Neil Sands
Workplace Relations Minister Brooke van Velden has acknowledged long-standing concerns about unregulated employment advocates but says her reform agenda is already too busy to act on the issue.
“This is something that I hear about quite consistently. It doesn’t matter which city I’m travelling to, people have concerns about employee advocates,” van Velden told TLANZ’s Burning Issues in Employment Law conference in Auckland on Thursday.
Lay advocates are allowed to carry out the same work as lawyers in the employment jurisdiction, but they don’t have a regulatory framework and there have been several cases where they have acted in an unprofessional or abusive manner.
There are also concerns about the quality of service they provide to clients.
After outlining the government’s workplace reforms at the conference, van Velden was asked about regulating employment advocates but indicated it was not an immediate priority.
“The real answer to this is that I’ve bitten off quite a lot of work in my work program already. I wish I could add even more to the agenda, but out of fear of picking up too much and them all falling over it’s not something I’m progressing with regulating at this time.
“But it is something that my officials are aware of, and it’s something that potentially the next minister could pick up.”
Van Velden also said the so-called “gateway test”, which will apply to contractors when the Employment Relations Amendment Bill (ERAB) is passed, was about...
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