PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
LIBERTARIANZ PARTY
Nelson wharfies show up Wilson
Margaret Wilson waded into the Nelson wharfie’s strike by saying that her job was to safe-guard everyone’s ‘rights’ on
the issue, i.e.; the locals ‘right to a job’ and ‘right to fair pay and conditions’ "What nonsense!" says Libertarianz
Spokesman Russell Watkins.
"That the Attorney-General does not understand rights is worrying," he says, "but unfortunately not surprising. The
single question added to the above ‘rights’ would make the issue of rights clear: ‘At whose expense?’"
"Carter Holt Harvey’s logs, and the profit made from those logs, belongs to them; it is their right to own them and it
is their right to employ whom they want to employ," says Watkins. "It is for them to decide what the pay and conditions
shall be. Potential employees of Carter Holt Harvey have the right to choose: it is for them to decide whether those
proffered conditions are acceptable or not, and to work on that basis. Carter Holt Harvey has no ‘right’ to force people
to work, the union has no ‘right’ to force people not to work. There is nothing for the Attorney-General to ‘balance’."
There is in fact no such a thing as ‘a right to a job’ since that right would be at the expense of one who must provide
that job. There is only the right of free trade, that is: a man’s right to take a job if another man chooses to hire
him. There are no ‘rights to a fair wage or a fair price’ if no one chooses to pay it, to hire a man or to buy his
product.
"Rights do not mean the ‘right’ to force unchosen obligations on anyone else," concludes Watkins. "The sooner the
Attorney-General understands that, the better."
ENDS
For more information contact:
Russell Watkins
LIBERTARIANZ SPOKESMAN
Phone: (07) 543 3136
Kaimai, Tauranga
Or contact the Libertarianz Media Coordinator on (025) 861 927, organon@ihug.co.nz
* LIBERTARIANZ * More Freedom * Less Government *
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