The Minimum Wage
Monday, March 31st, 2008 Posted in Employment, Labour's Achievements, National Party | No Comments »Just in case you needed more convincing of how much better New Zealand workers are under a Labour-led government, the folks over at The Standard put together this graph to show growth in the Minimum Wage during the past two decades (give ...
April 1st no joke for Kiwi families
Monday, March 31st, 2008 Posted in Helen Clark, John Key, Labour's Achievements | No Comments »It's the first of April, a day normally associated with practical jokes and pranks. However the great news for Kiwi families coming from the government today is no joke.It's no joke that around 2,400 families will be better off, as ...
Got a burining question??
Thursday, March 27th, 2008 Posted in Election 08 | No Comments »The Standard has decided to ask each of the political party leaders a series of questions and publish their responses online. They'll decide the questions based on reader's suggestions. This is an interesting idea and I hope they're successful. So ...
Economic Growth - NZ vs Australia
Thursday, March 27th, 2008 Posted in Economy, Labour's Achievements | No Comments »The folks over at Kiwiblogblog have done an excellent post on New Zealand's economic growth since 1990. It notes that the New Zealand economy grew 3.1 percent in 2007, compared with 1.6 percent in 2006, meaning the economy was actually stronger ...
Speech to the Heretaunga Rotary
Thursday, March 27th, 2008 Posted in Featured | No Comments »Last night I spoke at the Heretaunga Rotary Club. I've posted a copy of my speech notes on my website: http://chrishipkins.org.nz/?p=33 although like most speeches, the delivery didn't follow the notes word for word. I talked about the baby boomer retirement, ...
Gains for workers continue
Monday, March 24th, 2008 Posted in Employment, Labour Policy, Labour's Achievements | 2 Comments »News that the Labour-led government is legislating to ensure that those working eight hours have a guaranteed meal break and two shorter paid rest breaks once again demonstrates how much better off Kiwi workers are under a Labour government. Trevor Mallard ...
Buying back the trains
Saturday, March 22nd, 2008 Posted in Public Transport, State Assets | No Comments »I was heartened to see that Finance Minister Michael Cullen is in negotiations with Toll to buy back the rest of the rail operations. Rail seems to come up regularly when I'm out and about in the electorate talking to people, ...
“Slippery John” changes position on tax cuts
Saturday, March 22nd, 2008 Posted in John Key, National Party, Tax | 1 Comment »The Sunday Star Times has an interesting story today on tax cuts that illustrates once again how John Key's strategy of making it up as he goes along is starting to fail badly. There is a trend here. First, Key makes ...
Key’s speech on the public sector
Thursday, March 20th, 2008 Posted in John Key, National Party, Public Service | No Comments »Last week John Key made a speech promising to put a halt to public sector growth should National form the next government. As Helen Clark has pointed out, Key conveniently overlooks the fact that the vast majority of the additional ...
Welcome to Candidate’s Blog
Thursday, March 20th, 2008 Posted in Election 08, Featured | No Comments »Welcome to my new Blog. Over the coming months I hope to use this forum to keep you informed about my work as Labour's candidate here in Rimutaka and to promote debate on the important issues we should all be ...