by Paula Määttä

IX. New Zealand

A. The legislative provisions for equality in pay

New Zealand uses the expression "equal pay" to denote the principle of equal remuneration for men and women for work of equal value.

Considerable progress in equal pay had been made at an early stage in New Zealand under the Government Service Equal Pay Act 1960, which applied to all Government employees. The Act expressed to wage-fixing authorities that differentiations based on sex in scales of salary or wages of Government employees were to be eliminated, so that there would be equal pay for equal work under equal conditions.

The principal legislation in this area is the Equal Pay Act, which was enacted in 1972 and brought the concept of equal pay to the private sector. The Long Title to that Act sets out its legislative purpose as being "to make provision for the removal and prevention of discrimination, based on the sex of the employees, in the rates of remuneration of males and females in paid employment". Under the Act, equal pay was to be phased in by 1978, but a 1976 amendment to the Act accelerated this process, so that implementation would be completed by 1 April 1977.

Section 2A of the Equal Pay Act as amended in 1991 provides that:

"No employer shall refuse or omit to offer or afford any person the same terms of employment, conditions of work, fringe benefits, or opportunities for training, promotion, and transfer as are made available for other employees of the same or substantially similar qualifications, experience, or skills employed in the same or substantially similar circumstances."

Other legislation that is relevant to the equal remuneration principle are the Employment Contracts Act 1991 and the Human Rights Act 1993, both of which prohibit discrimination on the grounds of the employees sex. Section 28(1)(a) of the Employment Contracts Act and s 22(1)(b) of the Human Rights Act are couched in the same terms as § 2A(1) of the Equal Pay Act. An employer is liable to pay compensation for discrimination under both the Employment Contracts Act and the Human Rights Acts if the employer engages in discriminatory pay practices. The employee, however, is required to choose to lay a complaint under either the Human Rights Act on the one hand, or the Equal Pay Act and/or Employment Contracts Act on the other. This is because the legislative framework maintains a strict separation between the enforcement of human rights and the enforcement of employment rights entitlements to avoid the duplication of similar causes of action.

In 1990 the Employment Equity Act was enacted, which legislated for equal pay for work of equal value. It applied to both the public and private sector. The Act ensured observance of the principle of equal remuneration in collective agreements, in respect of wages for jobs held mainly by women and in respect of wages paid to employees not covered by arbitration awards. In December 1990, a newly elected Government of the opposing party repealed this Act. The Government considers that greater equity in employment opportunity would not be achieved through the highly prescriptive and centralised procedures for equal employment opportunities and pay equity that the Employment Equity Act had attempted to put in place.

New Zealand ratified the Equal Remuneration Convention, 1951 in 1983.