The end of 2024 marks one year in power for the National-led government. This retrospective look at the year for unions examines the state of the union movement in 2024 compared with the first year of the last National-led government in 2009.
National Party leader John Key was sworn in as Prime Minister at the end of 2008 just three months after the economy had entered a recession brought on by the Global Financial Crisis of 2007-2008. The official unemployment rate of 4.4% would rise to 6.6% by the end of Key’s first year in power. Christopher Luxon’s first year is marked by a similar (if weaker) trend, with the economy slipping into recession in December and unemployment rising from 4% to 4.8% by September 2024.
Rising unemployment can create insecurity for workers and undermine union strength. John Key’s government amplified that insecurity in 2009 by extending 90-day “sack at will” trial periods to all workplaces. Luxon’s government is amplifying insecurity with its own employment law changes, including an amendment to the Employment Relations Act which will overturn a court ruling granting minimum legal rights for workers deemed to be “contractors”. Rising unemployment can also deliver a hit to union membership numbers when tens of thousands are losing their jobs.
But the state of the union movement also depends on how unions respond, industrially and politically. The response in 2024 has been better than it was last time.
In 2009, the overarching concept framing union political strategy was tripartism. As defined by Diana Russell, Senior Consultant at BERL Business and Economic Research Ltd, “tripartism is where three social partner representatives with equal mana at the table, worker (union), employer, and government, meet freely to discuss and compromise to address issues of economic and social concern.”
Sitting underneath the overarching political strategy of tripartism is political lobbying to secure legislative changes to benefit working people and legal activism to enforce these rights through the Employment Relations Authority and the courts. Also underneath this umbrella is union work in various bipartite forums with employers, mainly in the public sector. The strategy prioritises the actions of union leaders and officials.
The birth of tripartism as an overarching union strategy in Aotearoa had a long gestation. In his address to the 2003 CTU Conference, PSA National Secretary Richard Wagstaff described it as “a natural embodiment of a partnership approach” pioneered in this country by the PSA.
The emergence of the partnership approach can be traced to 1998, when a partnership agreement was signed between the PSA and the Manukau City Council. The evolution into tripartism came at the PSA Congress two years later, where I was a lone voice on the conference floor against a partnership agreement embracing the union, employers and government.
But tripartism and partnership did not originate in Aotearoa. “The concept of tripartism”, says BERL’s Diana Russell, “was designed outside New Zealand for the ILO [International Labour Organisation]”. Richard Wagstaff acknowledged this at the 2003 CTU Conference, “We also went off-shore for inspiration. The Social Partnership or Social Dialogue model of unionism is prevalent in Europe and fits well within the social democratic political systems of those countries.” When the ILO was incorporated into the UN system, it became part of what is known as the rules-based international order.
Official union acceptance of social partnership and tripartism in Aotearoa was made possible by four things. Firstly, the election of the 1999 Labour-led government. This in turn helped to sideline the Business Roundtable, with its extreme free-market policies, and allowed the more pragmatic Business NZ to become the recognised voice for business. Labour-aligned top union leaders could then overcome opposition to partnership with “reasonable” employers and with “their” government. Finally, a decade of unusually strong economic growth allowed employers to make small concessions in the name of partnership.
Once entrenched, however, the underlying problems with tripartism came to the fore under National from 2008 as it turned into a leg-iron for the labour movement. A belief in the possibility of union partnership not just with a Labour-led government in good economic times, but with the National-led government during the Global Financial Crisis, shaped the CTU position going into a high-profile “Jobs Summit” called by Prime Minister John Key in February that year.
On the eve of the summit, CTU president Helen Kelly wrote in her column in the Dominion Post Business Day, “This is a scary time to be a worker… It is also a scary time for many business owners. Both groups have an interest in each other’s survival through these unusual economic circumstances… The Council of Trade Unions does not object to support for businesses at this time… We are actively participating in the Government’s programmes for economic stimulus.”
The CTU discussion document, presented at the summit a few days later, called for a “social consensus” to tackle the economic crisis. In October, John Key was invited to give a keynote address at the 2009 CTU Biennial Conference – the first time that a National Party Prime Minister had been given that platform. Having been handed the opportunity, Key appeared to me that day to win over a significant number of conference delegates.
Union leadership – President Nano Tunnicliff (Right) heading the NZNO delegation to the 2009 CTU Conference, with Grant Brookes (Left).
The union movement’s political response during the first year of the Key National government was summed up by an editorial in the newspaper of the National Distribution Union, NDU Express. Under a headline, “A National Government: shall we dance or box?”, it said:
“Unlike the 1990s National Government, this one says it wishes to work with unions rather than kill them. It is inviting unions to help develop policies to fight the recession. The NDU and the entire union movement need to be ready for both possibilities; we have to be ready to box or dance with the new Government – or prepare for a combination of both.”
This “wait and see” approach gave the National Party the benefit of the doubt and disarmed the union movement industrially. The annual number of strikes in Aotearoa would fall to single digits under the Key government – the lowest level in over a century. Union membership also declined. It wasn’t until four years later that the NZCTU mobilised union members to oppose the government – and even then, their nationwide “Fairness At Work” rallies in 2013 had a narrow political focus, limited to opposing further changes to employment laws.
The immediate political response to Luxon’s government in 2024 has been different. In October, the CTU called on people to “Fight Back Together” against the government. Their “Maranga Ake” rallies held across the motu had a broad political focus, which included opposition to government attacks on Te Tiriti and Māori rights and their huge tax breaks to landlords. More than 10,000 people responded to the call.
Recent history shows that the number of strikes tends to be higher under Labour-led governments, partly due to higher expectations among working people that industrial action can succeed. But official statistics show there have been more strikes in the first eight months of 2024 than there were in all of 2023. Staff in tertiary education providers, supermarket workers, ambulance officers and junior doctors and are just some of the workers who have taken industrial action. With strikes planned by nurses in Te Whatu Ora in December, 2024 is likely to see more strikes than any of the previous three years under Labour.
The 3 December 2024 NZNO picket line was joined by unionists from First Union, Unite Union, Public Services Association, Maritime Union and more
Figures for total union membership in 2024 have not yet been released. But in March, the country’s second largest union, the New Zealand Nurses Organisation Tōpūtanga Tapuhi Kaitiaki o Aotearoa, published membership figures showing an increase of 6% over last year to reach 60,000 members for the first time. NZEI Te Riu Roa, the third largest union, grew by 7% this year to more than 50,000 members.
Encouragingly, there are also signs of a new overarching political strategy emerging for the union movement to replace tripartism. As I wrote in 2009:
“The problems with this union approach [tripartism] run deep. As the lessons of the 1930s should tell us, the growing economic crisis now sweeping the globe will create a centrifugal political force which shatters any ‘social consensus’. That decade saw the growth of right-wing extremism worldwide, and a corresponding wave of social revolts, militant trade unionism and growth of the radical left – including, in this country, the election of the most left-wing government New Zealand has yet seen.”
Looking back at my 2009 article, “the growth of right-wing extremism worldwide” and the creation of “a centrifugal force which shatters any ‘social consensus’” occurred more slowly than I expected.
Throughout the John Key years, the union movement persisted with its existing overarching political strategy. In 2020, Richard Wagstaff was able to celebrate “a welcome return to tripartism” after 2017. But the Luxon Government is a different beast. There are no tactical moves to engage with unions. Far-right political forces in Luxon’s Cabinet are shattering tripartism. Political lobbying to secure legislative changes to benefit working people is clearly a fruitless exercise today. Legal activism to enforce statutory rights has limited value under a Government which legislates to overturn the outcome.
Underpinning the eclipse of tripartism, the breakdown of the UN system and the so-called rules-based international order which gave rise to it is clear for all to see. The political systems of Europe which gave rise to the Social Partnership model of unionism, described by Wagstaff in 2003 as “social democratic”, have been fractured by the rise of the far right.
Breaking from tripartism in favour of a strategy based on collective struggle and confidence that unions have the power to achieve their objectives through independent political action against the government is not without risk. Creating unity in action is challenging for unions containing members who support the current government. Even among the majority who oppose government policies, decades of social partnership mean there is little experience or confidence in collective struggle.
But I would like to conclude by pointing to a possible alternative overarching concept for union political strategy. These are the words of Kerri Nuku, NZNO Kaiwhakahaere, in her speech to the 2024 NZNO Annual Conference in September:
“A year into the coalition government and attacks on workers, unemployed, and Māori are so clear to see. From the Treaty Principles Bill and the Māori Wards referenda to the scrapping of Fair Pay Agreements, benefit sanctions, and Brooke Van Velden’s war on health and safety legislation, this is a right-wing government bent on stoking racism, eroding worker rights, and helping the rich get richer.
Our health system is in total decay, and as nurses we grind ourselves to a pulp to try to fill the gaps. We are pushed and pushed, to tears, to breaking point, to burnout or worse, and still we’re utterly devalued and sidelined. And we’re not the only ones. Workers in factories, picking fruit, cleaning streets, teaching children, fighting fires, saving lives—the ones keeping society going—are all being ground down by this system. The assault on our rights is overwhelming, but it has also heightened the consciousness of those who want a more just world.”
Kerri told the story of the occupation at Takaparawhau, Bastion Point by Ngāti Whatua land protectors which began in 1977. She talked about how the Auckland Trades Council organised a Green Ban on Bastion Point – that is, a ban on any work on the planned redevelopment.
“The unions were criticised for going outside of working class issues, but leaders like [Bill] Andersen at the time pointed to the very rules that governed the Federation of Labour as reasons to support the occupation. The Federation of Labour, which is now the Council of Trade Unions, stated that its aim was to advocate for the human rights and interests of working people. Andersen was massively vocal on the point of supporting Māori workers’ aspirations and pointing out the injustice of land theft. To him it was clear that colonisation is a union issue because, as we know, unionism is about justice.
The story is potent because it reminds us of the strength of our movements, and the power in solidarity. And it’s so important because here we see what the union movement is capable of when it overcomes racism and division, and instead focuses on justice…
The basis for our own liberation and the advancement of justice, for women, for workers, for Māori, is solidarity, commitment to organising and principled leaders. We need leaders who are imaginative, who think beyond what they believe is possible or palatable, to offer a clear vision of change rooted in our collective values of justice.”
In 2025, a new era of social justice unionism in Aotearoa could be on the cards.
Photo Credit: Public Service Association
