International Socialists

ARC MEDIA RELEASE - Message to NZ Bus: Auckland has had enough - deliver the services or go back to Wellington

12 October 2009

ARC Chairman Mike Lee has delivered a simple and blunt message to NZ Bus, on day five of the NZ Bus lock-out of drivers.

“We have had enough. Auckland will not be held to ransom. If you can’t deliver the services that the people of Auckland rely on, then we will have to find someone else who can,” he said.

NZ Bus workers locked out

The NZ Bus company withdrew 700 buses from its Auckland routes on October 8, locking out 900 drivers and cleaners after they refused to call off proposed industrial action over a five-month pay dispute. Workers have rejected a pay rise offer of 10.5 percent over three years, and are demanding 12.6 percent over three years. [NB: as noted in previous articles on this site, this only constitutes a base rate of $15 per hour - hardly as dramatic as it may sound]

The company said it will not lift the lockout until the four unions representing its workforce remove their notice of work-to-rule and submit to negotiations facilitated by the government’s Employment Relations Authority.

An estimated 80,000 passengers are affected daily on city routes that include Go West, Waka Pacific, LINK and City Circuit.

Auckland bus drivers, with the support of the National Distribution Union, had been planning a "Work to rule" strike¹ to support their rejection of a pay offer made by employers NZ Bus a.k.a Infratil (parent company). NZ Bus is New Zealand largest public transport company, owning bus fleets in several major centres, and in 2008 had an estimated income of 195 million dollars from fares and contracts alone, up from $180M in 2007².

In response to the demands of the workers, instead of going to mediation NZ Bus today announced that as of 4am on Thurday 8 October (30 mins before the "Work to rule" was scheduled to begin), the drivers will be locked out. The 900 workers who supported the demands laid by the NDU will be unable to drive their routes, upsetting the routine of thousands of Aucklanders who ride the buses to work and school.

The Police Are Rioting
Reflections on Pittsburgh
By David Rovics

If any elements of the corporate media have been paying any attention to what's been happening on the streets of Pittsburgh over the past few days I haven't noticed, so I thought I'd write my own account.

There is a popular assumption asserted ad nauseum by our leaders in government, by our school text books and by our “mainstream” media that although many other countries don't have freedom of speech and freedom of assembly – such as Iran or China – we do, and it's what makes us so great. Anybody who has spent much time trying to exercise their First Amendment rights in the US now or at any other time since 1776 knows first-hand that the First Amendment looks good on paper but has little to do with reality.