bartlett’s case on 18 April 2017.

Since 2017, the $2 billion settlement has seen 55,000 aged and disability residential care and home, community and support workers achieve pay rises of between 15% and 50%.

THE EMPLOYMENT (PAY EQUITY AND EQUAL PAY) BILL 2017

The Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment consulted the Council of Trade Unions and others on its draft of new legislation to enable further pay equity claims. However, despite the 2013 court ruling and the working group’s recommendations, the bill limited comparators to those within the same workplace or industry. However, the only occupational group in the health sector that is not women-dominated are bio-medical technicians.

The incoming Labour government rejected the bill, instead drafting a revised EPA. MERAS presented our union’s submission at the Select Committee in February 2019. I had made a last-minute decision to attend and found myself addressing the Select Committee. “The (1972) Equal Pay Act was passed before I was born”, I began. “I shouldn’t be here - none of us should be here - this should have been sorted a long time ago.”

A few months later, I was back in Wellington as a MERAS representative on the Bipartite Oversight Committee for the (employed) Midwifery Pay Equity claim lodged by MERAS in June 2018.

Women have always had to fight five times harder to obtain the same rights as men, so I was not surprised to witness underhand tactics commonly used by the patriarchy when faced with potential loss of money and power. It was the blatancy however, beginning with the deliberate omission of GPs as a potential comparator, which left me stunned.

After leaving school, my mother worked behind the counter at the local post office until she married my father. She had two children, cooked, cleaned, knitted and sewed us matching outfits. I will never know if she harboured other aspirations, but I do know that it is only due to decades of hard-won socio-political change that I had choices not socially acceptable in her era: two bachelor’s degrees, a master’s degree, earning my own income and buying a house with the mortgage in my own name. But I like to imagine it is the fact that I am a registered midwife who prescribes contraception for women - with no regard for their husband’s consent - that would have left her most proud. square

Women have always had to fight five times harder to obtain the same rights as men, so I was not surprised to witness underhand tactics commonly used by the patriarchy when faced with potential loss of money and power. It was the blatancy however, beginning with the deliberate omission of GPs as a potential comparator, which left me stunned.

For MERAS Membership merasmembership.co.nz www.meras.midwife.org.nz