The fair pay agreement legislation, passed in October, has the potential to transform our local dining culture.

This is an excerpt from our weekly food newsletter, The Boil Up.

It’s been just over a month since the fair pay agreement legislation, one of the biggest shake ups to employment law in recent history, passed its final reading in the house.

In short, fair pay agreements (FPAs) aim to create a “floor” of minimum rights for employees in particular industries which are agreed to by both employers and unions. It covers things like wages, guaranteed breaks, health and safety, penalty rates and so on. (If you’re still a bit confused, I’ve written this explainer and this one too which hopefully help to illuminate things.)

I’ve been particularly intrigued by the prospect of one of these for the hospitality industry because I think it has the potential to transform how we think about the industry. And today∗, on the first day of initiation, it looks like hospitality workers across the country could be the first across the line to make a claim, which will begin the next step of the process – negotiations with employees.

Throughout the process, the overwhelming response from hospitality employees and their representative associations quoted in the media has been starkly pessimistic toward FPAs. But Renwick Boon who co-owns Night Flower, a dimly-lit and well-hidden cocktail bar tucked away just off Cuba Street in Pōneke had a chat with me about why he feels the agreement marks a new dawn. And not just for the chefs, bartenders, dishwashers, servers and baristas who keep our plates and glasses full – but for the dining scene as a whole.

CML: What was your experience in hospitality before opening Night Flower?

RB: I’ve been in hospitality for almost two and a half decades. I decided I was gonna be a rock and roll musician, so initially I was working in hospitality to support that. I just fell in love with it. I’ve probably worked in about a dozen bars, mostly in Wellington. There were really good operators, and there were some dreadful operators. And it wasn’t till I worked for Havana Bar that I started to think things could be very different. They treated us so well and had a genuine concern for our health and mental wellbeing. It was a big inspiration.

When you opened your own place, was that something you had front of mind?

Definitely. We wanted to change the culture that we had experienced, which I think we’ve done with some success as well as making some mistakes. We’re still learning.

So when did you start thinking about FPAs?

Before we heard about FPAs, we often talked about the industry and how people simply aren’t paid enough. Overseas, you have people who are career bartenders, like in New Orleans, people will be in their 60s, and that wasn’t happening here. You hire someone so talented and they’re like “hey, look, I’m going over to Melbourne, I’m off to London”. There’s all this great talent just leaving. At the same time, there’s no great margins for the bar, so you can’t really compete as much as you’d like with the businesses who are paying staff less.

It’s a rare breed who can do what I expect of people, and they work so hard. We have one person here who knows how the different processes of yeast affect the end product. We have someone behind the bar with a doctorate. We have someone who speaks two languages. It’s not a place for unskilled people. I expect so much of these beautiful people working for me, they will memorise a couple of hundred cocktails, they know the history behind them, the history of the alcohol.

Aside from benefits to staff, what would be the benefits to the industry as a whole?

There’s a lot of talent here but if we paid properly, there’d be a lot more talent. There wouldn’t be three bars fighting over the same three people, we’d be drawing from a lot more experience and growth. From a very selfish point of view for the businesses it makes more sense for us all to be paying more and building up the skills and reputation. People are missing all the good that can come out of this FPA for the culture too. It will give us better coffee, better drinks, better service.

In places like Melbourne, workers in the industry get paid well because they have minimum pay and standards and their dining scene is so vibrant and exciting. Could you see FPAs having a similar impact here? 

Oh, absolutely. I think that’s been hugely important and their industry hasn’t suffered from it. It’s just exploded. Every now and then you pop over and see what they’re doing over there and it’s an inspiration. It’s created a beautiful culture that Melbourne is definitely benefiting from, the tourism industry is benefiting and other industries are getting the flow-on effects.

You’re a rare employer voice in the discussion around FPAs, why do you think your perspective differs from a lot of those more oppositional voices?

If we do this right and it’s a fair negotiation between two parties who are equally represented, it should strengthen us. A business should not be running on the model of paying staff less to make money. You’re just taking money out of one person’s pocket to fill your own. That’s not a business model, that’s a people farming model.

I know we’ve just gone through Covid-19 and things are hard. Things are tough here. But the idea that this place could be making money but taking money out of their pockets is not a model we felt comfortable with. We just couldn’t do that, that’s not right. We’re not going to do it by making people unable to pay rent, or unable to have dental care. Those things are what those bars are making money off: people’s inability to access the basics.

Are there any specific impacts you think FPAs will have on smaller and more bespoke spots like Night Flower, compared to more standardised hospo places?

There’s more margin in flinging canned beer than a good cocktail. And for small places, the FPA is going to really benefit us because we need to pay people well, we need to attract people to our places. It just makes us competitive, it’s all a good thing. We’ll get things that are different. It’s going to create some competition for us which is going to be fun. We’re gonna have to stay on our toes or we’ll end up being dinosaurs.

At the moment you’ve got chains who are essentially farming people to make money competing with hospitality businesses that are trying to create something special. FPAs will change that and help to create a much more exciting and vibrant hospitality culture across New Zealand.

∗ The initiation began on Thursday 1 December.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.