As you may be aware, there are several labour reform developments underway in the Cook Islands, some of which have been under development for a number of years.
As the Employer Representative on the tripartite committee, the National Labour Advisory Board (NLAB) , the Chamber of Commerce has been in the thick of these developments, ensuring that there is a private sector and employer lens across all of the areas.
These include the Workers Health and Safety Act (WHS) , a new standalone Act which is scheduled to be introduced by 1 July 2025; the new Workers Compensation Act (WCA) (to replace the Workers Compensation Ordinance 1964); and a review of the Employment Relations Act 2012.
Following the consultations of the policy developments for the WHS and WCA in 2019, the draft Acts were written. Since that time there have been many meetings to review the drafts by a sub-committee of NLAB. As a member of that committee, we have been required to keep information of this in-committee. We are now in a position to share information, and the new Acts are due to be tabled in December this year.
The Chamber has workshops planned for the first quarter of next year to go over in detail some of the impending changes and impacts on employers, businesses, and employees. We have had an initial meeting where we got together to learn about the evolution of some of these changes. We also discussed some of the challenges that already exist in this space. We are now planning our workshops so they are targeted, relevant, of good value, and they cover off the main points you, the stakeholders, want. We want to also ensure that we are accurately representing the employers in our views being presented at NLAB.
Please register your interest in the workshops and we will be in touch with dates and times.