by Keith Locke
Last month the Green Party signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Service and Food Workers Union – Nga Ringa Tota. The MoU is a commitment between us and one of New Zealand’s largest unions to forge allegiances in order to work towards a fair and sustainable New Zealand society.
The election of a National-led Government has sparked newfound employer militancy, and public sector employers are among the most militant. Finance Minister Bill English announced in September that rising Government debt meant the state sector would face a funding freeze for up to five years, and many public sector employers are consequently refusing to negotiate on even modest pay claims on behalf of the most poorly paid employees.
These include hospital orderlies, cleaners and kitchen staff who earn as little as $14.62 an hour, and school support staff, teacher aides and librarians, some of whom earn as little as $12.94 an hour. Many of these workers are represented by the SFWU with whom we have signed the MoU. Others are represented by the PSA and by the NZEI.
And the unions are fighting back on behalf of low paid public service employees. On Friday 27th they have organised nationwide lunchtime (12.30pm – 1.30pm) rallies to protest against the public sector wage freeze and call for a fair deal for low-paid workers.
I’m planning to go along to support the workers at the Auckland rally, and hope as many frogblog readers as possible can get to your local protest. Here’s a full list of rally locations:
Kaitaia - Cnr Redan/Commerce St Whangarei - Main mall in the centre of the town – Cameron/James St Cnr Auckland - Methodist Church on Queen Street Thames - Outside the Civic Centre on Mary Street Hamilton - Garden Place, Victoria St Taumarunui - Next to library on “One Way Street” Rotorua - Cnr of Arawa St and Ranolf St Taupo - State Highway One – near Council Buildings Tauranga - Red Square at bottom of town – Devonport St/The Strand/Spring St Cnr Whakatane - The Strand/Commerce St (near roundabout) Gisborne - Cnr of Gladstone Rd/Reads Quay (near the bridge) Hastings - St Johns Hall, Southland Road New Plymouth - Meet between centre city and Devon St (If wet: St Josephs Church) Hawera - Salvation Army Hall Regent St, marching up High St to Chester Burrows office Whanganui - Majestic Square on Victoria Ave Palmerston North - PSA House King Street and then march to Square Levin - Adventure Park Pavilion, Main Highway and then march down main street Wairarapa - Old Folks Hall Cole Street Wellington - Meet @ Loaves & Fishes 1100-1200, then go to Parliament Nelson - Top of Trafalgar Street Westport - Outside Hospital Greymouth - Outside Grey Base Hospital, High Street Christchurch - Victoria Square (march from TUC) Ashburton - Checkerboard Town Centre Timaru - Town Square cnr Strathallan and Strafford Sts Dunedin - Octagon (march from Hospital) Invercargill - Cnr Tay and Dee Streets
Published in Economy, Work, & Welfare by Keith Locke on Mon, November 23rd, 2009
Tags: NZEI. public sector, PSA, Service and Food Workers Union, wage freeze
More posts by Keith Locke | more about Keith Locke
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
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Good one Keith. I’ll give up my lunch break on Friday to go along and support the low paid state sector workers at the Auckland rally.
Sure, we are in an economic recession, times are tough, and there is a need for restraint. The sacrifices should be borne by those who can afford them – not by people earning only $12.94 an hour and their families.
So even though I earn enough to get by on myself, I’ll see you there.
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I agree if there is going to be a salary freeze then it should be first instigated by and for the CEO’s and management.
They should be freezing their own salaries.Can we see this happening?
Well I will see it when I believe it.
This is the time when the left should be uniting and Joe of socialist Aotearoa is calling for a ‘United Front’ an ideas I fully support.
Some of the bloggers think that socialists have no place in the Green Party, but I see social and environmental issues as parallel issues the b$stards who don’t want to pay a fair wage usually take short cuts with regards to the environment.
Either way capitalists should never be allowed to control any government on any level national or local. This is a point that Ralph Nader was very strong on, once they acquire such power then the flood gates are open to all sorts of abuses and corrupt activities.
Is this happening today?
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But the truth is there are plenty of small business owners who are adding thousands of dollars per week to their mortgage, so they can pay their workers, in the hope that they don’t have to lay staff off and close up shop – haerorrhaging money in the hope that things will turn around.
However these people will never get an ounce of gratitutde from the likes of the Green party for taking big risks with their own homes, taking zero wages themselves, so they can hopefully keep their staff employed.
They are employers, and as such they must be evil, and should be treated as thievung stealing rich elite who would never do a thing for their workers.
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from a forum response by “streetstupid” at the motley fool metar board.
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photonz1 & sendthestuff
FFS, we are talking District Health Boards and schools here – not struggling small employers whom I admit in some cases cannot afford to give their staff pay increases at the moment.
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Actually toad – the story was talking about the Food Workers union quite a bit – how about all the small businesses that have been hardest hit of any – cafes and restaurants (quite a few have recently gone bust)
As for public service workers – their paymasters (all US other workers) are clearly rolling in dosh and can afford much more tax to be taken from our measly hourly rate.
What you are giving to one lot, you have to take away from someone else.
Small employers are already contributing way more than their fair share to the country.
Take a owner operator with one employee – they pay SIX lots of ACC
Employer ACC for the worker
Residual Employer ACC for worker (to cover old claims)
Employer ACC for the themselves
Residual Employer ACC for themselves (to cover old claims)
Earner ACC for themselves
Residual earner ACC for themselves.(to cover old claims).
Yet after being absolutely hammered by ACC and IRD, the hourly rate for owner operators is often below the rates above that you are complaining about.
The economic wellbeing of NZ will continue to drop while we have polititians who think the main purpose of busineeses are places to extract as much money as possible.
Clearly a 50% fail rate for new companies after 5 years (and the worse statistic of 70% after 7 years that few people hear of) is not a high enough failure rate for polititians – they want more to fail than that.
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Yer, Right on Keith! Is this Govt. working it’s way out of office or what!
Speaking to a wide range of people (as one does). I’ve yet to find an enthusiastic supporter of the current way Bisiness is being done in the House.
“When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint.
When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist” .- Dom Helder Camara
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Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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the leopard doesn’t change it’s spots does it!?
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And let’s remember that if the 1990 minimum wage applied today it would be over $15 in 2009.
If the government is successful hundreds of thousands of people would be on wages less than the minimum wage of 1990.
I have not seen stats on this, but its my guess that the top income earners of today are on higher wages than their peers in 1990 – now why is that?
bigbro
Are you so completely unaware of the real world you don’t know about the work of the Greens in moving the youth minimum wage to the adult wage and successful advocacy for increasing the adult minimum wage from 9 to $12 over the 2006-2008 period. Either that, or you are not here with any sincerity.
Lie
1. Greens were not advocating for higher wages between 1999-2008
2. Unions were not seeking wage increases every year under the former governement (they seek them each year).
Obvious lies, but I suppose bigbro believes in the bigger the lie theory.
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Rubbish!!! During the Clark Labour government the unions were very active and they are active regardless of who is in power BB.
Photon; I have run a small business and I know what it is like waiting for the next sale when there is an economic downturn especially one is turning out luxury items.
Yes I recognise the fact that small businesses are the ones who are getting clobbered when they should be getting the tax breaks.
When we are talking about capitalism we are talking about the national and transnational corporations who are adept in exploiting all the anomalies of the tax regime. They have a totally different ‘modus operandii’than your local dairy and that is squashing the opposition to gain a monopolistic advantage.
At some stage one can mutate into the other and the line there is very blurrey.
I would say that the rot begins when a company is floated on the stock exchange and that’s when it looses it’s virginity. But then there are exceptions to this rule when there are large family dynasties like Cargill in the US who have been quite nasty.
Maybe it’s a spiritual thing ‘ What shall it profit a man should he gain the whole world and loses his soul’
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photonz1
Let’s guess
In a recession governments go into deficit and expects its workers to take a pay freeze
In a recession employers have it tough and expect workers to take a pay freeze.
When growth returns and governments return to surplus they then
1. paybackdated pay increases to workers to at least cover CPI increases since the pay freeze
2. hand out tax cuts to those whose wages were not frozen
(correct answer is 2 most times but its never 1).
When growth returns and businesses make good profits employers
1. pay workers backdated pay increases to cover the CPI increases they miss out on
2. any other option
What private sector employers have ever done 1 (we know the government never has)?
Now why does the income disparity between the top paid and the lower income worker always widen …
Hardworking people work for no pay increase – take a real cut in income in the tough times but when the times get good do they ever get compensation? Na. But the hard working “boss” does … and yet who bleats here how seeking some justice for the worker is somehow being anti-employer …?
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Drakula – there are benefits when a company lists on the stock exchange.
If you think the banks are ripping you off, you can buy shares in the bank.
If you think the electricity companies are ripping you off, you can buy shares in the electricity company.
However what you often find is that companies you think are rip-off merchants, are in fact only making a 5 – 10% profit margin.
That of course does not necessarily have any relationship to how they treat their workers.
However it does give you an idea that profit margins are usually pretty narrow and there’s not much spare for workers or shareholders.
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SPC – I’ve just been through exactly the situation you describe, and yesterday gave my employee a 2x CPI payrise backdated 7 months.
My wife once had an ex-employer(who she hadn’t worked for for years) send her $1000 as he couldn’t afford to pay her much during the short period she worked for him.
There is a problem with attitude to employers though – the attitude that all employers are bad. In my experience the vast majority are very fair.
However I do agree that at the top end there are some obscenely large wage and salary packages.
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photonz1
Whilst I acknowledge not all employers are rip off artists public companies are often not run for the benefit of the shareholders but for the benefit of management. So if you are being ripped off by your power company buying shares in it will not help.
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bliss – I agree with your sentiments about greedy and top heavy management, however the reality is that for many large companies total managemnt fees are only one or two percent.
In other words a reduction in management pay will make negligable difference to power prices.
In fact they could all work for free and it still wouldn’t make much difference.
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“Last month the Green Party signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Service and Food Workers Union – Nga Ringa Tota. The MoU is a commitment between us and one of New Zealand’s largest unions to forge allegiances in order to work towards a fair and sustainable New Zealand society.”
Is this a way of ensuring support for red greens?
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jh
We have 4 pillars – social justice is one amongst equals. Now what was your question ?
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Fastbike,
And those four pillars have no place being equal always. Some are vastly more important than others in relation to survival and thus the realisation of other pillars.
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Sapient
Have you engaged with GP members to find out how they rank them – or would you rather spout your opinions here as gospel instead
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Anyway back on track – looks like there will be Greens attending several of these meetings tomorrow. Good to see the focus on all of our four pillars/principles.
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Fastbike,
Sorry for the late reply.
In short, yes. I am a Green party member, as is BJ. There has been a fair amount of discussion on this topic on the internal forums and from my conversations with other party members it would seem there is a substantial group who do agree with me.
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