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  Issue No 102 Official Organ of LaborNet 13 July 2001  

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News

Cleaner Wins Right to Attend Family Reunion

By Andrew Casey

Cleaning contractor LIMRO has been ordered to allow their Canberra employee Slavica Noveska to go on leave so she can attend a family reunion in Macedonia.

Slavica Noveska is a cleaner employed by the cleaning contractor LIMRO at the Calvary Hospital where she has worked for six years.

Slavica's workmates and other unionists staged a demonstration outside Calvary Hospital to support her. This demo was widely reported on the local TV news and in the Canberra Times. Hospital staff including nurses, doctors and scientists signed a petition in support of Slavica .

Last January Slavica applied to take her annual leave in July /August so she could go on a trip to Macedonia for a family reunion which was taking place at the time of her niece's wedding.

She was very excited about the trip and one of the people she was looking forward to seeing (for the first time ) was her 4 year old nephew.

Her employer LIMRO refused to give her leave at the time she wanted insisting that she take it when it suited the company.

Slavica's workmates said they would have no problem doing her work while she went on leave and LIMRO should let her go.

The LHMU took her case to the Industrial Relations Commission where there were two conciliation conferences.

LIMRO continued to refuse to give Slavica leave saying she couldn't go in July because of "operational reasons". The IRC ordered LIMRO to give Slavica her leave.

The Commissioner hearing the dispute was critical of LIMRO and one of the things the Commissioner said in her Decision was that LIMRO was unwilling to explain the operational reasons (even to the Commission) behind the refusal to give Slavica her leave when she wanted it.

"Could it be that there were no operational reasons? Could it be that it was simply a case of managerial prerogative gone feral?," Yvette Berry, ACT LHMU Cleaning Union organiser, asked today.

" Well our members showed them that they were wrong and the Commission told them they were wrong. Now all cleaners in the ACT have at least some protection against unreasonable bosses.

" On the union's application the Commission has put in the Award that The employer must not unreasonably refuse a request for accrued annual leave".


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In this issue
Features
*  Interview: Jolly Green Giant
Senator Bob Brown on the upcoming federal poll, balances of power and what the Greens can teach the trade union movement.
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*  Workplace: Call Centre Takeover
Theresa Davison brings us this real-life story from the coal face of the call centre industry.
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*  E-Change: 1.2 Community � The Ultimate Network
Peter Lewis and Michael Gadiel look at the potential for network technologies to reconnect communities.
*
*  International: Child's Play
Union Aid Abroad-APHEDA has recently entered a new alliance with the Child Labour Schools Company to support a project for child labourers in India.
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*  History: Flowers to the Rebels Faded
With the departure of our own Wobbly, a look at the development of the Wobblies in Australia and their view of Labor politicians and the work ethic seems timely.
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*  East Timor: A Dirty Little War
In this extract from his new book, John Martinkus recounts the scenes in Dili immediately following the independence ballot.
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*  Satire: Telstra Share Failure Ends City-Bush Divide: Everybody Screwed Equally
Communications Minister Richard Alston today claimed that the government had fulfilled its promise to ensure that the bush was not disproportionately disadvantaged by Telstra's privatisation.
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*  Review: Cheesy Management
Currently climbing Australian best-seller lists is the 'life-changing' motivational book 'Who Moved My Cheese?' Rowan Cahill has a nibble but doesn't like the taste.
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News
»  Search for a Dude Begins
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»  Public Money Backs a Stellar Bully
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»  Workers Get First Meal Break In Five Years
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»  Soft Penalty for Video Nasties
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»  Negligent Employers Should Pay
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»  Brit Cleaners Serve It Up to Aussie Boss
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»  Rio Tinto Guilty of Hunter Valley Sackings
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»  Rail Workers Strike for their Families' Security
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»  Nurses Seek Urgent Action on Pay
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»  Workers Win Tip Top Delegate Rights
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»  Telstra Halts Latest Privatisation Plans
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»  Requiem for the Banks
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»  Surfers Remember Oil Slick Disaster
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»  Widespread Mail Disruptions on Cards
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»  Minister for Caged Hair Gets Hot Welcome in West
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»  Cleaner Wins Right to Attend Family Reunion
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»  Howard Cuts R&D Spending by 15 Per Cent
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»  Fears Grow Over Shangri-La Protests
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»  Mick Young Play Award
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»  Activist Notebook
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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
»  Strained Relations
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»  Crocodile Tears
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»  Wrong Bias?
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