Inequality seen as result of pay bill

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33033, 28 September 1972, Page 2

Inequality seen as result of pay bill

(New Zealand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, September 27.

If equal pay were implemented as planned, there would be women working in the same factory — without even a wall between them — yet on unequal steps of pay, said a member of the Parliamentary Select Committee considering the Equal Pay Bill, Mr N. V. Douglas (Lab., Auckland-Central) today.

In some factories women under the woollen workers’ award would be getting their first step of equal pay early next year. But women in the same factory with the same employer, but under the shirt (white and silk) award would have to wait several months longer for the same step, Mr Douglas said. The committee was crossexamining the Council for Equal Pay and Opportunity. Mr Douglas said he could see no difference between a woman sewing cotton or silk and another woman sewing wool. The bill at present provide- for equal pay to be introduced in five steps, beginning with the expiry of awards after April 1, 1973. ADJUSTMENTS "I still don’t see why it can’t all start on April 1, 1973,” Mr Douglas said This might mean adjusting the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act, but since t' Equal Pay Bill involved amending several other acts

this difficulty could be over, come.

"If we are going to string out equal pay’s introduction over awards as they fall due it is going to be very piecemeal,” said Mr Douglas. Speaking for the Council for Equal Pay and Opportunity, Mrs R. King said she considered employers were over-emphasising difficulties in the timetable for equal pay. There would be an advantage to employers with only a few women workers to introduce equal pay fairly quickly, Mrs King said in answer to the committee’s chairman. Mr J. F. Luxton (Nat., Piako). Mrs King emphasised the council’s desire to see equal pay implemented in full by April 1, 1977, instead of 1978 ar in the bilt The bill’s definition of “retauneration” did not clearly state the intention embodied in the commission’s recommendation, that equal pav should apply to “every rate of remuneration, . however determined.” she said.

A clearer definition would be that contained in the Stabilisation of Remuneration Regulations. “If it is necessary to spell out the difference between minimum and actual wages in these regulations, it should be even more important to do so in the Equal Pay Bill,” Mrs King said. “We ask that the bill be worded so there is no doubt that it covers work which is Pi-dominantly performed by women and applies to actual as well as award wages.” Tht council, established in 1957, comprises representatives of eight major women’s vol mtary organisations, 19 trade union and employee organisations and one educational association. Written submissions were also presented from the Canterbury branch of the Council for Equal Pay and Opportunity, the Federation of University Women and the School Committees’ Federation.