Written By: - Date published: 7:10 am, February 2nd, 2012 - 36 comments
It’s tough getting a job in the Key economy. There’s 80,000 more people wanting work since Key came to office and 43,000 fewer jobs. Fortunately, there’s always a do-nothing government job going … if you know the right people. Eh, Catherine Isaac? Sure she’s got no qualifications but the ACT leader-in-waiting needs an income.
Written By: - Date published: 11:41 am, January 25th, 2012 - 11 comments
Headline – PM to Ratana: National has made a difference
Are Maori looking forward to another three years of Key’s ‘difference’?
Written By: - Date published: 7:24 am, January 18th, 2012 - 6 comments
The travesty of the Port of Auckland dispute is that we have a publicly-owned company trying to slash its workers’ pay so that it can try to undercut another majority publicly owned company that has already slashed wages, the only winners being the foreign shipping lines. Well, here’s some of our representatives standing up for Auckland workers.
Written By: - Date published: 12:10 pm, January 10th, 2012 - 40 comments
Other day, Curran asked what they should do with Red Alert. Now, Mallard’s again using it, in conjunction with Pagani on his blog, to try to do an end run around his own party to promote benefit ‘reform’. Leaving aside the fact it’s the employment system, not the backstop, that’s broken, this is more strategic idiocy.
Written By: - Date published: 1:04 pm, November 16th, 2011 - 34 comments
Now that we’re all over Nice Mr Key, maybe we can focus on minor details like the environment, the economy, assets, and jobs…
Written By: - Date published: 9:14 am, November 13th, 2011 - 16 comments
The Nats admit that they’ve failed to close the gap between rich and poor. In fact, of course, it’s getting worse. Bill English says they’ve “created opportunities”, which is Tory speak for doing nothing at all.
Written By: - Date published: 9:16 am, November 11th, 2011 - 34 comments
Labour want to raise the minimum wage to $15. The Nats say that will cost jobs (they want to lower the minimum wage instead). Documents obtained by 3 News show that Treasury think the Nats are wrong. A vote for increasing the minimum wage will not cost jobs.
Written By: - Date published: 12:06 pm, November 10th, 2011 - 37 comments
Written By: - Date published: 7:24 am, October 7th, 2011 - 81 comments
National’s economic credibility was shot to pieces last week when Fitch and Standard & Poor’s gave them ‘not achieved’ marks. Less than a quarter of the OECD has been downgraded. New Zealand is one of them. The Nats won’t admit there’s a problem. When the statistics are laid in front of them, they say they’re wrong. In the Nats’ war with reality, we’re the victims.
Written By: - Date published: 6:43 am, October 3rd, 2011 - 43 comments
As National muddles through, refusing to reexamine its economic plans after the shock double-downgrade on Friday, the job losses are starting to pile up again. It’s very reminiscent of the last recession, which we will haven’t recovered from thanks to 3 years of muddling. Can we afford 3 more years? Here’s a list of job losses in the past month.
Written By: - Date published: 12:14 pm, September 29th, 2011 - 21 comments
Written By: - Date published: 7:10 am, September 29th, 2011 - 23 comments
National did not cope well yesterday when their economic record was held up to the light. John Key was all at sea as he tried to dismiss new statistics showing 47,000 jobs have been lost under his watch. He cited instead another statistical series, which he has previously rejected when it showed 56,000 more people are unemployed under National.
Written By: - Date published: 7:13 am, September 21st, 2011 - 51 comments
Economist Paul Krugman argues that governments the world over need to wake up to the fact that they’ve been trying to solve the wrong problem.
Written By: - Date published: 7:29 am, September 3rd, 2011 - 48 comments
Remember those thundering editorials and opinion pieces chastising Labour for focusing on trivia instead of the substantive issues?
Written By: - Date published: 1:33 pm, September 1st, 2011 - 91 comments
This afternoon Labour released a substantial policy package targeting youth unemployment. Once again the public is being offered a choice between Labour’s realistic response to a significant problem, and more do-nothing smile and wave.
Written By: - Date published: 7:13 am, August 29th, 2011 - 75 comments
One of the lies at the heart of the Nats’ approach to industrial relations is that negotiating directly with the employer “empowers” the individual worker and allows them to get better wages and conditions. The facts prove otherwise.
Written By: - Date published: 1:13 pm, August 27th, 2011 - 67 comments
Following the release of data by the Chief Coroner, suicide is once again getting some time in the headlines. Coincidentally, news from Christchurch supports the suggestion that stronger communities reduce suicide rates.
Written By: - Date published: 12:10 pm, August 25th, 2011 - 21 comments
The government reckons it can cut the number of public sector workers without cutting services. That wasn’t the experience of the 80s and 90s when vital institutional knowledge and expertise were lost in a frenzy of asset sales, privatisation and brutal job cuts– when public service numbers dropped from around 85,000 public servants to under 30,000 …
Written By: - Date published: 11:01 am, August 24th, 2011 - 17 comments
Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, August 19th, 2011 - 60 comments
Bennett and Key are divided in their opinions and their stats, but at least they’re united in their state of denial.
Written By: - Date published: 10:08 am, August 18th, 2011 - 36 comments
In a desperate and heartless attempt to spin their way out of their awful record on jobs, National is getting surreal. First, there’s Bill English claiming that the job you used to have under Labour wasn’t a real job. Then, you’ve got John Key saying that you’re not really unemployed now. I guess it’s all in you imagination. Don’t look to National for help.
Written By: - Date published: 12:11 pm, August 17th, 2011 - 18 comments
The tidal wave of unemployment is all the more heartbreaking because we have been here before, last time we had a 1st term National government. But have the Tories learned the lessons of the past? Not a bit of it. Paula Bennett, who had her hand up from the government when she needed it, says there’s “a lot to celebrate” about 58,000 disconnected youths.
Written By: - Date published: 6:46 am, August 17th, 2011 - 45 comments
Having decided to beat up on a few thousand of the most hard done by young people in the country, National is now refusing to acknowledge the problem of disconnected youth that has ballooned under their watch. There are enough young people who aren’t in education, training, or work to fill Eden Park, and Key is literally running from the issue.
Written By: - Date published: 1:27 pm, August 14th, 2011 - 329 comments
Like the UK, we have a crisis in youth poverty. We don’t have riots, yet, because we lack the population density. There’s no jobs. Increasingly, no hope. Key’s solution? Tinkering. A bureaucratic, easily beatable system where young people on benefits get food stamps and basic costs paid directly. Where are the jobs, Key? Or have you given up?
Written By: - Date published: 2:53 pm, August 7th, 2011 - 25 comments
Next week, a report will reveal the abuse of 2,500 foreign workers used as virtual slaves on ships employed by kiwi fishing quota holders in our waters. By rights, we should have a world renowned fishing fleet. Instead, we let our potential go to waste and employ foreign slaveowners and human traffickers to do the work instead.
Written By: - Date published: 10:42 am, August 3rd, 2011 - 44 comments
120 jobs per weekday lost but nothing to worry about. The market will right itself.
Written By: - Date published: 9:07 am, August 1st, 2011 - 76 comments
A typical shock horror headline on Stuff in the weekend – “Pre-teens dream of kids and dole”. So what’s going on here, and is it an argument for “welfare reform”?
Written By: - Date published: 9:23 am, July 28th, 2011 - 45 comments
Last week, Jim Anderton said that the tidal wave of youth unemployment we’re experiencing will lead to more suicides. He’s right. The best response from the Right: slash young people’s wages and that might create a few more jobs. But Te Ururoa Flavell’s suggestion to ostracise and condemn the dead is just as bad.
Written By: - Date published: 7:08 am, July 21st, 2011 - 48 comments
While Key is monkeying around in LA achieving nothing, Labour is pushing ahead with policies that will take this country forward. Last night, Phil Goff announced the party’s procurement policy at a meeting of Kiwirail Hillside workers, who have just experienced the results of government contracting that ignores wider economic impacts on the country.
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