‘Govt promoting strikes, unrest’

Press, 28 February 1984, Page 3

‘Govt promoting strikes, unrest’

Experience had shown that the legislation on. voluntary unionism was totally impractical and unworkable, according to the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, Mr Palmer. Mr Palmer said in Christchurch yesterday, that the Government could be justly accused of promoting strikes and stoppages by insisting on the passage of an unworkable law. The Government had ignored suggestions from the Labour Party, the Employers’ Federation and the. Law Society which said that the legislation should allow for closed shops and conscientious objectors.

Labour members of Parliament had also said that the enforcement provisions in the law were cumbersome and unworkable. “They amount to a paradise for laywers and an impossibility for everyone else,” he said. “People who do not relish the industrial stoppages now taking place should reflect on the fact that they are a direct result of the Government’s new law. “That law provides a fertile source of disputes of a type which have never plagued New Zealand before.” The Government knew when it introduced the legislation that it would lead to problems. “The inevitable conclusion is that the Industrial Law Reform Bill was passed with the deliberate intention of promoting industrial unrest which the Government could exploit in election year. It is a strategy which will not work because it is too intently transparent,” Mr Ffalmer said.