People Power at Awaroa
Most people will feel a warm glow of pleasure that a campaign to save a beautiful beach for public use and access has been successful. That sense that “people power” has prevailed will be felt well beyond the 39,000 who pledged their contributions.
The great majority of those contributors will probably, along with the rest of the population, never get to walk or swim or sail at Awaroa beach. What is inspiring, however, about what has been achieved is that, for once, personal aggrandisement has taken a back seat. The pleasure that people feel is because the community has spoken and a public good has been secured.
We are, sadly, all too well used to seeing private property rights taking precedence over community interests. The organisers of the campaign deserve great credit, not only for their organisational and campaigning abilities, but for their understanding that this was an issue that wasn’t to be decided by a handful of wealthy landowners but was one where ordinary people felt that they could make a difference and could preserve something of the New Zealand we all love.
It is for these reasons that the offer of financial support from Gareth Morgan aroused such controversy. At first sight, his offer was a generous one and seemed designed to guarantee that the target of $2 million dollars would be met. But, whether he understood the implications or otherwise, he could not resist attaching to his offer a requirement that he should derive a personal and exclusive benefit in terms of the use of the property.
There can be no clearer demonstration of the prevailing mentality of those with substantial financial resources – that, in the midst of a crowd-funded community enterprise, the ability and willingness to contribute more than anybody else should not be treated simply as a generous gesture, but should legitimately be accompanied by a requirement that a preferential and exclusive advantage for the donor should be gained.
There was the authentic voice of those who had come to believe that money, in the form of personal wealth, would always trump all other considerations.
We understand from Gareth Morgan, after the event, that his intention had been all along to arouse such indignation at this requirement as to encourage more people to donate and therefore to frustrate the personal and exclusive benefit that he appeared to seek.
Whatever the truth of that, there can be no starker example of how the public good and the private interest can collide.
The episode will no doubt pass quickly from the public memory. That would be a pity. That generous impulse, focused on delivering a public good rather than a private property right, is very much worth holding on to.
It is surely a salutary and encouraging lesson to learn – that the community interest can be brought to bear and can prevail over the conviction that money will buy you anything. That lesson can be applied well beyond the sands of Awaroa. Our society will be stronger and healthier, as well as more agreeable for everyone to live in, if we see more of that community spirit expressed and applied in other parts of our national life as well.
Bryan Gould
24 February 2016
Equal Pay for Work of Equal Value
Many of us have become enured to reports from around the world of terrible crimes against women – not just acts of violence against individuals but damaging and degrading actions against women in general which seem to be expressions of belief systems, cultural or religious, that thankfully have no place in our society.
New Zealand has long enjoyed a reputation, since we pioneered full voting rights for women, as a country where women have equal rights and are full members of society. But if we want to retain that reputation, we need to be vigilant. And, while we are mercifully spared the worst excesses of discrimination and ill-treatment found elsewhere, our current performance suggests that there are good reasons for that vigilance.
We should acknowledge, for example, our distressing record on domestic violence. And we should understand, too, that for every instance of physical or sexual abuse that is reported, there will be others that are not reported – cases of women damaged, often psychologically, trapped in abusive relationships, too frightened and beaten down to do anything about it.
We remain, in other words, a society that fails in important respects to treat women properly. Discrimination against women, here as elsewhere, remains the most pervasive and significant manifestation of unfair treatment to be found worldwide.
One aspect of that unfair treatment is increasingly identified, but not acted upon. Our failure to pay women at the same rate as we pay men may not seem comparable to the serious abuses women suffer in other respects, but it is nevertheless an expression of a deeply entrenched attitude in our society.
The struggle for equal pay will be seen one day in retrospect as equivalent to the battle for women’s suffrage. In the meantime, however, it remains evidence of a refusal to acknowledge that women have the same rights as men, or that a contribution made by a woman is worth as much as the same contribution made by a man.
Women’s pay in New Zealand is still on average substantially below that of men; and, as a recent survey has revealed, that is as true in the public sector as it is in the economy as a whole, with the worst public sector offenders in the State Services Commission and the Crown Law Office maintaining a gap as high as 39%.
A landmark victory was, however, recently achieved in the Court of Appeal. A care worker, Kristine Bartlett, sued her employers, Terranova, for their failure to pay her at the rate that a man would receive for work requiring a similar level of skill and commitment.
The employers offered a familiar defence. The low rate paid to Kristine was not, they said, because she was a woman but was because the job itself commanded only a low rate of pay. The fact that most of those paid at that low rate were women was purely coincidental; it was not their fault that women happened to choose low-paid jobs.
The Employment Court would have none of that argument, and the Court of Appeal agreed. They were clear that the job of a carer required a level of skill and commitment, and provided an economic and social value, that were comparable to other jobs that were mainly performed by men. They found that Kristine’s pay, and that of her co-workers, male or female, was low because the work was mainly done by women, and not because it was of intrinsically lower value than jobs done mainly by men.
The principle of fair remuneration and equal pay as defined in the Equal Pay Act 1972 required, they said, that there should be the same pay for jobs of the same value. Kristine’s pay was lower than it should be, in other words, because her job was wrongly undervalued on the basis that it was mainly done by women.
The decision was of course welcomed by care workers and their union, but was condemned by employers and business more generally on the familiar ground that an increase in pay as required by the Court of Appeal’s interpretation of the meaning of equal pay could not be afforded. A similar objection was made to the abolition of slavery.
The really interesting response, however, came from the government. It has, of course, a vested interest, since the wages paid by rest home operators are funded by government grant. The government’s constant drive to cut public spending means that the grant is kept as low as possible. A move to equal pay as defined by the Court of Appeal would not be welcome.
So, the government decided that it would not allow the Court of Appeal decision to stand. A working party was set up to consider how policy on equal pay should be framed – and presumably how the Court of Appeal decision could be watered down. It will report next month.
The working party comprises four government appointees, four business representatives, and six trade union representatives, thereby providing an inbuilt 8-6 majority for limiting the effect of the Court of Appeal decision. There are no prizes for guessing what the outcome will be. We are still a long way, in other words, from achieving anything that can really be called equal pay.
Bryan Gould
17 February 2016
Which Immigrants to Get Tough On?
When Britain joined what was then the Common Market in 1972, a century-old trading pattern that had served British interests very well came to an end. Britain had enjoyed an unrivalled range of trading relationships which provided not only the cheapest and most efficiently produced food and raw materials from around the globe, but also preferential markets for British manufactured goods overseas.
That allowed a cheap food policy at home (using subsidies to farmers to bridge the gap between the costs of domestic and foreign production), and cheap food in turn meant that manufacturing costs could be kept down, thereby creating a significant competitive advantage over manufacturing competitors.
Common Market membership brought an end to these advantages. It meant, through the Common Agricultural Policy, to whose costs Britain was a major contributor, a substantial increase in food prices and therefore in costs, making British manufactured goods more expensive. It also meant an end to preferential markets for those goods overseas, and meant instead direct competition in a single marketplace from more efficient manufacturing rivals.
A country like New Zealand, which had had a symbiotic relationship with the British economy, found that food and raw materials produced over a century for the British market were denied free access, with the corollary that British manufactured goods were seen less and less in New Zealand. The countries with which Britain substantially severed links in favour of new arrangements in the Common Market are today, of course, some of the fastest growing and developing economies in the world.
But the change was not just in trade. Commonwealth citizens found themselves obliged to queue at length at immigration controls when visiting friends and family or holidaying in Britain, while those arriving from Europe walked straight through. The sacrifices jointly made in wartime seemed to count for little.
The personal and family links between Britain and Commonwealth countries nevertheless proved to be remarkably resilient. Despite the dismissal of the Commonwealth by British policymakers as being of little importance, and the obstacles placed in the way of Commonwealth visitors, the family links and social relationships between the citizens of the UK and of countries like New Zealand remained strong, and are constantly refreshed.
While Britain is, for New Zealand, less and less important as a trading partner or even as a foreign policy or military ally, the flow of people – family members, students, holidaymakers – between the two countries is as strong as ever. This is particularly significant for young New Zealanders. The “big OE” (or overseas experience) is virtually a rite of passage for young Kiwis. Although the rules about working in the UK have been tightened up considerably over the years, young graduates in particular will, almost as a matter of course, set off for the UK to “see the world” when they have completed their studies.
Some will treat their sojourn as a working holiday, financing it with short-term and usually low-paid jobs. Others – perhaps professionally qualified – will take on more permanent and skilled employment. In either case, what then often happens is that – young people being young people – friendships and relationships, often romantic relationships, are formed. Those that develop into something more permanent will require a decision to be made sooner or later as to where that development will progress. The outcome is usually that either young Kiwis will find themselves seeking permanent residence in the UK with their new partner and family while others will return to New Zealand with a British partner.
In either case, the family links between Britain and New Zealand are not only strengthened but actually extended. This is today the most significant aspect of the relationship between the two countries. How sad, therefore, that the UK’s European obligations (whatever their other merits) should once again intrude so as to blight what remains of that relationship.
A British public, apparently alarmed at the influx of migrants from Europe, demands from its political leaders that action should be taken. A British Prime Minister, anxious to placate his critics but hogtied by his commitments to his European partners, casts around for some step that will show that he is tough on immigration.
He has, it seems, found a suitably soft target. There is nothing much he can do about migrants from the EU but those young Kiwis (and other non-EU migrants) who insist on coming to the UK can be deterred by making life tougher for them. From April, the rules will be tightened yet further. Those seeking an employment visa will not only have to pay for the visa but an immigration health surcharge as well. If they earn less than £35,000, their right to stay will be shortened. If they earn more than that, those employing them must pay an annual levy of £1000 for each such employee.
The numbers of New Zealanders seeking long-term employment in the UK have already dropped from 18,000 in 2000 to 8500 in 2014. We can expect further falls as a result of these measures and a further weakening of the links between the two countries. But David Cameron is unconcerned. He knows whose interests are expendable.
Bryan Gould
16 February 2016.
Proud to be a Socialist?
An amazing thing is happening in the primary elections for the American presidency – and it’s not Donald Trump. Mr Trump, in any case, “doesn’t like losers” and, having lost in Iowa, should presumably now be “re-considering his position”.
The amazing thing is happening on the other side of the political divide. The Iowa primary ended in a virtual dead-heat between Hillary Clinton, the Democratic front-runner and assumed shoo-in, and 74 year-old Bernie Sanders, the Senator from Vermont, who started the race as a virtual no-hoper.
Hillary Clinton, by far the best-known of the Democratic candidates, carries some baggage as a consequence, and there will be those who claim to have foreseen that her less than spotless record would eventually catch up her. But the real surprise is not her relatively poor showing, but the rise to prominence of the elderly and hitherto little-known Bernie Sanders.
It has been widely assumed that Senator Sanders is to all intents and purposes unelectable. His age and relative obscurity would in any case count against him, but the real disqualification, it is believed, is that he is a self-declared socialist.
It is hard to think of a label that would more surely destroy a candidate’s chances in an American primary election. This is a country in whose politics even the term “liberal” is a dirty word and is used as an attack weapon in much of the political discourse.
A “socialist” is even further beyond the pale. The political right in the US has invested huge effort and resources in convincing American voters that socialism is akin to – even identical with – communism, and is fundamentally un-American.
No candidate in his or her right (or even left) mind would willingly allow even a whiff of such a label to taint their campaign. So how does a candidate who not only embraces it and uses it proudly as a banner manage to do so well with the voters – in Iowa and possibly elsewhere as well?
He is, after all, flying in the face of conventional wisdom, not only in the US but in much of the English-speaking world. Left-of-centre politicians in New Zealand, the UK, Australia and Canada, long ago conceded that to be labelled as a socialist is the kiss of death.
That concession is, of course, all of a piece with the loss of intellectual self-confidence that has afflicted the left in the English-speaking democracies. Not content with failing to challenge the right on their analysis of what constitutes a successful economic policy, or of how a strong and healthy society can tolerate growing inequality, or of what is the proper role of government, left politicians have conceded the language of politics as well.
The banner that was once flown proudly by those who proclaimed the virtues of greater equality, of a fair deal for all, of an inclusive economy that allows everyone to contribute and to derive the benefit from being members of society has now been fearfully disowned.
So, what explains the surprising courage that Bernie Sanders has shown, and the success that, so far at least, he has enjoyed? Even if his campaign were to stall from this point on, and he were to return to decent obscurity, how are we to account for the fact that his willingness to describe himself as a socialist did not immediately knock him out of the race?
The answer lies in listening carefully to what he says. He hasn’t used his socialism as either a sword or a shield. He has instead carefully explained what he means by it. He has assumed, rightly it seems, that people are willing to look behind the label – a label whose meaning has consistently been misrepresented to them – and to understand what it really means.
When Bernie Sanders says he wants “an economy that serves the interests of working people and not the billionaire class”, when he laments the plight of graduates who end up with low-paid jobs and deep in debt, when he commits to equal pay for women, he recognises that the natural tendency of a “free-market” economy is to concentrate wealth and power in fewer and fewer hands, leaving the majority to fight amongst themselves for what is left.
His message – that unless democratic government intervenes to regulate the “free” market and its outcomes, the rich will get richer and the poor poorer – is, it seems, well understood by a large swathe of more thoughtful voters. In describing himself as a socialist – someone who sees that we are all in this together and that there is such a thing as society – he also creates the advantage for himself of pointing up how much he differs from Donald Trump.
Trump is of course the archetypal “free” marketer. He is a cartoon version, a parody, of what the “free “market means. He is a self-obsessed “winner”, he hates “losers”, and he is used to grabbing what he can and devil take the hindmost.
Bernie Sanders shows that people will respond to his very different message, but only if they hear it – and that requires someone with the courage to deliver it to them. Some of that courage would not come amiss in other western democracies.
Bryan Gould
3 February 2016
Investing in Our Future
I was one of the lucky ones. In my day, universities, like primary and secondary schools, charged no fees. With the aid of a scholarship, working in dairy factories during the holidays, and my parents chipping in, I completed my education debt-free.
But, the sceptics will argue, things have changed since then. The numbers going on to university in those days were so small that the cost could easily be borne by the taxpayer. The cost has risen so far today, it is said, that it would be unfair and impracticable to saddle the taxpayer with it.
Paradoxically, however, the case for a free tertiary education has over recent decades actually got stronger, rather than weaker. Whereas in the old days, tertiary education could be easily distinguished from the primary and secondary schools in the compulsory sector by the fact that only a small and privileged minority stayed on the education conveyor belt and went on to university, that distinction is now much harder to maintain.
The fact is that virtually all Kiwis will, at some point in their lives, have some experience of tertiary education. The conveyor belt will still operate for school leavers but it will take them not only to university but to polytechnics, wananga, private academies, apprenticeships and other forms of vocational training.
For those Kiwis who may not go straight on to post-secondary school education, tertiary education will become an option at different and later stages of their lives; nor will their progression through the education world follow a standard pattern. Someone with a Ph.D. may return to education later in life to do a certificate or diploma course in something quite different.
Tertiary education, in other words, is no longer so different from the compulsory sector. It is to all intents and purposes now universal and comprehensive. It is no longer the preserve of the privileged. The case for sparing the taxpayer the cost of tertiary education by applying a “user pays” principle looks pretty shaky when the user and the taxpayer are the same people.
The widely accepted argument that primary and secondary education bring such benefits to the whole of society that they should be publicly funded must, in other words, now be extended to tertiary education as well. Our hesitation about doing so is the product of less than clear thinking.
When I returned to New Zealand in 1994, a body called the Todd Working Party had been set up to decide how the cost of tertiary education should be divided between the public and private purse. The Working Party members spent many no doubt innocently enjoyable hours debating what proportion of the benefits of tertiary education could be attributed to the public good and how much to personal gain.
Some said the proportions were about 50-50. Others favoured one side of the equation rather than another. All persisted in the nonsense that it was a zero-sum game which implied the ridiculous proposition that, the higher the perceived personal benefit, the lower must be the public good.
The truth is that the undeniable public gain from investing in tertiary education can only be achieved through raising the educational levels of individuals, just as it is with compulsory education – the two are necessarily complementary rather than competing. A higher general level of education means better educated individuals but also a better-functioning and more successful society – one able to take a wider and longer-term view and achieve a deeper understanding.
As most people instinctively realise, the great economic and social benefits of education can be achieved only if we are prepared to invest in our future. When that investment is made, the benefits are felt by everyone in society. For an investment that is so important, and whose benefits are so widely shared, what could be more sensible than to fund it through the public purse?
The debate about whether tertiary education should be free (that is, taxpayer-funded) or not resolves itself into two main issues. First, is the ramshackle and problematic student loan scheme the best, fairest and administratively most straightforward way of funding tertiary education? The scheme is administratively complex and requires a substantial bureaucracy to allocate and track over decades the loans undertaken by tens of thousands of students.
It also has a deterrent effect on potential students; and since the debts incurred by virtue of the scheme continue to weigh heavily on individual budgets and to deter expensively educated young Kiwis in particular from returning to New Zealand, so that we are denied the benefits of the education we have funded, the answer to that question would seem to be conclusively in the negative.
The second question is not, as so often suggested, can we afford it, but what priority should we give it? The cost to taxpayers might require us to forego other purposes of public spending (though it would be more than offset by savings to thousands of students and their families). The real question is, can we afford not to ensure that our future generations are educated to the level that enables us – as a society – to compete in an increasingly global environment?
Bryan Gould
2 February 2016