New Zealand: Labour goes back to “core values” The recent national conference of the New Zealand Labour Party – held after their recent defeat in the elections – produced some interesting controversy around the question of what Labour should do if it gets back into office. The ideas of Marxism were present in the debate.
New Zealand Perspectives 2009 New Zealand society is entering an extremely turbulent period as the effects of the economic recession are felt. As previously mentioned in 2008 Perspectives New Zealand will not be immune from the global downturn. In fact the notion that our so-called “good economic fortune” in the past will save New Zealand from the worst excesses of the global downturn is evaporating before our eyes.
New Zealand: National Party win decisive victory in general election The victory of the National Party at the polls was due to the bankruptcy of the right-wing Labour Party leadership that had no real meaningful reforms to offer workers. This resulted in the lowest turnout since 1978 and the second lowest turnout in a general election since 1902. A large proportion of workers didn't vote Labour or just didn't vote.
New Zealand General Election: Economic storm clouds gathering The forthcoming elections in New Zealand have been overshadowed by the world financial meltdown and the oncoming recession, which have highlighted the huge level of debt in the country’s economy. This all puts at risk the very ability of any government to guarantee basic social reforms. In New Zealand as elsewhere the choice is between whittling down the welfare state or a radical socialist transformation of society.
New Zealand general election: socialist policies needed Prime Minister Helen Clark has called the general election for November 8th hoping to win a fourth term. The problem for the Labour Party is that it is well behind in the various opinion polls which give the National Party between an 8% and 18% lead over the Labour Party. With such a lead in the opinion polls the Labour Party is most likely to be defeated.
New Zealand: The 'R' word is back – Recession! New Zealand is clearly entering into recession with its economy shrinking in the first quarter of this year. "Statistics New Zealand" (SNZ) has provided the figures that confirm what most of us have known for sometime that indeed we are at the beginning of a recession.
New Zealand Perspectives 2008 Bourgeois historians portray New Zealand as a place where class conflict has never really existed. Such statements bear no relation to reality, as the history of New Zealand is a history of class struggle with the building of the trade union movement in the late 19th century, the fight against the arbitration system and for militant trade unionism in the early 20th century culminating in the great strike of 1913. Today that tradition is once more coming to the fore with a rising level of working class militancy.
Socialist Appeal New Zealand We are proud to announce a new website linked to Marxist.com, Socialist Appeal New Zealand, the website of the Marxist tendency in New Zealand. Its aim is to defend the ideas of Marxism within the New Zealand labour movement and create a tendency embedded in the mass organisations of the New Zealand working class.
New Zealand: Auckland Docks Strike Earlier this month there was a very militant 48-hour strike of the New Zealand dockworkers over pay and conditions. As usual, the bosses, while getting fat salaries themselves, claim the dockworkers are already well paid!
New Zealand: first ever national lock-out in public hospitals ends in victory Locked out SFWU workers say 'We Beat the boss'!
The price of a life in New Zealand? - NZ$168.40 An Auckland woman, Folole Muliaga, recently died in New Zealand because she could no longer run her oxygen machine which kept her alive, the reason being the electricity company Mighty River Power cut off her supply because of a NZ$168.40 arrears. A clear example that services run for profit kill!
Full Employment in New Zealand at the expense of Kiwi workers On the surface New Zealand is “booming†but it is doing so at the expense of the working class. It is not surprising that under such conditions trade union membership has significantly increased and strikes over collective agreements and pay have broken out.
New Zealand: Supermarket workers win! After 28 days of being locked out workers belonging to the National Distribution Union (NDU) and the Engineering, Printing & Manufacturing Union (EMPU) at the 3 Progressive Enterprises supermarkets depots have won pay parity across all depots within the next 18 months in one of the bitterest dispute seen in New Zealand in a generation.
New Zealand: lockout after 48-hour strike of supermarket workers Wages are abysmally low for supermarket workers in New Zealand. Recently the National Distribution Union organised a 48-hour stoppage. The bosses reacted with a lock-out. This has only served to strengthen the resolve of the striking workers. Send messages of solidarity and protest.
Attitudes towards War in Afghanistan and the general economic and political situation in New Zealand Rupert O'Shea explains the mood towards the war in Afghanistan among workers in New Zealand and also explains a little of what is happening in the political an d economic scene in the country. There have been demonstrations against the war, in fairly modest numbers so far, but starting before the first bombs were dropped on Afghanistan.
