Kiwiblog

Kerri Jackson at Stuff reports:

Small businesses that cannot afford to pay their staff a living wage should probably not be in business at all, a union leader says.

First Union general secretary Robert Reid said while the movement supporting a living wage of at least $18.40 an hour was generally targeted at large corporations and city councils, some undercapitalised small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) needed to think about their business practices as well.

“Why should a worker suffer for being employed by a business that maybe shouldn’t exist?

What an appalling statement. It shows the hatred for business that some union leaders have. Small business owners often spend months or years struggling to set up a business when they can’t even pay themselves a salary. And they create jobs for others, but Robert Reid thinks they are making their workers suffer if they pay them less than $18.40 an hour.

A mole has leaked to me a couple of strategy documents from Labour and Greens on the referendum they have just purchased with our money. The documents are embedded below, and they show the extent of taxpayer resources used to purchase this referendum.

CIRs are meant to be about the public being able to send a message to MPs, not MPs using taxpayer funds to relitigate an election result. Some key revelations:

• They aimed for 400,000 signatures as they knew a fair proportion would be found to be invalid.
• At the 300,000 mark the Greens collected 150,000, Labour 105,000 and Unions 40,000. The Greens are the ones who used taxpayer funding to hire petition collectors.
• Labour pledged 30 hours per week staff time from their taxpayer funded budget
• Greens were using their permament taxpayer funded staff to co-ordinate
• The unions had a paid national co-ordinator
• They refer to unions gathering “car loads” of organisers and activists to travel to areas
• For their day of action, Greens said they will committ five full-time staff – presumably all taxpayer funded, if Labour does the same. That’s 10 taxpayer funded organisers.
• A list of unions to pressure to do more, including PPTA, NZEI, Nurses Organisation – minority shares in power companies of course being key education and health issues!

It is very clear that there has been very few ordinary citizens involved in this petition – mainly a legion of taxpayer funded staff and union staff.

Asset Sales Petition Strategy Docs

Jason Hart at Red State writes:

Dennis Van Roekel was paid $389,620 in fiscal year 2012 as president of the National Education Association (NEA), America’s largest labor union. Van Roekel was one of 14 NEA bosses paid more than $250,000 with dues taken from teachers in Ohio and other forced-unionism states as a condition of employment.

Incredible. Compulsory unionism in the US. We are somewhat better here, but not entirely. You can’t get a collective contract unless you join a union, and in the public sector, public servants are often effectively paid by taxpayers to join a union.

As current union contracts expire, Michigan’s new workplace freedom law will make Michigan the 24th state to protect the right of educators to choose whether they contribute to the following NEA paychecks.

24 states done, 26 to go!

Rodney Hide writes in NBR:

The Maritime Union of New Zealand is in the same pickle as the New Zealand Meatworkers’ Union. It, too, has hidden millions of dollars of spending from the legally required public scrutiny.

Following my complaint, the Registrar of Incorporated Societies, Neville Harris, has ordered the Meatworkers’ Union to re-file six years’ of accounts (Hidesight, Aug 24).

His clear expectation is that the full accounts be presented for approval at the annual meeting on November 7 and be filed promptly thereafter.

It will be fascinating to see if the union complies. It has fought long and hard to keep its accounts hidden. But I’m backing the Registrar to prevail. He has the necessary statutory power to ensure the union complies with the law.

This is good. Unions get numerous rights and privileges under the law. One of the few obligations to to be an incorporated society, which means their annual accounts must be public documents. Hiding the majority of funds away from public scrutiny is not acceptable.

Rodney writes how the Maritime Union has also been hiding money in branch accounts, which have not formed part of their public accounts they file with the Registrar. He notes in the comments on his post:

The Registrar of Incorporated Societies replied to my complaint as follows:

“In light of the issues raised by the NZ Meat Workers and Related Trades Union matter, my office is currently reviewing financial statement compliance by those incorporated societies who are registered unions.

This suggests that the Registrar will be investigating all unions to ascertain how many are following the law and disclosing their full accounts, and forcing those which are hiding accounts to publish in full. It will be fascinating to see how many other unions have been doing this.

Hat Tip: Whale Oil

The main job of Labour seems to be to try and enhance union power and funding, and the main job of many unions is to get Labour elected. If it involved businesses, it would be called corrupt.  The latest example is on the obscure Advanced Technology Institute Bill. Look at the select committee report and the minority report from Labour:

In particular, it points to the recognition in that Act of the interest of unions as representatives of employees, both in industries directly engaged in the economic development that NZTE assists, and in the wider economy. The submitter asked that these provisions be mirrored in the ATI bill. We agree with this recommendation, and believe that union representation should be added to clause 10(4)(b)(i).

Firstly unions are not representative of employees. Off memory less than 17% of employees belong to a union and in the private sector it is under 9%.

But on Labour, they have done it again after backtracking on their plans to legislate to exclude unions from the lobbying bill they are now trying to legislate seats for unions on the stakeholder advisory board of the Advanced Technology Institute. Imagine if the Nats put up an amendment for a seat for Business NZ.

It would be interesting to find out whether this was signed by their research and innovation spokesperson David Shearer – is all this union sycophancy from Labour because they are about to gain 20% of the vote on future Labour leaders?

Kate Chapman at Stuff reports:

Trade unions do not want to be exempted from a potential lobbying register, despite Labour’s attempts to have them excluded.

Green MP Holly Walker has a member’s bill that would create a register of lobbyists and require them to follow a code of ethics.

The bill passed its first reading with unanimous support, but Labour has since suggested an amendment that would exempt trade unions.

Fairfax Media can now reveal that the unions have not asked for that and say it would not be practical.

In a draft submission, the Council of Trade Unions expressed concern about the proposed regime.

“Lobbying is a core activity of trade unions, but the consequences on trade unions and NGOs from this bill if it were to proceed have not been sufficiently considered.”

There were practical difficulties in establishing which staff within a union would have to be registered and the reporting requirements and penalties were “particularly burdensome”.

But it did not ask to be exempted from the scheme “on the basis of being unions”.

Rather, the CTU sought different reporting requirements for unions and non-governmental organisations.

Effectively they are still asking for an exemption, or at least reduced requirements. They’re just saying all non-businesses should be exempt or have reduced transparency requirements.

“The CTU has concerns about the increasing influence of corporate lobbying and the influential impact of professional and secret lobbying.”

Translation: Lobbying by businesses is bad and evil, and lobbying by unions and NGOs is good and lovely.

“The bill in its current form treats all lobbyists as if they are equal when lobbyists’ power and influence is very unequal.”

Unions are very powerful lobbyists. If Labour MPs get offside with unions, they risk losing selection battles or being demoted down the list. The next Leader will be 20% elevated by unions, and unions are a primary source of funds and campaign activists for Labour.

Kate Chapman at Stuff reports:

Labour wants trade unions excluded from a potential lobbying register and blames the MP who drafted the plan for including them in the first place.

Green MP Holly Walker’s member’s bill would require those who lobby politicians to be registered and adhere to a code of ethics.

It passed its first reading with unanimous support from all parties, but Labour has since put forward an amendment that would exclude trade unions.

The unions are major backers of the Labour Party.

More than just backers. They

• get to write industrial relations and other policies
• have an influential role in list ranking
• are major funders
• can tip electorate selections to a preferred candidate
• will soon have 20% of the vote for future leaders
• provide a major source of campaign workers

So it is no surprise Labour are desperate to exclude them.

Labour MP Trevor Mallard said the bill was a “bad piece of work” and should have been tidied up before going to select committee.

It would currently capture a union official who rang him to help with a constituent’s housing problem, or a foodbank that wanted assistance getting a client welfare entitlements, he said.

It would also capture an employer that rang him on the same issues. Is Trevor proposing an exemption for businesses? Of course not.

The exemptions should be on what types of activities count as lobbying, not on protecting your union overlords.

You have to listen to this interview on bFM to believe it. David Shearer tries and justifies Labour’s proposal to exempt unions from the lobbying transparency bill. An extract:

“It is more of what I was just saying before umm ethan is that, you know I get you know trade unions or say salvation army or whatever they are standing up for rights of you know workers or rights of the poor or whatever, or whatever it is likely to be. Umm I don’t look to gain have had any sort of, I don’t look to have any material gain from that as a, as a as an MP–but there is what the the idea was is to try and capture the you know the various sort of business and corporate interests that might you know in a sense be trying to do sort of what you know they do offshore (not sure happens here?) is to buy buy politicans off”

Is the leader of the Labour Party really saying he has nothing to gain from unions, when they are both major funders of Labour, but also now get 20% of the vote on who is the Labour Leader? Unions get a major say in Labour candidate selections also. Yet Shearer says they should be specifically exempt from lobbying transparency requirements!

Again, I recommend people listen to the whole interview – it is far from clear and concise!

Sir Bob writes:

The role of Minister of Education has always been a nightmare posting. If you’re Minister of Agriculture then you’re subject to intelligent dialogue with Federated Farmers. If Justice Minister, you can wallow in the ego-inflating pleasure of issuing pompous utterances, interspersed with all-night drunken sessions with the Law Society, and so it goes.

But Minister of Education; God help the poor buggers, confronted as they always have been with embittered, self-important nobodies, as teacher union representatives invariably are.

Sir Bob continues:

Readers may consider I’m being too charitable with that description. Well, I can’t help it, temperance having been my life-long practice. But I’d be a great deal more if instead of endless moaning, the teachers’ union focused on promoting English, science and history and abandoned film studies, Maori wonderfulness, gender studies, et al bogus subjects, now so prevalent.

I’ve speculated why teacher unions are so ghastly when compared with other lobbying bodies. My conclusion is that they have never left the school-room or grown up and that if we resurrected corporal punishment and delivered a daily flogging to these unionists, it might produce a general amelioration.

Bob may need t be careful. If the PPTA affiliates to Labour, they’ll get a vote in the next Labour Leader, and in exchange for their votes may insist the next Leader brings in a hate crime law, so Sir Bob is jailed for hate speech against them

In 1991, I popped over to Georgia to have a look at proceedings when the civil war broke out. One night in Tbilisi, my wife and I were guests of some university academics in an outdoor restaurant near the river. Abruptly the night erupted with explosions and for half an hour, mortars rocketed over our heads from across the river. Our Georgian friends took a nonchalant approach to this. “Relax,” they said, “it’s just the school teachers’ union bombing Parliament,” this over some trivia they were whining about.

Heh. Probably a protest against league tables.

Anyway, after two weeks here and there, we arrived at our Blantyre hotel. At 6pm I turned on the television news. The lead item was the president of the Malawian Women’s Institute carrying on about school teachers having it off with schoolgirls.

She was followed by the Malawian school teachers’ association president.

Never have I witnessed such explosive anger. He was livid and I would describe him as being white with rage, but in the circumstances that would be pushing it.

“Do you realise how little my members are paid?” he shouted at the Women’s Institute president, who began to look remorseful.

“Are you demanding my members risk their lives with you Aids-ridden lot? This is the sole perk of the job,” he exploded

Well that is a novel rationale for a pay rise.

Union bosses are now going to be more powerful than MPs, in selecting future Labour leaders. Labour are proposing that their union affiliates will get 20% of the say in future leadership contests. They have five affiliated unions and this means all future leadership contenders will be beholden to them.

Union leaders will endorse a candidate and the vast bulk of votes from that union will go towards that candidate – if the five unions collectively endorse one candidate, then their 20% is likely to be decisive – especially if the members and caucus are split in their support.

Could you imagine the outrage if the NZ National Party said that it was going to give (for example) Business NZ, Telecom, Contact Energy, Carter Holt Harvey etc the right to vote in National Party leadership elections.

Organisations should not be eligible to join political parties (let alone vote in them). Political parties should be comprised of individuals who have individually decided to join and support a party and pay a membership fee to that party.

Stuff reports:

Meanwhile, Labour MPs will today consider a proposal that would give members – and possibly unions and supporters – a say in who leads the party; something now determined only by MPs.

Shearer yesterday confirmed that, if approved, it would be “a mix of caucus and the membership in terms of electing the leadership”.

The percentage votes allocated to each group were “up in the air”, and he would not yet disclose what part unions and affiliates would have.

But the party’s discussion paper, released earlier this year, points to Britain where in leadership ballots MPs’ votes count for one third, the membership vote for one third and affiliated unions and supporters for one third.

I think giving members a vote in the leadership would be a good thing. But it should be one person one vote. Giving union bosses a huge bloc vote would be a huge mistake. It would make Labour even more captive to them.

Parliament has passed a law requiring unions to hold a secret ballot to vote on strike action. This is highly desirable, as no employee should be heavied or threatened with consequences based on how they vote – which can happen, if it is a show of hands.

Now most unions do operate secret ballots. But, not all. And making it a requirement rather than an option, seems basic common sense. Unions get a number of special powers under our law, so a basic requirement around secret ballots of members is hardly onerous.

Yet Labour, Greens, New Zealand First, the Maori Party and Mana all voted against requiring unions to hold secret ballots. I can understand them saying the bill is not a priority. But to actually vote against it can only be interpreted as saying they support unions not having to hold secret ballots when voting on strike action.

And yes I would have no problems requiring any company that votes for a lock out to have their board (if they have one) vote by secret ballot on it.

Labour MP Andrew Little reveals his views on employers. Think if a National MP referred to some unions as parasites.

Incidentally I would have though a parasite would be a union which deducts PAYE off its employees wages and then spends it on political campaigns instead of paying it to the IRD, as legally obliged.

Hat Tip: Whale Oil

3 News reports:

Affco has accused the union representing its employees of not complying with its statutory reporting requirements, and says there are “irregularities” in its financial accounts.

The New Zealand Meat Workers and Related Trades Union and Affco have been involved in a tit-for-tat series of strikes and lockouts since February, fighting over changes to union members’ collective employment agreement.

In the latest move, Affco says it is laying a complaint with the Serious Fraud Office on behalf of its employees over the payments they make to the union.

CEO Hamish Simson says the union has not declared its total income, and has failed to disclose what it does with its members’ contributions.

“It appears from the union’s published financial statements that only a fraction of its total income has been declared,” says Mr Simson.

“Affco workers contribute over $500,000 to the union each year, paying $5.95 each per week. Affco workers represent less than 10 percent of the 23,000 members the Union says it has and yet it only declares revenue of just over $700,000 per annum”.

The Meatworkers Union is affiliated to Labour, and donated $18,000 to them at the last election.

Looking at their accounts, I would say that levies are paid to branches, and a fraction of those levies are paid to the main union as capitation fees.

Now if those branches are all incorporated societies also, then probably all is okay. But if they are not, and do not publish accounts, then there is a case they are concealing their overall income. Unions are required to be publicly registered. Do those who pay the unions fees think they are joining the NZ Meat Workers Union or a separate branch union?

The only other incorporated society that has the words “Meat” and “Workers” in its name is the “CANTY MARL NELSON BR NZ MEAT IND RELATED TRADES IND UNION WORKERS WELFARE SOC INCORPORATED”. They have not filed annual accounts for 2003, 2005, 2007, 2009 and 2010. Their 2011 accounts only show income of $37,000 so they do not explain where the “missing” $4 million of revenue is.

If 80% of the money is kept in branches whose accounts are excluded from the incorporated society’s accounts, then that is seriously wrong. Branches are generally regarded as part of the parent body, unless themselves incorporated.

It will be fascinating to see if there is an innocent explanation for the missing $4 million or so.

Whale has blogged on this issue in recent days.

The Electoral Commission has also published the spending of the registered third parties, who spent over the disclosure limit.

The NZEI spent $280,000 campaigning against National and national standards.under

Just behind it was the PSA who also spent $196,000 campaigning against National, including texting people in the final week of the election to vote to support strong unions.

The big money was also with the Campaign for MMP (despite the hysterical claims about business funding the Vote for Change campaign. The Campaign for MMP spent $157,000 while Vote for Change spent a mere $80,000. There was also referendum spending pro MMP by some of the political parties and unions, but under the disclosure limit.

As with previous elections the spending by unions is a magnitude greater than that by business groups.

Martin Johnston at NZ Herald reports:

Some Auckland surgeons are being paid more than $6000 for a day’s work at a public hospital.

My God. They are part of the 1% scum.

The Waitemata District Health Board scheme has divided doctors over concerns that the surgeons involved can earn nearly four times as much as general physicians and psychiatrists on their collective agreement’s top step.

Income inequality alert. This is evil and must be stopped.

The Waitakere “pilot” project pays orthopaedic surgeons a contract rate of $2200 for each total hip or knee replacement package of care. This comprises $1320 for the operation plus $880 for daily patient review, any call-backs during the hospital stay, availability for six weeks after surgery and a six-week visit.

A fixed cost per operation. We can’t have that.

On the union-negotiated multi-employer collective agreement, specialists of all kinds on the highest step earn an annual base salary of $206,000, or $99 an hour, but this increases to around $170 an hour when leave, KiwiSaver and allowances are factored in. Some specialists are paid above the collective’s rates.

Good God, they get paid even more than stevedores.

Senior doctors’ union executive director Ian Powell said the split rates undermined the team-work that was critical to the safety of patients in a complex public hospital.

Oh yes, because one doctor is paid more than another, they will compromise patient safety. I have to say I don’t know any doctors like that.

So why is the DHB doing this nasty income inequality with its doctors?

DHB chairman Lester Levy said the pilot had worked very well.

The rates paid to orthopaedic surgeons were around 60 per cent of private-sector rates. The scheme had led to a number of surgeons opting to do less private-sector work in favour of doing most of their work on public patients.

Productivity was up by a third. Costs shrank 12 per cent for hips and 16 per cent for knees because of a 40 per cent reduction in patients’ average length of stay in hospital, less time in theatre and fewer staff being involved in treatment.

Bringing previously out-sourced surgery in-house saved the DHB $3 million in the last financial year. Patient satisfaction was high and the transfer rate to North Shore Hospital was low.

So paying some staff more has saved the DHB money, improved productivity, reduced lengths of stays in hospitals, increased patient satisfaction and reduced the transfer rate.

But despite this, the union is against this because not all staff are paid more, only some.

Labour should be welcoming what Lester Levy is doing. Rather than contract their operations out to the private sector, the Waitemata DHB is now doing them in-house.

Claire Trevett in the NZ Herald reports:

WHAT THEY GAVE
(2008 donation in brackets)
* Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union: $40,000 (2008: $60,000)
* Dairy Workers’ Union: $25,000 (2008: $12,000)
* Maritime Union: $18,500 (2008: none disclosed)
* Meat Workers’ Union: $18,000 (2008: $25,500)
* Service and Food Workers’ Union: $15,000 (2008: $20,000)
* FIRST Union (not affiliated): $4000 (2008: nil)

Donations of over $30,000 must be disclosed within 10 days of being made, but those over $15,000 but no greater than $30,000 do not have to be disclosed until the party does its annual return by 30 April 2012.

The unions here have disclosed early in response to inquiries by the Herald, which is commendable.

In total they gave $110,500 of donations above the disclosure threshold in 2011. In 2008 it was $117,500 so not a lot of change.

National’s donations over $30,000 have already been disclosed and commented upon. It will be interesting to see in early May who else donated above $15,000.

Also of interest is a new requirement (proposed by me, amongst others) that for the first time parties have to reveal the number of donations they received below the individual disclosure limit – in bands. This will give us a more holistic look at how parties are funded, and will also be out in May.

John Pagani blogs:

When ministers sit around next year asking if they what policy they can tweak here and there to increase wages and reduce poverty, they should look at increasing the minimum wage and increasing union membership so that wages rise as the economy recovers.

There – fixed, and they didn’t need to spend a dollar in the stretched budget. In fact, people who earn more pay more tax, so it helps the budget.

Pagani has made the same mistake the Greens have made. They seem to think that money prints on trees.

If an increase in the minimum wage pushes wages up for those on the minimum wage by say $800 million, then yes at 12.5% tax that will be an extra $100 million of PAYE tax collected.

However those businesses will have their profits reduced by $400 million (as money does not grow on trees as the left always assumes) and at 28% company tax, that is $224 million less tax. Hence the Government has $124m less tax revenue overall. So rather than help the budget, it actually does the opposite.

Also ironic that Pagani thinks increasing union membership will help the budget. The only budget most of them help is the Labour Party’s. And at least one of them don’t even pay PAYE tax on behalf of their employees – preferring to spend it on political campaigns instead.

Chris Trotter writes:

WHAT MUST LABOUR DO to be welcomed back by ordinary Kiwis? What are the things it has to find, and what must it lose?

The first thing it has to lose is trade union affiliation. The big private sector unions still associated with the Labour Party: the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union (EPMU) and the Service and Food Workers Union; must be cut loose – and soon.

I write those words with a heavy heart, because it was the affiliated union vote that elected me to the New Zealand Council of the Labour Party way back in 1987. In those grim years unionists were the backbone of the opposition to Rogernomics. They kept the flame of the true Labour faith flickering through the party’s darkest days. And it was the block-votes of the trade union affiliates which kept Helen Clark’s political machine ticking over so reliably for the 15 long years it controlled the party.

Even so, it’s time for them to go.

If Labour wants to do the working-class a big favour it will purge its party of these oligarchs and welcome workers into the party as ordinary rank-and-file members. Who knows, if enough of them join up, they might even be able to persuade Labour’s MPs (including those who owe their positions on the Party List to the machinations of the Affiliates Council’s wise old heads) to rebuild New Zealand’s trade unions to Twenty-First Century specifications – most particularly by requiring them to operate, from bottom to top, as inclusive, transparent and recognisably democratic institutions.

Cactus Kate has details of the impoverished wages that the wharfies are striking over at the Ports of Auckland.

Their oppressive employer is only paying them:

• An average full-time wage of $91,480
• Free medical insurance for not just the stevedore, but their entire family
• Three times the statutory sick leave entitlement, being three weeks a year accumulating up until nine weeks.
• Fully paid in-house training (no qualifications needed)
• Five weeks annual leave

The wharfies will be disappointed Labour did not win the election, because Labour’s proposed Workplace Commission could have ordered Ports of Auckland to pay them more money, in line with a industry standard they set.

Phil Goff claimed today that Labour is not directed by any unions. It is of course just a coincidence that the CTU wrote their workplace relations policy which gives them pretty much everything they asked for.

Only 7% of private sector workers are in a union, yet they dominate Labour. Whale has a list of the backgrounds of the Labour List.

80% of their top 10 have a union background, and 70% of their top 20.

The current average of the public polls has Labour projected to get 35 MPs. Of those 35, 22 or 63% would have a union background.

I’m all in favour of unions helping out employees who chose to join. I’m not in favour of them controlling the Government.

And no I’m not in favour of business controlling the Government either. And in the last three years business organisations have been significantly critical of many Government decisions such as keeping WFF and interest-free student loans.

I want a Government that governs in the national interest, not in the interest of the powerful groups that constitute their party.

Could you imagine the outcry if National allowed (for example) the Regional Chambers of Commerce to actually join the National Party, get seats on selection committees, have votes at conferences where their vote counts for much more than individual members, vote on party policy with their weighted numbers and gets a seat on the ruling Board?

When will someone in Labour be brave enough to reform the party, so it is one (natural) person, one vote? Parties should be comprised of individuals, not of corporate entities.

Derek Cheng at the Herald reports:

The Labour Party’s vision for the future of work and wages is virtually identical to a unions’ wishlist outlined at the party’s annual conference a year ago, prompting questions about their influence.

Of course it is identical. Labour is effectively the parliamentary wing of the unions.

It is incredible to consider that Phil Goff who supported so many of the reforms of the 1980s, is now pushing a return to the 1970s.

What other new policies will Labour announce? Maybe ..

• No Sunday trading, to give workers a break
• A retail pricing commission which sets maximum retail prices to stop consumers from being ripped off
• A rent freeze

What other 1970s policies should Labour resurrect?

Whale shows us what Middle Earth would look like under Labour’s industrial relations policy. Enjoy and share.

This policy is so backwards, so appalling and so one-sided I don’t even know where to start. It is clear that the unions have written this, because they have got everything they could think of.  The policy is here.

It includes:

• A 15.3% increase in the minimum wage, including for youth.
• Labour will appoint those union bosses who fail to make their caucus to a new Workplace Commission that will have the power to determine Industry Standard Agreements for entire industries – unionised or not. This is all but a return to the days of national awards. No employer and employee will be able to agree to terms less than those set out by the Workplace Commission
• The Workplace Commission will be able to set a standard for an industry for “union rights”. This could mean anything, from employers forced to fund unions themselves directly to guaranteed access to any workplace at anytime for recruitment purposes.
• The Government will fund unions (“provide resources”) s they can better understand the new law and “build capacity for negotiations”. This means hire more staff. The same staff who come election time turn out en masse for Labour putting up their hoardings, using union vehicles etc etc. This is Labour’s backdoor funding of itself.
• Workers who are not in unions will be “provided with information and advice about joining the relevant unions”
• Will repeal the 90 days laws, despite the evidence that 40% of those hired under it would not have had job offers without it
• Labour will legislate to allow contractors to collectively bargain, as the Australian actors union demanded. Goodbye Wellington and NZ film industry. They really are Hobbit haters.
• State agencies will be told to blacklist companies who tender for work if they are seen as anti-union (‘not respecting the right of their employees to join a union”)

This is their worst policy, by far. The unions are getting their payback for their many donations to Labour – not just money, but especially of personnel and buildings and vehicles. Remember many of the unions are actual affiliate members of Labour, so the more employees they push into union membership the more money Labour gets from those unions in membership subs. This policy is all about appeasing the union masters.

I never thought I would see the day that a party (other than Mana) would effectively propose a return to national awards. Here’s what those good old days looked like:

The only good thing about the policy, is it should send Labour down in the polls further. The Roy Morgan poll out today has just had them drop to 28%.

Felix Marwick from ZB tweeted:

Getting releases from unions about Labour’s wages policy before I’ve been sent the material by Labour. Embargo times are different too.

Well at least the unions are getting to release Labour’s wages policy for them, rather than have Whale Oil do it like he did for ICT.

No surprise the unions are doing releases on it, as they of course would have written it.

But in another policy, a key organisation mentioned turns out to know nothing about the policy proposal. This is NZ on Screen. Labour’s policy says:

Labour will consider expanding the role of NZ Onscreen as a broader online content storage facility and will actively encourage new business models where NZ creative content can be distributed online in an affordable and accessible way.

Russell Brown notes:

It’s not clear what content an expanded NZ On Screen would be storing or how a strictly non-commercial public-good service would facilitate new business models.

Exactly. NZ on Screen (a wonderful service) provides content for free, and has no access controls, tracking, charging etc. So touting it as a business model is like touting a foodbank as a new business model for Woolworths.

So it is no surprise perhaps that NZ on Screen has tweeted:

To clarify for those interested, we have had no conversations with Labour about this policy: http://www.stuff.co.nz/technology/digital-living/5794027/Labour-reveals-radical-internet-ideas it’s news to us too!

Oh dear, this is not the sign of good policy formulation.