Sarah Dalton: Executive Director of the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists on Health Minister's 'unlawful' bargaining talks

The senior doctors’ union says the Health Minister's proposal of arbitration, would've taken away their members right to decide.

Simeon Brown wanted Health NZ and the union to let a third party decide the terms of the contract.

The Association of Salaried Medical Specialists rejected this and called his proposal a breach of employment law.

Executive Director Sarah Dalton told Heather du Plessis Allan that there were a lot of unknowns around the proposal.

She says the minister signalled they didn't see the pot of money as being any different and that's a situation they didn't want to enter into.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Heather do the Senior Doctors Union has declined the invitation
to go to binding arbitration and will instead vote to strike.
The union has accused the Health Minister Simeon Brown, of
breaking the law by undermining their bargaining process and is
calling on the Prime Minister to step in. Sarah Dalton
is the executive director of the Association of Salary Medical
Specialists and with us HI Sarah Kelder, Heather.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
Why have you said no, we don't want binding arbitration
where our members will sit in our executive don't want
to give away our members right to decide whether they
settle or not in the bargaining process.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
Would binding an arbitration not be the best outcome because
you're can have somebody completely neutral sitting there looking at
what you want, looking at what the government is offering,
deciding which of the two is fairer, and then forcing
forcing Health New Zealand to stick to it.

Speaker 2 (00:49):
Yeah, the Minister signaled in his request that he didn't
see the numbers on the table or the pot of
money as being any different. And if that is the
case of Health New Zealand and interested in bringing more
money to the table, we certainly don't want to throw
our lot into that sort of a situation. Were also
we don't know there was no signal in the letter

(01:09):
about who the arbitrator will be, what the terms of
reference would be, what the rules of engagement where if
you like so, And we also don't believe that bargaining
has broken down. Just the day before the letter arrived
from the Minister, I was on the phone with Dale
Bramley talking about next steps and bargaining and what we
both thought it might take to get it, to get
the job done. We have subsequently received a letter back
from the Minister this afternoon just suggesting that we go

(01:34):
back to bargaining where we never left, and we're very
happy to do that.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
You realize how political this looks ay, I mean, here,
you've got this has been going on for a year,
You've got the opportunity to finally get a deal for
your members, but you choose to strike instead. Potentially, Plus,
in the media release in which you decline the arbitration,
you name check the Prime Minister in the first line.
Just looks political.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
Well, it is political. This government is refusing to fund
our health system appropriately. They're refusing.

Speaker 1 (02:03):
But what I mean, sir and so you guys look
like you're just taking a chance to make it difficult
for a right wing government.

Speaker 2 (02:09):
Oh, absolutely not. We would love nothing more than to
settle this agreement. That is what our members want. We
have moved. So when we put in our claim last year,
we had a claim that was around about twelve percent.
Health New Zealand eventually responded with an offer that's worth
about one percent per year to our members. Our members
have told us that's unacceptable. In facilitator bargaining, we came

(02:31):
up with a revised claim that would see our members
getting between about four and a half and seven and
a half percent depending where they sat, but the bulk
of them it would be closer to four and a
half percent. And Health New Zealand has refused to look
at that. They're still sitting on one percent. We have moved.
We need Health New Zealand to move. If that's political,
that's what it is. But that's how bargaining works, right,

(02:54):
And yes, we are balloting our members for strike action
if we can get some movement, if we think there's
some progress, we will take that back to our members.
There will be no strike, I mean, so it's absolutely
the ballers and Health New Zealand Court, the governments who
are their funder Sarah.

Speaker 1 (03:09):
Thanks very much, Sarah Dalton, Executive director of the Association
of Salaried Medical Specialists. For more from Heather Duplessy Allen Drive,
listen live to News Talks d B from four pm weekdays,
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