Joycie says relax

Written By: - Date published: 9:52 am, September 6th, 2012 - 20 comments
Categories: jobs, privatisation - Tags:

Steven Joyce is meant to be the Jobs Czar. That’s what Mobie is supposedly for – creating jobs and growth. So, what’s his reaction to another hundred job losses yesterday at the Bluff smelter and the threat of the loss of 3,200 more? “If [Tiwai Pt closed], it would adjust different things like investment profiles and all sorts of things” but no worries because Rio Tinto and Meridian will “come to some arrangement”.

No wonder 65,000 more people are unemployed under National. They just don’t give a fuck.

Joyce can turn out glossy booklet after glossy booklet about how things ought to be in his view but when it comes to actually acting when real jobs are under threat – nothing. He’s all theory, no delivery. All dreams, no action.

In closely related news, Joyce says its all cool that National has been forced to delay its flagship policy by six months:

“Much of the interest is from Kiwis who might be new to the sharemarket and to owning shares,” Joyce said.

“There is a strong desire for more understandable, factual information about the mixed ownership programme generally and also the sharemarket in general,” he said.

“We’ll use the additional time to provide this information to New Zealanders so when the first share offer commences in 2013 prospective investors will be in a position to be confident when deciding whether or not to make an investment.”

The first fact that any potential investors will want to know is “is the largest electricity customer in the country going to hang around”? And Joyce doesn’t seem to think that matters. If I had a couple of grand to spare, I would be steering well clear of a market that could see the bottom drop out of prices at the whim of a multi-national that wants to get out of New Zealand.

20 comments on “Joycie says relax ”

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  1. tracey 1
    6 September 2012 at 10:12 am

    Hmmm all these jobs that could allegedly come from resources, are disappearing by the month… How are they going on their 170,000 jobs. Perhaps someone should start a barometer, like they do in fundraising to monitor the govts promise.

    • SpaceMonkey 1.1
      6 September 2012 at 1:59 pm

      I think we might’ve all misunderstood… their goal must be 170,000 job losses. They’re well on the way to meeting that target by 2014.

      • David H 1.1.1
        7 September 2012 at 5:49 pm

        More like 170,000 jobs total by 2014, and every one else unemployed. And they are well on the way to reaching that target.

  2. vto 2
    6 September 2012 at 10:16 am

    Our household, powered by Meridian, is losing money at the moment too. I have approached Meridian to see if we can renegotiate our contract. We are still waiting to hear …

  3. Brokenback 3
    6 September 2012 at 10:24 am

    At least Joyce is consistent in his free market delusion.
    The unfortunate truth for the 3200 Comalco workers is that their jobs have been subsidised heavily by the retail electricity consumers & the government of NZ for as long as the smelter has operated.

    They have also been subsidised until quite recently by State supported shipyards world wide which have limited the capital cost of the bulk ore carriers that are essential to the Tiwai operation . Most of the shipyard subsidies have disappeared in the economic meltdown post ’08 and the the cost of shipping is set to rise significantly.
    Shipowners [ such as the Rena’s ] have led a charmed existence for the past 40 years , carrying out minimal routine maintenance & scrapping degraded vessels and replacing with cheap newbuilds.

    With fuel prices on the rise , shipping costs are escalating and Tiwai smelter must be near the end of its economic life—–unless we subsidise it more by reducing the already ludicrously cheap tariff they pay for 100% renewable energy.

    As a commodity , aluminium is solid electricity and to that end Comalco have tried many times to purchase Manapouri for their dedicated use , perhaps their current machinations are just another ploy to convince us that they are indeed worthy beneficiaries of our energy wealth.

    • tc 3.1
      6 September 2012 at 2:56 pm

      What if the NACT were to renegotiate a deal that links power prices with jobs, cut jobs pay more for power, with a minimum headcount of proven local workers. Watch them flap at that suggestion.

      China is pushing Aluminium prices down, it can as it owns it’s power infrastructure, to end up owning the market then watch it skyrocket.

      They’re playing a long term game on many fronts, beware people.

    • fnjckg 3.2
      6 September 2012 at 4:13 pm

      interesting
      tc-yes, this is the century of China, imo (and many others apparently) and not before Time

  4. starlight 4
    6 September 2012 at 11:14 am

    ‘I know everything Joyce’ will want to build another road or two,spend more tax
    payers money on mediaworks,close some schools to financially support charter
    schools,strip health, part of this is raising scripts to $5,disgraceful.
    There does seem to be alot of ‘play’ in the mining,electricity areas at the moment,
    perhaps the prices were to high for their favourite mates to buy in,looks like they
    have got our rail-way sorted,devaluing and running it into the ground,its all a rouse
    for prospective buyers and its ‘robin hood’ in reverse.

  5. Carol 5
    6 September 2012 at 11:34 am

    Russel Norman shows that the asset sales won’t raise any more money than the government would get if they don’t sell:

    http://www.greens.org.nz/press-releases/no-need-sell-assets-return-surplus-0

    The Government’s target of returning to surplus by 2014/15 will be easier to achieve if the asset sales don’t go ahead, Green Party Co-leader Dr Russel Norman said today.

    Adjusting the track to surplus in Budget 2012 to reflect the impact of the asset sales not proceeding shows that surplus will still be achieved in 2014/15 and will actually be larger than if the sales happen.

    Norman illustrates it with a comparative table of stats.

    Meanwhile Julie Anne Genter shows that, another Joyce favourite, roads by PPP are a failure overseas:

    http://www.greens.org.nz/press-releases/why-national-copying-australia-s-failed-highway-ppps

    Research compiled for the Greens shows that Public-Private Partnership (PPP) highway projects in Australia have seen cost blow-outs and below-forecast traffic volumes. Private companies in PPPs have collapsed and taxpayers have had to bail out the failed projects.

    New Zealand Transport Agency board papers obtained by the Green Party show that the National Government is well-advanced in its plans to use PPPs to build some of its uneconomic highway projects.

  6. Dr Terry 6
    6 September 2012 at 11:52 am

    The Tories never fail to turn a bad thing into something good – whatever lengths they must go to. I guess they know well that very many suckers are going to buy it!

  7. Kotahi Tāne Huna 7
    6 September 2012 at 12:11 pm

    “We’ll use the additional time to waste even more money on glossy brochures about failed policies…”

    There ya go Joycie, FIFY.

  8. headbanger 8
    6 September 2012 at 12:58 pm

    And now they’ve pulled out an announcement that unemployment will be below 6% by 2014.

    I think it’s really impressive how they can predict this kind of thing without any plan or process to make it happen. Aren’t politicians amazing? 

  9. dewithiel 9
    6 September 2012 at 5:30 pm

    Fascinating essay on the privatisation of British publicly-owned electricity resources by James Meek in the forthcoming London Review of Books: http://www.lrb.co.uk/v34/n17/james-meek/how-we-happened-to-sell-off-our-electricity

    A small, historical, moment here: ‘Privatisation was not a Thatcher patent. The Spanish economist Germà Bel traces the origins of the word to the German word Reprivatisierung, first used in English in 1936 by the Berlin correspondent of the Economist, writing about Nazi economic policy. In 1943, in an analysis of Hitler’s programme in the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the word ‘privatisation’ entered the academic literature for the first time. The author, Sidney Merlin, wrote that the Nazi Party ‘facilitates the accumulation of private fortunes and industrial empires by its foremost members and collaborators through “privatisation” and other measures, thereby intensifying centralisation of economic affairs and government in an increasingly narrow group that may for all practical purposes be termed the national socialist elite’.

    Mr Key and his bumptious mate Mr Joyce would appear to have interesting precedents for their proposals.

  10. Jiri 10
    7 September 2012 at 11:50 pm

    Unemployment is quiet big problem where I live. Around is like 15 % people without of job and it getting bigger at winter time. Im searching for job too so if you know about something let me know.