Author Archive

Armstrong takes on Double Dipton

Written By: - Date published: 2:19 pm, September 26th, 2009 - 5 comments

John Armstrong joins the list of commentators saying Bill English shouldn’t get a cent for his housing rort: The time has come for Bill “Double Dipton” English to end the charade. Now, being Armstrong, the reasons aren’t principled, it’s all about limiting the damage to National: The possibility of the watchdog of public spending investigating the Minister […]

Trivial

Written By: - Date published: 11:33 am, September 26th, 2009 - 81 comments

The more I think about it, the more Key’s Letterman approach is demeaning both to his office and New Zealand. Sure he did the stand up comedy competently but is that what we want our PM reduced to? A gag to be treated at best as a cute nobody, at worst dismissively, by some variety […]

David Clendon

Written By: - Date published: 3:00 pm, September 25th, 2009 - 14 comments

Following Sue Bradford’s resignation, next into Parliament on the Greens’ list is David Clendon, an Auckland business advisor and lecturer in resource management of Pakeha and Ngapuhi me Te Roroa descent. As the Greens’ candidate in Helensville last year, Clendon won more candidate votes (6%) than the Greens won party votes (4.9%) . Not a […]

Key’s Top Ten

Written By: - Date published: 12:15 pm, September 25th, 2009 - 57 comments

Obviously, the most important thing ever is how John Key did on Letterman. It’s quite cute actually, Key’s clearly a bit nervous standing out on the big stage. It really does remind you that we’re a little country. But Letterman’s very nice, although he does forget why Key’s there for a moment. He knows we’re […]

Secret ballots for strikes

Written By: - Date published: 8:47 am, September 25th, 2009 - 60 comments

Tau Henare has put a private members’ bill in the ballot that would require ballots by union members on strike action to be held in secret. Henare draws on his memories from the 1980s as a union organiser and reckons that open ballots are used to intimidate workers into toeing the line. Well, maybe it […]

Building constituencies

Written By: - Date published: 12:31 pm, September 24th, 2009 - 5 comments

On Tuesday, both Sue Kedgley and Sue Moroney tabled petitions in Parliament with over 15,000 signatures, on food standards in schools and pay equity respectively. That’s an incredible achievement. Most petitions get a few hundred, maybe a thousand signatures. Generally, not a lot of organising energy goes into getting signatures for them because, frankly, they […]

Sir Howard Morrison dies

Written By: - Date published: 11:05 am, September 24th, 2009 - 28 comments

This was always a favourite of mine.

Yes, we’re screwed

Written By: - Date published: 1:00 pm, September 23rd, 2009 - 10 comments

On Monday, New Yorkers discovered their free rightwing rag, the New York Post, had suddenly come over all green. The front-page was typical NYP: a headline screaming “we’re screwed”. The difference was that, in a reversal of the norm, the paper was fake but the facts were real. The Yes-Men had produced a 32-page newspaper on […]

No pay freeze at the top

Written By: - Date published: 9:28 am, September 23rd, 2009 - 11 comments

It seems the trend of rewarding company bosses with extravagant pay rises regardless of performance isn’t limited to Telecom’s $7 million man, Paul Reynolds. The Dom Post reports the bosses of Contact and Skellerup have been given huge pay rises, despite both companies’ profits taking a dive in the last year. Contact’s managing director David […]

Double standards for Double Dipton?

Written By: - Date published: 6:30 am, September 23rd, 2009 - 39 comments

Our readers pointed out some interesting quotes in yesterday’s thread on Bill English’s attempt to bully journalists into silence over his housing allowance rort. Key on why he fired Richard Worth: “The test of whether someone enjoys my confidence is not a legal test and I have never argued that Dr Worth broke any legal test.’ […]

Nat-linked company tries to bully workers

Written By: - Date published: 5:39 pm, September 22nd, 2009 - 15 comments

The Open Country Cheese dispute is getting nastier by the day. The workers began their eight-day strike last week. The Talley’s and National Party-linked company responded by bringing in strike-busters (farmers, apparently) to take the workers’ place, which is illegal. On Saturday, one of these untrained strike-breakers allowed polluted sludge from the factory to flow […]

The story Bill English doesn’t want you to see

Written By: - Date published: 9:01 am, September 22nd, 2009 - 43 comments

On Wednesday last week, Labour released new information on Bill English’s housing allowance rort. Naturally, the media raised the issues with English. TVOne and TV3 ran stories that night. They weren’t particularly harsh stories. They didn’t really editorialise. They didn’t even say English should give the money back or resign. Later that night, in a fury […]

Wake up

Written By: - Date published: 11:19 am, September 21st, 2009 - Comments Off on Wake up

The Global Climate Wake-up Call is happening today. It’s a grassroots way for people to say we want our leaders to do more about climate change before it’s too late. There are flashmob gatherings all over the country this lunch time. The list is here: http://www.avaaz.org/en/tcktcktck_map/

Are you worth less this year?

Written By: - Date published: 10:40 am, September 21st, 2009 - 42 comments

Right now, spurred on by the hypocritical words of Bill English and John Key, employers in the public and private sectors are saying they can only offer a 0% pay increase this year – and many are trying to cut conditions like redundancy and overtime. 0% is a pay cut. The cost of living went up 1.9% […]

Open Country polluting our rivers too

Written By: - Date published: 12:16 pm, September 19th, 2009 - 20 comments

The Talleys and National Party-linked Open Country Cheese is currently trying to run its factory without its workers as it attempts to bust the union and casualise its workforce. They’ve said they’re running the factory (arguably illegally) with local farmers and strike-breakers flown in from other parts of the country. Problem is, these people aren’t […]

Breaking English

Written By: - Date published: 3:50 pm, September 17th, 2009 - 41 comments

Bill English is not holding up well to the persistent questions put to him in Parliament about shuffling around his financial appearance to rort the taxpayer by claiming $1000 a week in housing allowances. Today, Bill English was stuttering his way through questions put to him by Pete Hodgson. And English again refused to publicly […]

Why the Redundancy Protection Bill matters

Written By: - Date published: 11:00 am, September 17th, 2009 - 23 comments

Over at Red Alert, Darien Fenton tells the story of just one of the thousands of workers currently being laid off without redundancy compensation. Really brings home how important it is for the Government to back the Redundancy Protection Bill: Tanya has worked for Chong Newztel for three years and some of her workmates had […]

Contempt for democracy

Written By: - Date published: 5:30 am, September 17th, 2009 - 46 comments

Gerry Brownlee in Question Time yesterday. He’s asked a question, just sits there and refuses to answer. Doesn’t even open his mouth, just sits there with a smug look on his face. Lockwood, out of his depth like always, just ignores the rules to cover Brownlee’s arse. Only ten months in and this Government is abusing or […]

English’s story disintegrating

Written By: - Date published: 5:12 am, September 17th, 2009 - 29 comments

Pete Hodgson is continuing to chip away at English’s ministerial allowance story. English looks very uncomfortable as Brownlee and Key cover for him. To my mind, this is yesterday’s crucial exchange: Hon Pete Hodgson: If the Hon Bill English has no pecuniary interest in his ministerial residence, then how come the email I have here, dated […]

Nats attack democracy on two fronts

Written By: - Date published: 11:30 am, September 16th, 2009 - 9 comments

Again, National has put the House into urgency to slam through unpopular legislation. This time, it’s the Supercity legislation. National whinges that it has to use urgency to pass legislation that could be passed anytime in the next months because they only get 17 hours a week to pass laws otherwise and that’s not enough […]

Lockout at Bridgeman Concrete

Written By: - Date published: 10:45 am, September 16th, 2009 - 14 comments

Last week I wrote: We’re seeing a new pattern in work relations emerging. The big employers, emboldened by having their party in power and using the recession as an excuse, are attacking workers’ pay and conditions. Now, on the same day Talley and National-linked Open Country Cheese begins shutting out its workers and illegally using […]

A hollow gesture

Written By: - Date published: 10:45 am, September 15th, 2009 - 7 comments

Some good comments from CTU president Helen Kelly in the Dom today on the Government’s posturing over MP pay increases. “The Government is trying to make a hero out of anybody who doesn’t get a pay increase, and I’m worried about that because there are a lot of workers out there they’re putting pressure on […]

Kaupapa for sale

Written By: - Date published: 9:08 am, September 15th, 2009 - 6 comments

A few important passages from the special select committee report on the Emissions Trading Scheme: In the long term, price caps stand in the way of market development and shield business from the real price of carbon to the economy…[National and United Future] recommend to the Government that if a short-term price cap is introduced, […]

The emerging consensus to keep MMP

Written By: - Date published: 2:00 pm, September 14th, 2009 - 18 comments

Unexpectedly, a consensus is emerging to keep MMP. A search of the Herald, Stuff and other sites shows that most editorial pages and political commentators are against changing systems, citing MMP as fair and a check on the unbridled power the largest party enjoyed under First Past the Post*. The only notable exception is Fran […]

Condoms and democracy

Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, September 14th, 2009 - 36 comments

Have to disagree with Zet’s call for Labour to ‘just put it away‘ on the remit to conference calling for subsidised condoms in shops to help reduce unplanned pregnancies and our high rate of sexually transmitted diseases. Sure, if Labour were putting it up as a policy priority there might be an argument. I’m completely […]

Says it all

Written By: - Date published: 8:00 am, September 14th, 2009 - 17 comments

From the firefighters’ protest against John Key’s pay freeze: Really highlights the double standard in a government that tolerates Bill English’s rorts then has the cheek to turn around and tell the rest of us to show restraint. On another note, it was interesting to see in the 3 News piece John Key using private […]

Battlelines

Written By: - Date published: 2:00 pm, September 11th, 2009 - 7 comments

We’re seeing a new pattern in work relations emerging. The big employers, emboldened by having their party in power and using the recession as an excuse, are attacking workers’ pay and conditions. But this isn’t 1991 redux. The unionised workers of today have joined voluntarily and believe in collective action; the unions are no longer […]

National-linked dairy company threatens six week lockout

Written By: - Date published: 12:26 pm, September 11th, 2009 - 31 comments

There’s a nasty dispute brewing at Open Country Cheese involving a six week lockout threat, some highly aggressive anti-union PR, calls for the Government to gut labour laws and major links between the company and senior National Party figures. It’s early days yet, but this could be a big one. Open Country Cheese was founded […]

Time for Telecom to come to its senses

Written By: - Date published: 5:43 am, September 11th, 2009 - 11 comments

Today, 200 Telecom engineers in Auckland and Northland will be fired. Not because there’s no work for them but because Telecom and it’s $7 million CEO want to cut ‘labour costs’  – that’s workers’ incomes, families’ livelihoods to you and me. Here’s how Telecom’s scam goes.  Currently, the engineers are employees of Telecom contractors Transfield […]

Labour and the RMA

Written By: - Date published: 3:55 pm, September 10th, 2009 - 40 comments

No Right Turn and Frogblog both have pieces up on Labour’s decision to vote in support of the Government’s moves to gut the RMA last night. It’s disappointing to say the least. I’d be interested to hear from some Labour MPs why they voted this way, either in the comments section of this post or […]

Brash and Banks try to profit off vulnerable

Written By: - Date published: 2:13 pm, September 10th, 2009 - 31 comments

Former National Party leader Dr Don Brash and Auckland Mayor John Banks love making the big bucks. And what better way to do it than hitting the most vulnerable in society. Today the National Party stalwarts are after mental patients. The Herald notes: KiwiSaver targets mental patient An Auckland woman is dismayed her 25-year-old son […]

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