{"id":21483,"date":"2025-08-26T03:46:34","date_gmt":"2025-08-26T03:46:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/?p=21483"},"modified":"2026-02-10T19:41:59","modified_gmt":"2026-02-10T19:41:59","slug":"what-new-pay-transparency-laws-mean-for-new-zealand-businesses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/2025\/08\/26\/what-new-pay-transparency-laws-mean-for-new-zealand-businesses\/","title":{"rendered":"What New Pay Transparency Laws Mean for New Zealand Businesses"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t<div data-elementor-type=\"wp-post\" data-elementor-id=\"21483\" class=\"elementor elementor-21483\" data-elementor-post-type=\"post\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-8dcf31d e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"8dcf31d\" data-element_type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-bdb7958 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"bdb7958\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">What New Pay Transparency Laws Mean for New Zealand Businesses<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-aff539c elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"aff539c\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>A new law has just passed Parliament on 20 August 2025, awaiting Royal Assent and set to come into effect the day after, ushering in a new era of pay transparency for businesses nationwide.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What the Law Does<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>1. Protects employees who discuss their own pay<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\n<ul>\n<li>Employers can no longer take adverse action against employees for talking about their salary or pay terms<\/li>\n<li>Pay secrecy clauses in contracts remain legal\u2014but they can\u2019t be enforced under this new legislation<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>2. Creates a new ground for personal grievance<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\n<ul>\n<li>The Employment Relations Act 2000 now includes \u201cadverse conduct for a remuneration disclosure reason\u201d as a personal grievance ground<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>3. Adverse conduct includes:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\n<ul>\n<li>Dismissing someone.<\/li>\n<li>Refusing equal terms or opportunities compared to peers.<\/li>\n<li>Pressuring someone to resign or retire.<\/li>\n<li>Penalising employees in any way for discussing pay<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>4. Two-part test with reverse onus<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\n<ul>\n<li>To bring a grievance, the employee must show (a) that adverse conduct occurred, and (b) that the conduct was substantially motivated by remuneration disclosure.<\/li>\n<li>The law presumes this connection unless the employer proofs otherwise on the balance of probabilities<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Implications for Businesses<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\n<ul>\n<li>1. Contracts and HR policies need updating<\/li><li>While pay secrecy clauses don\u2019t need to be removed, including them in future agreements is ill-advised since they can no longer be enforced<\/li>\n<li>HR policies should now openly support pay discussions, emphasizing that speaking about remuneration is a protected right.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>2. Training on adverse conduct risks<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\n<ul>\n<li>Managers must be trained to avoid adverse reactions when employees discuss pay, even if those conversations feel awkward or unwelcome.<\/li>\n<li>Such conduct could open a business to personal grievance claims, which are costly and reputation-damaging.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>3. Internal fairness audits become critical<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\n<ul>\n<li>With pay transparency increasing, businesses should proactively audit pay across roles, genders, ethnicities, and disability status. Being caught off-guard by discrepancies exposed via employee discussions can trigger scrutiny or legal exposure.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The Amendment aligns with a broader wave of employment law changes, including the removal of the \u201c30-day rule,\u201d privacy updates, wage theft criminalisation, and more all of which we will bring to you once they come into force. For more information please contact <a href=\"mailto:anna@networkhr.co.nz\">anna@networkhr.co.nz<\/a><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A new law has just passed Parliament on 20 August 2025, awaiting Royal Assent and set to come into effect the day after, ushering in a new era of pay transparency for businesses nationwide.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":19841,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business-advice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21483"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21483\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21496,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21483\/revisions\/21496"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19841"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}