By VERNON SMALL
One of the leaders of the country's biggest union has given qualified support to employers' bid to have highly paid staff excluded from elements of the Employment Relations Bill.
Andrew Little, secretary-elect of the 60,000-member Engineers, Printing and Manufacturing Union, said employers' call for a "salary cap" of about $64,000 was "partially correct."
But the union would like to see a higher bar - perhaps $150,000 - and account taken of the level of executive authority the employee wielded.
Employers are particularly keen on having the cap apply to employees who lose their jobs when fixed-term contracts end.
Under the draft bill, such staff are treated as unjustifiably dismissed unless genuine operational reasons exist for a fixed-term arrangement.
Mr Little said a threshold at which personal grievance provisions and fixed-term contract provisions cut out was "not a bad idea."
"It is just a question of how to define that threshold.
"The salary idea is a little bit crude.
"It should also relate to the level of executive authority."
He said there were good public-policy reasons for excluding some employees.
"The Employment Contracts Act ... tried to draw up a law that the labour market is one homogeneous blob, and it isn't."
Many union members were paid more than $64,000 but had no executive authority, he said.
On the other hand, senior people in non-profit organisations had relatively modest incomes but a high level of executive authority.
Mr Little said large pay packages generally reflected a higher level of risk and greater bargaining power.
Executives knew they were being rewarded for a higher level of responsibility "and for the fact that if they lose the confidence of their governing body, they don't stick around."
Council of Trade Unions secretary Paul Goulter said a salary cap would create problems because it would affect higher-paid union members such as medical professionals and school principals.
He said the bill as drafted gave employers the flexibility to argue any genuine operational need to have a manager on a fixed-term contract.
The CTU believed it was better to treat matters case-by-case, rather than have a blanket salary cap.
Submissions to the select committee considering the bill close on May 3.
Sources said the Government was willing to make changes to draft fixed-contract provisions.
Union raises ante on employer bid to alter new law
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