Do you like Pina Colada

62 comments on “Do you like Pina Colada ”

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1. One Anonymous Knucklehead 1

   7 July 2013 at 12:28 pm

   Thanks Helen, keep up the good work!

   I hope the next government has the commitment to turn this around, and especially to look these bullies in the eyes and tell them unapologetically that they aren’t wanted in New Zealand.

   Typo? “Employer as beneficiary?
   • Helen Kelly 1.1

     7 July 2013 at 12:33 pm

     ta. fixed.
2. Pete 2

   7 July 2013 at 1:25 pm

   I was on a hiring panel last year for a couple of entry level positions. There were about 200 applications. I wouldn’t dream of psychometric testing, but it took a lot of time to fairly consider all those applications and whittle them down to a shortlist for interviews. I think it’s a sign of how precarious the job market is for people out there, particularly youth, and nothing this government has done has improved their security or increased the incentive to settle down in the community.
3. AsleepWhileWalking 3

   7 July 2013 at 1:27 pm

   Re: Elderslea.

   Would they make the hours causal/on call if they were men??

   It’s a rest home FFS. To expect variations in occupancy to the point where they need to roster accordingly is strange – are they getting death waves or something??

   http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/local-papers/upper-hutt-leader/8871302/Tears-as-hours-cut-at-home

   Elderslea management maintains that the changes will make the rest home more efficient and workers will not lose many hours if they are flexible about when they work.

   But Service and Food Workers Union organiser Penny Clark said 33 workers that belonged to the union would lose more than 10 hours per fortnight under the changes, with non-unionised staff also affected.

   Several Elderslea staff that spoke with the Leader said that they were unable sign up for new “flexi shifts” because only workers in certain jobs could take on the additional work.

   The average loss of hours among a list of 17 SFWU members supplied to the Leader was about 13 hours per week.

   An employee who had worked at Elderslea for a decade said that the drop in her hours meant that she would have difficulty paying for rent, power and food.

   snip

   STAY OR GO

   An A4 sheet of paper signalled an end to years of work for some Elderslea staff at the beginning of June. The “feedback questionnaire” asked employees whose hours had been reduced or changed by 10 or more hours to tick one of two boxes, indicating a preference for redundancy or acceptance of the new roster.

   Several staff had reportedly chosen to take redundancy.
   • Draco T Bastard 3.1

     7 July 2013 at 2:10 pm

     The thing about the Elderslea is the same thing we see when we hear from employers that they need more flexibility and thus casual work hours. What we see is that the increased insecurity of the worker doesn’t come with increased pay to cover that insecurity. The employers want the flexibility but they don’t want to pay for it.

     It seems to be a belief in NZ management that they can get all these benefits and not pay for them. National is, of course, helping with their attacks on workers rights.
4. Macro 4

   7 July 2013 at 1:36 pm

   The thing I hate most in the whole “modern management” approach to employees is the “Human Resources and Development” idiom. It used to be “personnel”. At least then, there was some understanding that people were involved. This “new speak” removes the connotation of people and what they entail and places workers alongside bed pans and machinery as simply another resource to be used as and when required. It is an insidious notion and the sooner it is relegated to the dustbin of useless phrases the better.
   • halfcrown 4.1

     7 July 2013 at 7:36 pm

     Well said, I remember many years ago applying for a job I told the “Resource” Manager to shove the job up his arse as I was not a resource I was a person. Unfortunately I don’t think people have that luxury today and have to take what is offered with all the humiliating crap that goes with it.
     • farmboy 4.1.1

       7 July 2013 at 8:27 pm

       on the dole ever since
       • halfcrown 4.1.1.1

         7 July 2013 at 9:23 pm

         “on the dole ever since”

         No fuckwit I have worked for over 50 years. But I have not and will not take shit from right wing arseholes like you. So you can fuck off.
         • pollywog 4.1.1.1.1

           7 July 2013 at 11:28 pm

           Nice cut of your jib there 🙂
   • Rodel 4.2

     7 July 2013 at 7:41 pm

     Macro
     Yes At least the expression ‘personnel’ implied some dignity to the relationship between the employee and the employer.
     Human Resources is oft better named as Inhuman Resources but the one that really gets my wick as an insult to people (although lately the consultancies don’t seem to be having much luck getting it accepted into the jargon) is ‘human capital’. I have a relative in HR, right winger of course, who naively sees nothing wrong with the term human capital. They just don’t get it, do they?

     PS.Helen Kelly talks sense…make a good PM?
5. Rogue Trooper 5

   7 July 2013 at 1:43 pm

   psychometric testing- question their Validity, Reliability, Objectivity and Test Norms. Critiques of all fashionable tests will be found in free-access online journals, PsycINFO for beginners.

   question the causality relationship between drug use and employment; fatigue (long, irregular hours), lack of training (minimal is prevalent), productivity / performance pressures (stress) and personal issues ( threat, information and sensory overload) are possibly underlying much self-medication drug use and abuse.

   The Elder-care sector is likely to embrace further rationalization; demographics, budgetary constraints , interest rates, share-holders return on investment and so on. None of this is going to be easy to stomach or pretty to watch, unlike…
6. Rogue Trooper 6

   7 July 2013 at 1:49 pm

   ps, speaking of ‘tea-leaves’, all the commentary on these legal synthetics suggest that they are highly addictive in a short time, and more analogues are on the way for summer; very sad really.
7. tc 7

   7 July 2013 at 1:49 pm

   HR has been turned from departments who looked after employees a few decades ago to ones that do the managements bidding. Hire, fire, via the now regular disestablish and restructure and ensure the company doesnt get sued by always stay within the law, so the nats law changes have made this job alot easier.

   Helen has nailed it about psychometr ic testing, the horoscope would be a better tool. Yet another excuse for modern management to go ‘oh look there are issues there, look at the tests’ yes it’s called being a human with a personality, not a corporats robot. I have seen lots of peoples time get wasted in interviews and tests for jobs that actually were never filled as ‘the right fit’ was not found.
8. Draco T Bastard 8

   7 July 2013 at 2:00 pm

   It is part of the “employee as beneficiary” narrative, asserting that workers are lucky to have the job and should be prepared to be humiliated to get it.

   That’s been part of the narrative for the last few decades/centuries. It comes across in National and other conservative parties insistence that we have to cut taxes on the rich so that they’ll create more jobs. That we have only what we have due to the benevolence of the rich and thus that the rich should have more and, when looking for work, that we should be grateful to the rich that they’re so nice as to employ us.

   When you really break down the language of the well off it really is dis-empowering to everybody else and thus detrimental to society as a whole.
   • blue leopard 8.1

     7 July 2013 at 4:11 pm

     +1 DTB

     I think this “employee as beneficiary” phrase in this article is very powerful and very much what is going on.

     We are being turned into ‘beneficiaries’ on many levels.

     “Shut up and be grateful”

     What a pity that employers weren’t so arrogant and are so incapable of acknowledging what benefits they gain from their employees.

     Employers also gain many benefits from the welfare system, where this “casualisation” of work is propped up by increasing numbers of supplementary handouts from the State.

     Result: More and more of us are being turned into ‘beneficiaries’

     ….and have you noticed the increasingly loud messages of being told to live with a ‘oh I’m so thankful for small mercies’ attitude…?

     …and what purpose does this all serve?

     So the Fat-Cats can just get fatter.

     Jolly good.
9. Populuxe1 9

   7 July 2013 at 3:05 pm

   “The increase in the practices of psychometric and drug testing by companies to employ and dismiss staff is the first.”
   I hate psychometric testing, Briggs Meyers etc, but under our current laws it would surely be illegal to dismiss staff based on their results – or is that some grammatical mistake and only referring to the drug testing.

   As for drug testing, I have no problem for this to be conducted in high risk and particularly isolated work environments. A business has an obligation of care and safety to other employees that transcends any warm and fuzzy feelings about the self-esteem of the individual, a business also has a right to protect itself and its shareholders from liability with all due dilligence. Unless someone can provide data that says that such work places *wouldn’t* be *more* dangerous than the already are without drug testing, I’m calling bullshit.

   As for Pike River, the Government should step in and offer adequate compensation for the families, but can we get beyond this farcical drive to retrieve the bodies as if that’s going to change anything. It will only be added expense and danger for a gesture.

   The treatment of care workers in this country is appaling and a national shame. There needs to be some proper legislation there.
   • felix 9.1

     7 July 2013 at 3:34 pm

     Drug testing is not impairment testing.

     It doesn’t test for being high at work.

     “Unless someone can provide data that says that such work places *wouldn’t* be *more* dangerous than the already are without drug testing, I’m calling bullshit.”

     They also wouldn’t be any more or less dangerous if they refused to employ people who keep pet snakes at home.
     • Draco T Bastard 9.1.1

       7 July 2013 at 5:31 pm

       Drug testing is not impairment testing.

       It doesn’t test for being high at work.

       Exactly.

       Now, I can understand drug testing if at work and acting in a way that indicates use of drugs (including alcohol) at work but use of drugs in a persons time has absolutely nothing to do with work.
       • Populuxe1 9.1.1.1

         7 July 2013 at 11:26 pm

         That would depend. I could see an argument for it if you lived on work premises and it was a dangerous situation, like a logging camp or a fishing boat.
         • Draco T Bastard 9.1.1.1.1

           7 July 2013 at 11:49 pm

           So, that would be testing at work?

           If you’re still bound by the restrictive rules of work then you must still be at work and being paid.
10. blue leopard 10

    7 July 2013 at 3:54 pm

    What an entirely excellent article this is, thank you Helen Kelly, you are a great awareness raiser and spokesperson for these people, who are being appallingly treated.

    It seems about time that employers start realising, really realising that their employees ARE their business (without employees, there wouldn’t be a business. in employer-speak: no employees, no profits) and thus meeting employees needs is integral to a business–not a side issue–as seems to be the view being held currently.

    Employer culture needs to change in this area.
11. john ryall 11

    7 July 2013 at 4:43 pm

    Thanks for highlighting the case of the Elderslea aged care workers Helen.

    I attended a meeting with them last week at the local Cossie Club and they each told their stories of how the cut in permanent hours and income would affect their families, but most of all how it would affect the people they were supporting.

    In the District Health Board contract with Elderslea every caregiver is meant to achieve about 30 competencies after six months employment and the facility has to prove these have been achieved.
    However, casual workers don’t accumulate service as they are employed by the day, or in some cases by the hour.

    Elderslea aged care facility is owned by the Oceania Group, which is in turn owned by the Macquarie Bank, one of the largest investment banks in this part of the world.

    The decision to move to reduced permanent hours and more casual hours was purely a bottom line decision made by a bottom-line obsessed company. This is the same company where the unionised workers needed to take strike action last year to have the government funding increase passed on to their wages.

    The attitude of the company is that these workers are lucky to have a job. This has got to change – not only with this employer, but with the whole employment relations system in this country.
    • karol 11.1

      7 July 2013 at 5:09 pm

      Elderslea aged care facility is owned by the Oceania Group, which is in turn owned by the Macquarie Bank, one of the largest investment banks in this part of the world.

      Unbelievable. How next for major banks to maintain their levels of wealth extraction!

      Excellent post, Helen, and 4 very telling stories. They show how the balance has been shifted too much in favour of employers in recent years, and that labour laws need to be changed to support more workers.
12. red blooded 12

    7 July 2013 at 4:45 pm

    Helen, you are an incisive and articulate spokesperson for the disempowered and under-appreciated. Kia kaha.
    • Roy 12.1

      8 July 2013 at 9:06 am

      ^ what he (or she) said
13. MrSmith 13

    7 July 2013 at 6:09 pm

    The music industry, the only place where a positive drug test gets you the job.

    Shit if I was an employer then people that tested positive for drugs might just get the job, firstly they are Positive, secondly they are showing some initiative, thirdly they are at-least trying to escape from reality.

    I could go on but gotta run as the GCSB are at the door.

    Nice Piece Hellen keep up the good work.
    • Draco T Bastard 13.1

      7 July 2013 at 6:39 pm

      +1

      😆
      • weka 13.1.1

        7 July 2013 at 10:20 pm

        😀

        Plus they save the health system all that money by buying their own drugs (generally speaking).
    • ghostrider888 13.2

      8 July 2013 at 10:56 am

      Uphoric
14. The Stepper 14

    7 July 2013 at 6:10 pm

    Helen, I disagree with much that you have had to say in the past, and no doubt will in the future.

    This time, however, I was surprised to agree with the vast bulk of your article. Psychometric testing has never been of any real value, and drug testing should, in my view, be only ever post-incident (and possibly pre-employment, depending on the industry).

    I’m an employment lawyer who acts on both sides of the employer/employee divide. I find that in the majority of cases where I’m acting for employees (noting I don’t work on any kind of contingency or no-win/no-fee basis – my bills go out at the end of the month without fail, which does tend to weed out the treasure hunters) an actual, real apology is what my clients are looking for. The opportunity to look their (former) employer in the face and tell them that they did wrong, and to have that acknowledged.

    My view on it is that there has been a breakdown in trust in the employment relationship. A good part of that is the employer, as has been noted in the comments above, seeing employees as a ‘resource’ as opposed to people. But another part of it, being completely fair, is that employers have an increasing fear of litigation based on procedural matters and so are nervous about having an honest chat with an employee and instead call me in. The introduction of lawyers generally does no one any good.

    I genuinely believe that those honest conversations (while bad for my business) would go a long way in preventing the issues that we see on a day to day basis. Unions used to be a way that these conversations happened by proxy. With decreasing union membership, and an increasing tendency towards litigation – fostered in no small part by no-win/no-fee employment advocates – I struggle to see a way in which this can be addressed.

    Of course there will always be other employers – particularly in my experience, Australian companies that buy out a New Zealand outfit and cut employees immediately – that do just look to save costs. I think though that there has been a vilification of small businesses in employment terms, where a (very) small minority is tainting the rest. Most are actually very good employers and this is often overlooked, and very seldom celebrated.

    Anyway, no real point to the above but to have a rant. Good article.
    • Rogue Trooper 14.1

      7 July 2013 at 6:34 pm

      As a Workshop Manager, after notifying company (and staff) by letter of safety and operational concerns about bus fleet, owner, manager and accountant were on to the ’employment lawyer’ lickity-split, and I was paid out contractual notice 😀 (had another job sussed anyway) 😎
    • Helen Kelly 14.2

      7 July 2013 at 8:29 pm

      I like the fee for success model as in many cases it is the only way a worker can afford representation. The awards are so low, the process now is very complex and lawyers fees are so high that for many workers they can’t take the risk or afford the monthly bills. There are some lawyers in Wellington that have workers all around the town paying weekly dd’s to pay off legal bills that far outweigh their awards. Your attitude that there are treasure hunters sort of fits into my post somewhere I think. There are plenty of employers not scared of talking to their workers and in fact see the relationship as essential to their success.
15. Lou 15

    7 July 2013 at 6:22 pm

    Some irony here. Quite often aged carers are working class and begin largely unskilled off the street to look after quite often middle class pakeha that haven’t had to pay any capital gains tax. Hmmm.
    • just saying 15.1

      7 July 2013 at 7:19 pm

      Not lost on me, Lou.

      Thanks for this thoughtful post, Helen.

      It seems that just the working class is subject to the privacy and dignity invasion that is drug-testing. Surely surgeons and other medical personnel, airline pilots, parliamentarians, CEOs (if what they do is such important, highly-skilled work), dentists, managers, engineers, lawyers, councillors, judges, and a myriad of others whose work impacts on the safety and lives of so many and the planet itself, should be a the top of the list for random drug-testing, if concern for the dangers of impaired workers was the real reason for testing.

      But the prescription medications and weekend recreational activities of the comfortably middle-class aren’t subject to scrutiny, because if it were ever seriously proposed, a law change would prohibit testing, outside of tightly restricted limits. Because the rights and dignity of those people matter. Even Shearer would have something to say in their defence.

      A friend of mine took a personal care job recently. The contract was horrific and many pages long, it seems that the company she works for has opted out of any and all responsibilities to her, but amongst the privacy she was required to forfeit to them for $14 per hour, were her consent to personal searches, and drug-testing on request, and all her past, present and future medical records if she is injured on the job. Needless to say she was desperate for any kind of paid work. And poor and desperate is exactly how the elites want us to be, that and fighting amongst ourselves for the crumbs from their table.
      • idlegus 15.1.1

        7 July 2013 at 7:42 pm

        “Surely surgeons and other medical personnel, airline pilots, parliamentarians, CEOs (if what they do is such important, highly-skilled work), dentists, managers, engineers, lawyers, councillors, judges, and a myriad of others whose work impacts on the safety and lives of so many and the planet itself, should be a the top of the list for random drug-testing, if concern for the dangers of impaired workers was the real reason for testing. ”

        – YES! that would certainly be an eye opener.
      • Draco T Bastard 15.1.2

        7 July 2013 at 11:53 pm

        The contract was horrific and many pages long, it seems that the company she works for has opted out of any and all responsibilities to her…

        No contract can negate the law so I would suggest having the CAB look over the contract.
16. Yes 16

    7 July 2013 at 7:38 pm

    Your reference to Pina Colada is very interesting

    “Asking people that have shown an interest in working for you if they like Pina Colada and getting caught in the rain”

    The song is about a man and a wife who are deeply unhappy and she puts an ad in a lonely heart column. He also is unhappy and responds only to find out that when they met and find out it is each other who put the ad (wife) and the respondor (husband) – they had both realise they had issues which needed to be highlighted.

    By referencing the song then all i can say is that it proves the point – testing is important – it find things out about people before they walk in the door.
    • karol 16.1

      7 July 2013 at 7:45 pm

      Say what?
    • Helen Kelly 16.2

      7 July 2013 at 8:21 pm

      Yes but this is a trick question – if you like Pina Colada you wont get the job (drugs testing) and if you like getting caught in the rain you will (forestry). So you can’t win either way when the question is joined up like this.
      • Yes 16.2.1

        7 July 2013 at 8:39 pm

        A riddle hmm…have to say a great song though
17. RedLogix 17

    7 July 2013 at 8:15 pm

    Labour relations in this country are an on-going slow motion train-wreck. Every year of my adult life I have seen things get slowly, but certainly worse.

    Unfortunately I don’t see any way out of it. Most people are indeed “grateful just to have the job” and are sullenly resigned to being treated as feudal serfs by the corporatocracy. Most are indirectly bound to their employer by debt or rent servitude and have little to no choice about whether they able to withdraw their labour.

    A man I greatly respect once told me to always try and have three months of salary stashed away as your ‘get fucked money’. Inevitably the day will arise when your employer will ask you to do something that you know you should not do … and at that moment you need to have the choice to walk. If you cannot then you are owned, and you will be a slave as long as you stay. And you will be miserable.

    Most people do not have that choice. Most ordinary working people feel powerless and alienated from their place of work. Sure there’s a lot of lip-service and fake dressing up in the modern work-place, but most people fairly quickly learn that it’s all a facade. While they may detest their servitude, the slaves aren’t about to revolt. (Although as our employment lawyer friend above will attest, they sure will strike back in whatever small ways are safely available to them.)

    And this personal powerlessness reflects in the political impotence of the left as well.

    The state and the corporates have long reserved the power of collective action for themselves; increasingly over the last decade they are have been increasing the asymmetry of information… secrets and privacy are for them and not for us. Personally I think it’s far too late to turn the clock back on any of this. The left must anticipate that this process of re-enslavement will gather pace. The intersection of global corporates power and technological reach ensures this.
    • Draco T Bastard 17.1

      7 July 2013 at 11:57 pm

      A man I greatly respect once told me to always try and have three months of salary stashed away as your ‘get fucked money’. Inevitably the day will arise when your employer will ask you to do something that you know you should not do … and at that moment you need to have the choice to walk. If you cannot then you are owned, and you will be a slave as long as you stay. And you will be miserable.

      QFT

      And most people today can’t walk away which makes them serfs with only the illusion of freedom. National is, of course, trying to cement in this condition through laws that are detrimental to workers and beneficial to employers and selling off state assets.

      The left must anticipate that this process of re-enslavement will gather pace.

      /agreed
    • ghostrider888 17.2

      8 July 2013 at 10:49 am

      always worth reading when you put pen to peon RedLogix.
18. Yes 18

    7 July 2013 at 8:48 pm

    Drug testing is very important I believe pre and post employment so disagree…age care issues agree…physcometric testing..that is a companies or business right..so disagree as future employees are told up front..pike river..agree.

    Helen the big story of the week is the man ban…what is the unions position and who will the union vote be now David shearer is a lame duck
    • McFlock 18.1

      7 July 2013 at 9:12 pm

      Q: does drug testing detect fatigue or outright stupidity?
      A: Nope.

      Q: Do traces of a drug (or even a false-positive) necessarily mean impaired performance?
      A: Nope

      Drug testing is a lazy way of detecting impaired or substandard performance. But it makes managers feel big and gives them deniability to OSH, so they do it.
    • Draco T Bastard 18.2

      8 July 2013 at 12:05 am

      Drug testing is very important

      No it;s not as it achieves nothing except to stigmatise a few people.

      physcometric testing..that is a companies or business right..

      Considering that it, again, achieves nothing except to stigmatise people who are powerless then why should it be? From what I can make out it should actually be illegal because of that stigmatisation of the powerless.

      Helen the big story of the week is the man ban…

      And how you’d like that to be true. Personally, I think it’s sinking like a stone no matter what the RWNJs in the National Party and the MSM do to try to keep it alive.
    • Roy 18.3

      8 July 2013 at 9:12 am

      Given the very long half-life of THC, and that you can get a positive on opiate testing from eating a poppy-seed bagel, drug testing is idiotic. For those on prescription drugs it may also be an invasion of privacy since these can show up on the screen even though they do not affect performance. I have run drug screens and they are very broad-ranging.

      As for the psychometric tests, many are not validated or are minimally validated and are little better than astrology.
19. Martin 19

    7 July 2013 at 9:03 pm

    NZ sucks just like the rest of the excremental free market world.
    • Yes 19.1

      7 July 2013 at 9:12 pm

      Well leave and go live in your favorite non free market country…which country will that be by chance? Iran? Eqypt? Congo?
      • Draco T Bastard 19.1.1

        8 July 2013 at 12:05 am

        NZ will be fine – just as soon as we get rid of the neo-liberals and capitalism.
        • One Anonymous Knucklehead 19.1.1.1

          8 July 2013 at 7:50 am

          I don’t think we should “get rid” of them. Punitive legal sanctions should be enough.
      • Martin 19.1.2

        9 July 2013 at 3:11 pm

        why not just reclaim my own country?
        regime change begins at home.
        Then again, in Europe people are protesting on the streets about being spied on while here we just watch another game of rugby. Sheep! What will happen when the sheep look up?

        Iran, Egypt, Congo? countries people like Yes have plundered or tried to.
20. locus 20

    8 July 2013 at 2:01 am

    i think justification for drugs and alcohol testing at work has to be a combination of all these:
    – proof that drugs and alcohold impair performance and cause errors in a high hazard workplace, i.e. could lead to serious harm to yourself or others.
    – backed up by a programme that offers a chance to deal with addictions, i.e. keep people in work if you can
    – the method of testing, and the procedures following a ‘positive’ test, accepted by unions and employees

    It’s interesting that drugs and alcohol testing is regarded as a ‘must’ in aviation but is sometimes seen as violation of rights for workers in other high hazard workplaces.

    Aircraft have multiple safety systems (design, equipment, inspection & testing procedures etc.) in place to prevent accidents in the event of impaired performance by pilots, but despite this and the significantly lower probability of a major accident occurring during a flight than in other high hazard industries, pilots and co-pilots are required to have regular alcohol and drug tests. Whether or not it is provable, the value of these tests in improving flight safety is assumed by air crew, the aviation industry, authorities and passengers.

    Compare this with the mining industry, where the likelihood of a major accident event occurring and the severity of the consequences are much higher than in the aviation industry. Yet safety regulations and practises between the two industries are markedly different.

    I think part of the reason is public perception of risk. Everyone is likely to fly at some time, and the danger – emotionally calculated in terms of the lack of passenger control and the consequences of a plane crash, is seen as extremely high.

    Because the public aren’t going to find themselves down a coalmine they’re not personally concerned, and so don’t demand or expect the same safeguards for miners as they do for themselves when flying.

    It’s high time that the rigour and extent of safety law in NZ was reviewed to reflect the level of hazards that workers face, and to ensure appropriate punitive and reparative consequences for abject safety performance and disregard of major accident prevention by the company (both management and shareholders).
    • ghostrider888 20.1

      8 July 2013 at 10:55 am

      that is an informative and prescriptive read locus.
21. marsman 21

    8 July 2013 at 9:50 am

    Thank you Helen. You have articulated very clearly the uneasy feelings I had when I read the article about the huge increase in drug-testing.
    Re Rest Homes. They have become a very high profit industry and it seems the owners of Elderslea want even higher profits but paid for by its employees.
    • Draco T Bastard 21.1

      8 July 2013 at 1:10 pm

      Profits are always paid for by the employees. It is, after all, their work that creates the income/value.
22. Sable 22

    8 July 2013 at 1:01 pm

    This is all part of a process to control people at work much as the scum sucking government wants to control most other aspects of peoples lives.

    I have turned down at least one role where they asked me to take a drug test. For one thing, it was an office job so I saw no good reason why they demanded it in the first place. I’d agree too that it causes resentment and leaves a bad impression of an employer as distrustful.
23. muzza 23

    8 July 2013 at 3:39 pm

    When will we learn how to relate to each other and value each others humanity?

    Until individuals begin to understand they are NOT, the center of the universe, there is unlikely to be halt, let alone a shift.

    As the monetary system races towards its destination, as more energy is drained from the life of humanity, the techniques employed will become ever more draconian and demoralising, this is the desired outcome, it won’t be stopped, because people can’t accept it exists!
24. feijoa 24

    8 July 2013 at 6:21 pm

    So, are there any rest homes out there that pay a living wage?
    Where would you like your elderly parent to live – any rest homes doing it right out there?
    I guess it’s pretty hard to boycott these places as rest home places are often very limited in some areas and you have to take what’s available.
    It makes the prospect of old age even less appealing…
25. Hippo 25

    10 July 2013 at 1:13 pm

    There are two types of apology:
    -> The passive aggressive bad apology where you say “I’m sorry a bad result happened here”. Like, “I’m sorry you’re offended”. This is the apology people (especially those in powerful positions) prefer to make because it is an apology in name only and admits no fault on the part of the apologiser. They therefore have no ethical reason to DO anything at all to make amends. It has no real meaning and is therefore worthless.
    -> The ethical good apology where you say, “I’m sorry. Not only did my action produce this harmful result for you, but I was wrong to make the decision in the first place. Mea culpa. And I’m going to stop it happening again and make amends by taking this action.”

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