Re: [pf] Speech by NZ Green MP Nandor Tanczos in Parliament Weds.20

At 18:54 11/9/2000 -0700, I (David Mac) sent on to the Positive Futures list:
>From: Paul Bensemann <Paul.Bensemann@parliament.govt.nz>
>Subject: Australian Police Rough-Up Nandor And Sue, In Melbourne
>   Tues, 12 Sept, 2000
>
>  Greens deplore police violence in Melbourne
>
>Australian police have over-reacted against demonstrators at the World
Economic Forum in Melbourne, New Zealand Green Party Co-Leader Rod Donald
said today.
>  Green MP Nandor Tanczos said he and Sue Bradford were on the receiving
end of police violence in Melbourne this morning, as riot police trampled
over a group of 40 protesters who were sitting on the ground peacefully
outside the Melbourne casino. [both are Green Members of Parliament, in NZ.
D.]
>  Although the two were not badly hurt, other protesters have lost teeth
or received other serious injuries. ...

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· This is Nandor's speech, a few hours ago. He and Sue Bradford have been
strongly criticised by many of those who value "strong leadership" in this
country, those who reckon the "top people" should rule. The criticism:
dragging the good name of the NZ Parliament in the dirt.

· Nandor knows something about life on the street; does this shock you? :-
http://www.emucities.com.au/member/davd/images/Nandor_on_board.jpg

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Delivered-To: davd@ihug.co.nz
From: Paul Bensemann <Paul.Bensemann@parliament.govt.nz>

Speech by Green MP Nandor Tanczos in Parliament today

Today I want to talk about the underpaid and the poor, the sufferers of New
Zealand and overseas.

I want to talk about children - children who have no time for play, or for
school, who spend their young lives working in sweatshops in places like
China, Thailand and Indonesia, to make goods for the privileged of the world.

And I want to explain to the House why Sue Bradford and I took part in the
demonstrations at the World Economic Forum in Melbourne last week.

The World Economic Forum and the free trade agenda it promotes are obscene,
an affront to our humanity. It represents a not-so-new world order run by
multinational corporations, that began with the kidnapping of up to 60
million African slaves, which provided the economic base for the
colonisation of this planet, and continues in the neo colonisation of the
developing world by the heirs to that tainted wealth.

On a local level it means nearly 400 jobs lost last year in East Tamaki, Te
Rapa and Te Aroha because the Bendon clothing company shifted its
manufacturing to Asia. How many families depend on welfare cheques as a
result? 

In Bill English's region of Gore and Mataura, Goodman Fielder and Carter
Holt, which were once New Zealand companies, have closed an oatmill and
paper mill with the loss of 36 jobs and 155 jobs respectively. There are
few other prospects for laid off workers in those small towns.

But it is when we look at what the WEF means for the developing world that
sadness becomes anger.

According to the International Labour Organisation about 120 million
children aged 5 to 14 work throughout the world. Of those 73 million are
aged 10 to 14 and 61 percent of these children work in Asia. 

Most of these children don't have a choice. They are, in a very real sense,
slaves. Many are forced to work 14 to 16 hours a day, seven days a week,
with no holidays.

I want to read you the words of one of those workers. Her name is Sawai. At
age 13 she was forced to work in a clothing factory in Thailand. She says,
in an interview published in 1997, "There were six people working in the
factory and we all shared one room...with about five machines and the
lighting was very poor. I worked from eight in the morning to midnight.
This was a privilege. My cousin often stayed up sewing until two in the
morning."

Apologists for corporate globalisation say that the solution is to give her
exploiters unfettered access to global markets and its profits. I can only
shake my head in wonder.

I want to show the house a souvenir of my trip to Melbourne. A Koala bear,
made in China. You would find the same label on stuffed kiwi toys in duty
free shops here. I don't know whether this is made by child slave labour.
It is almost impossible to find out. But I do know that about five million
children work in China and that some of them work in toy factories.

But even if we knew, can we stop their import? Corporate globalisation says
that any barrier to free trade must be removed. Products of sweatshop
labour must be allowed to be sold. Products that destroy the environment
must be allowed to be sold. Products made in dangerous conditions must be
allowed to be sold. And while the children suffer Mr Creosote gets fatter.

It's not just toys and clothes. According to the Trade Aid organisation
there's an estimated 800,000 children working as bonded slave labour in the
South Asia hand-knotted carpet industry. Some are as young as five years
old.  

The Green Party advocates a vastly different system - one which is based
around environmental sustainability, respect for all people, human rights
and fairness.

We support a system of fair trade over free trade, that does not exploit
one country and its people to the benefit of another. We back the adoption
of binding international environmental codes for trans-national
corporations, the implementation of International Labour Organisation basic
standards worldwide, and strengthening of democratic economic and political
systems which are not based on the exploitation of working people, local
communities, indigenous people or the planet. The WEF is the opposite of
that. 

ENDS

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sent on to PF by David.
(David MacClement) davd@ihug.co.nz 
http://www.emucities.com.au/member/davd/index.html#top
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