Government tweaks gig-economy bill but keeps door wide open for historic claims

Tuesday, 9 December 2025

The Government will tweak a law change designed to prevent gig economy workers claiming employment rights in future, to ensure it does cover firms such as Uber.

However, Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden reiterated the Employment Relations Amendment Bill would not be retrospective, keeping the door open for potentially tens of thousands of gig economy workers to claim employment benefits for work done in the past.

Those claims could include demands for the minimum wage and holiday and sick pay, in some cases going back decades.

The Employment Relations Amendment Bill is designed to reverse the future employment implications of a Supreme Court ruling last month that confirmed four Uber drivers were employees, while not extinguishing those and other claims for past work.

A “gateway test” will determine whether workers have the ability to claim employment status.

Uber had warned the original wording of the bill — which will now be changed — would not have done the trick for its own business because of the way in which it had defined gig workers.

As well as altering the wording of the bill to meet its original intent, van Velden has agreed to a change recommended by a select committee that will change, at the margins, who among high-paid workers will be excluded from bringing personal grievances in future.

The Government had originally proposed axing the right to bring personal grievances for people on salaries of more than $180,000 a year.

That will be changed to those earning more than $200,000, including incentives and bonuses.

Van Velden said the changes recommended by the majority of MPs on Parliament’s Education and Workforce Committee strengthened the bill while keeping its core objectives intact.

They also make clear that specifying a gig economy worker needs to work the equivalent of full-time hours does “not in itself constitute a restriction on working for others”, making it easier for firms to rely more heavily on such contracting arrangements.

Uber had called for the law change to be made retrospective to get it off the hook for the settlements it may need to enter into as a result of the Supreme Court ruling.

The Government has repeatedly signalled it would not do that, but that has not stopped speculation it might belatedly buckle as the implications of the Supreme Court ruling threaten to spread to other workers, such as NZ Post courier drivers.

Van Velden appeared to rule out a re-think. “I disagree with some submitters’ calls that the gateway test should be applied retrospectively,” she advised fellow ministers in a just-released Cabinet paper.

She expected the bill would advance to its second reading in Parliament early next year.

“The Government remains committed to improving labour market flexibility and helping businesses grow, innovate, and employ with confidence,” she said.

Council of Trade Unions president Sandra Grey slammed the bill as “one of the most anti-worker bills in New Zealand history”.

The changes recommended by government members of the select committee would make life for workers “even worse than the original draft”, she said.

“Van Velden drafted aspects of the bill to please corporate lobbyists for multinationals like Uber,” she said.

“The personal grievance changes are also trying to tie the courts’ hands and prevent them from establishing justice for workers. They entrench power imbalances and leave workers facing unjustified dismissal with no statutory protection.”

Grey also noted the bill would remove the so-called “30-day rule”, which currently ensures workers are covered by the protections of any collective agreement they could enter into during their first 30 days in a new job.

That would encourage employers to exploit workers when they were at their most vulnerable, she said.

Labour members of the select committee said the bill undermined the principles of the Employment Relations Act and would shift power unfairly towards employers, “eroding the protections and stability that have benefited both workers and businesses for a generation”.

The Greens said it would enable companies to claim extra profits at the expense of vulnerable workers.