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Issue No. 128 15 March 2002  
E D I T O R I A L

Why I'm Marching
If you haven�t guessed already, I'm no Labor apparatchik. In fact my entry into politics was through the old Nuclear Disarmament Party.

F E A T U R E S

Interview: The Wedge Buster
Labor's immigration spokeswoman Julia Gillard talks about her job of developing policy to blunt Howard's wedge.

History: Fighting for Peace
Was the first Palm Sunday parade a celebration or a protest, asks Neale Towart.

Unions: Rattling the Gates
When Pacific Power workers traveled from Newcastle to Macquarie Street this week life-long loyalties were on the line, as Jim Marr reports.

International: Facing Retribution
Serious fears are growing for the safety of Zimbabwean trade unionists after the tainted election defeat of their former leader Morgan Tsvangirai.

Technology: How Korean Workers Used The Web
Electrical power industry workers in Korea are relying on the internet, and mobile phones, to successfully organise a militant nation-wide anti-privatisation strike.

Industrial: Working Futures
Can an assortment of economists, lawyers, historians, industrial relations specialists, unionists, journalists, sociologists and psychologists help us develop a decent future for work and social relations in Australia?

Review: Rumble, Young Man, Rumble
To compress the full and exhilarating life of The Greatest to film-length is no easy task but Ali makes a reasonable fist of the job writes Noel Hester.

Satire: GG Survival Doomed: Fox-Lew In Charge Of Rescue Bid
The hopes of embattled Governor-General Dr Peter Hollingworth took a battering last night, after he learnt that the rescue bid for his survival is being headed up by Lindsay Fox and Solomon Lew.

Poetry: PSST
From Sue Robinson to Michael Kirby, some things in politics are constant...only the names have been changed to defame the innocent.

N E W S

 Girl's Maiming Sparks Entry Plea

 More Time Off for Babies

 Workers Break Bank Cartel

 State Law Push For Virgin Sites

 Outrage at Privatisation by Decree

 Woomera - Flames, Razors, Rope and Despair

 Bus Drivers Block ALP Funds

 Crean Gets on Front Foot

 Nurses, Teachers On The Money

 Asset-Stripping Sparks Walk-Out

 Opposition Grows Over Howard's Freedom Attack

 Heffernan Prompts �Right of Reply� Demands

 Della Dumps Dunny Blues

 Smith Flies Into Turbulence

 Guards Force Drinks Break

 Levy Struck to Support Rockhampton Meatworkers

 ACTU Assists former Ansett Staff

 Activist News

C O L U M N S

The Soapbox
The War on Terror - Impunity for Abuses?
Federal Labor MP Duncan Kerr argues that governments are using the fears of the post-Septmeber 11 environment for thier own ends.

The Locker Room
Oh, The Humanity!
So, sports people are human after all. Now there�s a headline.

Week in Review
Tomorrow, The World
Jim Marr picks over the entrails of a week in which world domination, or at least hegemony over that part of it in which the principal operates, is a recurring theme.

L E T T E R S
 Carr and the Fire Fighters
 On Inequality
 Harmony Day
WHAT YOU CAN DO
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Letters to the Editor

On Inequality


Dear Sir,

On reading the article "The Changing Nature of Inequality" , Labor Review , issue79 ,( http://www.council.labor.net.au/labor_review/79/update791.html) , I was filled with feelings of apprehension , and dejavu , of a previous life where one was compelled to tug on the forelock in the presence of the master. Is this not just another facet of serfdom , imposed through economic rather than physical intimidation , not only on the individual , but on sovereign states , and compelling these states to punish their .citizens for non adherence to policies that National Socialism would have embraced freely.

As the very core of Socialism is to care for those disadvantaged through a collectivism , and what better way than as we as individuals or groups climb further out of the pit of bondage , be it economic , political or religious , we pull our brother and sisters with us. Some have said that in this Comradeship, lies the seeds of humanity. Are these not the threads with which legends such as "Robin Hood", William Tell, and even our own Ned Kelly, were over generations woven into a colorful tapestry of self sacrifice, and even the myth of Australian Mateship.

Recent times have seriously challenged these myths, in not only there respective homes, but on a Global basis, with the pivotal change in national and international values. Values based on pre Dickensian England, where property held more value than Human Life.

The Great Dividing Range (The Great Divide) once meant a geophysical manifestation a system of mountain ranges and plateaus in eastern Australia. Which extended for more than 3,500 km along the eastern coast of Australia from the Cape York Peninsula in northern Queensland to Victoria State; a branch of the system is submerged in Bass Strait before reappearing as the central highlands of the island of Tasmania

Today when someone refers to the Great Divide, it is the division of our society, the separation between Rich and Poor. The division between families who all work and accept middle class welfare payments for private education, Child Care, and various other subsidies , which were initiated as a blatant "Pork Barrelling", exercise by one or other of the main political parties , to placate the nosiest of their supporters. If there was an abundance of this "Cake of Benevolence", and there was full employment, with educational and medicial facilities provided, commensurate with this theft from the Commonwealth purse, then one would have naught to complain about.

Unfortunately, the cake is smaller, and those that have, are receiving more, much more than their share, leaving only the crumbs and abuse for those disenfranchised and vilified in a vulgar and reprehensible attempt at character assassination and guilt transference unto those in real need of a Social Wage , - the aged ,the sick and the unemployed . What an absurdity , for families with income in excess of several thousand dollars a week , claiming any form of government subsidy , while there are homeless roaming our streets at night, like "Lost Souls".

While there is a 3 year waits for a Hip Replacement, while Australians die from heart disease, while waiting on treatment, these funds being used in a manner no different from a third world country ,: For the purchase of Votes!

This article , "The Changing Nature of Inequality" , grabs into the past in using the gestures of Martin Luther , nailing his thesis to the Castle Church door ,in Wittenberg on October 31, 1517. to make his point,"The theses they would nail to the doors of policy makers and activists include:".

I would suggest that rather than nail to doors belonging to policy makers, rather their foreheads would be a more appropriate and transparent situation in which to broadcast these policies*.

(*See article: http://www.council.labor.net.au/labor_review/79/update791.html)

Tom Collins


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*   View entire issue - print all of the articles!

*   Issue 128 contents



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