August 2025
Tēnā koe,
Restaurant Association of New Zealand submission on the Employment Relations Amendment Bill
The Restaurant Association of New Zealand (the Restaurant Association) welcomes the opportunity to provide feedback on the Employment Relations Amendment Bill (the Bill).
Since 1972, the Restaurant Association has worked to offer advice, help and assistance in every facet of the vibrant and diverse hospitality industry, covering the length and breadth of the country. We’re passionate about our vibrant industry, which is full of interesting, talented and entrepreneurial people.
The Restaurant Association supports the intent of this Bill, which seeks to give businesses the confidence and support to grow, hire, and innovate; as well as reducing compliance requirements and associated costs – particularly as they relate to small-to-medium-sized businesses.
Providing greater certainty for contracting parties
The Restaurant Association acknowledges the intent of supporting greater labour market flexibility by providing certainty for contracting parties, however we are concerned that the amendments proposed in subpart 1 of Part 1 of the Bill only defines a specified contractor as a natural person (person A) entering into an arrangement to perform work for another person (person B). This clarifies contracting arrangements when it comes to ridesharing services (where there are only three parties — person A, person B, and the service user), however, we would like to see greater clarity that excludes product providers (e.g. restaurants in the case of food delivery services) from any role in the employment of a specified contractor.
It is our position that restaurants who opt to use food delivery services like Uber Eats or Delivereasy are requesting a service to be provided by person A and person B, rather than engaging in a contracting relationship, and this should be clear in legislation to avoid any doubt.
Strengthening consideration of and accountability for employee’s behaviour in personal grievance process
The Restaurant Association strongly supports the proposed changes to personal grievance remedies. We have heard countless times from our members that, even when an employee is at fault and is dismissed for actions such as theft or harassment — both considered criminal offenses in many cases — it is the employer, not the perpetrator, held liable to pay thousands of dollars in remedies.
The Restaurant Association recognises that it is a minority of employees that try to game our employment relations system — just as it is the minority of employers who need to be held accountable for genuine grievances caused. However, our employment relations system has become hyper-focussed on building up processes and penalties that try to weed out the minority of bad employers, which have in effect negatively impacted the vast majority of employers who follow the law, while simultaneously refusing to take any effort to ensure that employees are held accountable for their actions when required.
The Restaurant Association believes that these proposed changes will help to rebalance the employment relations system, which is long overdue and will in our opinion help to prevent further frivolous personal grievance complaints being made.
Wages and salary threshold for unjustified dismissal personal grievances
While we support the intent of the amendments proposed in subparts 3 and 5 of Part 1 of the Bill, the Restaurant Association has long held the view that across regulation, using wage and salary rates to define seniority is an arbitrary measure of seniority that does not adequately give effect to the desired policy outcomes.
We understand that the proposed amendments are intended to remove the ability for personal grievances for unjustified dismissal to be raised for employees earning above a certain threshold (in this case, above $180,000 per annum), however we submit that a more suitable measure against which to remove this ability is to define seniority in legislation to ensure that equivalent roles are treated similarly, regardless of industry.
Revocation of 30-day rule and reinstatement of related information requirements from 2015–19 period
The Restaurant Association supports the amendments proposed in subpart 4 of Part 1 of the Bill, which will remove the administrative requirements placed on employers. It is not a business’ responsibility to manage the administrative, recruitment and engagement functions of a union — that responsibility rests with the union itself. In our view, these proposals will require unions to engage more collaboratively with employers, rather than demanding information from a business without any course for the protection of employee information.
Thank you for the opportunity to provide feedback on the Employment Relations Amendment Bill. We would be happy to discuss any part of this submission in more detail, and to provide any assistance that you may require.
Ngā mihi nui,
Marisa Bidois
Chief Executive
Restaurant Association of New Zealand
Read the content of the Employment Relations Amendment Bill here.
More submissions by the Restaurant Association can be accessed here.