“Assets owned by and run for the benefit of NZ citizensre being sold to the highest bidder” – Harawira

Posted on June 20, 2012 by admin in Hone Harawira, Press Releases
Last week, government’s bill to sell off our state assets passed its second reading. Their agenda is now clear for all to see. Assets owned by and run for the benefit of NZ citizens, are being sold to the highest bidder, many of whom will be overseas companies with no interest in the Treaty of Waitangi, or the people of this country.

  • WELFARE services are being privatised and government is wiping its hands of its responsibilities to provide for its most vulnerable citizens;
  • EDUCATION is being privatised through charter schools and private schools, at the expense of public education for ordinary Kiwi kids;
  • Access to HEALTH is being denied to the poor by ever-increasing costs, while the country leads the developed world in third world diseases;
  • ACCIDENT COMPENSATION is denied through harsh and costly processes and bad management, as government prepares to privatise ACC;
  • CORRECTIONS is building a billion dollar jail, but the rights to run it have already been sold off to an overseas company;
  • State HOUSING is being sold off to the private sector while homelessness reaches record levels;
  • WATER management and water rights have already been privatised;
  • And the country is finally realising that selling off assets and services built up by generations of NZers will leave our mokopuna with a future too bleak to contemplate.

MANA opposes this bill to sell off 49% of the shares in government owned power companies because there are no provisions:

  • to guarantee NZers preferential treatment or even a dedicated percentage of the shares;
  • stopping overseas companies from bidding for a majority of the shares;
  • requiring government to protect NZ interests, to regulate the price to NZ consumers, or to guarantee supply to NZ citizens;
  • to require the new companies to honour Treaty obligations, even though the government is still the majority shareholder; and
  • to ensure Maori interests in water will be protected (government’s opposition to the NZ Maori Council’s application to have those interests considered by the Waitangi Tribunal, shows just how much contempt this government has for Maori people and how much disregard it has for it’s coalition partner the Maori Party).

I want to thank those who have taken a stand against this bill, including:

  • the 1500 people who made submissions to Select Committee, the overwhelming majority of which were opposed;
  • the tens of thousands who joined the “Aotearoa is Not for Sale” march from Te Rerenga Wairua to Parliament last month;
  • Grey Power and the Students Associations, an unlikely mix brought together by a hugely unpopular bill;
  • The NZ Maori Council and those iwi doing their best to stop government’s “sell the assets and to hell with the people” agenda; and
  • the Unions, Labour Party, Greens, NZ First and MANA who have all committed to gathering the 300,000 signatures required for a referendum on stopping asset sales;

And I urge those same groups to redouble our efforts, because once those companies have been privatised, investor demand for an profit from higher power prices, will force more of our old people to switch off their hot water to save power, lead to even greater sickness in cold and damp homes as poor families are forced to cut back on heating, light and refrigeration, and reduce this nation to a level of servitude our children do not deserve.