Nats: instilling the work ethic early

Written By: - Date published: 1:51 pm, October 22nd, 2008 - 34 comments
Categories: humour, national, racism - Tags:

Lockwood Smith has unveiled more National workforce innovations. In addition to favouring Asian seasonal migrants over Polynesians because their hands are smaller, Smith has announced that National’s plans to have new schools built and owned by private companies will include “co-location of educational and industrial facilities” to “further leverage our most precious asset: our children, with their small hands and abilty to work in cramped conditions”

The first PPP school under National would be an all-boys primary school located at the Pike River coal mine.

As National opposed increasing the minimum wage for young people to the same rate as adults get, the child workers will be paid in ambition.

34 comments on “Nats: instilling the work ethic early ”

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  1. higherstandard 1
    22 October 2008 at 2:06 pm

    Are you comparing the Asian body type to that of children Clinton ?

    What’s next penis jokes ?

  2. Tane 2
    22 October 2008 at 2:10 pm

    HS. I think you must have deliberately misread SP’s post to come to that conclusion. He’s clearly satirising Lockwood’s archaic views.

  3. Ianmac 3
    22 October 2008 at 2:13 pm

    I expect that Lochwood’s equivalent for girls will be teaching what girls are best at: sewing and cooking good basic meals, and witchcraft.

  4. higherstandard 4
    22 October 2008 at 2:15 pm

    Really golly I would never have guessed.

    A few weeks to the election and the economy tanking and all the media and blogs have got to waste their time on is this cak – makes you wonder really.

  5. Scribe 5
    22 October 2008 at 2:21 pm

    Beneath this satire one can find some interesting statistics on how child workers have been exploited in recent years with — gasp — Labour in Government.

    Pay rates are very low, with an effective hourly rate among children in the survey of between $1.67 and $6.25.

    http://www.caritas.org.nz/?sid=1078

    Thankfully, things look set to change, with an assist to agencies like Caritas.

    http://www.caritas.org.nz/?sid=1118

  6. Tane 6
    22 October 2008 at 2:24 pm

    Well, Lockwood did choose a lull in the election campaign to make his monumental gaffe. Poor timing really.

    It’s definitely newsworthy though. This is a guy who could soon be immigration minister making offensive and arguably racist comments about Asians and Polynesians, just weeks before the election.

  7. Felix 7
    22 October 2008 at 2:25 pm

    Ambition and cheese?

  8. Steve Pierson 8
    22 October 2008 at 2:29 pm

    Scribe. as you know Labour has come out against these companies exploiting children. We wrote about it on this site, as I recall it was your mates arguing that ‘it’s a market’

    HS. I think you need to prescribe yourself some sedatives. It’s the small hands comment that I’m satirising, not Asians.

  9. higherstandard 9
    22 October 2008 at 2:30 pm

    Tane

    “This is a guy who could soon be immigration minister making offensive and arguably racist comments about Asians and Polynesians, just weeks before the election.”

    Lockwood is a dimwit plain and simple – I don’t however think he’s a nasty piece of work in the mould of Winston who as Foreign Minister and head of NZ first has made comments which make me feel far more uneasy.

  10. Hamish 10
    22 October 2008 at 2:32 pm

    The poly comment was just so totally stupid. However the comment about asian’s having small hands was not so much. Most asians would agree that they have small hands compared to other races, and that would certainly aid in pruning.

    The funny thing is, the MSM have gone straight so some race relations lecturer about it, and have not even consulted the wine-growers about the situation and found out what they’ve said about the whole thing. Apparently Lockwood was just repeating what they told him.

  11. higherstandard 11
    22 October 2008 at 2:33 pm

    What are you saying Clinton that asians have small hands – arghh my God, the humanity, I’ve never been subjected to such filth before – I’m off to have a faint.

    Ps I’m being sarcastic.

    PPS Prescribe yourself an enema

  12. higherstandard 12
    22 October 2008 at 2:34 pm

    Is someone going to make a penis joke …..sod where are you when we need you ?

  13. Tane 13
    22 October 2008 at 2:36 pm

    Regarding minimum wage for under 16s, it’s an area we certainly need some action in. The Greens have been good on this, and Sue Bradford has said she wants to address it now her youth rates bill has passed. I’m pretty sure Darien Fenton from Labour has expressed similar sentiments.

    That’s the problem with reformist politics. You don’t fix everything at once, but gradually over time. I imagine if we get another term of Labour with a strong Green presence in Parliament this problem will dealt with, even if I’d have rather seen it fixed sooner.

    All that aside, I doubt Scribe’s mates in the National Party will be introducing minimum wage protections for children any time soon given their staunch opposition to abolishing youth rates, or raising minimum wages in general come to think of it.

  14. Robinsod 14
    22 October 2008 at 2:41 pm

    HS – I’m more interested in your enema quip. It does match up with the psychosexual stage Dr ‘sod had diagnosed you as being stuck in…

  15. Phil 15
    22 October 2008 at 2:45 pm

    Is someone going to make a penis joke

    What’s that one about marrying women with small hands?

  16. burt 16
    22 October 2008 at 2:47 pm

    Tane

    This is a guy who could soon be immigration minister making offensive and arguably racist comments about Asians and Polynesians, just weeks before the election.

    So that would make him just like Winston and Labour would defend him… Oh no they won’t will they because they will think about what he said rather than think about retaining his vote at any cost…

  17. Phil 17
    22 October 2008 at 2:48 pm

    Sod, there’s nothing wrong with a little bit of ‘kink’.
    Just because you have a closed mind to sexual experiences (fear of inadequecy? that would explain the loud mouth…) doesn’t give you the right to pre-judge HS’ possible fetishes.

  18. Steve Pierson 18
    22 October 2008 at 2:54 pm

    I think the less time we spend discussing HS’s fetishes the better.

    burt. i don’t think you’ll find anyone here defending Peters’ racism. in fact there have been posts condemning it. Now, I wonder if you’lll do the same on Smith’s racism. Or will you continue to try to avoid the issue or pretend it’s not racist?

  19. Ben R 19
    22 October 2008 at 2:59 pm

    “The funny thing is, the MSM have gone straight so some race relations lecturer about it, and have not even consulted the wine-growers about the situation and found out what they?ve said about the whole thing. Apparently Lockwood was just repeating what they told him.”

    Indeed, why look at the RSE scheme and how it’s working out? Should Asians be discriminated against if the employers find they are proven workers? Is there a massive culture shock for new workers and should the government be doing more to assist?

  20. Felix 20
    22 October 2008 at 3:01 pm

    “psychosexual stage” is a reference to a level of development, not to a fetish.

    Please keep up, people.

  21. Robinsod 21
    22 October 2008 at 3:05 pm

    Thank you Felix – I’m sure you’ll agree that, like many conservatives, HS shows all the hallmarks of that particular psychological retardation?

  22. Steve Pierson 22
    22 October 2008 at 3:10 pm

    I was working in the Dip Corp when the RSE was being developed. Basically, Australia and NZ take a bunch of seasonal workers, primarily from the Pacific for agricultural work. It was pushed by the Pacific Island countries as a way of getting more remittances and upskilling their work-force and by the agriculture industries here and in Aussie, who want labour but are too cheap to pay decent wages.

    A number of Pacific Islands nations are allocated set numbers of RSE permits per year, they arrange the individual workers who will come over. It is essentially an aid programme for the Pacific (with a payoff for us form cheap labour), that’s why most of the workers are from the Islands. Take away the allocations for the Pacific Islands and you take away the point of the scheme and it becomes just a way for agriculture to undercut local workers.

    maybe this should be a post.

  23. Ben R 23
    22 October 2008 at 3:24 pm

    Interesting. I think North & South had an article a while ago about it. I felt it seemed unfair to Asian workers who had previously worked in the orchards/vineyards, however, I can also see the logic of giving preference to our pacific neighbours. Ultimately it’s the employers who are paying for it though, so I think they should be able to select from wherever they want.

    “it becomes just a way for agriculture to undercut local workers.”

    They still have to comply with minimum wage laws & health & safety legislation though.

  24. rave 24
    22 October 2008 at 3:48 pm

    But Bill did utter some homophobic remark whilst on the psychosexual stage last week didnt he?.
    I think Sod is onto something. The conservative is hung up on the family which is the engineroom of sexual repression, so we get very bad hangovers about dark people who arent raised properly to eat with us, same sex people who won’t breed for civilisation, and from John boy himself homilies on how to displace your psychosexual energy and be good little child workers.

  25. Tripod 25
    22 October 2008 at 3:58 pm

    Higherstandard – I don’t think your dismissive comments are warranted. You need to be aware of the appalling work conditions some of these migrants were subject to.

    Lockwood is implying that Islanders are “not productive” (“lazy”). He’s not simply repeating what he’s been told, he’s indulging in his constituents’ prejudice.

    I am very interested in what the man who is likely to be our next Minister of Immigration has to say, especially when he holds views that wouldn’t be out of place in Victorian England.

    It’s extremely newsworthy to PI voters, as well as voters from other ethnicities who care about the views of those who aspire to be in Cabinet.

    Where I agree with you though is that with exemplars of medicority like Lockwood inhabiting Parliament we are all doomed when the recession hits.

  26. Rex Widerstrom 26
    22 October 2008 at 4:05 pm

    Countering Dr Smith’s bold move, Labour frontbencher Annette King noted the imminent arrival of a full moon and the consequent surge in crime sure to hit South Auckland.

    “It’s not enough that we wait for National to convincingly win the next election and allocate 200 more Police to the area,” she said, up to her elbows in cat entrails.

    “Co-locating schools and industrial facilities as Dr Smith suggests is clearly a complete waste of time, since there’ll be no jobs for them anyway now we’ve blown the surplus just when it was needed to prime the economy. Instead Labour proposes a bold new plan to co-locate schools and juvenile detention facilities, with a handy revolving door between the two.

    “Graduates of these new academies will become CYFS social workers who – when they’re not taking nude photos of their charges – will equip them with the life skills they need to avoid a life of crime – like predicting the phases of the moon so they know when to stay inside, and making sure they remain immersed in a bath of iced water whenever the temperature looks set to rise above 22 degrees.”

    Throwing salt (and bits of catgut) over her shoulder and turning widdershins three times, Ms King predicted the program would be a success. “I’ve read this detailed policy outline which suggests it works,” she trilled, leaning a ladder against a wall so she could then avoid walking under it. “It’s by a bloke called Dickens”.

  27. randal 27
    22 October 2008 at 4:15 pm

    All national MP’s have small brains. It gets them the gig in the party but it wont make them the government in November. And very sorry but I dont feel like making a penis joke and lockwood smith in the same sentence.

  28. higherstandard 28
    22 October 2008 at 5:09 pm

    sod

    “I’m more interested in your enema quip. It does match up with the psychosexual stage Dr ‘sod had diagnosed you as being stuck in ”

    This for an ass who has a predilection for domineering madams ……. I’m truly hurt !

    Tripod – are you boasting ?

  29. toad 29
    22 October 2008 at 6:12 pm

    SP, I’m keen to identify the most humourous and cutting blog post of the election campaign.

    Sorry, no cash prize (I donate all my spare cash to the Green Party), but I would have to say that so far this one wins by a country mile.

    Brilliant, and exposes the Nats on a number of different fronts!

    Well done!

  30. burt 30
    22 October 2008 at 9:23 pm

    Steve P.

    Or will you continue to try to avoid the issue or pretend it’s not racist?

    No it was a stupid thing to say. I don’t think it was good at all and I’m not sure if he should be sacked or not. But yes I agree it was stupid to make such racist generalisations.

    I’m not a big fan of Lockwood Smith so I’d probably sack him if it were my call and he had previously said similar things. I’m not sure on his priors so I’ll abstain on making that call.

    captcha: keys mositen – ewwww.

  31. jbc 31
    23 October 2008 at 2:53 am

    Rex: gold.

    It requires no great stretch of the imagination to picture Ms King as described.

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