Southland AGM Thursday 28th April 2005
Chamber Southland held the 2003-2004 AGM at the White Herron. The evening started with drinks and nibbles at 5.30 with the official meeting at 6.00
President Kevin presented his report and the new Board was installed. This was the first year of the new voting system that allows voting via the internet, so gone are the days of tieing up the evening counting and counting votes. Kevin Frater stood down and Andrew Leys took up the roll of President. 
The meeting also saw Wayne Afleck and Ernest New retire after 5 and 4 years receptively and Brian Cooper NZAS came on the Board.
Business NZ CEO, Phil O'Reilly was the guest speaker with the subject “The way ahead for NZ manufacturing”
Phil is quite adamant that manufacturing in New Zealand if very much alive and kicking and not the 'sunset industry' commentators claim it to be. Manufacturing employs 300,000 people, earns over 12 billion dollars a year in export receipts and makes up around 16% of our gross domestic product.
Manufacturing creates jobs for New Zealanders. It creates jobs not just in the main centres, but in all regions of New Zealand. In the Otago Southland region, it is responsible for around 20,000 alone - definitely a substantial number.
The high NZ dollar, high interest rates, higher petrol prices, the Kyoto agreement and especially the Engineers union's across-the-board 5% wage claim, are factors that Phil believes will upset the stability of manufacturing in NZ.
"The employment agreement the engineer's union has chosen is a 'multi-employer collective agreement' or 'meca'. A meca binds all the union members across a number of workplaces - as well as all of their respective employers - into one contract. This can be dangerous for employers who can't pay as much as others - they can get squeezed if the union decides to play hardball and demand an across-the-board wage increase, such as we are seeing now", says Phil. "The unions seem to be thinking the way they did in the 1970s when we were a centralised bargaining economy. But that's no longer the case - wage rates are now a matter between employees and their respective employers and pay increases should depend largely on productivity - otherwise, we'll just get inflation."
Phil also spoke on the effects of the Kyoto agreement, the free trade agreements with China and just recently negotiated, the trade agreement with Thailand. He says NZ manufacturing is in a prime position to start taking advantage of these and not to be frightened over the size of the countries we are bargaining with. He also commented on a new employment bill put forward by the Green Party. It is called "The Employment Relations Flexible Working Hours Bill". This bill - would make it compulsory for an employer to consider an employee's request for flexible working hours; would require the employer to make a full business case to support their decision and would make the employer pay compensation if they failed to comply. "Now you and I know that taking account of staff needs is the best way to retain staff in a tight labour market, so this sort of legislation is totally unnecessary. If this bill passes - and it could, because the Government has made supportive noises about it - then we will end up with yet another compliance cost", Phil expressed to members. Compliance costs are another area where Business NZ has investigated 'priorities for change' as indicated by the survey results below.
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