The sectors hardest hit by job cuts this year
Monday, 25 November 2024
It’s been a year of redundancies with the unemployment rate at a four-year high and expected to rise into the new year.
So what sectors have been hit the hardest and how many jobs have been lost?
Public sector
It’s no secret the public sector had been rocked by job losses this year with the new Government’s goal to cut spending across the sector.
Read this story in te reo Māori and English here. / Pānuitia tēnei i te reo Māori me te reo Pākehā ki konei.
Late last year David Seymour estimated up to 7500 jobs could be gone in the public sector, but this number had already been surpassed, with nearly 8000 people losing their jobs across a number of ministries.
The Ministry for Social Development was expected to experienced the largest number of job losses at 941, followed by the Ministry of Education at 755 and the Department of Internal Affairs at 672.
So far the the Public Service Association had won its legal fight to halt a Ministry of Education restructure arguing it breached the workers’ employment contracts.
Mills
Rising electricity costs had put pressure on mills across the country.
More than 200 workers were left without a job in the middle of the North Island as the Winstone Pulp International closed its two mills near Ohakune in September.
Oji Fibre Solutions also closed its Penrose paper recycling plant in September which put 75 people out of work.
Meanwhile on Wednesday workers at the Kinleith pulp and paper plant near Tokoroa had been called to a meeting with fears up to 230 people would lose their jobs.
Health
Health NZ had accepted more than 400 redundancies last month.
In late August, Health NZ offered the option of voluntary redundancy to some staff in health administration, advisory and knowledge roles.
It came after Health Minister Dr Shane Reti sacked the Health NZ board following reports it had been overspending by about $130 million a month.
The government appointed commissioner Lester Levy to the organisation to address the issue with him warning just days into the role that up to 3000 could be on the line.
It had also proposed further cuts to the sector across teams in hospital and speciality services.
In August, 126 roles in Health NZ - Te Whatu Ora's commissioning team were disestablished and 142 vacant roles were left unfilled, with the total number of roles disestablished sitting at 268.
Media
The most notable job losses in the media sector this year was the complete closure of Newshub before it was picked up by Stuff and transformed into ThreeNews.
In April Warner Bros Discovery NZ announced it would close all its Newshub operations, including the 6pm bulletin, website, and the AM Show, which resulted in up to 350 people losing their jobs.
State-owned broadcaster TVNZ was still in the throes of a restructure with a proposal to disestablish 90 roles and create 41 new roles which would result in 50 job losses across the company as part of a restructure to save $30 million.
It also intended to disestablish the jobs of several news bosses and potentially demote its head of news.
Earlier in the year it axed current affairs programme Sunday, consumer programme Fair Go, and stopped its midday and late-night news bulletins.
NZME announced last week it was proposing to close 14 long-standing community papers in the North Island, which would result in the loss of about 30 roles, while on Tuesday current affairs magazine North & South announced it would temporarily cease publication as it aimed to build and online presence.