Written By: - Date published: 11:07 am, June 11th, 2013 - 69 comments
Similar neoliberal, corporate-friendly, beneficiary-bashing, anti-worker, anti-democratic & big-brotherish measures favoured by the US & UK governments have been adopted by Key’s government. Prism, Thin Thread and Kim Dotcom documents, show the GCSB & SIS need to be reigned in. How to ensure a fair, just & democratic society?
Written By: - Date published: 9:23 am, June 11th, 2013 - 179 comments
Matthew Hooton is spinning like mad to talk up the economy. Unfortunately his spin sometimes bends the truth beyond breaking point, and there were three examples of that yesterday.
Written By: - Date published: 11:38 am, June 10th, 2013 - 54 comments
The Nats’ attacks on workers rights and conditions started with the “fire at will” (90 day probation) Bill. No surprise to find pressure from employers to double the duration.
Written By: - Date published: 12:01 pm, June 6th, 2013 - 35 comments
Labour MP Darien Fenton has posted this on Red Alert.
Written By: - Date published: 10:00 am, June 6th, 2013 - 116 comments
(Socialist) feminism seems to be on the rise internationally, exposing how threats to “old boys” corporate-aligned power are countered by policing women’s bodies. Sue Bradford highlights the contradiction between Owen Glenn’s paternalistic corporate capitalism and the feminist-aligned participants in his Inquiry. Jan Logie addresses the gender pay gap.
Written By: - Date published: 7:56 am, June 2nd, 2013 - 14 comments
A Fairfax poll shows an NZ divided by income inequalities & political allegiances. Little unemployment for National voters & more for opposition voters: a precariat with a high proportion of Maori & Pacific people. The right time for Russel Norman’s speech and blockupy?
Written By: - Date published: 11:03 am, May 30th, 2013 - 87 comments
As Naomi Klein said in the Shock Doctrine documentary, disorienting natural and economic shocks result in the wealth being shifted from “public hands” to the wealthiest. The wealth gap, and extent of poverty in NZ is increasingly & devastatingly marginalising good Kiwis. Meanwhile, Peter Jackson is flying high.
Written By: - Date published: 10:10 am, May 29th, 2013 - 24 comments
Last night The Shock Doctrine (2009) aired on Maori TV. John Key, and his cheerleaders have followed their latest series of shock-inducing attacks on democratic processes and (low income) people’s rights, with positive forecasts for our future. Meanwhile, the gap between the haves & have-nots has grown.
Written By: - Date published: 7:29 am, May 28th, 2013 - 89 comments
John Key and David Shearer have made similar (inaccurate) statements about who has ultimate responsibility for feeding the kids.
Written By: - Date published: 5:57 pm, May 21st, 2013 - 8 comments
Hamilton City looks like it’ll be the first Council to pay a Living Wage, as it fulfils its obligations as a good employer, following the likes of The Warehouse and Progressive Enterprises.
Written By: - Date published: 10:09 am, May 17th, 2013 - 55 comments
Air NZ has recently posted a $138 million profit. It now forecasts that it will double that profit in the next financial year, and is offering a sale of shares in the near future. So a few months after concluding a collective agreement, they’re indulging in bad faith and illegal practices. This is how you embroil yourself in keeping share prices low.
Written By: - Date published: 9:21 am, May 15th, 2013 - 24 comments
Thursday’s budget is likely to make businesses central to blunting the edge of child poverty. Campbell Live is concerned about the marginalisation of skilled community organisations. Harawira has delayed the reading of his Feed the Kids Bill & argues for the state to play a stronger role.
Written By: - Date published: 1:07 pm, May 9th, 2013 - 31 comments
The latest Household Labour Force Employment statistics are out, and on the surface, look good for John and Bill. But this is driven by improved employment in Canterbury over the last quarter. Grant Robertson says, “Disaster recovery is not a plan for jobs”.
Written By: - Date published: 9:35 am, May 9th, 2013 - 23 comments
Big Western retailers provide us with relatively cheap clothing, through paying low wages in countries where industrial health and safety is poorly regulated. Last month a big garment factory in Bangladesh collapsed, killing over 700 800 people. Ultimately we are all damaged by the profiteering of the elites.
Written By: - Date published: 8:19 am, May 8th, 2013 - 7 comments
The EPMU has won back millions of dollars of back-pay for workers at Tiwai point after taking a case at the employment authority.
Written By: - Date published: 7:34 am, May 8th, 2013 - 66 comments
The Warehouse has adopted a policy of paying a living wage of $18.50-$20 an hour for longer-term employees. It’s a really positive move and The Warehouse is to be congratulated. It’ll cost about $2.5m a year, or 5% of profits. As we’ve seen in the NZ Power debate, it’s a rare thing for major companies to look beyond their balancesheets to the community they exist within. Now, who’s next?
Written By: - Date published: 8:15 am, May 7th, 2013 - 51 comments
US universities’ budgets partly rely on endowment funds. Harvard University investment activities in poor countries exploit people and lax regulations, damaging communities, the environment & economies. They are one of the biggest foreign owners of NZ land.
Written By: - Date published: 8:25 am, May 5th, 2013 - 45 comments
John Key promised a “brighter future” – “wave good-bye to higher taxes not your loved ones”; a higher standard of his MPs, and honesty for the PM. John Key’s NZ is actually one of callous entitlement of the elite, and dis-entitlement and Struggle Street for battling Kiwis.
Written By: - Date published: 9:00 am, May 4th, 2013 - 192 comments
Supporters of the sale of the powercos, portray the Labour-Green NZ Power policy in terms of political strategy and game-play. They focus on the “market”, risk, profits & “fat cat hatred”. They avoid dealing with the guts of the issue: fuel poverty, income inequality & damaged lives.
Written By: - Date published: 9:27 am, May 3rd, 2013 - 61 comments
Today’s NZ Herald editorial on Auckland’s up-coming mayoral election campaign, says Brown has vision, but Minto and Williamson lack it. What sort of vision should the left provide in the up-coming local authority elections around NZ, and in NZ’s parliamentary elections in 2014?
Written By: - Date published: 7:58 am, May 1st, 2013 - 64 comments
The Nats have chosen International Workers’ Day as the day that legislation allowing employers to slash youth wages takes effect. According to the Same Work Same Pay campaign “Youth rates failed to create jobs in 1990 when youth unemployment reached an all time high” and “the burden of the Government’s failure to drive job growth is now being put on young people”. Protest action is planned.
Written By: - Date published: 9:36 pm, April 30th, 2013 - 116 comments
The Independent Taskforce on Workplace Safety finds the New Zealand workplace health and safety system is “not fit for purpose” and is an indictment of employer self-regulation. An average of 100 people die each year in New Zealand, and the Taskforce thinks National’s target of reducing workplace deaths by 25% by 2020 is modest – I think it means the government still doesn’t get it. One death at work is one too many – zero tolerance should be the policy.
Written By: - Date published: 2:48 pm, April 29th, 2013 - 26 comments
I/S at No Right Turn on the Nats’ excuses and choices as they oppose the extension of paid parental leave.
Written By: - Date published: 8:32 am, April 27th, 2013 - 5 comments
Key said “we would love to see wages drop”. Sure enough National’s anti-worker employment Bill is designed to have that effect, as stated in a Cabinet briefing paper.
Written By: - Date published: 10:09 pm, April 26th, 2013 - 28 comments
National’s Labour laws announced today have new sanctions on workers’ strikes: parties will have to provide notice of a strike, and employers will have a new right to fine workers for “partial strikes.” Also today the Herald’s Insider reports business reaction to Labour’s NZPower and invokes the threat of capital strike, posed as a threat to an elected government’s right to govern. If Simon Bridges wants to see fairness, then capital strikes by business should surely face the same constraints as worker strikes.
Written By: - Date published: 12:15 pm, April 26th, 2013 - 139 comments
The changes announced today to employment law represent the most serious attack on the rights of working people to a fair go since 1991. As I wrote on this blog that the Bill will reduce the Employment Relations Act to a farce and the result will be wages are driven down and employment agreements broken […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:00 am, April 19th, 2013 - 9 comments
Pike River found guilty of breaches of health and safety, leading to the death of of 29 miners. The CTU is calling for law changes to make company directors responsible for their company’s negligence. And the NZ MSM coverage of the catastrophe immediately after it happened?
Written By: - Date published: 10:43 am, April 19th, 2013 - 34 comments
Bank profits are up again. A 10 per cent increase over the past three months it was announced yesterday. What we don’t often hear though is how this profit is generated. It basically goes like this. Bank staff are all under sales targets. They need to sell a certain level of debt to meet these […]
Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, April 18th, 2013 - 42 comments
The current direction of Key’s government, and the challenging circumstances of the 21st century create a need for urgent attention to the form of a new left politics; one that embraces the working class, trade union solidarity, gender, diversity & the emerging “precariat”.
Written By: - Date published: 6:31 pm, April 17th, 2013 - 20 comments
As expected David Clark’s private member’s bill to “Mondayise” holidays passed its final reading this evening. The vote was 61 to 60 with National and ACT voting against.
Written By: - Date published: 10:08 am, April 16th, 2013 - 23 comments
Telecom’s $1.3 million a year CEO has announced a pay freeze. Says workers who don’t like it should quit. The rich fuck’s already sacked a thousand workers, now he thinks he can dictate the terms of employment contracts. I’ve got news for you, arsehole. Employment contracts are bargains between worker and employer, not diktats from rich dickheads.
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