Workers news 6/2/13

WORKRIGHTS NZ

CTU: Wages need a boost
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU1302/S00126/wages-need-a-boost.htm

Christchurch teachers take a lead, government’s education plans can be defeated
http://workersparty.org.nz/2013/01/29/christchurch-teachers-take-a-lead-governments-education-plans-can-be-defeated/

Working is a two way deal – unionist
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/workplace/news/article.cfm?c_id=74&objectid=10862995&ref=rss

Event Cinemas gets a Visit from the Union
http://unitenews.wordpress.com/2013/02/04/event-cinemas-gets-a-visit-from-the-union/

Event are Miserables- Justice for the Highland Park cinema workers- Rally this Thursday at 5pm
http://unitenews.wordpress.com/2013/02/04/event-are-miserables-justice-for-the-highland-park-cinema-workers-rally-this-thursday-at-5pm/

Port dispute end in sight, but when?
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/8247005/Port-dispute-end-in-sight-but-when

Health & Safety Professionals In Favour Of Imprisonment for severe breaches of workplace health and safety standards resulting in death
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1302/S00030/health-safety-professionals-in-favour-of-imprisonment.htm

NZ ECONOMY

Manufacturing inquiry draws submissions
http://www.3news.co.nz/Manufacturing-inquiry-draws-submissions/tabid/1607/articleID/284706/Default.aspx

CTU Economic Bulletin 142, January 2013
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/18076151/CTU%20Monthly%20Economic%20Bulletin%20142%20January%202013.pdf

Employment: Are we there yet? With the latest job figures showing huge fluctuations in how New Zealand’s regions are coping with unemployment, the Sunday Star-Times dug into the numbers to see if John Key’s claims of falling unemployment stack up.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/8227603/Employment-Are-we-there-yet

Welfare reform youth unemployment NZ Politics Daily - Bryce Edwards Otago University liberation blog - www.liberation.org.nz

CTU: A start made on apprenticeships, but more is needed
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1301/S00111/a-start-made-on-apprenticeships-but-more-is-needed.htm

RBNZ and Government need to focus on the real problems
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1301/S00145/rbnz-and-government-need-to-focus-on-the-real-problems.htm

Bryan Gould: Blame ideology for housing crisis – A free market is supposed to match need with resources, but it’s pushed up house prices to insane levels.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/opinion/news/article.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=10862381

Kiwibuild and housing in the modern capitalist economy
http://workersparty.org.nz/2013/02/01/kiwibuild-and-housing-in-the-modern-capitalist-economy/

EPMU: Manufacturing strategy needed for New Zealand
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1301/S00125/manufacturing-strategy-needed-for-new-zealand.htm

Lid blown on power price rort
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10863135

POVERTY & WELFARE DEBATE

Policy Watch Newsletter – 25 Jan 2013: NZ Council of Christian Social Services

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1301/S00107/policy-watch-newsletter-25-jan-2013.htm

Is The Welfare Safety Net Starting To Slip?
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1301/S00049/is-the-welfare-safety-net-starting-to-slip.htm

Prescription hike will hit poor says MP
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/8136268/Prescription-hike-hit-poor-says-MP

Welfare drug tests may break privacy law
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/8215584/Welfare-drug-tests-may-break-privacy-law

Sponsorship programme for Kiwi kids
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/8233382/Sponsorship-programme-for-Kiwi-kids

STATS OF THE WEEK

“The combined net worth of the 2012 class of the 400 richest Americans is $1.7 trillion, up from $1.5 trillion a year ago. The average net worth of a Forbes 400 member is a staggering $4.2 billion, up from $3.8 billion, and the highest ever, as two-thirds of the individuals added to their fortunes in the past year. Another factor: the gap between the very rich and the merely rich is widening. Only two in the top 20 are poorer, and as a group they are worth $73 billion more than a year ago.”

http://www.forbes.com/sites/luisakroll/2012/09/19/the-forbes-400-the-richest-people-in-america/

“The world’s top 100 billionaires now hold so much wealth, says a new Oxfam report, that just the increase in their net worth last year would be “enough to make extreme poverty history four times over.”
http://toomuchonline.org/to-end-extreme-poverty-end-extreme-wealth/

“During World War II President Franklin D. Roosevelt called for what amounted to a maximum wage. FDR urged Congress to place a 100 percent tax on income over $25,000 a year, a sum now equal, after inflation, to just over $350,000. Congress didn’t go along. But FDR did end up winning a 94 percent top tax rate on income over $200,000, a move that would help usher in the greatest years of middle-class prosperity the United States has ever known.”
http://toomuchonline.org/a-bold-new-labor-call-for-a-maximum-wage/

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

WORLD ECONOMIC CRISIS

Europe is haunted by the myth of the lazy mob – It suits the wealthy to turn the debate about poverty into a morality tale, but the reality is that inequality is structural
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/29/myth-lazy-mob-hands-rich

Matt Taibbi on Big Banks’ Lack of Accountability – Rolling Stone‘s Matt Taibbi joins Bill to discuss the continuing lack of accountability for “too big to fail” banks which continue to break laws and act unethically because they know they can get away with it.
http://billmoyers.com/segment/matt-taibbi-on-big-banks-lack-of-accountability/

New Paper Finds that the IMF is Promoting Socially and Economically Harmful Policies Broadly Across Europe
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/publications/reports/macroeconomic-policy-advice-and-the-article-iv-consultations

LAND, LABOUR AND THE ENVIRONMENT

Earthworker: Workers create climate solutions
http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/53162

Reduced Work Hours as a Means of Slowing Climate Change
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/publications/reports/reduced-work-hours-as-a-means-of-slowing-climate-change

CULTURAL DISSENT

A Novel Idea: Fiction for Labor Activists
http://labornotes.org/2013/01/novel-idea-fiction-labor-activists

At Sundance Film Festival, Documentaries Shine Light on Overlooked Stories of Global Injustice
http://www.democracynow.org/2013/1/24/at_sundance_film_festival_documentaries_shine

INTERNATIONAL

Sharif Abdel Kouddous: On Egyptian Revolution’s 2nd Anniversary, Protesters’ Demands Mostly the Same
http://www.democracynow.org/2013/1/25/sharif_abdel_kouddous_on_egyptian_revolutions

Greece: Striking transport workers ‘face arrest’
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-21189322

European authorities still punishing Greece – can they be stopped?
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/02/20132295452509680.html

IRELAND: Sit-ins, Sabotage and Superdollars
http://ceasefiremagazine.co.uk/irish-times-7/
Worried HMV workers stage sit in

QATAR: Qatar 2022 World Cup will exploit migrant workers, says report
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2013/jan/29/qatar-2022-world-cup-exploit-workers

Don’t buy South African wines: striking workers’ plea to foreign consumers
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jan/24/south-africa-wine-farms-strike?CMP=twt_gu

SOUTH AFRICA: Marikana massacre: police shooting video footage – Channel 4 News shows police footage which appears to undermine claims officers were acting in self-defence over the shootings. Inigo Gilmore reports on the distressing footage and its implications.
http://www.channel4.com/news/marikana-massacre-police-shooting-video-footage