The Budget: a socialist response
“Budget 2018 sets out the first steps in a plan for transformation.” That’s how Grant Robertson introduced Labour’s first Budget. Hopes for transformation brought Labour, the Greens and NZ First into government last year. A glance around at the inequality, underfunding and social suffering that have become normalised after nine years of National shows how […]
Health workers make their voices heard
Thousands rallied across the country last weekend to show their support for health workers in their campaign for better pay and conditions. There were gatherings of several hundred in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and Dunedin, and rallies in cities all across the country. From Greymouth to Gisborne people came out to stand in solidarity with nurses […]
The rise of the Red Fed
The defeat of the 1890 Maritime Strike, a general strike of transport-related unions, smashed up the first wave of union militancy in these islands. Union membership was knocked back from 63 000 to just 8 000, and the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act 1894 was passed. The arbitration system ended strikes completely. It applied to […]
Health workers need more: ‘independent’ panel no way forward
During last year’s election campaign Labour seemed to be the party that offered pay equity and a boost to health spending. Nurses, health care assistants and midwives, working in unbearable conditions under National’s cutbacks, took Labour at its word. In November the ordinary member of the New Zealand Nurses Organisation voted down a collective agreement, […]
Nurses fight for their rights
Sarah Anderson works as a nurse. She submitted this to the New Zealand Herald a fortnight ago, before nurses voted down the DHBs’ latest inadequate offer. The ISO is happy to publish this guest post, and stands in full solidarity with the nurses and their demands. Negotiations between the New Zealand Nurses Organisation and District […]
Lessons from West Virginia
The Great West Virginia Wildcat is the single most important labour victory in the US since at least the early 1970s. Though the 1997 UPS strike and the 2012 Chicago teachers’ strike also captured the country’s attention, there’s something different about West Virginia. This strike was statewide, it was illegal, it went wildcat, and it seems to be spreading. West Virginia’s […]
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 […]
Employment law changes show the limits of reformism
On 25 January the Labour-led government announced in outline its proposed changes to employment law. We will have to wait for the wording of a draft Bill in February to see the details and any devils lurking there. If the reader detects a level of distrust on my part this will be in large measure […]
We Support the RMTU
The Wellington picket for the RMTU’s 24-hour strike on Thursday drew a steady stream of support. Alongside RMTU members, some of whom were at the picket from 6am to 6pm, unionists from the Tramways union, the PSA, E Tu, NZNO, PPTA, TEU and other unions turned up to tautoko the strike. “What we’re doing is […]
Wellington rail strike – end contracting out!
Privatisation, in the form of contracting out, lies behind the Wellington rail dispute between Rail and Maritime Transport Union members and their employers Transdev Wellington and its maintenance subcontractor Hyundai Rotem. Greater Wellington Regional Council contracted Transdev to operate the region’s passenger services from July 2016 for 15 years. Previously the service was run by […]
