The Greens are calling for a public boycott of Progressive Enterprises' supermarkets (Countdown, Foodtown and Woolworths) to protest their lockout of their distribution workers. Good - it's about time some politicians spoke up on this issue. But you really have to wonder why it isn't the Labour Party - the "worker's party" - that's doing so...
how does it feel to devote your life to the destruction of civilisation? i just don't get the mindset of those like yourself...it must be the equivalent of a spiritual graffitist
ReplyDeleteAnon: paying your workers a decent wage isn't "destroying civilisation", it's promoting it.
ReplyDeleteThat aside, its the market in action. If Progressive isupset by it, they have a simple solution: pay their workers properly, and don't act like arseholes.
I/S - Progressive is paying a market rate. none of those workers are forced to stay there. they can all go and get other jobs.
ReplyDeletewhat does their desire to get around productivity and auckland cost weightings have at all to do with civilisation
Sage: "market rates" aren't necessarily civilised. We have only to look at the nineteenth century to see that. Progressive are not willing to be decent to their staff; they are paying people in Auckland less than they pay in a dipshit place like Palmerston North, essentially because they couldn't find a way to sack the workers here and rehire them on lower wages as they did in the other two centres. And if they're not willing to be decent to their staff, I don't see why people should support them.
ReplyDelete(As for civilisation, it'll have everything to do with civilisation if they start running out of toilet paper in places like Te Awamutu, where they have a local monopoly...)
I/S, you don't seriously believe the Labour Party is the workers party do you?
ReplyDeleteToo many workers seem to believe it 8( Or at least vote as if they do.
ReplyDeleteAnthony: no, I don't; I'm pointing at the difference between their history and current position.
ReplyDeleteOnce upon a time, Labour would have been first to declare their support for striking workers. Not anymore.
"That aside, its the market in action"
ReplyDeleteNot really, in a true market the strikers would (or at least could) be fired. The fact that they can't be is a legal distortion of the market.
Of course, your market relies on arbitary private property rights enforced, at the end of the day, by police brutality. I was on the picket line and I saw it first hand.
ReplyDeleteThere is nothing natural or eternal about your market. It is merely our current form of social organisation, and it relies on force as much as any other.
The dispute is between the workers and their union and Progressive Enterprises. Properly, a government shoud avoid intervening in private disputes like this and simply ensure the legislative framework guards the rights of the workers and doesn't tilt the playing filed in favour of the more powerful employers. Remember, if Labour were to intervene to help the workers in an inudtrial dispute, it would be a green light for a National administration to turn to full power of the state and bosses onto workers if it were ever to gain the treasury benches again.
ReplyDeleteAnd you honestly think National needs to be given a green light for that?
ReplyDeleteWayne Mapp was one One News tonight kicking up a stinck that Steve Maharey had made a personal donation to the locked out workers in Palmy North. Apparently he is a 'far left' Minister supporting a 'hard left' union.
ReplyDeleteWoops. Stink, not stinck. Typing too fast.
ReplyDeleteJames: Good on Maharey, about time.
ReplyDeleteDitto. Good to see that some in Labour at least remember their party's roots.
Oh look it's Tane, the guy who never replied to my comment on the 90-day bill at aucklanderatlarge.
ReplyDeleteNever mind, I'll get back on topic.
I have to admit, I might not be as smart as you Tane, because I don't understand what you mean by "arbitrary property rights". Are all property rights arbitrary? Or only for people you don't like?
If someone was burgling your house would you avoid calling the police for fear of them being brutal?
If I avoid taxes long enough the police will eventually take me away, and if I resist they'll probably brutalise me. So can I not pay taxes?
Please explain, I'm dying to know.
I notice the union spokesperson was playing hte nationalism card. that might explain quite a bit of the support.
ReplyDelete7.29am is a bit early to be hitting the electric puha hugh.
ReplyDeleteOh dear, stood up. Again! Maybe Tane isn't 'Tane' enough to come back...?
ReplyDelete(Sanctuary, it says PM where I'm sitting.)
Labour support for locked out workers.
ReplyDeleteLocked out supermarket distribution workers need our help.
Hundreds of NDU and EPMU members at Auckland, Palmerston North and Christchurch Distribution Centres supplying Countdown, Foodtown and Woolworths supermarkets are locked out by their Australian-owned employer, Progressive Enterprises.
Progressive Enterprises says their employees cannot return to work until they abandon their claim for a national collective agreement.
The lock out, now in its 3rd week, is an attack on union rights. Please support the locked out workers and their families who are standing up to their multi-billion dollar Australian owner.
Donations can be made to the National Distribution Union at the BNZ account: 02-0200-0217968-00 with the reference "Lock Out".
As well as donating generously you can help by letting the company know that you support the locked out workers and their unions on 0800 404040.
Click here to find out more about the dispute.
Just so you know, that was taken from the latest issue of Labour News, an e-newsletter that goes to all party members.
I'm visiting family here in Hawkes Bay, and there is a definte impact on Progressive - lots and lots of people in my ear shot at Pak and Save were unfamiliar with the layout and my careful eavesdropping revealed most were boyotting Countdown and Woollies across the way.
ReplyDeleteAnd the manager of Woolworths spent most of his lunch hour following my sister around his carpark giving her a verbal tirade of threats as she put union pamphlets on customer cars. EXCELLENT!
As an aside, in other sweet, sweet news my spies tell me that Hawkes bay today lost 40% of its subscribers after it published its outrageous "Vote National" stories on the eve of the last general election.
All in all a sweet weekend in Napier.
Labour has been re-energized in Napier. Now its time to get rid of the useless Chris Tremain as Napier MP and get someone whose sole claim to fame isn't his father.
Maria: I'd just noticed that and was going to mention it. Still, given Labour's roots its a little odd not to see more comment by its politicians. We're not in the age of Muldoon now, where industrial disputes were solved over a few drinks in the PM's office, and Ministers don't (can't?) get involved. So what's stopping them speaking out?
ReplyDelete(It's a rhetorical question; the answer is fear of upsetting the virtual senate of international investors. But who the hell elected them?)
who elected them? In a sense the global community did.
ReplyDeleteInternational investors to an extent represent ourselves. they are a proxy for "what the world want's" in a slightly more honest way than if they actually told us (ie no one votes for cutting down the rain forests - but by spending most of our day wasting paper and a fraction of our year doing anything about the rain forest we vote with our $ so to speak).
(I guess we just aren't all that nice or smart)
Add to that that a little ripping off, corruption and anti-competitive behavour of course - but that is the lesser effect.
Ah Hugh, I used to think like you, that the police weren't politicised. Sadly I've seen them enforce the "rights" of the owners many a time now, even from my soft existence. I type "rights" because often what the police act to protect, for one side, don't seem to be rights that actually exist in law, which may be what Tane means by arbitrary.
ReplyDeleteNew World College Hill was a sea of shoppers yesterday, many as confused as I. By the way this dispute is going it looks like I am going to have to get used to the layout - and remember to take my Flybuys card.
Genius: The problem with the argument that the market is a form of democracy is that it misses the most important part: "one person, one vote". Instead, you get "one dollar, one vote" (which is why the rich seem so keen on it).
ReplyDeleteThere's also the question of "what gives them the right to dictate our policies like this"? And what the hell does it mean for our democracy where New Zealand policy is effectively made by unelected (or elected by the rich) executives in Washington, Londonand Sydney rather than the people we elect to Parliament in Wellington?
Span: I'd interpreted that "arbitrary" as pointing out the simple truth that property rights are, like marriage, entirely a social convention - and thus changeable if we decide a different scheme suits our purposes better.
ReplyDeleteBut some people persist in thinking of them as being like the laws of physics...
I/S,
ReplyDeleteyes it isn't perfect democracy, in certain areas where rich people are diferent from the poor (like maybe house design? what do rich people spend their money on?) the poor will 'loose out'. Worse yet it isn't only your country that gets a vote - so we (new zealand) can't have really offensive pollicies (like apatheid, or developing nukes for war). And surprise, surprise, - putting sanctions or tarrifs or harming hte investments of other countries will have concequences.
Sometimes it is just the 'we dont like other countries oppinions, or we dont like our own opinions that is the problem, although I admit it may also be the 'we want to slant political power more towards the poor'.
Yes, Idiot, that's what I meant. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry I didn't get back to you sooner Hugh - I do have other things to do in my life than trawl the comments sections of the local blogs.
If you feel the need to discuss this issue any further then feel free to email me at tane.wilton@gmail.com