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Speaker 1: Would you like to tell your workmates about your salary

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Speaker 1: but your contract stops you from doing that. There's a

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Speaker 1: labor bill that's going through Parliament at the moment, currently

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Speaker 1: making its way through the House to protect employees' rights

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Speaker 1: to speak about their salary. Labor National, the Greens and

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Speaker 1: the Maori Party all voted for it at the first

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Speaker 1: reading Act in New Zealand. First, we're in Nate. Amy

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Speaker 1: Ross is an employment relations expert director of work Ethics.

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Speaker 1: She's with me now, Hi, Amy, Kyoda, Good to have

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Speaker 1: you on the show. Do you actually want Do you

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Speaker 1: think keewis actually want to tell their workmates how much

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Speaker 1: they're getting paid.

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Speaker 2: I think a lot of people do, and I think

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Speaker 2: they should have the protected right to do so if

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Speaker 2: they wish. I mean, the information about what you earn

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Speaker 2: is effectively your information, so you should be able to

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Speaker 2: share it if you want to. You shouldn't be forced to,

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Speaker 2: and you can still under this alteration say oh no,

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Speaker 2: I'll keep that to myself. Thanks. But if I want

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Speaker 2: to be able to discuss that, and I want to

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Speaker 2: be able to identify potential inequality in the workplace, then

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Speaker 2: I should have the right to do so without risking

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Speaker 2: getting fired or getting called into a disciplinary meeting.

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Speaker 1: But no one's forcing you to sign the contract, right,

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Speaker 1: There's no law that says no one can speak about

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Speaker 1: their contracts or their remuneration with one another. It's only

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Speaker 1: if you sign the contract that says you can't that

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Speaker 1: you can't.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, but I think we have to remember the real world,

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Speaker 2: there's an imbalance of power between the employer and the employee.

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Speaker 2: In fact, that's one of the opening lines in the

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Speaker 2: Employment Relations Act. And the reason we have legal protections

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Speaker 2: is that the employer is often in a position where

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Speaker 2: they can say sort of take it or leave it,

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Speaker 2: and sometimes we have to take it. So I think

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Speaker 2: we have to be realistic in that we have legal

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Speaker 2: protections for a reason, and that is to smooth out

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Speaker 2: that imbalance of power and make sure that employees can

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Speaker 2: identify inequalities in the workplace in remedy those Do.

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Speaker 1: You think they will though? I reckon that's the point.

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Speaker 1: I don't think it's the key we way to run

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Speaker 1: around and tell every on what you earn or how

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Speaker 1: much is in your bank account, or who you voted for.

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Speaker 1: I just don't think it's in our psyche.

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Speaker 2: I think that often legislation encourages conversation and a change

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Speaker 2: in culture. And I think you're right, there is a

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Speaker 2: bit of a legacy of hangover of conservatism and being like, oh,

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Speaker 2: you know, salary is status and status and that is private,

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Speaker 2: and we've got to kind of keep all that under wraps.

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Speaker 2: But actually it's not serving us because we have a

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Speaker 2: persistent gender and ethnic pay yet. And unless we talk

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Speaker 2: about salary and able to identify what's causing those problems,

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Speaker 2: then we can't fix it. And legislative changes can encourage

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Speaker 2: that conversation and can actually change society. And some of

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Speaker 2: the legislative changes we see now seem totally normal now,

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Speaker 2: like homosexual law reform controversy at the time, completely normal now.

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Speaker 2: And you know, legislation can do that. It can shift

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Speaker 2: our cultural thinking.

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Speaker 1: You're not surely you're not comparing this to homosexual law reform.

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Speaker 2: I mean I'm saying that that's essentially what you're saying.

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Speaker 2: We're not ready for it, but legislation has to go

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Speaker 2: and change our thinking. Okay, yeah, give us our rights

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Speaker 2: and protections that we deserve it.

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Speaker 1: But you have the protections now, there's no law that

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Speaker 1: says you are not allowed to discuss your remuneration. It's

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Speaker 1: only if you sign your rights away that you lose

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Speaker 1: that protection, you know what I'm saying.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so the Act is silent on it at the moment,

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Speaker 2: which gives employers the capacity to write those clauses in

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Speaker 2: to an agreement.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it's hardly a Martin Luther King moment, is it.

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Speaker 1: I mean what we're talking about. No, But.

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Speaker 2: Let's but you know, if you're going to make the

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Speaker 2: point about we're not ready for it, it's an example

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Speaker 2: about how legislation can also shift cultural thinking over time,

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Speaker 2: and how things which seem like transformative or radical we're

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Speaker 2: not ready for it, can actually be seen later down

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Speaker 2: the track as normal. And I think that is all

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Speaker 2: this is. It's another one of the pillars in the

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Speaker 2: platform we need to build to actually eradicate an equality

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Speaker 2: and pay which New Zealand is value fairness. You and

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Speaker 2: I would agree on that.

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Speaker 1: All right, Okay we Amy, we have to leave it there,

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Speaker 1: but we'll see what the people think about this one.

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Speaker 1: I'm interested that you've put ford a good argument. I

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Speaker 1: appreciate you coming on the show. Amy Ross, who's an

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Speaker 1: employment relations expert and director of work ethics. For more

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Speaker 1: from Heather Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to news talks

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Speaker 1: it'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast

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Speaker 1: on iHeartRadio