Letter No.2
10 October, 1994

26 September 1994

Growth in assets and membership of Credit Unions announced at Invercargill annual conference.

Council of Trade Unions makes submissions to the Employment Taskforce.

ILO team leaves NZ after investigating NZ labour law and meeting with govt, union and employer groups.

27 September 1994

Salvation Army's Christchurch foodbank organiser invites Jim Bolger to spend a day in the city foodbank to see that there were indeed people going hungry in New Zealand.

28 September 1994

Jim Bolger and Irish PM Reynolds discuss setting up a reciprocal working holiday scheme for young people under age of 27.

29 September 1994

Jim Bolger asks Social Welfare to look into the reasons why people on benefits still needed to turn to foodbanks for help.

Income Support Service in Christchurch announces policy to regard Green Dollar credits within the Plains Exchange and Barter System (NZ's largest) as income and will deduct benefits accordingly.

Labour's new economic policies propose to give low-income families an extra $25 a week in Family Support.

30 September 1994

Govt signals plans to cut tertiary subsidies further and make students pay a greater chunk of their tuition costs.

Commissioner for Children Laurie O'Reilly warns that NZ was heading for a socially toxic environment.

Refit of cheese processing plant at Eltham could mean the loss of 70 jobs.

3 October 1994

Latest issue of Employment Matters is released, with a new-look layout, and a special feature on the Community Employment Group's SportsWorks programme.

Outcry over Ukranian fishermen, on boats chartered by the NZ company Independent Fisheries in Christchurch, being paid only $4.50 a day.

Christchurch City Council's Jobskills scheme has put 500 young workers into jobs in four months.

Statistical Assoc. says that important decisions affecting NZ economic and social policies were being made with inadequate data.

4 October 1994

The number of economic enterprises in NZ grows by 6.3% in year to Feb 94, highlighting a rise in small businesses.

International Monetary Fund and the World Bank begin their 50th anniversary joint conference in Madrid. Protests in Wellington and Christchurch by the 50 Years is Enough Campaign opposed to their policies.

Social Welfare will spend $225,000 to find out if beneficiaries get enough money to live on and pay the rent. Survey not expected to be completed til late 1995.

Alliance's Dave McPherson calls for benefits to be restored to their pre-1991 level as a stop-gap measure. Expected cost: $200m.

Manufacturers Association warns of a shortage of skilled labour.

5 October 1994

Economic Growth of 6.1% in the year to June has put NZ at the head of OECD nations.

Got a Job - an Inside NZ documentary on TV3 follows a group of Limited Service Volunteers, a year after they left their course. Results : 80% have jobs following their six-week stint in the army.

Mortgage Corporation which bought 20,000 Housing Corp mortgages of low-income people in 1992, plans to increase its interest rates to as high as 25% more than charged by banks.

Minister of Employment Wyatt Creech hits out at criticisms that funding social services is decided on by economic considerations rather than welfare objectives.

Student in Auckland diagnosed as suffering from scurvy. Principal Ian Mitchell suggests many NZers were malnourished or had poor diets.

Waiariki Polytech to lay off 45 staff.

Call by Federated Farmers to cut further tariff levels after 1996.

Unprecedented rich-poor row in Madrid as world's poorest Third World and former Soviet Union countries denied adequate funding for development proposals.

7 October 1994

Housing Corp to lay off 100 staff as it closes three regional offices and centralising Mortgage operations to one office in Manukau.

8 October 1994

Campaign to be launched by Income Support to explain the earning rules for beneficiaries undertaking seasonal or part-time work.