Written By: - Date published: 1:25 pm, February 29th, 2012 - 32 comments
Written By: - Date published: 10:23 am, February 29th, 2012 - 17 comments
There are quarter of a million jobless people. In a typical quarter, about 250,000 people start new jobs. Does that mean we can eliminate joblessness in a quarter? Of course fucken not, but that’s what National is telling you when they rabbit on about ‘10,000 jobs on Trademe’. To get joblessness and benefit numbers down you need a net increase in jobs,not just churn.
Written By: - Date published: 12:14 pm, February 28th, 2012 - 34 comments
Don’t panic. It’s 3 year since the National Ltd™ “Job Summit”. I’m really looking forward to the 3000km Kaitaia-to-Bluff cycle way, the nine-day fortnight, and the $1 billion contribution from the banks plus $8 billion from government to invest in job-producing industry. Can’t be long now before we start to see jobs being created . . . John promised.
Written By: - Date published: 8:52 am, February 28th, 2012 - 169 comments
So, naturally, the answer is to spend a whole lot of money forcing solo mums to spend their time looking for jobs that aren’t there.
Written By: - Date published: 7:05 am, February 24th, 2012 - 52 comments
Show your support for the MUNZ workers in the Ports of Auckland dispute, including a picket today from 10am.
Written By: - Date published: 12:36 pm, February 23rd, 2012 - 33 comments
Hey remember how the Nats weren’t going to cut frontline staff? How’s that working out?
Written By: - Date published: 9:45 am, February 17th, 2012 - 172 comments
The Nats want to replace public service jobs with computerised systems. They claim that this will improve service and save money. Quite apart from the folly of destroying jobs in the current economy, they are likely wrong on both those claims.
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 - 41 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 - 35 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 - 53 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 - 92 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 - 23 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.
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