Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 8:54 am, January 27th, 2023 - 26 comments
National Deputy Leader Nicola Willis said yesterday that it was a great shame that the minimum wage had increased by so much because it means the Government can’t do it now to help low-income Kiwis make ends meet without stoking inflation.
Written By: advantage - Date published: 7:48 am, November 20th, 2022 - 69 comments
2023 is going to hit New Zealanders hard. Since the 2011 Christchurch earthquakes New Zealand has been beset by a new major crisis about once every two years. 2022 was our year off and get ready we are in for a strange and hard recession.
Written By: notices and features - Date published: 9:07 am, August 5th, 2022 - 56 comments
Energy costs, supply line issues, worker rights.
Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 7:55 am, June 13th, 2022 - 10 comments
BusinessNZ’s attempt to put New Zealand on the ILO naughty list because of fair pay agreements has failed.
Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 8:05 am, April 26th, 2022 - 45 comments
Jack Tame’s interview of Chris Luxon on Q&A suggests that the post leadership change honeymoon may now be over and that Luxon does not really understand how difficult a job being Prime Minister would be.
Written By: lprent - Date published: 8:17 am, February 15th, 2022 - 16 comments
It sounds like the Industrial and Trades sector of the economy has had a significiant wage rise over the last year. While we wait for the wages stats data, this is an interesting indicator. The national median hourly pay in the sector is now $27 an hour, up $2 from 2020/21. But this isn’t just here, the world labour market is shifting just as the supply chains are.
Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 10:19 am, December 11th, 2021 - 48 comments
BusinessNZ and Federated Farmers have this week attacked the Government for intending to implement policy designed to improve the plight of poorly paid workers.
Written By: weka - Date published: 6:10 am, August 6th, 2021 - 97 comments
Rather than economics, can we talk about the values that underlie how we manage the country?
Written By: Guest post - Date published: 8:24 am, May 13th, 2021 - 29 comments
Outrage at suggestions that nurses, teachers, social workers, and doctors were not worthy of a pay rise this year has been swift.
Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 8:02 am, May 12th, 2021 - 34 comments
Some good news from yesterday. The Government has decided to walk back earlier comments suggesting a wage freeze for teachers and nurses.
Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 8:47 am, May 8th, 2021 - 34 comments
Yesterday Minister of Labour Michael Wood led the announcement of a policy that conceivably could do more to address the decline in workers wages and conditions over the past 40 years than anything else tried recently.
Written By: weka - Date published: 6:05 am, May 8th, 2021 - 18 comments
Mindboggling.
Written By: notices and features - Date published: 6:04 am, May 8th, 2021 - 24 comments
Consistent with how they’ve governed so far, Ardern and Robertson are happy to demand workers sacrifice for the greater good — but asking the rich to do the same is a red line they simply won’t cross.
Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 7:40 am, May 6th, 2021 - 45 comments
A few of us on the left have issues with the public service wage freeze announced yesterday. By setting the salary level so low, at $60,000 per annum, the threat is that previous gains for teachers and nurses will be undermined.
Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 7:44 am, April 22nd, 2021 - 86 comments
Yesterday was a day where National focussed on dog whistle racism, supported religious extremists and moaned about workers receiving a modest increase in the minimum wage.
Written By: KJT - Date published: 4:36 pm, March 11th, 2021 - 50 comments
Expecting a bit much aren’t you? We haven’t had that since Muldoon. At least he had them. The kind of people now asking for a plan were those who complained about governments that “interfered with the sacred ‘free market’” and screamed about “central planning”, “picking winners”, “protectionism” etc. They prefer just getting cheap labour to give the illusion of economic growth. And build a cycleway!
Written By: weka - Date published: 10:37 am, December 12th, 2020 - 68 comments
Not a vague let’s raise wages and benefits explanation, but an in-depth, number crunching, evidence-driven explanation. Where is it?
Written By: advantage - Date published: 8:30 am, September 24th, 2020 - 100 comments
This is a backpocket election – and that’s where most of Labour’s effort is going as it rightly should.
Written By: notices and features - Date published: 9:53 am, September 17th, 2020 - 16 comments
The Green Party welcome Labour’s commitment to extend the living wage to Government contractors, but will push for Fair Pay Agreements across industries in the next Government so more New Zealanders can earn a dignified income.
Written By: nickkelly - Date published: 12:27 am, July 11th, 2020 - 4 comments
On the day of the council vote, we organised for the effected Citi-Ops workers to sit in the public gallery in the Council rooms wearing their High Viz’s and work gear. I was one of three speakers for the union, expressing opposition to axing these jobs. The Council debated the issue for about 30 minutes. Those councillors in favour of making the workers redundant argued that they should not interfere with management decisions. Those against the decision felt that management did not have the mandate to make this decision. The vote ended up being 7-7, so Green Party Mayor Celia Wade-Brown used her casting vote to uphold management’s decision to outsource these workers jobs. The Citi Operations staff were sitting in the room, so Celia and the councillors were looking at these workers as they made them redundant.
Written By: nickkelly - Date published: 7:27 am, July 6th, 2020 - 15 comments
Sure to form, Paul Swain along with Regional Council Chair and another former Labour MP Fran Wilde proposed tearing down the trolleybus wire and increasing the city’s carbon emission. This was to then promptly followed by re-tendering all the bus routes having redesigned all the bus network so that bus companies could then compete over routes and undercut each other. At one council meeting in mid-2016 Swain was questioned about the possibility of protecting drivers jobs and employment conditions. After a few questions, he lost patience, slammed in hand on the table and ended the meeting. This was the extent to which Swain and the Greater Wellington Regional Council considered supporting bus drivers during this process.
Written By: Incognito - Date published: 7:00 am, June 1st, 2020 - 65 comments
National’s new job-creation scheme appears to be inconsistent with their desire to fully re-instate the 90-day trial period.
Written By: notices and features - Date published: 12:19 pm, May 6th, 2020 - 45 comments
Low-wage essential workers are getting New Zealand through this crisis and continue to do so. They went to work when the rest of us were told to stay away – and people would be horrified to hear many of them barely earn enough to live on.
Written By: Guest post - Date published: 7:00 am, May 2nd, 2020 - 46 comments
A Guest blog from E tū Assistant National Secretary, Annie Newman. “Democracy creates a space for the market, civil society and the government but it doesn’t guarantee a balance between these spheres. That is government’s role. Right now, there is an opportunity for our government to do more than protect the future of business; it can address the imbalance in our democracy where the market dominates the agenda.”
Written By: Incognito - Date published: 7:00 am, April 14th, 2020 - 116 comments
We cannot go back to business as usual after the lockdown but can we shape the way things will be for the greater good?
Written By: Incognito - Date published: 8:00 am, March 31st, 2020 - 35 comments
When Opposition Spokespersons behave like concern trolls, we have a problem.
Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 9:22 am, March 7th, 2020 - 43 comments
In Parliament this week Carmel Sepuloni outlined action being taken by the Government to implement the recommendations of the Welfare Expert Advisory Group designed to improve the plight of beneficiaries.
Written By: weka - Date published: 7:10 am, February 27th, 2020 - 122 comments
Please don’t let economists, lefties, the right, or TOP design a UBI until we start talking about bolting welfare on. Here’s why.
Written By: mickysavage - Date published: 1:42 pm, February 17th, 2020 - 83 comments
Simon Bridges has claimed that the average wage earner in the country pays almost 33c in the dollar in taxes. Spoiler alert, they do not.
Written By: notices and features - Date published: 7:05 am, December 19th, 2019 - 32 comments
“Around a quarter of million workers will be better off next year”
Written By: darien fenton - Date published: 7:11 am, October 18th, 2019 - 40 comments
The CTU has launched a campaign to raise awareness about a discussion paper released by the Government on fair pay agreements amongst media comment that government support may not be secure.
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