Posts on the economy, work, business, income, and labour
Written By: - Date published: 9:01 am, August 26th, 2024 - 48 comments
It won’t come from the working class. But we know where it will come from.
Written By: - Date published: 12:33 pm, August 25th, 2024 - 28 comments
Roger Douglas, the most revolutionary minister in the postwar history of Aotearoa, knew how to exert change in three years. Rogernomics transformed the economy with dizzying speed, from protectionist welfare state to a neoliberal free market. Elliot Crossan argues that the left needs to take the same approach to end the era of neoliberalism.
Written By: - Date published: 2:03 pm, August 24th, 2024 - 25 comments
Ditch the NZ culture wars if we really want challenge status quo.
Written By: - Date published: 12:38 pm, August 22nd, 2024 - 17 comments
David Seymour’s new Ministry has 91 staff, including 3 Deputy CEOs who earn up to $348K each – more than Ministers. Seymour wants to use it as a vehicle to change how NZ makes laws and invokes Ruth Richardson in his vision.
Written By: - Date published: 4:26 pm, August 21st, 2024 - 63 comments
It gets rather depressing reading the statistics on National’s induced recession as they steadily push New Zealand into stagflation. The Reserve Banks unplanned OCR decision last week wasn’t a hopeful sign. We’re in for a few years of a National led and created recession. Get out while you still can
Written By: - Date published: 4:57 pm, August 17th, 2024 - 79 comments
It is a painful experience, to have fought long and hard for something you knew was inadequate and to have even that taken away. The Labour Party has long urged activists to be ‘realistic’. Elliot Crossan argues that it will not return to be a socialist party of the working class.
Written By: - Date published: 10:52 am, August 16th, 2024 - 24 comments
It is a shame that Ipredict is not still around. Otherwise I would be putting money on Chhour being the first to go.
Written By: - Date published: 1:06 pm, August 14th, 2024 - 32 comments
When Luxon claimed $1000 a week of tax-free, taxpayers money for accommodation, because he didn’t want the 2 free properties he was offered, he said he was entitled to it. But according to the government, all beneficiaries now require harsher rules or risk having their entitlements stripped. Yet only ~5% aren’t compliant and last quarter, 1500 were cut off. What do the numbers say?
Written By: - Date published: 1:23 pm, August 13th, 2024 - 9 comments
The jobseeker beneficiary sanctions and targets are not adding up. It also inflicts a lack of dignity and shame on recipients at a time when austerity is actively increasing unemployment.
Written By: - Date published: 8:19 am, August 9th, 2024 - 29 comments
Shane Jones, went onto radio yesterday and pledged a solution to high power prices. What are his chances and why are we in this mess?
Written By: - Date published: 12:16 pm, August 7th, 2024 - 49 comments
National’s decision to cancel the replacement Cook Strait ferry project is developing into a full blown political crisis for the Government with estimates that it could cost the Crown up to a billion dollars and with further costs to come.
Written By: - Date published: 12:41 pm, August 5th, 2024 - 5 comments
After months of warnings from doctors, nurses and hospitals, a Northland patient is dead after no doctors were present at the hospital. The budget cuts and chosen austerity measures are hurting us all. Here’s more.
Written By: - Date published: 9:15 am, August 4th, 2024 - 26 comments
In 2024 we ought to ask if the economic reforms of the 1980s and 1990s has delivered on what was promised.
Written By: - Date published: 5:20 pm, July 29th, 2024 - 21 comments
Since Shane Reti and Christopher Luxon announced the Health NZ cost “blowout” and an unexpected deficit, the truth has emerged, and it’s all becomes stranger than fiction. Which claims were accurate? And which seemed to be a case of misrepresentation?
Written By: - Date published: 9:12 am, July 26th, 2024 - 19 comments
It has emerged that National has sneakily reduced child poverty targets.
Written By: - Date published: 3:07 pm, July 24th, 2024 - 16 comments
Don Brash is now publicly standing together with Helen Clark to protest against the subservience of recent New Zealand governments to America’s anti-China policy.
Written By: - Date published: 11:25 am, July 23rd, 2024 - 96 comments
Christopher Luxon and Shane Reti took the extraordinary step of removing the Health NZ Board and replacing it with a Health Commissioner. Why did they do that and will it help the real issues facing our health system?
Written By: - Date published: 4:17 pm, July 18th, 2024 - 3 comments
The PSA just won an important case in the Employment Relations Authority against the Ministry of Education about collective agreements. There are significiant downstream implications to planned layoffs, legal fights, and Nicola Willis’s already tax cut strained budget.
Written By: - Date published: 6:30 am, July 18th, 2024 - 4 comments
Simeon Brown is working on National’s New 3 Waters called “Local Water Done Well.” But is it just a more expensive version with a privatisation catch?
Written By: - Date published: 11:06 am, July 12th, 2024 - 5 comments
As reports confirm that the Government intends to sell off Kiwirail ferries, the question has to be asked: “Why is the Government paying thousands of dollars to former National Party members for advice” and when is independent advice not reliable?
Written By: - Date published: 11:33 am, July 11th, 2024 - 15 comments
My ire was raised this morning when I read a pile of PR drivel from acting PM Winston Peters about the Interislander. If he wanted to be useful looking at “critical part of our infrastructure” – then there are number of better things he could usefully do – rather than chasing headlines.
Written By: - Date published: 7:57 am, July 11th, 2024 - 40 comments
Nicola Willis’s decision to cancel the Kiwirail i-Rex contract without a back up plan is coming back to bite. As costs pile up for the taxpayer, we have already lost half a billion dollars, but that won’t be the final bill. And there are still no ferries.
Written By: - Date published: 10:59 am, July 7th, 2024 - 11 comments
Minister for Workplace Relations and Health & Safety Brooke van Velden hasn’t met with the CTU Te Kauae Kaimahi since November last year. And has announced major proposed changes to workers rights and job conditions.
Written By: - Date published: 10:48 am, July 7th, 2024 - 79 comments
What should New Zealand Labour learn from UK Labour’s success in the recent election?
Written By: - Date published: 9:39 am, July 2nd, 2024 - 13 comments
30 years ago, we had Dot Matrix printers, Windows 95 and brick cell phones. Today we live in a world of AI, Tik Tok and 5G. While technology changes have been embraced, including in political campaigns, strategies and methods to connect with voters seem stuck in the MS-DOSS era.
Written By: - Date published: 12:29 pm, June 29th, 2024 - 14 comments
Are things back on track? How about for those who can least afford to feed themselves? It appears not with reports that funding for food banks is being slashed. And the consequence could be dire.
Written By: - Date published: 9:08 am, June 27th, 2024 - 45 comments
The Government is in a rather precarious position relating to the contract to replace the ageing Cook Straight ferries, which clearly need replacing.
Written By: - Date published: 10:44 am, June 25th, 2024 - 27 comments
Last week Northland had a power pylon simply fall down on a still day. 100,000 properties lost power. Quickly restored, it underscored how vulnerable the Far North is.
Written By: - Date published: 8:36 am, June 20th, 2024 - 16 comments
What is the lowest most disgraceful thing this Government has done? How about cutting funding for top ups of the wages of disabled workers aimed to get them to the living wage?
Written By: - Date published: 9:56 am, June 16th, 2024 - 18 comments
The Government is planning to reverse Labour’s previous policy relating to permanent safe speeds around schools. The change will decrease safety and walking and cycling and increase car use. And the upside is?
Written By: - Date published: 11:19 am, June 15th, 2024 - 37 comments
The Government’s latest announcement about worker safety is about business, not people.
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