Country’s biggest medical lab provider facing strike action

“These people worked their butts off during the pandemic, so you’d think Awanui would be able to come up with a decent offer for its staff”

Medical laboratory workers in the South Island and Wellington are expected to take industrial action against the country’s biggest lab testing provider after a breakdown in recent wage negotiations.

Lead advocate David Munro at the union APEX says it met with the company on 23 May, but Awanui said it wasn’t in a position to make a pay offer.

Mr Munro says the collective contract covering lab workers in the South Island and the Wellington region, is set to expire at the end of the month, leaving staff no option but to strike.

Awanui employs over 2000 people nationwide and dominates New Zealand’s private lab testing market.

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Mr Munro was unwilling to reveal details of the union’s claims. But he says the affected workers will have until the end of Friday to decide whether to take industrial action and they could be on strike as early as next week.

“Given that Awanui made no pay offer at all, I think taking strike action would be entirely reasonable,” Mr Munro says. He says the company refused to meet for a second scheduled meeting on 24 May.

Awanui general manager Vicki McKnight says its subsidiary SCL Group has been in negotiations with APEX over a new collective agreement.

“During the first day of bargaining, it became clear we were not in a position to make a pay offer due to the significant gap between the claims each party brought to the table,” Ms McKnight says.

“To date, there has only been one day of bargaining and the collective agreement has not yet expired, so we are surprised by the comments on potential industrial action after just one day of negotiations.”

Ms McKnight says the company agreed to meet with the union for a second day of bargaining, but APEX “declined”.

New Zealand Institute of Medical Laboratory Science president Terry Taylor says it isn’t fair to the affected workers that the only option they have left is to go on strike.

“We’re the poorest-paid registered health professionals in New Zealand and many lab workers don’t even get paid the living wage,” Mr Taylor says.

“These people worked their butts off during the pandemic, so you’d think [Awanui] would be able to come up with a decent offer for its staff.”

He says without intervention from an independent mediator, there will potential be impacts on health services in the regions involved.

For Awanui, Ms McKnight says if staff decide to take industrial action, the company hopes it is done in good faith.

“We are working to ensure we can deliver testing services during any industrial action to meet the needs of our patients and doctors.”

Awanui owns Labtests, Southern Community Laboratories (SCL), Canterbury SCL, Wellington SCL, Hawke’s Bay SCL, Taranaki Pathology and Northland Pathology. It was formerly known as Asia Pacific Health Group, before it was rebranded in April.

The company had been considering shifting its histology services from Nelson Medlab to Christchurch, with the expected loss of nine jobs.

But last month Awanui announced it had scrapped plans to cut staff in the upper South Island. The NZ Super Fund has a 48 per cent stake in the company, while the remaining shares are held by a Canadian pension fund and an iwi trust, which bought a 4 per cent stake in 2021.