The Government’s War on Workers and Welfare
In the 2023 New Zealand general election, the current National, ACT, and New Zealand First coalition government was formed. We are now at the start of 2025, and the working class is suffering. Thousands of public sector workers have been sacked to pay for tax cuts that overwhelmingly benefit the rich. This class war is […]
The Privatisation Agenda Behind the Dunedin Hospital Betrayal
The Dunedin Hospital is the only tertiary-level hospital for the Lower South Island. It is the nearest tertiary-level hospital for well over 300,000 people and has around 400 beds. The hospital is ancient and no longer fit for purpose, it was constructed with asbestos and it leaks all over. The hospital needs to be replaced. […]
The Student Protest Movement for Palestine
“It has been a little less than a year since I started attending these protests […] At first I marked them out by numbers: the first protest, the second. Then by location: Tauranga, Palmerston North, The Embassy, Parliament. Still more passed and they started becoming milestones: the first time I led the chants, the time […]
The Mine Ain’t Yours: Primary Industry and the Material Interests in Racial Division
The coalition is racist. Nearly a year on from the fateful 2023 election that saw the two-term Labour government swept away in a tide of reactionary fervour, Te Ao Māori has come under fire. The New Zealand Herald spreading Hobson’s Pledge propaganda, a stringent rewrite of the Marine and Coastal Area Act on the table, […]
Hīkoi 2024 – Partnership from Below
When I arrived early there was already a sizable, largely Māori crowd. There was a stunning diversity of banners and regalia. A woman walking by me gasped “ah, look at our people!” The contrast must be striking when you are used to almost always being in a minority in a place like Wellington. And not […]
The State of the Unions in 2024
The end of 2024 marks one year in power for the National-led government. This retrospective look at the year for unions examines the state of the union movement in 2024 compared with the first year of the last National-led government in 2009. National Party leader John Key was sworn in as Prime Minister at the […]
Hīkoi as a protest of defiance, unity and hope
The Hīkoi mō te Tiriti was not just a mass gathering of people, it was an act of defiance, unity, and hope. Māori, pākehā, tauiwi, all heeded the call of the organisers of Toitū te Tiriti, and came out in our tens of thousands. And while the formal call from the organisers was to rally around […]
Hīkoi as Education
All kinds of ākonga – Māori, Pākehā, tauiwi – in and out of uniform were out in full on the Hīkoi mō te Tiriti on the streets of Wellington last week. The Hīkoi will be remembered as one of those events in history, which will be taught in our Aotearoa History lessons, and one as […]
Toitū te Tiriti!
There is a palpable sense of excitement in the air. Granted, the Jetstar lounge isn’t necessarily the most excitable place in the country, but hearing Te Reo Māori flying and constitutional histories discussed by aunties and uncles is a sure cause. The eve before the march has Auckland Domestic Airport Gate 21 buzzing, as inked […]
Foreshore and Seabed: A New Wave of Attacks
Another round of Crown confiscations stand before us. Among the current onslaught of law-changes, the Government has recently announced its plans to overturn the 2023 Court of Appeal decision which lowered the threshold for meeting Customary marine title claims. The history here gets tangled easily, so let’s break it down in chronological order (an oversimplification, […]
