Huh. It turns out the government's proposed change on sick leave - allowing employers to demand proof from the first day that someone is sick - is already law. The difference? It requires the employer to have reasonable grounds to suspect that someone isn't really ill. So what National is demanding is that employers be allowed to do this on unreasonable grounds.
This is neither fair nor reasonable - but its the common theme running through National's whole approach to employment law: removing the requirement for employers to treat people reasonably as human beings. Instead, National is shifting employment relations to a "grace and favour" model, where employers can exercise arbitrary power without restraint, and where those of them who are unreasonable arseholes (or who just got up on the wrong side of bed that morning) carte blanche to abuse with impunity. Basically, they want to treat us like peasants - and we should not put up with it.
[Hat-tip: Matthew Poole]
