Outgoing CTU president Richard Wagstaff wishes more progress had been made on 'industrial democracy.' Photo / Mark Mitchell
After 10 years leading New Zealand’s biggest union, Richard Wagstaff is retiring in good heart. He shares his highs and lows from the decade - and a brickbat for the Prime Minister - with Senior Political Correspondent Audrey Young.
What makes good work? New Zealand’s leading trade unionist, Richard Wagstaff, is very animated about that as he prepares to step down from the Council of Trade Unions after 10 years.
“Good work is safe and healthy. Good work is, of course, secure. Good work is well paid, all those things. But good work is also something where people go and basically get respect,” he says in an interview with the New Zealand Herald.
“Good work is something where people go and they enjoy what I would describe as a democratic culture. That is, they feel they should speak up. They feel like they’re listened to. They feel like they have a lot more control over their work. They have a lot more meaning and purpose.
“Good work gives people a sense of well-being. Good work gives people a sense of pride, of collegiality, of meaning, of respect.
“Bad work robs people of those things, where you have those authoritarian relationships with workers where people lose their confidence, lose their health and safety because it’s so poor, lose their sense of purpose, lose their sense of value.”
“And good work is more productive,” he added. “And, by the way, people like working in productive organisations. Nobody likes digging holes and filling them in.”
Wagstaff is remarkably positive after 10 years as CTU president. Despite the unions feeling undervalued and under attack by the Government, they are in no crisis mode. In fact, the fight-back has put them in relatively good heart.
A big disappointment to him, however, is the lack of progress that has been made in what he calls industrial democracy, meaning labour-management partnerships, which he believes benefit workers and employers.
“That’s the secret to creating good work and creating better workplaces and ultimately creating higher productivity.”
He doesn’t mean things like company mission statements and endless surveys of staff.
“New Zealanders don’t like sort of fake culture surveys…or that ‘our shared value vision’ and stuff.
“They don’t like it unless they genuinely participated in it, and a union can bring that authenticity and value to that.”
But too many employers saw unions as a threat and not an opportunity, he said.
Singled out as an exception, however, was the Ports of Auckland turnaround, which was creating a “more authentic” place to work, a safer place to work, and a more productive one, while also paying higher wages.
“It’s not perfect, I’m sure. It may not last forever, I’m sure, but we have an opportunity to do something that’s good and it’s not unique in the world.
“There are other parts of the world that do this. Unfortunately, there’s not enough of it in New Zealand.”
Wagstaff is retiring at a time when the level of strikes and protests by unions is particularly high, comparable to the 1970s and 1980s, he thinks, and he takes pride in it.
“The environment is pretty hostile politically, and employers often take their cue from that,” he said. “I think you’re seeing a resilient trade union movement, an active trade union movement. You can see that with our presence not just in the workplace, but on the street in protests, strikes and so on.
“I think we’re in good heart. We’re certainly loud and proud, and we intend to build from here.”
Many of the strikes taking place at present, including the Public Service Association, NZEI, PPTA, the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists and the Nurses Organisation, are by unions affiliated to the CTU.
While cabinet ministers and the Public Service Commission criticise the actions and their impact on kids, parents and patients, Wagstaff makes no apology for the amount of industrial unrest.
When workers were expected to take rates of pay less than the rate of inflation, that was a pay cut, and that was unreasonable.
“The public sector…ended up feeling like they subsidised the service through taking lower rates of pay because the Government isn’t prepared to invest in it, and that’s just not a fair equation.”
When you don’t stand your ground, you get taken for granted, he said.
“I think it’s great that those workers and across the state sector are standing their ground and saying, we want a reasonable deal.”
The statistics for strike days lost this year have not been completed and while they spiked in 2022, during the terms of the last Labour Government, Wagstaff is sure they are higher now.
Wagstaff is only the fourth president of the CTU. It was formed in 1987 after a merger with the Combined State Unions and the Federation of Labour, which represented private sector unions. The first president was Ken Douglas until 1999, followed by Ross Wilson until 2007, then Helen Kelly, who died in 2016, and then Wagstaff.
And the CTU’s proportion of state sector membership has increased over the years to about two thirds of its 27 affiliated unions, totalling 320,000 members, or about 24% of the workforce.
Wagstaff’s work with unions began in 1988 as a researcher with the PSA in Wellington during the second term of the Fourth Labour Government.
“We had Roger Douglas running things…we were just trying to come to grips with this Government that was privatising the public sector.”
After a move to Auckland as an organiser working with union members in Corrections and the health and disability sector, he returned to Wellington and became national secretary of the PSA about 2000, and vice-president of the CTU for eight years before becoming president in 2015.
He laments the poor relationship the CTU has with the current National-led Government compared to the John Key-led National Government.
The CTU used to meet regularly with Key, Finance Minister Bill English and Workplace Minister Michael Woodhouse.
“It was a relationship with the Government that involved respect and listening to each other. Yes, we didn’t agree on a lot of things, but it was a pretty… normal relationship.”
And he said they got things done together, including banning zero-hours contracts where there were no guaranteed hours of work, but employees had to be ready to accept any shift. Principles for progressing pay equity were also negotiated in a tripartite process with unions, employers and the Government.
“This Government is right out of kilter,” he said. “This Government doesn’t engage with us at all. We feel unwelcome.
“We never meet with the Prime Minister. We’ve asked to. We’ve never met with the Minister of Finance. We’ve asked to.”
They had met only two or three times with Workplace Minister Brooke van Velden.
“So the Minister of Workplace Relations isn’t unique. She’s part of a team who won’t meet with us.”
Social Development Minister Louise Upston had met with the CTU and Business New Zealand together.
“Good for her, and she takes what I would describe as a normal approach. Let’s work on the things we can agree on. Let’s find what they are, but the rest of the Government doesn’t seem to be interested.”
Of course, the frosty relationship might have something to do with the position the CTU took at the last election.
It didn’t exactly tell its members to vote for Labour, the Greens or Te Pāti Māori, but it campaigned against National in a very public way.
It placed a sinister-looking front-page attack ad in the New Zealand Herald, and on billboards targeting leader Christopher Luxon.
“Out of touch. Too much risk” was the primary message, and inside the paper, the ad elaborated, saying he was focused on the wealthiest, called people “bottom feeders”, would scrap Fair Pay Agreements, and would give landlords tax breaks.
Fair Pay agreements, which provide for an industry-wide approach to bargaining in low-paid sectors, have been abolished, as promised.
But the overhaul of the pay equity claims process and cancellation of existing claims earlier this year was “unparalleled”, he said.
The strong response by unions reflected the massive disappointment of members at what he called the audacity of the attack. But it was also grounded in how the CTU conference two years ago decided to approach the then-new Government.
“It was like defiant, was assertive, it was like ‘we will determine our future’. We’re not going to buckle down and hope for the best.
“We’re going to be an active trade union movement that really challenges any attacks on working people and on Te Tiriti and on minority groups and so forth. We’re going to be active and make our presence felt, and I think we’re doing that really well.”
It also decided it wanted to show not just what it opposed but the sort of society it wanted and has produced “Aotearoa Reimagined”, which reads a bit like a party manifesto.
The booklet does not confine itself to just workplace issues but covers the Treaty of Waitangi and constitutional change, housing, local government, transport and health.
“So we’re both standing our ground and asserting what we think needs to happen, and we’re out there,” he said.
“I think we have a strong presence and I think our presence is equal to or better than it’s been for a long time.”
Wagstaff’s wife, Kerry Davies, has recently retired as PSA national secretary, and the couple will travel before making plans.
Wagstaff will be replaced as head of the CTU by Sandra Grey, who has been national secretary of the Tertiary Education Union.