Employers and business owners, who wish to extract maximum profits by paying their lowest ranked and most precariously employed workers a pittance, are the people most likely to welcome the new right wing coalition government’s repealing of NZ’s Fair Pay Agreement. Unsurprisingly, given the long history of women being an exploited sex-class, there tends to be a disproportionally high percentage of women in such low paid positions.
Posts
NZ Labour, Te Pāti Māori, The Opportunities Party and the Women’s Rights Party all have some policies that will benefit women, especially those on low incomes. I would prefer any of them to form a government compared with National, ACT and NZ First.
But, which one could I vote for?
The NZ Green Party have some very good policies for women and low-income people, particularly ones that will help a fair number of women struggling to pay essential bills. However, they have significant silences, confusions, and/or contradictions in their policies and plans that will have a negative impact on females.
We are living through a time of turbulence, instability, and uncertainty. The decades long neoliberal dominance within Western-European patriarchal capitalism is under extreme pressure. The four biggest political parties in NZ have all been infected to a greater or lesser degree by neoliberalism, with National and the ACT parties being the most deeply contaminated.
This is the WLA submission to the NZ government, Safer Online Practices and Media Platforms Consultation. The government was asking for feedback on their proposal, which is to be made into a Bill in 2024.
They are proposing to have a government appointed regulator to set codes of practice for social media and the NZ media. But, who will be watching the watchers?
I’m excited about the women’s Super Rugby Aupiki semi-final games on Sunday (19 March 2023), in spite of the small number of teams competing in the current competition. ed the top slot in the HSBC international rankings, winning the last 4 tournaments on the circuit. The domestic Super Rugby Aupiki competition shows a vast improvement in skills and tactics from last year.
The gender and sexuality questions in the NZ 2023 census are a bit of a muddle. Some of the definitions provided by the NZ Census and Statistics NZ departments add to the confusion. This makes it difficult, if not impossible, to answer the questions truthfully. It’s causing concern for many feminists and LGB people who understand the significance of material reality, science, and biology.
This is kind of the nature-nuture thing revisited. We are born with bodies that are very similar to other human bodies. Nevertheless, females are born with different reproductive systems from those of males. Within elements we share, we each have individual differences: our unique talents and weaknesses. The basis of all these things last for life, but our unique skills and failings can be improved or weakened to some extent by our experiences, choices, and individual efforts. And these will in turn impact on society and its arrangements such as those of our health system, which is a present under immense stress.
Kate Weatherly, a New Zealand transgender athlete in women’s downhill mountain biking, has spoken out against FINA’s (Fédération Internationale De Natation) new rules for trans inclusion in women’s events.
In a sense, Weatherly is right, there are bigger issues in women’s sport than the participation of a few transgender athletes.
Contact Us
womensliberationaotearoa@gmail.com
Please email us for membership details, essays you’d like published or anything else you’d like to bring to our attention.