Ardern will have to back

Morally obscene and just plain bad politics. The Government’s public sector wage freeze is difficult to fathom. For the next three years, public servants earning more than $60,000 will only be offered pay increases under exceptional circumstances. Those on more than $100,000 won’t get an extra bean.

Those workers were the heroes of the Covid-19 crisis, especially those in the health service and on the border. And they are being betrayed and punished to help pay for the cost of the coronavirus pandemic.

Many of these people – doctors, nurses, border workers, teachers, social workers, DoC rangers – have had wage increases less than inflation for years, essentially successive wage cuts.

They are already paid less than their private sector counterparts.

Hospitals are at breaking point, grappling with a dangerous lack of staff and last week senior doctors warned overwork is burning them out.

Early childhood teachers suffer the indignity of pay levels 31 per cent lower than their colleagues in schools and kindergartens.

And many of those cleaning managed isolation and quarantine facilities are earning only a shade above minimum wage.

For more than a decade, public service employees have struggled as their standstill pay packets are swallowed up by rising rents, soaraway house prices, high grocery bills and ever-climbing fuel costs.

It’s a kick in the teeth, that many on the Left are not prepared to wear.

Such is the depth of the anger, that supporters and unions failed to be soothed by a radical overhaul of employment laws, announced Friday.

It comes only a few weeks after Labour climbed into bed with Amazon, in a $1b Faustian bargain