{"id":290073,"date":"2025-07-25T08:09:15","date_gmt":"2025-07-25T08:09:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/290073\/"},"modified":"2025-07-25T08:09:15","modified_gmt":"2025-07-25T08:09:15","slug":"psa-takes-legal-action-against-mbie-over-flexible-working-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/290073\/","title":{"rendered":"PSA takes legal action against MBIE over flexible working"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/4M7OHLC_image_crop_126076\" width=\"1050\" height=\"700\" alt=\"No caption\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"photo-captioned__information\">\nPSA National Secretary Fleur Fitzsimons.<br \/>\nPhoto: RNZ \/ Samuel Rillstone\n<\/p>\n<p>A union has filed legal action over what it says is the Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment&#8217;s disregard of existing flexible work arrangements protected under the union&#8217;s collective agreement.<\/p>\n<p>MBIE has recently introduced a new flexible work policy intended to align with the government&#8217;s directive to restrict flexible work arrangements for public service workers, including reducing days working from home. That directive is also subject to legal action by the Public Service Association (PSA).<\/p>\n<p>The union has filed proceedings with the Employment Relations Authority (ERA).<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Cracking down on flexible work is the wrong approach from employers in 2025,&#8221; said PSA National Secretary Fleur Fitzsimons.<\/p>\n<p>She said the PSA originally raised objections to MBIE&#8217;s flexible work guidance in June 2025, but attempts to resolve the dispute through mediation had failed.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;MBIE hasn&#8217;t been willing to backdown, leaving the PSA with no choice but to take this step to protect the rights of MBIE staff included in existing agreements,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p>She said MBIE could not just change existing agreements which were protected under the collective agreement.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The collective agreement binds MBIE to supporting flexible work, so its new policy is simply unlawful. We are seeking a determination from the ERA that MBIE is violating the &#8216;flexible by default&#8217; approach which forms part of its collective agreement with members,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p>The PSA was hoping the ERA would allow the MBIE case to be joined to the broader case against the Public Service Commission.<\/p>\n<p>MBIE response<\/p>\n<p>MBIE&#8217;s chief people officer Jennifer Nathan said consistent with the Public Service Commission&#8217;s Flexible Working (work from home) guidance for the public service received last year, MBIE had updated its flexible working policy in line with government expectations.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Conversations with the Public Service Association (PSA) regarding the updated policy have been ongoing, including attending mediation with the PSA on 8 July. To date the parties have been unable to reach an agreement on resolving the PSA&#8217;s concerns.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;MBIE does not accept the PSA view that the review and refresh of the flexible working policy and procedures is a breach of the Collective Agreement.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>She said MBIE was notified yesterday that the PSA intend to file legal proceedings and was awaiting more information.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/radionz.us6.list-manage.com\/subscribe?u=211a938dcf3e634ba2427dde9&amp;id=b3d362e693\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Sign up for Ng\u0101 Pitopito K\u014drero<\/a>, <b>a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PSA National Secretary Fleur Fitzsimons. Photo: RNZ \/ Samuel Rillstone A union has filed legal action over what&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":288720,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3092],"tags":[1816,51,9409,897,12,196,10975,10973,10974,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-290073","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-audio","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-current-affairs","11":"tag-jobs","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-podcasts","14":"tag-public-radio","15":"tag-radio-new-zealand","16":"tag-rnz","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114912858202001688","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=290073"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290073\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=290073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=290073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=290073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}