Tuesday 5 October 2004

Stopwork Meeting Called at Burnham Camp

Members of the National Union of Public Employees (NUPE) based at Burnham Camp will be holding a stopwork meeting later this month to consider their next move in their bid to resolve a pay dispute with the New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF).

“Delegates have called a meeting for 20 October. The negotiating team is hopeful that we can resolve our differences with NZDF before that meeting,” said NUPE Organiser John Kerr.

Negotiations have been going on since the beginning of August. NUPE is claiming an 8% pay increase for its members, who comprise nearly all the civilian staff at Burnham Camp, NZDF has offered 2.5%. NUPE members held the first ever strike in the New Zealand armed forces on 30 September to send a signal to NZDF this offer was not good enough.

“Our members play a vital role in support of the army at Burnham, providing administrative, catering, payroll and storekeeping services to keep so the soldiers can concentrate on training for overseas deployments such as Afghanistan. Whilst the military have enjoyed generous pay increases in recent years, up to 23% since 2001, civilian staff are paid as little as $22500,” said John Kerr.

“Members are not asking for the same as the soldiers, they do very different jobs, but a little recognition in the form of an adequate pay increase will go a long way,” said John Kerr.

ENDS

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>