Our Bodies! Our Choice!
This rainy Tuesday, 250 people marched from Midland Park to Parliament to demand abortion be decriminalised. Around the country hundreds more rallied. Andrew Little’s Abortion Legislation Bill is approaching its second reading, and the pressure is on to get it passed. The bill removes abortion from the crimes act, and scraps the requirement for approval […]
State ‘care’ and stolen generations
“Oranga Tamariki told me I had five minutes to say goodbye to my baby and then they were going to take it… I hung onto my baby but I was worried they were going to hurt me and the baby.” These are the words of a young mother who in May resisted multiple attempts by […]
Battling for Abortion Rights
Anti-abortion politics have taken centre stage in the media following the passing of “fetal-heartbeat” laws this year in several US states: Ohio, Mississippi, Georgia and Kentucky. The new laws ban abortion beyond six weeks of pregnancy, before most people know they are pregnant. Alabama has passed an even more restrictive law that bans abortion at […]
Teachers’ Strikes: Lessons from our Struggle
Teacher and ISO member Romany Tasker-Poland, on learning from the teachers’ strikes. The teachers, primary and secondary, have had a victory (if a partial one). It has been a long fight. The first teachers’ strike was by NZEI primary teachers in August 2018. Primary teachers struck again in November in the form of rolling regional […]
Why we protested Jordan Peterson
The Pōneke branch of the International Socialist last night joined the wave of protests against Jordan Peterson, as he tours New Zealand and Australia promoting 12 Rules for Life. Peterson is not a philosopher-king or an intellectual. He’s an egg spreading reactionary ideas. He is a best-selling misogynist, a transphobe, and is regularly courted by […]
Rebel Lives: Clara Zetkin
A federal election in Germany was held on 31 July 1932 in the depths of the Great Depression and a political crisis. The Nazis obtained the largest share of the vote and 230 seats in the 608-seat Reichstag. On 30 August the oldest member had the honour of opening the session of the newly-elected parliament. […]
A response to Erin Polaczuk
We write as socialists and as women who are proud trade union members, active in building our unions and the wider movement. Recent comments by Erin Polaczuk, national secretary of the the Public Services Association, in the Listener distort our trade union history and close off our future. Polaczuk claims the union movement is “smarter […]
Abortion should come out of the Crimes Act
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said these words in a televised leaders debate in the lead up to the elections. She is the first leader to bring up the issue of decriminalising abortion in a forum so close to an election. It came as a breath of fresh political air. Not because Ardern was taking a […]
Equal Pay: a breakthrough… and a struggle to come
In April 2017 the National government announced a massive pay rise for workers in the aged-care sector: two billion dollars over five years; 55,000 staff receiving a pay rise between 15 and 49 per cent; many will move from the minimum wage to a rate between $19 and $27 an hour. Socialists and trade unions […]
Making a song and dance for Equal Pay
Yesterday saw a lively rally on Cuba Mall in support of Equal Pay. The rally was called by the Council of Trade Unions as part of their ongoing campaign, and drew a crowd of over 100, with curious passers-by drawn in by the banners and the dancing — the organisers had choreographed a little number […]
