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Issue No. 127 08 March 2002  
E D I T O R I A L

Power Plays
Depending on where you sit, the decision by a State Labor Government to sell off the division of the power industry responsible for its long-term planning is either bold or reckless.

F E A T U R E S

Interview: Still Flying
ACTU Secretary Greg Combet looks beyond the bid to save Ansett to a broader union agenda for 2002.

Women: Suffrage or Suffering
Alison Peters marks International Women's Day by surveying the achievements - and shortcomings - of a century of female suffrage.

Industrial: No Coco Pops For Brenda
The working poor get short shrift from the hypocritical Minister For Workplace Relations says Noel Hester.

Unions: Back to the Heartland
Lidcombe, western Sydney. A boring cultural desert, right? Wrong, wrong and wrong again according to CFMEU officials who talked to Jim Marr about relocating their headquarters to a working class base.

Activists: Getting to the Point
Rowan Cahill reports on a development battle that has fractured a South Coast community and the role the union movement has played to drive a just outcome.

International: Push Polling
On the eve of elections in Zimbabwe, trade unionists are paying the price for their commitment to democracy.

Economics: Debt Defaulters
Amidst the colour and movement of CHOGM little was said about the pressing issue of debt relief, writes Thea Ormond.

Poetry: Those Were the Days
The Golden Wing lounges have closed. The last of the commiserating Ansett workers have long since departed those makeshift taverns.

Review: Black Hawk Dud
If you want to find out exactly what went wrong during the US Marines' 1993 peacekeeping operation in Mogadishu in Somalia, do not see Black Hawk Down.

Satire: Fox-Lew Launch Rescue Bid for Beta Video
Businessmen Solomon Lew and Lindsay Fox have shocked the financial sector with a daring bid to rescue the communications giant Beta Video.

N E W S

 Egan Sells His Brains

 Spying Bill Targets Strikers

 Dunny Wars: Will Workers Carry the Can?

 Drivers Appeal To Commuters

 New Tack on Asylum Seekers

 Go Forth and Multiply � Unions on Women

 Howard Shuts Workers Out Of Steel Talks

 Questions Remain As Rio Rings Changes

 Labor Hire Swifty Exposed

 Unions Fight 'Industrial Blackmail'

 AIRC in Contracting Debacle

 Mayne Chance For A Wage Deal

 IT Workers Get Their Own Geek Scopes

 PNG Women Visit Australia

 Brazilian Unions Study Aussie Experience

 No Shangri-la in Jakarta

 Activists Notebook

C O L U M N S

The Soapbox
Love Thy Neighbour
Bruce Childs explains why he's reactivated the Palm Sunday committee to take a stand for refugees.

The Locker Room
Debt Before Dishonour
In a week that featured allegations of drugs in footy, fast horses and faster cars, Phil Doyle struggled to keep up.

Week in Review
Bullies Rule, OK?
Jim Marr considers a week which highlighted the absolute joy of being big, rich and powerful in a lassez faire world.

Tool Shed
Leader of the Free World
George W Bush barricades himself in this week's Tool Shed with the sort of double standards that gives world domination a bad name.

L E T T E R S
 How to Beat the Banks
 Collins Goes Cahill
WHAT YOU CAN DO
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News

Mayne Chance For A Wage Deal


NSW pathology workers are telling their union they don�t trust their employer, Mayne Health, who wants them under a non-union agreement.

"Mayne Health wants to walk away from their commitments after more than a year of talks between the company, the union and the workforce," Annie Owens, NSW LHMU secretary, said.

"During interminable negotiations the company has repeatedly refused to offer a wage rise to its loyal workforce."

Pathology workers at Mayne have a good track record of working together and organising to improve their working conditions.

LHMU members at Mayne won an important victory a little over 12 months ago when a union campaign in their workplaces introduced significant improvements to redundancy rights.

The package created a new benchmark for workers in the private pathology industry in New South Wales.

"When our members won this ground-breaking redundancy agreement Mayne was shocked at the union's strength - it seems they want to undermine the collective voice of their workforce by pushing for a non-union agreement," Owens said.

Gail Blakeney, the LHMU delegate at Mayne Health's Kogarah site said changes in top personnel at Mayne Health seemed to have slowed things down in the talks between the company and the union.

Mayne Health is the dominant pathology and health care company in Australia, employing hundreds of pathologists with major NSW centres at Newcastle, Kogarah, North Ryde and Wollongong - as well as about 130 collection centres throughout the state.

The base rate of pay for a Mayne Health pathology blood collector is $13.02 an hour.

Meanwhile Peter Smedley, the controversial Chief Executive and Managing Director of Mayne Health , receives an annual base salary of $1, 492, 308 and the benefit of an interest free loan to finance an issue of 2 million shares.

Before Smedley became a health industry guru at Mayne Health, in June 2000, he worked in the big money banking and oil industry at Colonial and Shell.

"LHMU officials have been visiting labs and workplaces to consult with members and get further feedback on their gripes and workplace complaints.

" An LHMU survey and information flyer is being distributed at all worksites .

" The surveys which have been returned so far have overwhelmingly showed confidence in workplace delegates and union officials representing the workforce for a union negotiated enterprise agreement."

Paint Worker in Scab Victory

A paint worker sacked for calling a manager a 'scab' has won an unfair dismissal case and his employer, South African multinational Barloworld Coatings, has been ordered to reinstate him.

Brook Shanahan - an LHMU union member for more than a decade - was sacked in early October 2001, after a number of incidents in which a maintenance manager was called a scab, when union members returned to work after a long strike.

Commissioner Helen Cargill has ruled that sacking the LHMU member over this incident was ' harsh, unjust and unreasonable' and ordered that he be allowed to return to work.

Barloworld Coatings is a paint manufacturer best known for producing the Taubmans brand of paints.

"During the IRC hearings the LHMU said our union does not condone abusive and threatening language, but the use of the word scab in itself was found by the Commission not to justify dismissal," Mark Boyd, LHMU NSW assistant secretary, reported.


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