When Simon Bridges isn’t criminalizing protest for big oil corporations, he is attempting to rob the little workers have by crushing Unions.
The sick joke of the National Party right now is that they are ‘the workers party’. They make this creaking gag every time they stand in Parliament to regurgitate their worthless praise of Simon Bridge’s new Employment Relations Act.
Just so we area all clear on how needlessly cruel this new law is, it will allow bad bastard bosses to…
-Refuse to negotiate a collective agreement with their employees
-Pay new workers less than the rate in the collective agreement
-Opt out of industry agreements in order to undercut their competitors on wages
-Deny workers meal and rest breaks
-Reduce the wages and conditions of vulnerable workers such as cleaners when a contract changes.
-Dock the pay of workers taking partial strike action
-Impose more restrictions on the right to strike
-Refuse to provide employees the information they need to challenge an unfair redundancy or dismissal
… National’s brutal 90 day right to sack law has been used to sack 11200 NZers and is just another weapon used by bad bastard bosses to intimidate and terrify their work force into accepting ever dwindling crumbs.
With 6.4% unemployment and the true nature of our poverty hidden by Paula Bennett being able to disqualify beneficiaries making them invisible to the stats, now is not the time to defang organized labour movements. Attacking the Unions and weakening them further isn’t so much an economic salve to some imagined crippling industrial relations problem as it is a teenage wet dream fantasy for the rights ideological stormtrooper brigade, and Simon Bridges is the baby faced political expression of that malignant hatred.
In the coming battle for the hearts and minds of the wider community, the Union movement has got to adapt to the new abilities social media provide them with if they want to counter this latest hostility. I was genuinely surprised that the recent rallies held around the country for workers were not live streamed in an attempt to reach out to those who would be sympathetic. Putting out a press release to Scoop isn’t really enough these days, and relying on ‘One Big Voice’ with 159 twitter followers seems hopeful in the extreme.
Labour’s next leader can’t simply repeal National’s crap employment law, they must be serious about giving Unions far more leverage at the negotiating table with real muscle. It’s time the pendulum swung back on favor of workers.
If National are able to get away with allowing bad bastard bosses to simply walk away from good faith process, this will be all process minus the faith. The war on workers is a war on us all.
Outstanding Post Bomber .
However . Simon Bridges is only baby faced if you have a fucking ugly baby to compare him to .
I watched him twist his lips as he espoused his earnest bile on tv the other night . I had the sound muted to intensify the Simon Bridges Effect . I think he was promoting his pretty self while grandstanding on the bodies of dead coal miners . He’s a lawyer isn’t he ?
Did you know ? They’re using lawyers in laboratories now instead of rats . They’ve found there are some things even rats won’t do . ( Robin Williams )
He , like his colleagues think they’re tough . They talk tough , swagger smugly as the drag their wallets through Parliament buildings and sneer and pout when challenged but really , it’s all just gas and bull shit but thanks to the likes of yourself , Tumeke , The Daily Blog and their contributors , little punks like Bridges have less places to hide .
What I’m about to write may cause much eye rolling , snorts of indignation and deep , dark , heavy breathing .
If New Zealand wants to be the safe haven for the Workers it once was , NZ Unions must engage the Farmer and most importantly , if not more importantly , the New Zealand Farmer must engage with the Unions . I don’t care how that’s done . A dinner and a movie followed by a few hours clubbing then home to beddy by’s ? However it’s done , it must be done . If this does not happen NZ will always limp along in a shambles .
The New Zealand Farmer has been lied to for generations into believing they’re rugged , independent individuals , alone out there on the land with only the Banks to hold their widdle hands when times get tough . The New Zealand Farmer needs to understand that they’ve been lied to and swindled . They’ve been tyrannized by a callously manipulated Trade Union movement which is where that bad blood came from while in the mean time vast fortunes were made and salted away for after a nice period of Swiss Bank Account money laundering .
For those of you who were too young to remember New Zealand as it was before this neoliberal political take-over to politically normalize that treasonous , traitorous , thieving period in our history , here’s a surprise . You won’t be able to find out much about it either . Funny that .
Back in 1989 , I found myself speaking to an audience of 3000 or so farmers stuffed into the Christchurch Town Hall . They were there to protest at the governments deviant and divisive tactics like fucking around with interest rates , stock piling wool to strangle off foreign wool buyers then gamble on making money on the variations of foreign exchange etc etc . Jim Bolger was there , a true Machiavellian liar and traitor . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Bolger . I remember shouting at him , accusing him of betraying his fellow farmer / workers to further his political career . I’m saddened to say that I was clearly right . The following year he was elected as National Prime Minister . Then he sold off New Zealand Rail . After muldoon , Jims teacher and mentor , thought Big and pulled up many branch line rail tracks into our foreign money earning agricultural hinterlands to hand that business on to the heavy road transport industry . And anyone who pays RUC’s on light diesel vehicles will understand how that subsidy works for the trucker cartels who rip up your roads .
Jim’s a good example of how the National Party cloned itself into the flanks of the Labour Party and Labour and National have been running a Deep State co-operative ever since .
Until David Cunliffe came along 30 years later with his anti neoliberal sentiments . Lets see how that works out for him shall we ?
Simon Bridges is a protege of the Old School and he can smell money . Lots and lots of dirty , filthy , lovely money and if he can trample people down and court controversy all the better . His ego will love it . While we pay him to become battle hardened to become the politician of tomorrow to torture and subjugate our kids of today .
Finally , I don’t regard cow-unit operators as farmers . They’re business people running cows on land in a factory like manner . No class darling .
( RIP Pop . My dear old dad . Happy Fathers day . x )
As a wild random aside Countryboy, are cow unit operators these kind of folks? Are these the business people you talk of?
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/dairy/9117539/Cow-tail-breaker-not-a-monster
This is the third industrial dairy animal violence case relating to tail breaking that I have heard of this year. Meaning these three cases are the only ones that I know of. How many other cases of neglect and cruelty go on every day in our milking sheds and farms?
In regard to the use of twisting cows tails as a form of coercion Grant Fletcher had this to say on the practice:
“The prosecutor for the MPI, Grant Fletcher said there was an industry understanding that a degree of force was used to put cows in dairy sheds”. I wrote this quote down from a newspaper months ago because I was shocked at the relaxed kind of acceptance we have towards our darling bovines.
Sorry, off topic mods but you know, in a way, our leaders and legislators treat farm animal and worker alike, as an economic unit, without a brain or central nervous system, as if we were impervious to pain and suffering. Our dignity has been lost.
This is why minimum wage is such bullshit. With so few people in unions , this is just the knife going in after – just for pleasure. These zombie economists hate working people – no, hate is not a strong enough word – they see working people as a scum they detest.
Go on, I dare you talk to one, push them into a conversation about peoples rights and/or unions and watch the venom pour – it will be polite, it will be vote getting – but the hatred will drip off them like ideological sociopaths that they are.
In this age we need to realize the clock has turned backwards. Unions need to give up being trade unions. Eek, I hear you say. No the best unions to survive this coming conflict and deal with these zombie economists is industrial unions. We need strength in numbers across the board. I know many unions have a proud history – but the nats are hell bent in making you just that – history.
Have no doubt folks this is nothing except zombie economist wet dream time – they want serfs – they will crush anything which looks to stand in the way of that dream. And guess what – when you organize – they fear the outcome!
Perfect photo as Simon (I’m wearing my) big boy Britches looks ready to blow someone from the oil industry or maybe Phil (me big boy) O’Reilly.
He really fits in the boys’ club.
Countryboy, although some of your posts shoot past the mark, or seem too outrageous to many, I agree with what you’re saying. The old man after the war tried to get, what would effectively have been a union going amongst King Country farmers, but to many who ” couldn’t see anything in it immediately for themselves” scuppered that idea! Back in depression times, a coalition of Taranaki farmers organised a load of meat for the starving in Wellington – they had the meat, the butchers, the distribution all arranged, all they needed was transport – the government of the day (Tories) refused to transport it by rail for free – none of them ever voted National or Tory again! (Dad’s father and several uncles involved in that lot)
National put themselves out as the farmers party – they aren’t – they follow the money, pure and simple!
“In the coming battle for the hearts and minds of the wider community, the Union movement has got to adapt to the new abilities social media provide them with if they want to counter this latest hostility. I was genuinely surprised that the recent rallies held around the country for workers were not live streamed in an attempt to reach out to those who would be sympathetic. Putting out a press release to Scoop isn’t really enough these days, and relying on ‘One Big Voice’ with 159 twitter followers seems hopeful in the extreme.”
Yes, it is a worry, how little the unions are doing to spread the news, messages and some video or other footage of meetings, of protests, of pickets and so forth. Perhaps they should learn a bit from Unite Union, who are more on the activist side, but certainly are present on many other marches and activities, whether union related or not. They also are vocal and take decisive, publicly effective actions when there is a dispute that affects their members, like not so long ago at McDonald’s restaurants. That gets noted!
As for this bill, it is a cunning and disgusting attempt to further undermine the rights and powers of workers. Union membership is already rather low, definitely so in private enterprise business sectors, and workers should bloody wake up and take note, that they will lose even more in future, if they do not learn and accept that on such serious efforts to undermine them are not reacted upon decisively, and in a unified manner!
The National led government has shown it over the last years, that they are experts at bringing in laws and law reforms, that on the surface do not appear and read as being that drastic, but when looking at them closely, they are appalling bits of policies turned into proposed legislation. They take away rights, breach human rights even, or are in part breaching UN conventions and natural justice (for instance recent benefit reform law and more).
Too many are not informed, and ignorance and division, the fact that most just follow own agendas now, that combined are the greatest threat to us all. So workers, take note, have a read, listen to Helen Kelly and others, and take a damned stand, before you end up with working conditions that are nothing but modern day slavery, especially for lower skilled and poorly paid, who suffer this already:
http://union.org.nz/taxonomy/term/24
http://www.parliament.nz/en-nz/pb/legislation/bills/digests/50PLLaw20451/employment-relations-amendment-bill-2013-bills-digest
http://dol.govt.nz/er/services/law/legislationreviews/summary-changes-employment-relations-amendment-bill-2013.pdf
Two Sunday’s ago I attended a public meeting where Helen Kelly was one of the speakers. Helen covered the topic in this post, the new employment law. It was mentioned that some parts of this legislation will be in breach of the International Labour Organisation’s conventions and NZ is a signatory to the the ILO. So yeah, Go NZ, so proud of you.
I have always wondered if the 90 day law is in breach of the ILO conventions, as this law denies the worker/victim access to legal representation. Does anyone know?
Finally it would have been great to have seen the employers of the 11,200 workers sacked under this law since it was passed in Xmas ’08 named and shamed. This needed to be in the spotlight right from the beginning. It hasn’t been and employers haven’t been held to account for their abusive practices.
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