The Country 26/08/25: Sandra Matthews talks to Jamie Mackay

Rural Women New Zealand has called on the Government to reconsider changes to the Equal Pay Act that threaten to entrench pay inequities and exacerbate workforce shortages in rural communities.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I haven't caught up with this woman for a while,

(00:01):
but always enjoy her company and input into the show.
Her name is Sandra Matthews. She is the National president
of Rural Women and ZED, also a gisbone sheep and
beef farmer. Smack in the middle of lambing. How's lambing going, Sandra, Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Afternoon, Jamie. Actually, lambing's going really well. The sun shining
today for a change. We've had a bit of scudy,
horrible weather the last few weeks, but we're about halfway
through lambing and it's looking good so far. Yeah, you're
really happy with how it's going.

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Do you get out and do a lambing beat?

Speaker 2 (00:31):
No, we haven't done a lambing beat for many, many years.
We leave them to it. We'll say that occasionally, we'll
do a bit of a ride around and just check
we've got no cast us and things like that, but
we leave them to it because we find that that
she do better by not getting involved with them in
the paddocks.

Speaker 1 (00:46):
But if you did do a lambing beat, you and
your hobby and you'd have pay equity, wouldn't you.

Speaker 2 (00:52):
Yeah, yeah, I think we would have paid equity, Jamie.

Speaker 1 (00:55):
I'm pleased to hear that equal pay for an equal job.
Do you think the government has got this wrong, especially
when it comes to and I know you're giving the
examples of rural health care, education and community services, because
to be honest with your Sandra, I thought this was
a bit of a political scrape between the government and
the unions.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
Yeah, no it's not, Jamie. It's actually broader and wider
than that. Royal Women New Zealand's been really consistent for
decades and fighting for pay equity, and the feeling out
there within our members and rural Waheni is that this
legislation has been rushed through. That's where our concerns lie
very much, is that the process was rushed, the use

(01:38):
of urgency, the lack of public consultation, the absence of
regulatory impact statements, and then suddenly extinguishing thirty three active claims,
some of which have been in the years in the process.
The feenis around the democratic democratic process is one of
the areas we've focused on in our submission yesterday to
the People Select Committee. You know, as you said, the

(02:01):
reality is that women are the backbone of rural healthcare,
education and community services and these are the sectors already
grappling with recruitment and retention issues in our communities, in
our real communities.

Speaker 1 (02:12):
What about the threshold for these pay agreements, because they've
changed that. I think the new requirement is that workforces
need to be at least seventy percent female over ten
consecutive years. Now you had a bit of a fluctuation
in the workforce. That might be a bit difficult to achieve.

Speaker 2 (02:30):
Yeah, this is a really important point. For large urban employees,
they've got a dedicated HR team and access to expensive
legal advice. Those sort of thresholds could be achievable. But
for small rural early child education centers, health clinics, where
staff numbers are small and fluctuate from you to year,
that threshold is really simply unrealistic.

Speaker 1 (02:51):
So, Sandra Matthew's national president of Rural Women in z
do you think this is a real threat to rural communities.

Speaker 2 (03:00):
We do, you know, as I said earlier, we've been fighting.
Rural Women's been fighting for this for many, many years,
and we're still strongly advocating for pay equity for our
rural communities. This isn't just about women's take on pay.
It's about whether our central services in rural New Zealand survive.
You know, as an example, the Rural New Zealand College

(03:22):
of General Practiousness their primary care nurses and rural practices
and fifteen to thirty five percent less than hospital nurses
in our cities. So that pay gap gap makes it
incredibly hard for rural areas to recruit and retrain the
wife the workforce. Same with teachers in isolated schools, it's
already hard to attract them. So without pay equity, the

(03:42):
prospect of pay equity adjustments, real placements become even less appealing.
And the same as it's the same for rest homes
and age care facilities and in home help for age
care to stay in their homes. So it actually rolls
on to a lot of these roles that women do
in our rural community and it's actually going to put
the under pressure.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
Well, I reckon, if you have to wipe someone's bum
in a rest home, you deserve to be well paid
for it. Sandra Matthews, National President of Rural Women and
ZED keep up the good fight and enjoy if such
a thing as possible, it probably is if you're not
doing a lambing beat. The rest of lambing, see it

Speaker 2 (04:17):
Great, Thank you Jamie