Barry Soper: ZB senior political correspondent on the workers protesting Government policies

Unions have come out in force against Government workplace policies, with protests happening today across the entire country. 

The nation-wide event - Fight Back Together - was designed to respond to the scrapping of fair pay agreements, the return of 90-day trials and similar contentious policies.

ZB senior political correspondent Barry Soper says it's hypocritical for the opposition to accuse the Government of being anti-worker - following some policy decisions during Covid-19.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Bary so pre Senior political Correspondence with.

Speaker 2 (00:02):
US Barry, Hello, good afternoon.

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Has So those raids on the Mangra that happened yesterday
that come up in parliament today.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
Yeah, they were fantastic, weren't they. It just goes to
show that the police really are taking the gangs very seriously.
We had the common cero's all, most of them in
christ Church being arrested. Now we've got the monies, particularly
a polter key. They looked at it and they raided there.
And I mean there's almost a bloody wall zone out

(00:26):
there if you look at what they pack up in
these raids. Rifles, pistols, cannabis, methamphetamine, cocaine, eight hundred thousand
dollars worth of property. I mean it's quite incredible. Well,
in Parliament this afternoon, the Maldi party leader I Well
rewaited tea. He wanted to know why Maldi weren't given

(00:47):
advance notice of the raids. I would have thought that
would have been obvious, because he says women and children
have been left traumatized by them. Policemanister Mark Mitchell, though,
was making no apollo us for them.

Speaker 3 (01:00):
I've been to a potoque several times, and I've met
with local e We and Habou, the mayor, and counselors
and senior gang leadership. All of them expressed to me
a strong desire for the town to take a different
path than the one that it was on. And I
hope that yesterday will be the circuit breaker, a podoke needed.

Speaker 4 (01:17):
If this government's objective is to crack down on gangs,
why then with Taminiqui comar to it, mother's best feeding
baby subjected to the police rage yesterday and no Portuguese
and now are fearful that police actions are targeted, calculated
and planned to create an unsafe environment.

Speaker 3 (01:35):
Well, we don't want tom Riki being in a gang environment.
It's not the police officers that choose to keep weapons
and drugs in the houses. There's those gang members that
choose to do that.

Speaker 2 (01:46):
I'd say, here here to that guy has deluded. Well,
I'm so sorry. If family members have to be around
when this sort of thing's happened.

Speaker 1 (01:54):
I mean I think they're around. Like, let's be honest
about it. If you're living in a house with a
mongrel mob gang member.

Speaker 2 (02:01):
And there's rifles and money.

Speaker 1 (02:03):
I think the police rate is the least of your problems.

Speaker 2 (02:06):
Absolutely, and if you were thinking about your kids, you
wouldn't be in that.

Speaker 1 (02:10):
No, and it is hardly the most violent thing that
you'll be subjected to it on a weekly basis. Okay, weird,
So whatever he's courting a weird vote here, isn't he?

Speaker 2 (02:19):
Well yeah, I'm not quite sure what he is courting
because courting the gang vote. Well, you but gang members
are what about eight thousand gang members in the country.
That's not going to put you back into parliament, is it.

Speaker 1 (02:30):
No, it's not big, But then again, the numbers and
the Marii electric is probably not that big.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
I would imagine there wouldn't be a lot of sympathy
out there broadly in the Maldi community for these gangs.

Speaker 1 (02:39):
Listen, what was there some protest about the anti worker
government about today?

Speaker 2 (02:44):
Well, if you listen to the CTU from farg Array
down to Win for Cargo, around ten thousand people turned
out across the country basically saying that the government is
launching ongoing attacks against workers. There were a thousand people
gathered here in Auckland and the Ata Square this afternoon.

(03:06):
Labour's Camilla Balich she made something of a misfire in
Parliament this afternoon when she asked the Minister of Workplace
Relations Brook van Balden whether she agreed with the protest
that that was the worst government in decades. Not surprisingly,
she didn't. Balich clearly got more than she bargained for, though, the.

Speaker 5 (03:26):
Most anti worker government we've seen in decades is the
previous government. It was the previous government that ordered vaccine
mandates for workers. Never before have we seen the rights
of workers across this country be eroded so swiftly. Not
only did this a roague workers freedom of choice and
bodily autonomy, so many people were forced out of their

(03:48):
jobs because the government refused to look at other options
like rat tests. Rather than listen to those affected workers,
the previous government pushed them to the margins of society.

Speaker 1 (04:00):
Not aboad argument. Remember when old Justinda and should be
loved to punch them down to the KFC worker as.

Speaker 2 (04:05):
Well, that's right, we tend to forget those loved worker.
It reminded me when Brook vun Dalden stood up to
reply to that question, I thought, yeah, that's right.

Speaker 1 (04:14):
Very very quickly, one fewer electric seats there will be
because of has this got to do with the fact
that the North Island has to have a certain number
compared to the South Island.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
Well, it's the census. It's basically numbers, that's where people
are living. So the sensors have shown that clearly the
North Island is overpopulated with seats, So there'll be one
fewer seat this coming election. Where it's going to be.
I tried to find out, of course, through the bureaucracy,
but I've got so many press secretaries in it it's

(04:44):
very hard to keep pin one down to find out
what's going on. But there will still be one hundred
and twenty seats.

Speaker 1 (04:49):
Because it be replaced by list MP Barry, Thanks very much,
very so, Senior Political correspondent.

Speaker 4 (04:54):
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