My weekly rant is a new approach to effectively saying what I think. It
differs to my other posts since I will not resign myself to a single topic (although I might at times) and
its related components, but will consistently flitter from one topic to another
unapologetically. I make no claims to assertions of truth and my arguments will
likely be largely un-thought out and therefore flawed in many respects. This is opinion folks.
Let’s go back to the 1980's. The absolute failing of New Zealand
politics since the massive reforms that were started by Labour, care of Roger
Douglas in the 80's and refined by National in the 90's still wreak havoc for
the poor and middle income earners of New Zealand.
What did Douglas do? Rogernomics. He took away what he called
'privileges' from everyone and decided that 'user pays'. Why? Because he was a
monetarist neoliberal.
Neoliberalism promotes profit over people. It takes power away from the state
and puts it in the hands of corporations. It focuses on an unregulated freedom.
Two words that imply the same thing right? No, not necessarily. As rational
beings we can all understand that there is no 'absolute freedom', if there
were, we would not have physical, mental or environmental constraints. Unregulated
freedom is simply giving an unjustified freedom to corporations at the expense
of the worker. It requires unemployment or joblessness in order for any
corporation to be profitable, because the labour force itself must remain
competitive. The ethos of corporations is
to drive down the wages of the worker down and ensure that top salaries are
increased. The effect of a competitive labour force when there is high
unemployment is that low skilled or unskilled workers have no chance. What is
their option? The benefit (I will return to this point). This is the kind of policy that Roger Douglas
imported into New Zealand political framework at the behest of Treasury. I don’t
care what politicians say about their disdain for Roger Douglas, they are liars
and they still follow the same ideology he introduced.
The Labour Party continues to
fail the left because they are still tied up in this right wing ideology. To be
honest, I don’t know what any of the Labour Party stand for anymore, and I am
increasingly suspicious of any policy promoted by any party whose main focus is
on capital gain.
If that makes me a loony leftist then so be it. But please, don’t put
the Labour Party in the loony leftist bin with those of us who actually care
about the people, the environment, and the real economy, because they are
clearly guided by right winged conservative policy.
However, don’t attack me with your ill-gotten quips about how the left don’t
care or know nothing about the economy. A healthy productive economy has
healthy productive people and a healthy productive environment within which to
operate. Putting money at the centre of economic policy will lead to an
unproductive economy, where’s my proof? Look around you. The world is at war
over oil reserves: the environment and the people are taking a massive hit from
the greed of corporations for mo’ money. So what’s New Zealand’s answer? Well hey,
let’s explore our seabed’s for oil reserves and sell them off to foreign
interests – we’ll ensure that the risk to the environment is minimised! Well,
you f*krs, you should be guaranteeing that there is no risk to the
environment, what’s a little bit of spilt oil? It’s too much oil spilt.
So if you right wingers want to
blindly follow the lion to the den and go on pretending that the loony left has
no substance then get a better argument. Or work story. Or a perm.
I’m going to go back to the point about unemployment. Once our unemployment rate is untenable, this
gives the government the excuse to lower the minimum wage. Why? Because they
can justify paying less by arguing that New Zealand will see higher investment
rates from international or foreign interests. Cheaper labour rates amount to
increased investments. Who makes money? The companies. Who loses money? The worker.
So when either the National Party or the Labour Party tells you they want to
ensure that everyone can get a job - they are lying. They can never guarantee
it because of the neoliberal paradigm within which NZ operates. The government
will never openly admit that unemployment is good for the (monetarist) 'economy', well
because that would be political suicide. But it’s true.
The problem is that the governments know with higher unemployment, they
will spend more in benefits, so what do they do? They make living
conditions in New Zealand unbearable. The effect of this is that the low or
unskilled workers migrate to Australia for better opportunities, reducing the
welfare bill. They migrate because they are competing for jobs with skilled
workers and constantly met with rejection from employers and unsustainable living conditions. The traditional low
and middle income earners take massive pay cuts so that those on the top
salaries get an increase and the companies’ profit. Alternatively, if they are unemployed and on a benefit they are forced off the
benefit into roles that they are overqualified for or where their skills can be
transferred and that will provide a barely livable wage. This situation is win-win for a govenrment under neoliberalism. It does not have to be this way. And, yes,
it will take a huge paradigm shift to fix, but would some political party just
grow some balls and get on with it!
