School-leavers face pay cuts—unionists

Press, 29 December 1986, Page 8

School-leavers face pay cuts—unionists

PA Wellington Thousands of schoolleavers face pay cuts because of changes to education this year, unionists say. Young workers were paid allowances as high as $lOOO a year for their University Entrance qualifications. New recruits with the internally assessed Sixth Form Certificate that has replaced U.E. do not receive these allowances. The Education Department has said sixth formers this year have worked harder and turned out higher quality work than students under the U.E. system. But many will get no money reward for their extra year at school because some employers refuse to recognise it — in spite of the Employers’ Federation backing a bonus for the number of years spent at high school. The Shop Employees’ Union failed to persuade employers in recent award talks to put a bonus $6-a-week in the pay packets of new workers who had finished sixth form.

Their employers pay a $14.72 weekly bonus for workers with U.E. None of this year’s 34,000 sixth formers will have the U.E. qualification. “Because of changes in the education system, in effect there will be a wage cut for juniors. Because they met all the requirements of the education system they get a wage cut," said the secretary of the Shop Employees’ Union, Ms Judy Reid.

For supermarket workers it is the same. Their Butchers’ and Grocers’ Union tried unsuccessfully in wage talks to negotiate extra pay for staying longer at high school. The ones who passed U.E. are paid $690 a year on top of their gross weekly wage of between $127 and $l4O. Sixth formers going into clerical jobs now have a “terribly lousy” deal, said a Clerical Workers’ Association spokesman, Mr John Slater. Under the award they are rewarded with no more money than workers with just School Certificate — an extra $450 a

year. Their counterparts who gained U.E. under the old system are paid an extra $9OO a year. An Employers’ Federation spokesman, Mr Ray Taylor, said the federation only recommended employers include money for years workers spend in secondary education in place of existing rewards for U.E. qualifications. He says it is up to employers to accept the advice or not.

Some employers have, as in wage talks with the Insurance Workers’ Union. The parties are clinching an award agreement that gives workers who complete the sixth form an extra $lOOO a year — the same amount formerly given to those with U.E. An official at the Education Department’s head office, Mr Peter Brice, said the department believed employers should give workers some reward for completing sixth form if they have been rewarding workers for gaining U.E. But the department had no power to make them do it.