Impact
The Commission has been involved in a range of activities to progress
equal employment opportunities:
•
The Commission launched an Ending Pay Secrecy campaign in March
2019 calling for the Government to establish an independent body
to ensure transparency in reporting about pay equity. The campaign
video has been viewed more than 25,000 times on Commission social
media platforms.
• We hosted a Preventing Pacific Worker Exploitation in New Zealand
fono with the Ministry for Pacific Peoples in May 2019. The EEO
Commissioner addressed the fono about the need for recruitment
agencies and employers to ensure that ethical procurement and hiring
practices are embedded in policies and workplaces to protect workers
and prevent human rights abuses in their supply chain. The one-day
workshop was attended by members of the public, social services
agencies, industry representatives, employers of seasonal workers,
Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, Police and Oranga
Tamariki. Participants talked about their experiences, where they felt
law and policy implementation failed to protect vulnerable workers
from exploitation, and demanded social services support for those
affected, including young people and children forced to work.
• The Commission hosted a workshop on Modern Slavery with large
New Zealand businesses which are reporting under Australia’s new
Modern Slavery Act and incorporating human rights impacts into their
supply chains.
• The Business and Human Rights Steering Group, consisting of the
Commission, ANZ, Fonterra, Ricoh, Countdown, EY, The Warehouse
and Vodafone, are finalists in a Sustainable Business Award for their
work on family violence in workplace collaboration, consisting
of a model policy for business and a microsite https://www.
businessworkingtoendfamilyviolence.nz/. The awards ceremony is
in November 2019. Important elements of the best-practice policies
promoted by the microsite became law when the Domestic Violence –
Victims’ Protection Act 2018 came into effect on 1 April 2019.
• The Suffrage 125 video, Still Striving for Equality, had its premiere.
The video focuses on the serious human rights issues still facing
women today – our unprecedented family violence statistics, the
gender pay gap and a lack of women in business leadership.
• The Commission facilitated a debate on the use of quotas as a
mechanism for getting more women onto private sector boards. The
debate was held at Parliament on 31 October 2018 in partnership
with the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians, Global Women
and the Ministry for Women. It was well attended and live-streamed
to 2,000 viewers through the Commission’s Facebook page.
Annual Report 2019
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