Why NZ’s Living Wage Movement is bigger than you think

In Book Takes, authors share three things that readers will gain from their books as well as giving an insight into what they learnt during the researching and writing. This weekend, Lyndy McIntyre talks about her book Power to Win: The Living Wage Movement in Aotearoa New Zealand.

After 40 years in the trade union movement, and years spent working in jobs as varied as a newspaper compositor, parliamentary press secretary and an elected district councillor, Lyndy McIntyre figured she knew a fair bit about workers and wage campaigns.

So, when she was asked to document the story of the Living Wage Movement – the campaign to lift the wages of some of our workforce’s most disadvantaged people – she didn’t hesitate. But, as McIntyre explains, there was more to it than she ever imagined.

In Book Takes, she shares three things readers will gain from reading Power to Win, as well as what she’s learned through researching and writing it.

It’s not just a union campaign

Unions don’t have a monopoly in caring about poverty wages. There are many in groups across civil society who care deeply and want to take a stand to end unliveable wages in Aotearoa. These groups have united around the goal of winning the Living Wage.

It all began with one union’s mission to win back the power to achieve decent wages for its members after the passage of the Employment Contracts Act in 1991, but it snowballed into a broad community movement. In the movement, faith groups, community organisations and unions work in partnership. These groups represent thousands of New Zealanders in organisations as diverse as Catholic social justice groups, the Māori Women’s Welfare League, students’ associations and refugee advocacy organisations. The diversity of the Living Wage Movement is the strength of the movement and the secret of the success of the many campaigns.

We talk about wages differently

The Living Wage Movement has changed the way we talk about wages in Aotearoa. Twelve years ago, nobody talked about the Living Wage. Now, it is part of our lexicon. Since the movement launched in 2012, we have changed from talking about what is the lowest an employer can legally pay to what a worker and their family need to live in dignity and participate in society.