Employers’ move on wages, taxes ‘unacceptable’

Press, 13 April 1984, Page 3

Employers’ move on wages, taxes ‘unacceptable’

PA Wellington The Labour Party leader, Mr Lange, has attacked recent comments by the Employers’ Federation executive director, Mr J. W. Rowe, saying they were unacceptable, counterproductive, and provocative. Mr Rowe suggested on Wednesday that penalty payments on wages be abolished and taxes on corporate profits reduced to improve employment opportunities.

He told the federation’s biennial conference that “the payment of all hours at the same rate could give a major boost to employment without pushing up unit labour costs.”

Mr Lange said yesterday, “His latest effort in calling once more for lower-paid workers to take more of the strain and for the abolition of company tax, against a background of unemployment having increased by 41,000 during a 20-month freeze, is totally unacceptable.”

Mr Lange said there had never been a situation where employers, unions, and a Labour government had no chance of reaching agreement because none of the three were natural enemies.

The Prime Minister, Sir Robert Muldoon, said he

disagreed with some of Mr Rowe’s statements.

“There is no point in saying that kind of thing because .realistically it is not going to happen. “Realistically there is no chance that the pay of lower-paid workers could diminish. It seemed to me the argument was quite unreal,” Sir Robert said. The president of the Federation of Labour, Mr W. J. Knox, described Mr Rowe’s call for the abolition of penal rates as ridiculous, unfair, and typifying the anti-worker stance adopted by the Employers’ Federation.

Mr Knox said Mr Rowe’s comments repeated statements made by the Minister of Labour, Mr Bolger, in an address at Nelson several weeks ago.

"This is further evidence of the collusion between the employers and Government on anti-worker initiatives to which I have had cause to refer on numerous occasions recently,” Mr Knox said. “Employers are aware that any attempts to take away penal payments will be opposed by very strong union action.”

The Engineering Union has challenged Mr Rowe to reveal his pay packet. The union was reacting to the statement that “un-

skilled workers” in New Zealand were overpaid.

The union accused Mr Rowe of casting aspersions on “able, willing, and conscientious members of the work-force.”

It said an unmarried process worker or trades assistant, with an $8 increase this year, would have a take-home pay of $149. The Opposition’s spokesman on Labour, Mr E. E. Isbey, said Mr Rowe’s attack indicated a dangerous new trend in the ranks of the Employers’ Federation in New Zealand.

He said such opposition was turning the industrial clock back to the age of child labour. “Penal rates for work done outside standard hours must remain, and indeed are part of the industrial code of all like democratic countries. The real object of this proposal is to drive down real wages,” Mr Isbey said.

The proposal to scrap penal payments for overtime and night work was another example of the collusion between the Employers’ Federation and the Government, said the Combined State Unions chairman, Mr Ron Burgess.

The C.S.U. executive had unanimously condemned the proposal, he said.