The Service and Food Workers’ Union recently initiated a campaign for a ‘living wage.’ This call has been endorsed by scores of community and union groups, from the Meat Workers to the PPTA to the Congregational Christian Church of Samoa. The Living Wage Aotearoa New Zealand Campaign’s statement ‘call[s] upon the Government, employers and society as a whole to strive for a living wage for all households as a necessary and important step in the reduction of poverty in New Zealand.” How can we win a living wage? What are the politics around this question?
A positive reform
The call for a minimum wage is a demand as old as the workers’ movement. It is the demand that is rooted in the radical assertion that every worker has a stake in the immense wealth that their labour produces. As such, it undermines a message that the ruling class of capitalist society has incessantly sought to carve into the collective consciousness of working people; that whatever we receive from our bosses is a privilege, not a right, and that even if work is hard and unfulfilling, we should always feel ‘lucky’ that someone decided to give us a job and pay us out of their own pockets. [Read More...]
Recent articles
“Restructuring”: Job Losses at Elam School of Fine Arts
[Thanks to Natasha Ovely for submitting this guest post.] Somewhere alongside the white wall studios slapped with half-hearted painterly expressions and littered with lewd, lazy structures, lie a set of workshops brimming with activity that beckon the golden years of art-making. These technical workshops are fast paced and at times chaotic environments that few […]
What’s behind the tensions on the Korean peninsula?
North Korea is a state many commentators – even on the left – feel they do not have to take seriously: the funny hairstyles, the platform shoes; the bombast and hyperbole of the state media. If there is not belittling humour, extreme moralism obscures any political analysis. The same phrases are swapped between left and […]
Socialism and the Campaign Against Asset Sales
Why do socialists oppose asset sales? The answer seems obvious: socialists want state ownership because it provides popular control of the economy. People on both the right and the left generally agree socialists stand for ‘big government’ and ‘state intervention’. But being a revolutionary means questioning accepted wisdom and although reformists in Labour and the […]
May Day: 2013
Kaimahi kaha – workers’ power! May Day greetings to all our readers. Although Labour Day has had more official recognition and celebration in Aotearoa / New Zealand over the decades, May Day is the internationalist celebration of workers’ struggle and solidarity. You can read about the history of May Day here. May Day marks our […]
Marching Against Asset Sales
Saturday was another reminder that there is deep-seated opposition to the government’s asset sales plans, whatever the spin around the advertisements may be. Asset sales benefit the rich and power is a public good that should run by the public in the public interest. It’s a simple, class-based analysis that resonates. The spirit of the […]
ANZAC Day: Lest we remember
Lest we forget: 48 Japanese prisoners of war massacred in Featherston following a peaceful protest. New Zealand’s army taking part in the dismemberment of the Korean peninsula, and working with the US army of occupation in post-war Japan to deport Koreans. New Zealand’s military commitment to the war against Vietnam’s national liberation. A decade of […]
Wellington Green Party Mayor votes for Outsourcing
There has been goings on at Wellington City Council of late to do with privatisation or “outsourcing” of services with a wobbly performance by the centre-left majority on the Council. In December last year the councillors voted to sack the chief executive of 15 years in a move seen as a bid to rein in […]
The Criminal Injustice System: from Aotearoa to the USA
Michelle Alexander’s book The New Jim Crow (2011) has caused a huge storm of discussion, debate and controversy in the United States. It may well be a book that sparks a new social movement. Alexander documents the rise of mass incarceration in the USA, and link this to entrenched racism, poverty and injustice. The privatising […]
From the archive
History catches up with Tongan King
Tonga, once a sleepy island kingdom sunk in tradition and religion, was rocked by riots on Thursday 16 November 2006, as frustration with the royal government hit boiling point. Almost overnight, Australian and New Zealand troops appeared on the scene patrolling the scarred streets of the capital Nuku’alofa and controlling its airport.
