If you believe the Government’s spin, protecting jobs in this recession is their number one priority. They even held a big fancy Jobs Summit to convince us they had it under control. But while that’s all very nice, I’m more interested in concrete actions that keep people in jobs. And right now I’m not seeing any.
Let’s have a look at some numbers. In the one week since the Jobs Summit we’ve seen jobs lost at the following firms:
Sealord – 180 jobs lost
Irwin Industrial Tool Co – 105 jobs lost
Nelson Pine – 60 jobs lost
Pacific Brands – 90 jobs lost
Tertiary Education Commission – 70 jobs lost
Gunns Veneer – 20 jobs lost
GE Money – 70 jobs lost
CWF Hamilton – 30 jobs lost
Transfield – 20 jobs lost
CI Munro – 20 jobs lost
So, that’s at least 665 jobs lost since the summit, that we know about, and not counting lost casual work or the ones, twos and threes being laid off on a daily basis. Of course, it would be foolish to expect the Government to save all these jobs.
But when the Prime Minister’s response to 180 Sealord workers losing their jobs and the rest being threatened with a $70 pay cut is to shrug his shoulders and say “you’ll always get quite a lot of movement in the labour market”, there is something seriously wrong.
When his Minister of Employment refuses to take action on hundreds of job losses and says her job is simply to send working families to the dole queue, there is something seriously wrong.
And when the PM and his Broadcasting Minister deliberately induce job losses at TVNZ by demanding a dividend when the company is already facing a $25 million shortfall due to the recession, well, that’s just fucked.
These aren’t just figures, they’re real people with families to feed and mortgages to pay, and all our Government can do is sit on its hands and watch them lose their jobs. What a disgrace.
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