Sunday 9 June, “Hei Waha” Debate, Taita Community Hall, Lower Hutt.
Statement on poverty. [Read more…]
Video: MANA’s Te Hāmua Nikora at the Ikaroa-Rāwhiti candidates debate
June 12, 2013 by
Auckland: Better housing for workers needed
June 10, 2013 by
Daphne Lawless, Auckland Fightback member.
Preliminary feedback has just closed on the Auckland Council’s Draft Unitary Plan, a document which will have major impact on how working people in the Super City live, work and play.
When the single Auckland Council replaced Auckland’s four cities, three districts and regional council in 2010, the law stated that a new Unitary Plan be drawn up to replace all the local planning documents – covering issues such as transport, housing, and infrastructure.
There has been big debate in the Auckland media on the issue – mostly on the question of “intensification” of housing.
Mayor Len Brown’s Labour-backed administration is supporting a halt to Auckland’s suburban sprawl along the motorways north and south. Instead, many more people will live in apartments, terraced houses, and other small dwellings.
Right-wing politicians and “residents’ associations” from the leafy suburbs such as St Heliers and Milford are up in arms about these proposals. They’ve been yelling about the danger of “slums”, about how higher-density living is “not the Kiwi way”, and refusing to let “their suburbs” change.
To some degree, these are the same people who have always run Auckland. The conservative leaders in Auckland supported sprawl along the new motorway systems starting in the 1950s.
Existing working class and Pasifika communities in the inner suburbs of the city – Ponsonby, Newton and Freemans Bay – had their homes destroyed for the new motorways. They were encouraged into houses in suburbs far from the city, such as Mangere and Otara.
Auckland thus developed a form of socio-economic apartheid. The old central villas in which working people had lived for decades were taken over and done up by the upwordly mobile class.
Right-wing politicians want Auckland to expand “outwards, not upwards” – new suburbs on greenfield sites. These will be dependent on cars, clogging Auckland’s roads even further. They will also mean that working people will continue to be housed far away from the leafy suburbs – keeping their beloved property prices high.
The right-wing argument that sprawl makes housing affordable is only true if we all need 4-bedroom stand-alone houses on big sections. But increasing numbers of working people have small families or no children, and don’t need that kind of space.
Well-designed apartments and terraced houses in the central suburbs of Auckland could not only bring housing prices down significantly. By hooking into existing public transport – as well as the proposed City Rail Link – they could remove the need to own one or more cars, an expense which makes a big dent in workers’ budgets.
However, Len Brown’s plans are far from perfect. If workers’s needs aren’t taken seriously, these new apartments might be put out of workers’ reach and bought up by the same kind of middle-class professionals who now dominate Ponsonby and Grey Lynn.
John Minto’s campaign for Mayor of Auckland on behalf of the MANA movement should take this up. We shouldn’t listen to the voices who support “traditional” suburban sprawl, dependent on cars. But we have to demand that perhaps 30% of the new high-density housing should be made available for rent or sale to working families at affordable prices.
Fightback supports McDonalds workers
June 3, 2013 by
Ian Anderson, Fightback Wellington branch member.
Fightback actively supported unionised McDonalds workers as part of our 2013 winter conference. On the evening of Saturday the 1st of June, members and supporters distributed nearly 2000 leaflets across Wellington McDonalds sites; Newtown, the Basin Reserve, Courtenay Place, Taranaki Street, Lambton Quay, Manners Mall and Bunny Street (which recently took strike action).
Fightback’s leaflet explained “Why we support McDonalds workers – and why you should too.” The leaflet explained how both workers’ action and wider public solidarity are needed to overcome casualisation and low wages, at McDonalds and elsewhere.
Customers were generally receptive, with some at the Manners Mall store even taking and distributing bunches of leaflets themselves.
Coming weeks will see further actions, including demonstrations and strikes. Fightback will continue to support and, where possible, initiate these actions. We see this campaign as part of a broader struggle for working class solidarity and self-organisation.
See also:
Unite takes on McDonald’s in high stakes fight for low-paid workers
Unite takes on McDonald’s in high stakes fight for low-paid workers
May 31, 2013 by
Originally printed by Green Left Weekly (Australia). By Joel Cosgrove, Fightback member.
After a relatively quiet couple of years, the Unite union, which organises fast food and other previously unorganised sectors, has burst into action with a vigorous industrial campaign against McDonald’s.
The key demands are focused around winning a NZ$15 starting wage, an end to casualised hours, a fair and transparent roster system and a number of union-only benefits, most of which have already been won by KFC Unite members.
Unite gained national attention when it began its SupersizeMyPay.com campaign in 2005. The campaign focused on developing union membership in the fast food industry, as well as campaigning for a $12 minimum wage and an end to youth pay rates.
The campaign achieved collective contracts in most of the major fast food chains ・ McDonalds’, Burger King (Hungry Jacks in Australia) and Restaurant Brands (KFC, Carls Jr, Starbucks, Pizza Hutt) for the first time since the end of compulsory unionism in the 1980s.
This was not an easy or smooth process. There were lightning strikes, wildcat strikes and walkouts. There was more initial success at Restaurant Brands (especially KFC), where union density was higher and management resistance towards the union was less deep- set than at McDonald’s.
McDonald’s have an international structure centred on McDonald’s HQ at Oak Brook, Illinois and “Hamburger University” — a 12,000 square metre complex.
McDonald’s claims its “university” to be “the company’s global center of excellence for McDonald’s operations training and leadership development”, churning out 5000 graduates a year and claiming to have graduated more than 80,000 “students”.
The role of the university is to centralise the company’s indoctrination process, building a consciously crafted global corporate culture. In New Zealand, this has been reflected in a culture of bullying, intimidation and anti-unionism that is spread through local operations.
McDonald’s has never been willing to give an inch. Every win has been heavily fought for.
The current dispute revolves around an offer of a $0.25 increase in all rates over a two year period. For those on starting rates, that is actually just the government mandated rise to the minimum wage.
An even more extreme perspective is held by most franchisee owners, who have expressed a desire to not even have collective contracts.
Unite has been building members numbers for several years now. The claims being put forward are being compared to the conditions already won by KFC workers. This example has been very useful to date in putting forward their example as a way forward for McDonald’s workers to begin the struggle for improved conditions.
In light of the miserly offer from the company and hostility from franchisee owners, 85% of members voted in support of industrial action in a recent nationwide ballot.
The process of starting this campaign has unearthed a raft of complaints and issues at McDonald’s nationwide. Most prominent was the revelation that union member Sean Bailey was told by a manager that “if you act gay on my shift, I will discipline you” and “if you turn anyone else in the store gay, I will punish you and make you lose your job”.
Similar issues of bullying and harassment have come to light, including not being able to take breaks and not being paid for overtime.
At a demonstration in Auckland with about 30 members and supporters, a large contingent of police arrived and roughly pushed away protesters who had been blocking access to an inner-city McDonald’s store. Police claimed the protesters were negatively affecting custom to the store, something the union stated was its right.
In the furore over the issue, Unite members in McDonald’s and other fast food stores brought up the issue of police getting free or heavily discounted food.
Although initially denied, a police spokesperson then scoffed at the idea that police could be “brought off” with burgers. McDonald’s said individual franchisee owners made the decision to give discounts to “emergency services workers”.
This was shown to be an insultingly mockery of the truth when a union member supplied to media a photo showing a button titled “police promo” on their electronic tills.
In the aftermath of these revelations, police officers provided anonymous statements about being disgusted at other officers’ taking these perks. Fast food workers came forward with similar stories and the police and police minister had to retract their statements from two days earlier.
Union pickets in the South Island have been driven into by customers seemingly desperate for their cheeseburger fix. Overall though, members of the public have been supportive of the campaign. Therer have been very few attempts to break picket lines in Wellington recently and fewer still managing to get through.
Pickets and protests have been marked by strong support from both pedestrians and passing vehicles.
A Unite “war council” has been formed in Wellington to coordinate the protests and strikes. Auckland are holding a “McStrike Training Day” to build the skills, contacts and networking that is required to win.
Christchurch event: What is Socialism? The Mechanics of Capitalism
May 29, 2013 by
Second in a series of “What Is Socialism?” meetings, Byron Clark, co-editor of the Fightback magazine and local Fightback activist, leads a discussion on the “Mechanics of Capitalism” and explores some introductory Marxist ideas. All are welcome if you have an interest at all in this area. Kai will be shared, a gold coin donation would be appreciated to help Room Four stay open =]
Saturday, June 8, 2013: 6:00pm until 8:00pm
Room Four, 36 St Assaph St, Christchurch
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