Workers Online
Workers Online
Workers Online
  Issue No 100 Official Organ of LaborNet 29 June 2001  

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News

The Crucifixion and Resurrection of Virtual Democracy

By Mark McGrath

The tense stand-off to enter Parliament was also played out in cyberspace, after an email campaign jammed the Macquarie Street server.

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While the major daily newspapers last week carried screaming headlines about NSW Premier Carr's claims that unions blockaded democracy, behind the scenes Carr's bureaucracy quietly crucified virtual democracy by blockading the union movement from electronic access to Parliament before some of the more principled and sensible officers of the NSW Parliament resurrected virtual access to our MP's.

The Virtual Crucifixion

This tale begun last Thursday when Workers Online released a special bulletin requesting its subscribers to support the union's workers compensation campaign by submitting a protest form on the workers comp campaign site on LaborNET [http://labor.net.au/compo/] that generated email to all NSW Upper House MP's.

The response was overwhelming, in just a couple of hours over 300 submissions were made through this protest form generating over 13,000 emails to Upper House MP's. The NSW Government's mail server started to groan under the load causing email gridlock amongst the bureaucracy. Apparently, this upset some of the political powers that be in Governor Macquarie Tower and later that day all email addressed to NSW parliamentarians being sent through Social Change Online's mail server (SCO is the technology provider for the NSW Labor Council's LaborNET & Workers Online sites) was blocked.

The irony was laughable, Bob Carr spent most of the week demonising unions proclaiming their parliamentary picket as an assault upon democracy, yet here was his bureaucracy deciding to close down electronic access to Upper House MP's that were soon due to vote on the workers compensation bill.

You Don't Need the Wisdom of Solomon to Work Out that Citizen Email aint Spam!

Email is increasingly becoming a ubiquitous and legitimate form of communication that people are using on a routine basis. So to block members of the public from email access to NSW Parliamentarians is equivalent to blocking telephone, fax or postal access to members of Parliament; something that most fair minded citizens would find outrageous.

The argument mounted against these online protest forms was that they produced what is known in the information technology industry as "spam". Spam is unsolicited email to private individuals of usually a commercial nature: it is the web equivalent of junk mail. Webopaedia defines spam as:

"generally e-mail advertising for some product sent to a mailing list or newsgroup."

source: http://www.webopaedia.com/TERM/s/spam.html

Clearly then email generated from the Workers Compo site on LaborNET was not spam as:

- it was not email of a commercial nature

- it was email submitted by individual citizens

- it was email sent to members of parliament who by their very position should be open to any submissions to the public and;

- it was email based on issues of serious concern to workers of NSW and a matter of vital interest to the public

The fact that these emails were being generated via an online form on LaborNET is irrelevant: the means by which submissions are generated should not prejudice the intent and content of submissions made by members of the public.

The Resurrection Shuffle

These points were made in representations by this author to the officials that are responsible for the business of Parliament: the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly, John Murray and the President of the Legislative Council, Dr. Meredith Burgmann to have the email blockade lifted. Meredith Burgmann was amazed that the blockade was even instituted and regarded it as "an outrageous undermining of democracy". After consultations with the Speaker advice was given that blocking email or any other form of communication to MP's was a breach of parliamentary privilege. Thankfully, messrs Burgmann & Murray saw sense and promptly arranged for the email blockade against the NSW Labor Council to be lifted.

The Truce

During this virtual melee' LaborNET decided to play the good guy and pulled down the offending forms that was making online life distinctly uncomfortable for certain Upper House MP's. A technical solution is being developed during this virtual truce that will enable online protest forms to be restored without threat of blockade and for NSW parliamentarians to be protected from spikes in email traffic.

It's taken some pain and embarrassment, but it seems that the NSW State Government is now acknowledging that email is a legitimate form of access to members of parliament.


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*   View entire issue - print all of the articles!

*   Issue 100 contents

In this issue
Features
*  Interview: Baptism of Fire
It�s been a rugged few weeks for Labor Council�s new honcho. But John Robertson accepts it comes with the territory.
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*  Politics: Seven Days that Shook Our World
Chris Christolodulou surveys the wreckage from a week when the political and industrial wings of the labour movement collided.
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*  History: History Sometimes Repeat
This is not the first Labor government to attack workers compensation entitlements. Some believe the Unsworth Government�s 1987 reforms were the beginning of the end for that administration.
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*  Technology: Unions Online: Where To Now?
Social Change Online's Mark McGrath goes looking for what's on the virtual horizon for the union movement.
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*  Media: The Printed Word Revisited
Rowan Cahill looks at the resurgence of the workers press and the lessons for unions in better communicating with their members.
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*  Unions: Time For Second Gear
The trends are in the right direction but unions are still drinking small beer in the IT world and need to allocate more resources to communications generally, argues Noel Hester.
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*  Satire: Texan Governor Faces Execution
The governor of Texas has been sentenced to death row after a jury found him guilty of killing hundreds of people.
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*  Review: The Insider
Neale Towart looks at a literary anti-hero who brings the factional machinations and double-deals of the ALP machine out of the back rooms and into the light.
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News
»  Picket MPs Face More WorkCover Heat
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»  Della Tries a Henry VIII
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»  Privatisation Opens New WorkCover Front
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»  The Crucifixion and Resurrection of Virtual Democracy
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»  Bank Staff Forced to Flog Insurance
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»  Email Surveillance Report Gathers Dust
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»  Fifty Years On, Women Still Short-Changed
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»  Firefighters Withdraw Strike Threat
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»  Telstra�s Sells Off Skills Base
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»  BHP - Billiton Faces $1.8 Billion OHS Claim
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»  Activist Notebook
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»  STOP PRESS: Quite Frankly, Reith Goes!
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Columns
»  The Soapbox
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»  The Locker Room
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»  Trades Hall
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»  Tool Shed
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Letters to the editor
»  Picket at Parliament: Police Respond
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»  Time to Break
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»  Well Done for the Ton
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»  The Life and Soul of the Party
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»  A Tuckpointer Is ...
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