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  Issue No 12 Official Organ of LaborNet 07 May 1999  

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Guest Report

Kristyn Thompson on Unions and Generation X


May Day is important to all of us in the Australian union movement because it gives us an opportunity, a reminder that it is important, to reflect on where we have come from, where we are going and where we are at today.

 
 

Kristyn Thompson

And where are we?

We are currently faced with the incredibly aggressive attack by the federal government and business groups on the ideology of collective organisation.

As a movement, we are supposedly irrelevant, we are dinosaurs and inflexible. This mantra goes on to say that a movement such as ours is incapable of attracting the individualistic Generation X.

These are not really new arguments - they are just coded in the lexicon of 1999!

But here I stand before you - and I am a woman, I am still under 30 and I eventually want a family and kids - I am the epitome of the type of person they would have you believe will never join a union.

But I am speaking to you and fighting an election in to become branch secretary of my union.

And what am I doing here - what attracted me?

I am attracted to belonging to a community of people.

I am attracted to a movement that seeks to empower people who the rest of the system is not interested in once they've left school

I am attracted to the notion that wealth should be shared amongst all and not just the few

I am attracted to being part of positive outcomes for those who really need it

I am attracted to a movement that does not simply accept the status quo, but asks how can we make this society better - not I but WE.

These are the things which brought me to this point and when you look around there are not many other movements that offer something to such a diverse range of people such as workers - and to young people.

And these are the things that will bring others to our movement, and it will bring a new generation of unionists.

There is no evidence that young people are more hostile to unions.

There is no evidence that young people support further market deregulation.

There is no evidence that young people believe that less job security, junior rates and longer hours are "good" for them.

There is no evidence that young people want to act individually and not collectively.

And there is not evidence that new industries such as call centres, information technology and old ones like hospitality - places where we find younger workers - cannot be organised.

In fact there is more evidence that they can be organised, because if you can organise the wharves, shearing sheds and the coal mines - workplaces which were also at one point not-unionised, casualised and generally exploited, then why not these industries.

The truth is we can and we will over time.

Most people never experience collective strength and what that can collectively achieve in terms of change. It is our challenge to give young people - the next generation - a chance to experience collectivity in a positive way, the best way, through unions.

Kirstyn Thompson is state secretary of the Australian Services Union's airline division. This speech was delivered to the May Day Toast on April 31


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*   View entire issue - print all of the articles!

*   Issue 12 contents

In this issue
Features
*  Interview: The Call of the Wild
We meet a union organiser who�s taking the union message into the call centres.
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*  Unions: After the Gold Rush
Call centres are the boom industry and governments everywhere are touting them as major job creators - particularly in regional areas.
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*  History: From Steam Trains to Information Superhighways
A new project is dedicated to promoting the heritage of the Eveleigh railway workshops.
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*  Work/Time/Life: This Working Life: Issue #1
The debut issue of the ACTU's new monthly bulletin for it's Working Time and Employment Security Campaign.
*
*  International: British Unions Halt Membership Decline
Union membership has stopped falling in the UK for the first time in 18 years, suggesting that unions� increased committment to recruitment and organising is starting to pay off.
*
*  Review: Cold Warriors' Secrets Exposed
NSW Attorney General Jeff Shaw looks at two books that lift the lid on Cold War espionage.
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News
»  Push for Decent Call Centres
*
»  Shaw Unveils Second Wave
*
»  Union Raises the Roof for Beryl
*
»  Cotter Withdraws Currawong Standover Claims
*
»  Reith Second Wave Will Prolong Industrial Disputes
*
»  It�s Rio Telstra -- Union Braces for Attack
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»  Fears of AWA Push in State Rail
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»  Age Tele-Centre Seeks Pay Equity
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»  Advocate Ads to be Referred to Auditor-General, ACCC
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»  Labor Council to Stage Pre-Drug Summit
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Columns
»  Guest Report
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»  Sport
*
»  Trades Hall
*
»  Piers Watch
*

Letters to the editor
»  Wran Wrong on Wrepublic
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»  Digging the Dirt-Digging
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