Brooke van Velden suggests new report on pay equity ‘a waste of time’, Labour cautiously endorses repeal
Tuesday, 24 February 2026
A damning but unofficial report on the changes to pay equity announced by the Government has been rejected by the Government immediately, with the minster responsible suggesting reading the report would be a “waste of time”.
Meanwhile Labour leader Chris Hipkins has retained his high level commitment to repeal the changes but still will not specify exactly how that might be carried out or what it might cost.
The “People’s Select Committee on Pay Equity” - a group led by former National Party MP Professor Marilyn Waring, featuring former MPs from National, Labour, NZ First, and the Greens - released a report on Tuesday morning describing 2025’s changes by the Government as a breach of the rule of law and a “flagrant and significant abuse of power”.
After months of hearings the committee found the retrospective cancellation of existing rights and remedies was a serious violation of the rule of law. That came after employers, charitable organisations and unions spent millions of dollars on the 33 cancelled claims that were axed by the law change.
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The bill making the changes itself was passed under urgency and did not go through a normal select committee process.
Workplace Relations Brooke van Velden, who made the changes last year, said she had not read the report and the Government would not be changing its mind.
“Former MPs are welcome to hold their opinions - like any other member of the public - but the Government went through a process, the law for pay equity has changed, and the Government won't be changing its mind,” van Velden said.
Asked if she would read the report, she replied: “It might be a bit of a waste of time for both myself and for those people who are involved in writing it because the Government’s been clear the whole time - that the law stands and there won’t be an amendment to it.”
She stressed that laws around equal pay for the same job remained in place but the Government had not believed it was fair to compare male-dominated with female-dominated professions in the way that the prior law had.
“What the law change here has been is instead of saying a nurse can compare themselves to a traffic controller or a Corrections officer, you need to compare yourself with a job within the same industry,” van Velden said.
Tamara Baddeley, a home support worker at the release of the report, said comparing her profession to fisheries officers would have made sense - as the male-dominated fisheries officers had secured far better conditions than the female-dominated care sector.
“As a home support worker, I use my own car to go from client's house to client's house, and I get a tiny little percentage back for mileage. Fisheries officers get given their own vehicle and a fuel card, and they drive from site to site to site. They get paid to drive from beach to beach, from site to site,” Baddeley.
She said her sector had only won the right to get paid for travel time at all in 2017 and it had been before the courts before the law changed.
Finance Minister Nicola Willis says the changes saved up to $12.8 billion over the four-year operating period, and has been eager to push Labour on where it might find the funds for a full repeal.
Hipkins said some of the figures “appear to be made up” and Labour was committed to making the “principles exactly the same as they were beforehand”.
Labour’s workplace relations spokesperson, Jan Tinetti, said the party would reveal more detail on that matter ahead of the election.
“We have heard there today that there's no clarity around where that money has gone to. Our fiscal plan will be released fully costed before the election, and we won't be able to give that exact detail until we're able to see that minute detail,” Tinetti said.
Baddeley said she was fine with Labour taking its time on the policy, but if it wasn’t strongly committed to it ahead of the election she would be thinking strategically about how to vote.
National MP Barbara Kuriger was at the event and said she would be taking the concerns of the women back to her party, but it was for ministers to comment on any potential policy changes.
– Additional reporting by Paora Manuel
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