Carter Holt Harvey told to consult

By MATHEW DEARNALEY

Carter Holt Harvey stands accused by the Employment Court of misleading or deceiving unions trying to prepare a defence against mass layoffs at its Kinleith pulp and paper mill.

Judge Graeme Colgan said in a reserved decision from the court in Auckland that the company focused unduly on its broad contractual entitlement to manage its business as it saw fit.

It did so without giving sufficient weight to contractual obligations requiring consultation or discussions from an earlier stage in its planning for major restructuring, which includes almost halving its 770-strong workforce, he said in the 69-page judgment.

These required disclosing information to allow the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union and other site unions to present informed and potentially acceptable alternatives to company plans, through contracting out maintenance and other measures, to save $31 million a year.

Leaving the unions with impressions they had been supplied all the information available to justify the company's plans was misleading or deceptive and in breach of the Employment Relations Act, Judge Colgan said.

The company is taking some comfort in a finding by the judge that it did not breach good-faith requirements of the act in refusing to bargain with the unions over its plans.

But he said the company was contractually bound to consult meaningfully over workplace change, and its employees were entitled to elect their unions to represent them in this regard.

Instead, the company insisted on consulting employees personally and CHH "did not act in good faith in this aspect of the consultation process".

The company says delays to its plans will cost it $1 million to $1.5 million a month, but Judge Colgan has ordered it to spend four weeks consulting the unions before making a final decision about restructuring its maintenance workforce.