Any suggestions that the union movement holds a grudge at the expense of their members should have been put to rest this week after the ACTU welcomed Chris Corrigan's buy-in of Virgin Blue. ACTU secretary Greg Combet clearly signaled he was not about to go and re-fight the waterfront war and accepted that the deal improved the prospect of Ansett workers retrieving their entitlements and, better, finding new jobs in the industry. While suspicions about Corrigan remain, the fact that he was ultimately a pawn in a bigger political game and has worked well with the MUA since that time, means that unions will be able to work pragmatically to make Virgin Blue a long-time player. From what we hear, there have been similar constructive talks with rail unions since he bought Freight Rail from the federal government.
But if unions and Corrigan are prepared to allow sleeping dogs lie, it seems that Dick Smith wants to get out the muzzle, don the balaclava and open the war on a new front. He launched a remarkable attack on aviation unions in this week's Sydney Morning Herald, blaming them for the "unbelievable inefficiencies and high costs" in the industry and lauding Corrigan for confronting his workforce head-on. At a time when the aviation industry is experiencing unprecedented turbulence, with one airline collapsed and Qantas in the middle of complex negotiations with its workforce - it's hard to think of less constructive intervention.
It's also a strange message for someone who has set himself up a one-man industry for anti-global patriotism by establishing his own, modestly titled 'Dick Smith' line of Australian-made products. The problem is that Australian economic sovereignty is all about respecting our national culture, including our strong collective industrial relations system that has delivered the high wages and conditions which he now rails against for being 'inefficient' for effectively representing Australian workers. Indeed, Smith was himself the President of the private pilots union in Australia (AOPA) where he campaigned for this position on the basis that the incumbent leadership of AOPA was not militant enough nor tough enough with the government of the day. Now, by calling to tear down unionism in the aviation industry, he is also advocating an assault on the Australian institutions he purports to champion.
This is the man who as head of the Civil Aviation Safety Authority championed the idea of 'affordable safety', based on the premise that genuine safety was not economically viable. By the time he had resigned from his position he'd fractured the organization in two and been accused by his own department as being 'dangerous'. His latest salvo comes in response to questions from the federal ALP over his change of heart towards Transport Minister John Anderson. Twelve months ago, Smith described Anderson as the worst-ever transport Minister and even threatened to run against him at the federal election. Now they're best mates and Smith is on a high level CASA advisory board, where he has ample opportunity to run his anti-union agenda.
If you join the dots you can see where this vision inevitably lead an airspace system that allows aviation enthusiasts like himself to fly free of charge. The commercial aviation industry can pay for the national airways system. At the end of the day that means the passengers - and the down-trodden worker - subsidising Dick's adventuring.
Textile Clothing and Footwear Union secretary, Barry Tubner, says the case of Yu Ge will be presented to the Carr Government as unions argue for immediate entry rights as part of the five-year review of the NSW Industrial Relations Act.
Tubner says the restoration of immediate entry rights is the only protection against a repetition of the human tragedy in which a youngster had half her right hand and thumb amputated after being caught in a machine at premises operated by River Island Clothing Ltd.
Yu Ge also suffered damage to her right foot, reducing sensation and limiting the growth of her calf in the accident that occurred in 1999 but has only now made it to the courts.
"It is obvious that when you are required to give 24-hours notice you are never going to find a 10-year-old working a sewing machine," Tubner says.
"The Department of Industrial Relations and Workcover deal with things after the event but the real issue is prevention. The only organisation able and prepared to deal with that is the trade union movement but entry restrictions leave us handcuffed.
"Vulnerable immigrants, and their children, are the losers.
Right of Acess
Theoretically, unions have immediate access on health and safety grounds but, in practice, these rely on rare tip-offs. They cannot enter sweatshops on the off-chance safety regulations are being abused.
A recent NSW State Government Sweat Shop Taskforce uncovered a string of clothing industry rorts. Health and safety top a list which also features bodgy wage and personnel records; and persistent evasion of superannuation and workers compensation payments.
David Tritton, a TCFU official who worked on the Taskforce, explains the practical difficulties.
"There are operations in Sydney I visited as a union official, giving 24 hours notice, who presented wage records showing six employees. When we visited those same places with the Taskforce, which had immediate access, we found 20 and more people on the sewing machines.
"These people cover their tracks. Give 24 hours notice and you will find workers, machines and records all gone."
Tritton says besides immediate entry there must be a requirement to keep records on the premises if governments are serious about health and safety, and rooting out child labour.
Five Year Review
Prompted by Taskforce discoveries, immediate access is a key Labor Council submission to the State Government's five-year review of industrial law. Those submissions closed on December 21 and the council is yet to hear anything from the Department of Industrial Relations or minister, John Della Bosca.
Yu Ge won't get her hand, her sport or her dexterity back but her family is looking for some level of justice through the legal system..
Traumatised by their daughter's disfigurement the family plans a new life in New Zealand. Even those dreams are in disarray after the system failed to come up with a judge when the case was listed for hearing in Sydney this week.
Yu Ge v River Island Clothing is rescheduled for June.
Labor Council secretary John Robertson says the best his organisation can do for Yu Ge is convince government that similar incidents should not happen again.
The Shop Distributive and Allied Employees (SDA) has struck the innovative deal with Coles and Bi-Lo Supermarkets.
It includes:
- paid leave for 'appointments associated with pregnancy', including pre-natal classes, for both male and female employees.
- unpaid parental leave extended from 12 to 18 months.
- the option for fulltime employees to return to work, part-time, after having a child.
SDA state secretary Greg Donnelly says the deal, which also includes a $50 per week pay rise, was struck after extensive canvassing of his membership.
Donnelly says while the current political debate centres around provision of paid maternity leave, the more important factor for his members was the right to return to work after a lengthy break.
"There are real limitations to the notion of paid leave; while eight weeks paid leave may be good, it really isn't much time for a new parent," he says.
The 18 months leave period is the first step in the SDA campaign to extend the community standard for maternity leave from one to two years.
The provisions of leave for pre-birth medical appointments is also significant because it would mean female workers did not need to take sick leave before the birth of their child, as many are currently forced to do.
Donnelly says the other big advance in the agreement is the reduction in the age at which adult rates are paid from 21 to 20 years, which would amount to a pay increase of around 10 percent for 20-year-old workers.
The breakthrough follows a tough campaign culminating in strike action before the Westpac AGM last December, and the release of the bank's now legendary 'barbeque cards' which fed workers lines on how to defend the bank at social occasions.
The Finance Sector Union this week struck the deal covering 24,000 workers that includes:
- a 12 percent pay rise over three years delivered in annual instalments of four percent.
- commitments to improve staff workloads, including $6 million in additional jobs.
- an undertaking to a share allocation in the term of the agreement of up to $1000 per employee per annum, based on the bank's performance.
FSU state secretary Geoff Derrick says the Westpac deal is significant because it breaks the 'cartel' approach of the major banks.
"Throughout the bargaining process the big banks - Westpac, NAB and ANZ - bargained as a unit," Derrick says. "Now that Westpac has reached agreement the pressure really is on the other banks to come to the party."
Derrick recognises the support of the broader union movement in the bargaining process and says the bank's new commitment to service and staffing levels is a win for the entire community.
The NSW Labor Council will approach the eight Labor administrations about insisting that start-up operations employ workers under state labour laws rather than their federal equivalents.
"This would eliminate the opportunity for employers who establish new businesses to utilise Howard's anti-worker legislation," ASU secretary Michael Want says.
The move arises from the ASU being confronted by Virgin Mobile's attempt to employ 200 NSW workers under discredited AWA individual contracts rather than collective agreements.
Council secretary John Robertson highlights the problems faced by Stellar employees at Wollongong in endorsing the move to bypass unfriendly legislation drafted by Peter Reith and his successor Tony Abbott.
Stellar used federal AWAs to slash wage rates and bar unions from the premises until being brought around by a concerted CPSU organising campaign.
Labor Council will take the proposal to the NSW Industrial Relations Minister in the first instance and ask that it be raised with his state and territory equivalents.
When South Australia fell to a Labor-Independent coalition last month it joined NSW, Victoria, Western Australia, Queensland, Tasmania, the ACT and Northern Territory in electing Labor dominated administrations.
While the ALP caucus will next week consider a motion to over-ride the cabinet decision to privatise Pacific Power International, Egan has the power to approve privatisation by regulation.
More than 200 angry Pacific Power workers rallied outside State Parliament this week in defence of their jobs and conditions, calling on the Carr Government to stick to party policy that explicitly rules out the privatisation of PPI.
NSW Labor Council secretary John Robertson has called on the Treasurer to talk to the workforce about their concerns over privatisation, particularly over job security and entitlements.
"It's not good enough to have these decisions made by ministerial decree without considering the workers concerns for their future employment," he says.
Adelaide-based lawyer Tirana Hassan has told Labor Council delegates a 34-year-old mother of two children set herself on fire this week.
Hassan, who regularly makes the 1000km Adelaide-Woomera round trip as part of the Womera Lawyers Pro bono Group, is scathing about this Government's regard for human rights and international obligations.
She says the detention centre, out of sight and mind in the desert and operated by American-based ACM, is purpose-built to de-humanise its occupants and drive them to hopelessness. Australians, she argues, must understand the horrors being perpetrated in their name.
"I don't understand what it takes to make a 34-year-old mother of two children set herself on fire as happened again this week.
"I don't understand why human beings try to hang themselves from the perimeter fence nor why a 12-year-old boy would write 'freedom' into his arm with a razor.
"It takes what they do at Woomera," Hassan says.
Numbers Not People
Hassan describes a foreboding place where human being are reduced to Alpha Numeric code. "I will say to someone - hi, I'm Tirana Hassan and I'm here to help - and they will reply - I'm WMA 10 15.
"The whole place is surrounded by fences, topped by razor wire, then inside there are more fences and razor wire. The people live in dungas, pre-fab buildings, typically a corridor with six rooms off each side. Each room is home to a family. They hang towels or sheets in an effort to get some privacy.
"Their every need is dependent on permission from DIMA or ACM. Whether they want shampoo or extra tampons they have to apply to the authorities."
Hassan is shocked by the effects of the process - self-harm or those reduced to swaying, catatonic messes. It is, she argues, the result of a deliberate process aimed at removing humanity and hope.
"This Government is evading its human rights obligations and demonising these people for its own agenda. They are being treated and portrayed as less than human.
"Yes, there are some Afghan shepherds at Woomera. There are also nurses, small business operators and PHDs. All of them are human beings and should be treated as such. We have to raise awareness of this situation and insist on accountability."
Hassan praises the history of the labour movement in battling injustice and calls on it to again stand on the side of human rights.
Palm Sunday Rally
Unionists will join environmental, religious and community groups in raising the issue at a silent march next Sunday.
The Palm Sunday Committee, including long-time convenor Senator Bruce Childs, has reactivated the traditional peace march to oppose the Howard Government's scape-goating of asylum seekers.
The rally will start at Belmore Park at midday, before a silent march down Broadway to Victoria Park where speakers and bands will inform and entertain.
Trades Council delegates impressed by Hassan's commitment and passion conducted an impromptu whip-around to help defray expenses faced by lawyers offering free services to detainees.
The Rail Tram and Bus Union yesterday agreed to lift a 48-hour strike, called the previous day at a fiery mass meeting after the State Transit Authority sought to end the bargaining period that allows for legal strike action.
While the issue will not be heard until March 27, the RTBU called off next week's action so as not to disrupt the Seniors Week gala concert on Tuesday.
If the bargaining period is ended, the claim - for 27 percent over three years - will be arbitrated in the Australian Industrial Relations Commission.
But drivers are so angry at treatment that they voted to instruct their union, the Rail Tram and Bus Union, from putting any money into ALP coffers. That money will instead be donated to the Westmead Children's Hospital.
The initiatives, an early sign Labor will front-end load its policy in this term of Opposition, also include relief for small business from the administrative requirements of the GST.
Labor will introduce four separate Private Members Bills to:
� Establish a scheme to guarantee payment of wages and other accrued entitlements in the case of employer insolvency;
� Make holding companies responsible for paying the workers' entitlements of a collapsed subsidiary where the holding company is implicated in the collapse;
� Ensure that employers pay their superannuation guarantee obligations on a quarterly basis rather than the current annual basis;
� Provide small business with a simpler method of calculating Goods and Services Tax payments.
Opposition leader Simon Crean also committed Labor to opposing the Howard Government's push to strip unfair dismissal rights for millions of workers employed by businesses with fewer than 20 staff.
Abbott Dodges Truth on Dismissals
Meanwhile, Workplace Relations Minister Tony Abbott was confronted with a damning independent study that undercuts Government claims on the need for a small business unfair dismissal exemption.
According to the study, only five percent of small businesses nominated unfair dismissals as the main impediment to hiring new staff, while only three percent of small businesses nominated "changes to unfair dismissal laws" as something that would encourage them to employ more staff.
By contrast, 25 percent of small businesses nominated the lack of skilled or experienced applicants as the main impediment to hiring staff.
Labor IR spokesman Robert McClelland says that at a time when 690,000 Australians are unemployed, Government should be talking to small business about the nature of the skills and experience they need.
Labor Council is circulating the model clause, agreed this week by the NSW Departments of Health and Education and Training, for awards covering thousands of public hospital nurses and school and TAFE teachers.
The NSW Government is going with union fee deductions as a matter of policy in the wake of a Labor Council application.
The Premier's Department confirms the clause won by nurses and teaches "will be adopted as a model for all Departments under Schedule 1 of the Public Sector Management Act", which also covers the Board of Studies and Department of Corrective Services.
The Premier's Department is issuing a circular to all chief executives advising of Government's "in-principle" support for the fee deduction arrangement.
Unions are running the test case in response to the employer tactic of routinely blocking union dues during disputes.
Labor Council assistant secretary Mark Lennon says the case aims to stop employers using payroll deductions as "a form of industrial blackmail".
He describes the state government's move as a "significant step forward by a major employer".
The workers, employed by a company which was sold to Flecthers recently, discovered this week that assurance made at the time of the sale would not be honoured.
A month ago the CFMEU was given assurances that Holland's would look after its workforce and that the $100 million worth of work Fletchers currently have would keep building workers busy into the future.
Now, through corporate sleight of hand the $100 million worth of work has magically turned into only $16 million worth and Holland's have told the Industrial Commission that they are only prepared to take on Fletchers white collar workers, leaving its blue collar workforce in a cherry picked shell company and facing an uncertain future.
CFMEU State Assistant Secretary Brian Parker Secretary says Fletchers workers will do whatever it takes to get some guarantees from their new employers. "These guys are furious and set for a long battle"
"The Union will back its members 100%. These are decent hardworking Australians. Take the case of building worker Tony Stone. 25 years with the company, his marriage went bust through the long hours; he has ruined both his knees in industrial accidents. He was promised secure employment and now he is on the scrap heap."
ACTU president Sharan Burrow says that new powers for the Attorney General to ban organisations on political and ideological grounds could be used to undermine Australians' rights to free speech and freedom of association.
"Terrorism is a serious problem and existing laws allow extensive surveillance and prosecution of people for criminal acts including conspiracy, incitement, aiding or abetting and reckless disregard," Burrow says.
"Why does the Government want new powers to ban organisations and imprison people for life simply for knowing about certain proscribed information?
If parliament approves these knee-jerk reactions to undermine basic individual rights, then terrorism has won the day."
Burrow has called on all federal parliamentarians to ensure any new anti-terror laws are consistent with Australia's traditions of free speech and individual rights.
In response to Senator Bill Heffernan's attack on High Court justice Michael Kirby, Teachers Federation delegate, Frank Barnes, told Labor Council he had been subject to smear and innuendo as a result of his sexuality.
"I'm used to it but at my age it doesn't matter and more," he said.
"But other people are more vulnerable. Thanks to Bill Heffernan we will have more suicides and more people dying. It's just a really shameful tactic."
He accused Heffernan, a close personal and political friend of John Howard, of making his headline-grabbing allegations, under cloak of privilege, for political reasons.
Barnes says getting soft-on-sex-abuse Governor General Peter Hollingworth off the front pages and implying that homosexuals are paedophiles are the senator's motivations.
The CFMEU has written to Justice Kirby, expressing its outrage, and the Teachers Federation will invite him to upcoming events in a show of solidarity.
Labor Council will push for a change to parliamentary privilege "so that citizens such as Justice Kirby can be afforded a right of reply in accordance with principles of natural justice".
Della Bosca has written to unions to assure them their toilets are safe after concerns were raised over the consolidation of the Occupational Health and Safety Regulations, which replace the Factories, Shop and Industries Act.
The SDA raised concerns after attending meetings with WorkCover where new draft regulations were tabled that removed provisions obliging employers to provide basic facilities like toilets and washrooms.
NSW Labor Council secretary John Robertson has congratulated the Minister on his swift action. "This is an issue which we did not want to get bogged down with the bureaucrats," he says.
Smith went the full biffo, posing as a turbo-charged Chris Corrigan who would deregulate aviation and smash worker organisation in the process, in a Sydney Morning Herald interview marking his appointment to a Federal Government airspace reform review.
O'Connell labeled the outspoken entrepreneur "hypocritical".
"Mr Smith was the president of the private pilots union (AOPA). He campaigned for the position, against the incumbent, arguing the leadership of AOPA was not militant enough, nor tough enough with the government of the day.
"Apparently, it is okay for rich men with planes to have a strong union but when workers in the same industry want that, it must be smashed."
Smith went off as five unions, including the CPSU, locked horns with Airservices Australia over an enterprise agreement covering 3000 workers.
A stoppage by Melbourne air traffic controllers (Civil Air) disrupted flights for several hours as workers resisted attacks on job security, conditions, and employer plans to water down super for new employees.
Central to the impasse are plans to restructure Airservices from July 1, a likely forerunner to privatisation, and the company's refusal to give undertakings beyond that date.
Airservices Australia has chopped its workforce from 7500 to 3000 since 1991.
The decision to supply the free water was announced on Friday afternoon, just as the LHMU Security Union was gearing up for mass meetings, on Monday, of SRA Security Guards in Sydney.
" Our members have been asking for the water for two years - they are quite rightly resentful that they have to buy water, or soft-drinks, as trains pull into stations on the trips between Newcastle and Sydney," NSW LHMU Security Union Assistant Secretary, Mark Boyd said.
" Earlier this month the members had had enough, and they walked out for fourty-eight hours leaving train services out of Newcastle without any security personnel."
The LHMU Security Union has called mass meetings in Sydney on Monday to report on the Newcastle stoppage, and the on-going dispute over providing proper and hygienic facilities for security guards working on the SRA train services.
There are over 1000 Chubb Security guards patrolling SRA train services which run throughout Sydney, and out to Newcastle, Wollongong and Lithgow.
" It is not much to ask for chilled water for these workers - and it has been part of a long campaign for proper amenities which Chubb and the SRA are refusing to provide our members."
" The 40 Newcastle rail security guards who service local and inter-urban trains, coming out of the Newcastle SRA depot, had listened to the lies from their bosses and weren't taking it anymore," Mark Boyd said.
The two-day strike resulted in trains running between Sydney and Newcastle without any security personnel.
Pointing the Finger
" After this latest stoppage both Chubb and the SRA were squirming when we met them last Friday in the Industrial Relations Commission - they were pointing the finger at each other, blaming anyone but themselves," Mark Boyd said.
" At the start of February LHMU members in Newcastle held a one day stoppage; Chubb had solemnly promised their workforce after this strike they would finally provide the new facilities - and it would happen within weeks.
" When they squibbed it, again, members decided to walk a second time on February 28 - but this time they went out for 48 hours. "
As a result of this second stoppage both Chubb and the SRA have been forced by the union, through the Commission, to set an immediate timetable to fix up the long-standing complaint about amenities.
The LHMU mass meetings in Sydney on March 18 and Lithgow on March 20 will discuss the results of this dispute and any on-going campaigns before the union reports back to Industrial Commission on March 26.
The Sydney meeting will take place at 11am, March 18, LHMU Security Union conference room Level 8, 187 Thomas St Haymarket.
The Lithgow meeting will take place at 11am, March 20, the Lithgow Workers Club
Central Queensland meatworkers are at the centre of a bitter lock-out after being stood down because they will not sign an inferior enterprise bargaining agreement.
The workers at CMG abattoir in Rockhampton are being supported by Queensland AMWU members in the coal industry.
AMWU Queensland secretary, David Harrison thousands of central Queenslanders are the victims of one of the worst capital strikes in recent Queensland history.
"This company is trying to starve workers into submission and damage Rockhampton simply so it can get its way in wage negotiations," Harrison says.
"This capital strike is having a devastating effect on many families and the Rockhampton region. In John Howard's Australia it seems it's okay for capital to go on strike, for months on end in this case, but labour strikes are something to be condemned and outlawed."
The $10.00 levy will be paid weekly to the AMWU's Queensland Coal Shop Stewards Levy Fund and then forwarded to the Meatworkers Union for distribution to the workers.
The seminars will be tailored to Ansett staff with information about their superannuation, social security benefits, tax implications and debt management. The seminars will be run by ACTU-accredited financial planners.
The initiative is in response to a high volume of calls to the ACTU Call Centre from Ansett workers requesting help, and a proliferation of approaches to the ACTU by organisations offering financial and employment services for Ansett workers.
"The intention of the seminars is to provide people with professional and specific information about the situation they are facing at the moment. We believe people need clear information about their super and entitlements and the implications of certain decisions they might make," ACTU Secretary Greg Combet said today.
"We want to ensure that unscrupulous people do not try to take advantage of former Ansett employees and their families" Mr Combet said.
The ACTU program will offer Ansett employees:
free Ansett-specific information seminars to be held nationwide;
an initial free consultation with an ACTU-accredited financial planner; and
standardised charges offered by all accredited financial planners
The program is being coordinated by the ACTU's commercial arm, ACTU Member Connect and will commence in early April. Ansett employees can contact ACTU Member Connect on the Ansett Hotline 1300 365 205.
A specific web site has also been set up at www.actu.asn.au.
Palm Sunday Peace March
March 24, 12 noon
Meet Noon Sunday 24 March 2002 at Belmore Park (Eddy Avenue, Central Station).
SILENT MARCH to Victoria Park (next to Sydney Uni) for a joint festival with Walk Against Want.
Speakers include: Tom Uren (former Whitlam Minister), Sister Susan Connelly, Jo Vallentine (former Senator), Lyndia Miller & John Robertson (Secretary, Labor Council of NSW).
The MC will be Lex Marinos and Music will be by Astro Tabasco and Guests.
********************
Pluto / Fabian Wednesday Forums
Bercelouw Books, 70 Nortoin Street, Leichhardt, 6.30pm
March 27 - The Death of Liberalism - Hon WC Wentworth and Greg Barnes (Admission $15 and $15)
April 17 - Labor and Refugees - to Lead or Follow? - Mark Latham and John Robertson (Admission $10 and $5 - members)
April 24 - The Future of the Left in Australia? - Boris Frankel, Peter Botsman, Helen McCue, Ghassan Hage and Eva Cox (Admission $20 and $10)
May 1 Open Australia Forum - Lindsay Tanner,, Mark Latham, Rebecca Huntley, Tom Moreton, Guy Rundle.
**********************
Call for Papers - EDUCATION AND SOCIAL ACTION 2002
Wednesday 11th to Friday 13th December, 2002
at the Centre for Popular Education, city campus of University of Technology, Sydney, Australia
(Broadway, walking distance from Central railway station).
THEMES
� Community Capacity Building and Cultural Development
� Facilitating Change for Healthy Environments
� School - Community Relationship Building
� Celebrations for Change and Development
� Health Education and Community Development
� Popular Education and Advocacy: Refugees and Asylum Seekers
THE 'EDUCATION AND SOCIAL ACTION' CONFERENCE building on the tradition of previous conferences organised by the Centre for Popular Education will:
* bring people engaged in different fields of social action and education together
* be a forum where activists, workers, policy makers, artists and scholars alike are encouraged to participate
* encourage research and enquiry to promote practice that helps people analyse and address social injustices
* have workshops that are sufficiently long to have decent discussions or engage in hands-on activities
* have plenty of music, theatre and dance; but more importantly there will be some opportunities for collaborative art-practice.
CALL FOR PAPERS AND WORKSHOP PROPOSALS
Refereed papers:
Selected papers of 2,000 to 4,000 words will be published in May 2003.
Proposals for papers should include:
* a title
* names of authors with full contact details and brief narrative resume/s
* a summary of about 200 - 400 words.
Proposals should be received by July 1st, 2002. Authors of papers accepted will be advised by July 15th. It is expected that full draft papers will be presented at the conference. Copies of draft papers will be made available to session participants. A final version of the paper should be submitted by early March, 2003 for publication in May.
Workshop proposals
Workshop proposals will be considered in rounds. To meet the due date of the first round, proposals should be received by July 31st. To find out due dates for subsequent rounds please ask [email protected] or tel. 02-9514 3843.
Proposals should include:
* workshop title
* names of presenters with full contact details and brief narrative resume/s
* a summary of about 200 words.
Send proposals to [email protected] or Centre for Popular Education, UTS, PO Box 123, Broadway 2007 or fax 02-9514 3939.
********
www.cpe.uts.edu.au
When the New York City firefighters arrived in Sydney last week Bob Carr treated them like Champions. A cortege of police outriders, Ministerial limousines and sparkling new fire engines not yet commissioned for service escorted the heroes of New York City from Sydney Airport to the five star Regent Hotel at the top of George street.
Our Bob was quick to link himself and his own political destiny to these men of heroism and tragedy.
With hindsight It seems all too familiar to John Howard and his snap decision to hop on the 'War on Terrorism' bandwagon twisting it to his own political advantage. Only this time our Bob was sharp enough to know that the whole world loves a winner.
No expense was spared in making our prized guests the coupe d' etat of the international tourism circuit. CNN, NBC and ABC all made great play of The Stars and Stripes being hoisted atop the Sydney Harbour Bridge. A triumph of US Imperialism and perhaps just a whiff of success for Bob.
With 347 New York City firefighters dead this is far and away the single greatest tragedy to have hit any fire service in the world. 195 firefighters remain missing and with less than three weeks to go until the cement mixers move in and reconstruction begins, it is unlikely they will ever be found.
Firefighters relate to each other in a far more intense way than many other workers do. The need to trust your life to another person means camaraderie is essential if you are to motivate yourself to run into a burning building while everyone else is running out. Fire Brigades are like families and losing 347 members of your family must be devastating.
The New York City firefighters were keen to meet their fellow "Brothers and Sisters" from Sydney so the call went out to all the fire stations around the city and about fifty of us turned up at the pub to say hello. They were all delighted to have found themselves in Sydney and after about three schooners of VB they were starting to look very jet lagged.
One young guy told me how he had lost his entire crew and that after one of the towers came down he had to be dug out of the rubble having been lucky enough to be the Engine Keeper on that day. Its hard to know what to say to someone who has lost their entire family.
While I hope I never have to experience the grieving these workers are going through they did tell me that their loss is in some way cushioned by the fact that every family of a firefighter killed on duty in the US is given a lifetime pension of 100% of the firefighters wage. A sharp contrast to the US $8 per week that the families of firefighters in NSW are entitled to under the current Death and Disability provisions Bob Carr extends to his state's firefighters.
No one in NSW wanted to take away the accolades the NYC firefighters received while they were in Sydney but perhaps now they are gone the Premier can explain
why NSW firefighters have the worst Death and Disability provisions of any firefighters in the OECD.
Why the decision to butcher the workers compensation entitlements of all workers in NSW shouldn't have firefighters angry at the spectacular hypocrisy of a Premier who enjoys some of the very best Death and Disability provisions in the world through his
Parliamentary Superannuation Scheme.
Pretty dangerous work really slinging insults and shuffling papers, but then the cheap grog and silver service dining room does keep them in tip top condition.
Who knows perhaps the next time I have to drag another unconscious victim from the 26th floor of the housing commission flats in Waterloo I might get the red carpet treatment from Bob Carr.
Then again some of the poorest people in Sydney live in the twin towers in Phillip street Waterloo, not exactly the Big End of town.
Stop the crocodile tears Bob, bushfires or high rise the public expects to have firefighters covered not thrown into Tony Abbotts damnation of the working poor.
Simon Flynn
Redfern Fire Station
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
March 21st 2002 is 'Harmony Day", a day against racism. My daughter's primary school Holy Rosary School has decided to become involved in a project for that day.
The invitation arises from a story of a doctor visiting Woomera detention centre a few weeks ago. A young child asked the doctor, "aren't there any flowers in Australia?" As the children look past the razor wire, all they see is the unrelenting brown desert.
Holy Rosary's School's challenge is to join with others and flood detention centres with flowers. Holy Rosary has been given names of florists who will send flowers to detention centres; this will be confirmed on Monday 18th March 2002. Thursday 21st will be student free dress day with a gold coin collection. The Money raised will go towards buying flowers to be sent to the detention centres.
Please act now to make March 21 a special day and to let the world know that racism is a movement against the human spirit and everything that is living. For more information phone mailto:[email protected]
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Do you perceive community attitude to have moved on the asylum seeker issue since the Federal election?
I don't think community attitudes have necessarily moved on the question of asylum seekers, but I think that there is a deeper scepticism about whether or not the government has got the solutions.
The outcome of the "Children Overboard' affair, where we know that no children were thrown overboard but that the Federal Government threw the truth overboard, means that no longer will the Australian community just accept the Government's word on asylum seeker issues.
I think it will treat it's word with scepticism and I think that means that we can have a more open debate on the policies that are best in this area that we could have had beforehand.
Given that there is a polarised view within the ALP, do you see your role as forging a compromise or actually coming up with a hard policy one way or the other?
I actually don't think that the polarisation in the ALP is any where near as bad as some of the media reporting would have you believe. Unfortunately, media reporting tends to stylise things down to slogans and when we exchange slogans it can appear that differences are actually quite largebiased.
But when you actually sit down with people and talk the issues through at a level of detail, you find that people aren't as far apart as the sloganising would lead you to believe. So, for example, I've had party members say to me that they support ending mandatory detention and when I ask them what they actually mean, the first thing that they say is- "oh no, I understand that there would need to be mandatory detention for identity checking and security checking and for health issues and there might be people who are at risk of absconding and they'd still have to be detained...".
Once you get down to talking about that level of detail it seems to me that people in the Labor Party aren't as far apart as a first glance would have you believe.
If I'm right in that view then I see my role initially as informing people, because this is a complex area and people can really only engage in the debate if they are across the factsstamp; secondly, listening to the views that people form having heard those facts and then, thirdly, putting together a proposal which I believe is good public policy for Australia.
We've seen the emergence of Labor For Refugees as a cross factional grouping within the Party, what impact has that had on the debate?
I've made contact with a number of the Labor For Refugee groups. Obviously I think they have an impact on the debate in the sense that they have established information networks on asylum seeker and refugee questions and I think that's healthy. The more informed people are the better the debate will be. But it's my intention to run an open Party debate where people have the opportunity to come to forums or to make submissions whether they are within Labor For Refugees or outside it.outsiders.
The Independent Education Union last week released a report on the whole asylum seeker policy issue, one of their recommendations was to change the language of mandatory detention to something like "compulsory processing" to get the punitive nature out of the language. Do you find that sort of suggesting compelling?
I'd have to say I don't find that sort of suggestion compelling. I don't think we need to have a collateral debate about language here. Labor introduced a mandatory detention regime and both Simon Crean and I have said that mandatory detention will continue to be part of Labor's policy in relation to asylum seekers.
The interesting question, and the question we need to work through is what form does that detention take? For example, even today under the Howard Government there are 25 women and children in an alternative detention trial where they get to live in ordinary style homes that were formerly used by Defence Force people. Now if you asked Minister Ruddock today are those people still in detention, he would say "Yes they are", but obviously the circumstances in which they live are very different from being behind razor wire in a highly secured compound.
So I think the debate we need to have is, bearing in mind that there will continue to be a role for mandatory detention, is about what form detention could take. And I'm interested in hearing what people think of the alternate detention that is currently in trial and what they think of proposals like supervised hostels. All of those thoughts onof alternate forms of detention models I'm interested in feedback on.
Have you formed a position on the ongoing justification for temporary protection visas?
No, when you look at our policy development framework, the one that the Federal Labor Party Caucus adopted on the 11th February, temporary protection visas is one of the issues on the list and it is an issue about which we would need to form a policy view.
However, I have indicated that I believe that the issues we need to expedite out of what are a wide range of issues, are to do with processing and mandatory detention. So we will be looking at those issues first.
In terms of why we selected those issues, I think the greatest degree of community and Party concern at the moment is around the mandatory detention question and you can't really look at that without working your way through processing issues. Obviously if we could fundamentally expedite processing then a number of concerns about mandatory detention might fall away as people wouldn't be detained for anywhere near the length of period that people are being detained now.
So we need to look at those two questions together and I think we need to look at those two questions as quickly as possible and then we will come back and look at the other policy questions of which obviously the circumstances of temporary protection visa holders is one.
Another issue that has been raised within the Union movement is the employment practices at ACM. Do you think that if we do have detention facilities they should be run by private operators?
No. Simon Crean has already made a number of policy announcements in the area of asylum seekers. He has made five separate announcements to date, the first of which was that Labor does not believe that children should be in detention, which he made on Australia Day. Then, out of our Caucus meeting on the 11th February, we made fivefour other new announcements.
The first of which is that we support the recommendation of the Independent Detention Advisory Group that Womerah should be "moth balled".
The second is that we believe that the Australian Protective Service should be put back in control of the detention centres, that is detention centres should be managed within the Public Sector, not by private contractors.
The third is that we say there should be a liftinglisting of the shroud of secrecy around detention centres and that subject to an agreed protocol there should be media access to them. Obviously an agreed protocol would be needed; as asylum seekersthey obviously have a right to say that they don't want to be the subject of media attention or identified in media reports. So there are some issues that need to be worked through, but subject to an appropriate protocol we think there should be media access to detention centres.
Fourthly, we've called on the Federal Government to extend the Repatriation Package for persons returning to Afghanistan. Not only to those people who are currently in detention but also to the 1400 who are on temporary protection visas.
Fifthly, as recently as this week we called on the Federal Government to enter into a proper time limited safe haven arrangement for asylum seekers from Afghanistan, similar to the arrangement Australia entered into for Kosovars.
So there's a suitefleet of policies out there already and clearly one of those policies is that we think that the Public Sector should run detention centres.
There's a perception that existing refugees have problems with asylum seekers because of the difficulties they have in getting their own families out to Australia under the current policies with the shift in immigration from Family Reunion to the Skilled Migration Program. Is that mix something you're looking at on a broader scale?
Absolutely. When Simon Crean structured my Portfolio he deliberately structured it as Population and Immigration and we did that because we think that the broad debate that the Australian community needs to have is around population policy. What do we want this country to look like in 50 or 100 years time? What's our vision for Australia?
Obviously the view you take about population numbers and population disbursal is key to that vision. On current trends, we are going to end up as both an ageing society and a declining society in a limited number of sprawling cities. If people aren't comfortable with that vision of Australia in the future, we need to come up with a population policy that supports a different vision.
So, we are saying let's start with the really big picture, having worked our way through the really big picture, then of course let's look at the role that immigration plays in that big picture. I think that is one way in which we can rebuild some community consensus around immigration matters because we've seen that consensus lost over the last few years. And in the course of looking at immigration in that context, we would be working our way through what our skills migration stream looked like, what our family reunion stream looked like and all of the associated issues. Obviously the refugee program then falls in as a subset of the immigration program.
One of the difficulties about the way Australia is been having the current debate around refugee and asylum seeker questions is that we've started there rather than at the bigger picture and worked our way backwards so that people could understand refugee and asylum seeker policy in it's proper context. And I think the loss of context for that policy has been part of the problem in terms of the loss of community support.
So will you be looking to come up with a headline population target for the future?
Yes. As Simon Crean indicated at the speech he gave at the Population Summit which was recently hosted by the Victorian Government, that Labor will have a population policy for the next election, including a population target and a plan for disbursal of population. So no-one in the Labor side is talking simplistically about just increasing immigration numbers and allowing there to be more stress and strain on areas like the Sydney Basin. We need a rational population policy that looks both at numbers and at disbursal across the Australian continent.
Just to be clear about the way in which these debates are going to be advanced, obviously the population policy debate is the big picture debate. I would have preferred that we had that debate first, then dealt with the immigration issues and then dealt with the refugee and asylum seeker questions in their proper context. Clearly the community concern and Party concern around refugee and asylum seeker issues means that we do need to expedite looking at that and we will in the first instance be looking at processing and detention issues, then over the longer term we will be developing the population and broad immigration policy.
And as a Party that championed the White Australia Policy up until the 60's is ethnic mix going to be something you're prepared to tackle as well?
Labor supports and, in my view will always support, there being a non-discriminatory immigration policy.
Finally, the Palm Sunday March that's being held in a number of cities on March 24, do those sort of community events have any bearing on the policy debates are taking place?
All expressions of community opinion inform the debate in the sense that we need to know as decision makers what the community thinks. I think we need to be pretty clear that community opinion is very divided on refugee and asylum seeker questions. There is obviously an activist section of the community that believes that Labor needs to move to a more compassionate position on asylum seeker issues. There are also wide sections of the community that would not have that view. What Labor is saying is that we think that we can come up with policies that are both tough on boarder border protection and more compassionate to asylum seekers and that's what we're going to be working on.
I'm interested in expressions of community opinion being a MP who spends a fair bit of time meeting my own constituents. I think I know their views pretty clearly and they probably wouldn't be the same views of the persons who are going to go on the Palm Sunday rally. But you know, that equally is a legitimate expression of community views.
Palm Sunday 2002 Website |
Was the first Palm Sunday parade a celebration or a protest? Whatever clerics may have decided, the popular imagination clearly attaches great significance to the protest viewpoint. Witness the vast numbers that have paraded at such events as the Palm Sunday peace marches (the 1985 one in Sydney had an estimated 170,000 people and the Corroboree 2000 walk across the Harbour Bridge in Sydney. Similar walks in other places at the same time attracted vast crowds.
George Turner, a Presbyterian minister says that "Jesus was a very angry man as he went into Jerusalem that day so, in many ways, what happened on that Palm Sunday was indeed a protest march or a demonstration - a demonstration of anger that would, of course, ultimately bring him into conflict with the religious authorities of the day." http://www.ptbo.igs.net/~stpauls/sermons2001/protest.htm
The nuclear disarmament rallies ran strongly for ten years in Australia, spurred initially by the posturing of the Reagan Administration. An international tradition of Easter Sunday peace demonstrations had grown up in western Europe, but the choice of Palm Sunday is unique to Australia. It remains a uniting force for people of diverse opinions and political creeds. The ALP was in power for most of this time in Australia, brought in by support of groups such as PND who had hopes for a more independent foreign policy from the ALP. By 1985 this hope had evaporated, and Bill Hayden's message as Foreign Minister to the Sydney rally in 1985 got a huge round of boos if I remember rightly.
Protest marches have combined campaigns for Aboriginal rights and anti-nuclear elements. The campaign against the Jabiluka mine in the Northern Territory was the focus in 1999 for Palm Sunday rallies.
Established Churches in Australia claim Palm Sunday as having developed special significance because it is the best example of ecumenical co-operation in Australia. A lot of meaning is invested in the day by lots of people.
Unions have been involved in the anti-nuclear protests since the debate about uranium exports in the mid 1970s, and involved heavily in peace protests since the Vietnam War. As the ACTU policy says, Peace is Union Business. Key donors of time and resources have been the AMWU, the BWIU, FEDFA (now part of the CFMEU), NSW Teachers Federation and the PKIU (now part of the AMWU). The role of Bob Hawke as president of the ACTU in promoting uranium mining and exporting was important in galvanising opposition. The Victorian branch of the ALP in particular was very critical of Hawke in 1977. The union and peace movement campaigns gradually swung public opinion on the issue from strongly in favour to disapproval, according to Greg Adamson's summary articles in Green Left Weekly in 1999. The peace movement he saw as finally getting its act together in 1978, after years of activity on many fronts.
Unions over the next few years, where they maintained opposition to uranium (despite ACTU support for existing contracts), used their strategic positions to disrupt transport of material through ports and on streets. Local governments also responded to public pressure. We saw lots of councils declaring Nuclear free Zones which made moving yellow cake to ports a difficult proposition.
To have faith in the ALP after betrayals on the issue of contracts, changing their policy on mines in 1982 (the infamous policy to get Roxby Downs underway, on the spurious basis that it was a gold mine principally) was stretching it. The rise of the Nuclear Disarmament Party in the early eighties was a sign of disillusionment with the ALP at the time. They got a senator up in WA and almost got Peter Garrett elected in NSW. It was non sectarian initially (sectarianism amongst left groups led to its demise a few years later)
The ongoing importance of the first Palm Sunday, when Jesus arrived in Jerusalem, which some of his disciples at least saw as part of a campaign against imperialism and war is seen in the comments of United Methodist Women who make the same links between Jesus' quest and the compassion needed today, after September 11 and other atrocities.
"Jesus wept over Jerusalem. He wept over its impending wounds and attacks. His heart broke in compassion and tenderness, but Jesus did not stop there. His kindness is always interspersed with justice. He asked why Jerusalem did not know the things that make for peace. Tears of compassion led to a question of justice".
As Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a Lutheran minister in Germany, who asked some justice questions before the onset of World War II, asked:
"How does peace come about?
Through a system of political treatises?
Through the investment of international capital in different countries?
Or through universal, peaceful rearmament in order to guarantee peace?
Through none of these...for the single reason that all of them confuse peace with safety.
There is no way to peace along the way of safety.
For peace must be dared.
Peace is the great venture.
It can never be safe.
Peace is the opposite of security.
Peace must be dared."
(http://gbgm-umc.org/umw/terrorism/palm_sunday.html)
As Jesse Jackson put it in 2000 at the Shadow Democrat Convention "Jesus led a march on Palm Sunday. He was a protestor. He is the author of the faith of many of us. There is power in protest when you stand up and fight back and resist with courage and character and conviction." http://www.shadowconventions.com/speeches/jacksonbspeech.htm
Martin Luther King also used the symbolism of Palm Sunday in his protest against segregation in the US. In fact a Judge issued orders on Palm Sunday in 1963 to prevent King from protesting on that day in Birmingham. He was arrested and wrote what became know as his "Letter From Birmingham Jail", a big moment at a time of crisis for King and the movement around him.
George W Bush has upped the rhetoric and threats of violence on at least seven countries around the world and thus on millions of people, in his "New War Fighting Plan". Our own federal administration supports Bush to the hilt, and screws down hard of the refugees and the poor of the world who seek to escape from some of the regimes who we claim to be opposed to.
Manning Clark's comments for the No to Nuclear War booklet, published in 1991, seem prescient.
"The end of the cold war may seem to some to remove the fear of a nuclear war. That hope is, I believe, ill-founded. The causes of war between nations and classes have not disappeared with the waning of the cold war. The unequal distribution of wealth, the increase in populations and grievances over past wrongs are still with us. Nuclear weapons are not the only threat to the survival of human beings on this planet. The passion and the high-mindedness dedicated to the campaign for nuclear disarmament should also be channeled into those areas of life which are sowing the seeds of future wars. Poverty can almost be as great a scourge as war. It lasts longer. We should now strive to help the wretched of the earth."
See the booklet published by the Nuclear Disarmament Co-ordinating Committee, No to Nuclear War: a decade of Sydney's Palm Sunday Marches and Rallies (1991) for speeches given at these rallies by people such as Patrick White, Helen Clark (then a member of the Lange Labour Government in NZ that had just banned US ships carrying nuclear weapons), David Williamson and Robyn Williams.
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Traditional Labor Party supporters are heading for the doors as MPs cuddle up to "aspirationals".
"They can't even take Newcastle for granted," warns CFMEU Pacific Power International delegate, Richard Brownette, "the swing against them in the general election made that obvious. It's something they really have to sit up and have a good look at.
"People are sick to death of privatisation. De-regulation, in this country, isn't exactly a success story."
Brownette, a former party activist who left over the NSW Government's move to dis-aggregate power, doesn't take pleasure in being proved right in his assessment that the Carr Government was headed towards privatisation.
He sees the Carr-Egan plot to put his employer on the block as a threat to workmates and the whole NSW community.
PPI, based in Sydney and Newcastle, is the brains behind NSW power.
"When the big stuff falls over, generation or supply, they call us in," Brownette explains. "Last year the expertise of our people saved the state Government $68 million, according to their own figures."
The state-owned corporation employs the engineers, technicians, testers, environmental scientists and associated skills which make NSW generation an industry leader. Without them, critics say, power is inevitably headed towards private ownership.
PPI also contracts to outside suppliers, winning contracts in other states and as far away as Vietnam.
Workers are intensely proud of their achievements.
Doug Stevens, a Sydney-based engineering officer who has probably removed as much asbestos from Australian worksites as anyone, highlights the Eraring Power Station.
"Eraring is built to world's best standards. I don't know if it is still the case but, certainly six months ago, it was recognised as the most efficient generator in the world," Stevens says.
"NSW is going to derive benefits from Eraring for the next 40 years.
"Private utilities don't build to those standards because their first responsibility is to shareholders. Their efficiency is judged by the balance sheet at the next AGM. Big industries, like power, don't operate well under those conditions."
Brownette has a three-word prediction for NSW consumers if they don't stop Labor in its privatisation tracks - "Auckland and California" - and points to current problems in the Victorian industry.
"The power companies there have just gone to the Government asking for a 20 percent price increase. Guess who's going to pay?" he asks.
Brownette says workers have their own concerns over conditions, job security and super but insists these pale against the broader issues for taxpayers and consumers.
The Carr Government promises there will no compulsory redundancies when it flogs off PPI. Brownette, and 75 Newcastle workmates, have signed a pledge, on that basis, not to sell their skills to a private owner. If the business goes, they say, they will sit pat at their university base.
The oil lab chemist says he smells "a big rat" behind the sell-off push.
Not surprising, perhaps, when you consider Egan has already confirmed the need for two new stations to be on line by 2005. Given that construction would take 24-36 months the timing would be propitious for a Government prepared to, say, knock off PPI to a purchaser who might be interested in using the asset to build and run a couple of power stations.
Of course, Carr's Government would never do that, it would be against party policy!
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The peak trade union body in Zimbabwe, the Zimbabwe Congress of Trades Unions (ZCTU), was forced to abandon a meeting this week after Robert Mugabe's police threatened to smash up the meeting with armed riot police.
There are real fears for the leadership of the union movement who have provided most of the organising muscle for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader Morgan Tsvangirai. Tsvangirai is a former ZCTU leader.
Shortly after Robert Mugabe declared himself re-elected this week a ZCTU spokesman told officials at the Brussels-based International Confederation of Free Trades Unions that, "at the moment we are okay, but everybody here is afraid of what will happen now."
The ZCTU had called the meeting to analyse the tainted weekend presidential election and consider the possibility of protesting the voting procedures by organizing a wave of strikes.
Late last night a member of the ZCTU executive contacted the ICFTU to inform them of the police threats.
" Everybody is terrified," a spokesperson for the ZCTU informed the ICFTU after the trade union meeting - scheduled for 3pm Thursday - was banned by the local police force.
In the hours before the meeting, the ZCTU was issued with a notice to the effect that police representatives would be present to monitor the proceedings.
When the ZCTU leadership refused, the police warned that if the meeting went ahead behind closed doors, it risked being broken up by armed riot forces.
Earlier this week the ICFTU General Secretary Guy Ryder wrote to the ILO's Director General Juan Somavia, appealing for an assurance of the safety of trade unionists in Zimbabwe, "in response to widespread and deep fears expressed for their safety as well as for victimisation while discharging their duties."
After hearing of the police threats against the ZCTU on Thursday the ICFTU's Guy Ryder again expressed his grave concern at the continually deteriorating situation.
"The prevention of a trade union meeting is a blatant violation of the ILO conventions, the tyranny of the Zimbabwean regime is unacceptable," Guy Ryder said.
" The harassment and intimidation that marred the electoral campaign is showing no signs of abating, the international community must take decisive action immediately."
The ICFTU will continue to closely monitor the situation and will raise the issue with the ILO Director General, Juan Somavia, if the Zimbabwean government continues to refuse trade unions the freedom to assemble and discuss matter of concern to workers.
by Andrew Casey
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Groups of electricity workers, who are now in the 3rd week of what has been deemed an 'illegal strike', are 'hiding out' around the capital, Seoul, and the rest of the country.
Twice a day they log into union run internet bulletin boards where they pick up topics and materials for group discussion, as well as news about the latest developments in the negotiations with the government and their employer.
More than 5,300 workers are continuing the strike in this way - dispersed around the country in groups of 5 to 10.
Trying to find these workers, and arrest their leaders, are some 10,000 police who have swept through tens of thousands of motel rooms in the 2 to 3 hour vicinity of Seoul.
The traditional Korean strike
Traditional mass strikes in Korea are normally based on thousands of unionised workers gathering at their workplace, university campuses, cathedrals, retreat centres and railway stations where they stay together - camping out - in noisy mass protests.
It is unusual in Korea for striking workers merely to just "stay away" from their work during a dispute - or organise rag-tag picketlines outside their workplace.
Both the moderate national trade union center, the Federation of Korean Trade Unions ( FKTU) and its smaller and militant competitor the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), traditionally use this mass camp-out tactic during strikes.
The major reason behind the Korean union tactic, of gathering the membership into one place for the duration of the strike, is to maintain solidarity and an esprit-de-corps.
These sit-ins and camp-outs are normally accompanied by a great deal of theatrics with chants and flag-waving - and even competitions between small groups for the best new union chant during a particular strike.
This traditional tactic of mass sit-in strikes usually ends with the workers marching back together into their workplace - again with theatrical mass chants and flag-waving - after a negotiated outcome to the dispute.
However, sometimes, the employers are able to convince the police to bring about a 'resolution' to the strike by bringing in the riot police and violently breaking up the sit-ins - especially when the government has declared a strike 'illegal'.
Pictures of bloodied union leaders and workers with broken limbs as a result of beatings by riot police are, unfortunately, all too regularly beamed across the world
An Untested 'Internet Strike'
The electricity power workers union is part of the KCTU.
While the KCTU is the smaller national trade union centre it has been growing faster than the FKTU - in part because the smaller grouping is seen as being more dynamic and web-savvy, using the 'net to organize and gather local and international support.
In the current anti-privatisation campaign both the gas workers and rail workers unions have threatened to change allegiances from the FKTU to the KCTU because of their dynamism and militancy.
So this time the striking electrical power workers have chosen a new, untested, course of action to continue their 'illegal' strike of dispersing workers in small groups- rather than keeping them together.
Each day, the power workers union and the KCTU provide the striking workers with topics and materials for group discussion and news of developments in the negotiations through the union's website.
And through mobile phone contact, the situation rooms are able to ascertain the well being of all the striking workers, including whether any of the striking workers have returned to work.
Striking workers are able to leave messages for each other and their families on the bulletin boards in the website from the easily available 'internet cafes' wired with broadband (usually for internet games).
Situation Rooms' Sends Info
Korea is famous for being one of the most wired societies in the world - with cheap and easy access to the WWW via 'internet cafes' on almost every city and town corner.
As well close to seventy per cent of Korean households will have high speed connections to the internet by the end of this year, with government plans to have ninety-percent of households with high speed connections by the end of 2005.
The local media is reporting, with fascination, this new-style use of the internet by Korean workers organizing a prolonged strike.
The strike leaders have set up a number of "situation rooms" at the Myongdong Catholic Cathedral, the KCTU and the KPSU offices where union staff are in regular contact with the "dispersed" striking workers.
From these 'situation rooms' they link up with all the groups of striking workers who have taken "submarines" twice a day through mobile phones and the union's website.
Govt Tries To Shutdown Union Websites
The Korean government hasn't been blind to the effective use by the union movement of the modem.
On March 4, the police applied to the "Information Communication Ethics Committee" of the Ministry of Information and Communication requesting permission to shut down the website of the electricity workers union saying that the "website is being used to instigate illegal activities, including delivery of 'struggle orders', assisting the hide-out efforts of the leaders of the union wanted for arrest, and the continuation of the illegal strike."
In response, the KCTU has set up a mirror site of the electricity workers union's website as a directory of the KCTU's own website at http://www.nodong.org/baljeon.
In order for the police to block the striking workers access to their website, it would have to shut down the KCTU's website.
The KCTU is also looking for methods to set up mirror sites overseas in case the police take the extreme act of shutting down KCTU's own site.
KCTU Cyber-Action Plan To Paralyse Govt Websites
KCTU has issued a special campaign directive in the event of the government's attempt to shut down the union's website.
It will call for a concerted cyber-action to paralyse various government websites, including that of the Presidential Palace Blue House, the National Assembly, the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy, and the National Police Agency.
The unprecedented internet "guerrilla" strike tactics of the electricity workers union has enabled the workers to continue the strike without the constant threat and danger of a riot police raid hovering over their heads.
It relies, apart from the availability of means of effective communication, on the strength of camaraderie, discipline, and confidence amongst the workers and between the members and the leadership.
by Neale Towart
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We are often told that the nature of work and industrial relations is changing. Manifestations of this are the increase in casual and part employment and a corresponding decline in permanent secure work, the decline of lifetime careers as people in some areas find themselves able to switch from sector to sector, and employers change the nature of jobs, which acts against the steady career path. The nature of the contract of employment at the workplace has changed, with the award system seen by some as unable to cope with the flexibility required, and even enterprise agreements being pressured by the legislative provision of individual agreements.
Unions appear to be big losers in this change, with membership levels having declined drastically since 1980, and many saying that the collective approach to the employment relationship is finished.
Structural change perhaps means that the historic social contract which can be traced back to the Harvester judgement of 1907 and also to the commitment to full employment put in place following World War II has been wiped forever.
This collection of research and commentary looks at likely future directions for work, employment, industrial relations and social relations.
A healthy corrective to the talk about all change being new comes from Greg Patmore. He shows that many changes hailed as new and transformative are in fact recycling of old ideas. A lack of historical perspective leads to a blindness to what has gone before and mistakes are repeated, experiences forgotten, This is exaggerated too by the waves of redundancy and outsourcing, which further rob organisations of institutional memory. Also historical studies of ongoing workplace issues such as the fight for equal pay, local area employment, green bans show that not only the traditional players (unions, employers, government) are affected and affect workplace issues. Other groups such as women's groups, conservation groups and local communities can impact significantly even if only temporarily on the world of work. This is crucial for unions to remember as they fight to maintain and reinvent their role in society.
Unions have been developing new forms of workplace activism and taking innovative approaches to industrial laws, in response to the dramatic rewrite of industrial laws undertaken by the Coalition government. Ron McCallum says that some of the changes reflect increasing concerns about safety in the workplace, and also the growing individualism of recent decades, which he claims has displaced collectivism. He feels that crafting labour laws to protect the increasing number of individual contractors performing employee-like functions is imperative (given his role in drafting NSW and Qld IR laws he should have been able to put into effect some of these ideas). Suzanne Jamieson comments on McCallums views, which seem to give undue weight to the idea of an equal of negotiation power in these contract situations. She says that mutual social obligation is giving way to increased one-on-one subordination. Ethics and human rights issues inform her commentary, as she all too briefly comments on the withdrawal of the state, and the failure of laws to deal with many discrimination and OHS issues.
Michael Crosby presents the case for the organising approach to revitalising unions, based on a huge amount of practical experience and studies in Australia and the USA. He acknowledges, quoting a New Zealand unionist, that "unions don't have a god-given right to exist". They are have been declining and need to reinvent themselves.
He argues that increased social inequality will be the result if unionism dies. Already as it has declined we have seen the gap between rich and poor widening, and workers in casual jobs and in non-unionised sectors fall further behind in pay and conditions.
So society pays dearly for the decline in unionism, one of the fundamentals of our democracy, part of the social contract. He says that a new style of unionism based around active workplace delegates and large rank and file committees is essential.
This new form of organising and activism does not come cheap. It is based on a US model, but unfortunately for Australian unions, it doesn't come cheap. US unions might have a low percentage membership, but raw numbers mean that union coffers are a bit fuller over there.
Crosby emphasises the need for union leadership to take the debate to members, to get them involved in the changing culture. Workers do not want to be in perpetual argument with their employers. Unions do not see a constant industrial war as the way to renewal. Rather they want workers to enjoy their work and empowering them in their own workplaces in a relationship of equals with employers is the vision.
Commenting on Crosby's paper Rae Cooper acknowledges the value of the workplace activists approach, but questions the extent to which unions (so far at least) have been able to enthuse and involve their membership in the transformation required (Cooper has recently published in the Journal of Industrial relations a case study of a NSW union examining just this issue). Cooper sees members being sceptical of union organising and empowerment, partly because they have been constantly sold short by their bosses in claims for more participation in decision making at work. Cooper feels that the organising model is too much top down and not enough consultation with members about the process of change. Members realise the need for change but feel left out of the process of deciding what it is to be.
Stephen Long echoes this view. Shifting responsibility to delegates and a union membership fee increase to pay for new approaches may not be popular with members. Members may feel they are paying the union officials but are then told that they can do lots of the bargaining and union work at their workplaces. They see the fees as payment for service, even if they agree that activism is required.
Despite this, Long says that the organising approach is probably the best way of re-inventing unions, with a combination of service, organising and social movement activism, with strategic use of arbitration. Some see a quasi-religious tone to the appeals of those pushing the organising model. Long sees this as appropriate and inevitable, as it is needed to maintain optimism about the future of unions.
Other contributors to this rich collection include Bettina Cass, Ed Davis and Alison Morehead on work and family practices, Mark Wooden, John Burgess and Joe Isaac on the changing labour market.
Ron Callus and Russell Lansbury summarising major changes in work and employment in Australia an globally. They conclude that unless changes are made to the status of workers, regulation or working time and the pooling of risks and responsibilities in regard to employment, there is likely to be a further deterioration in the quality of jobs and relations of work.
WORKING FUTURES: The changing nature of work and employment relations in Australia. edited by Ron Callus and Russell D Lansbury (Annandale: Federation Press, 2002)
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Muhammad Ali first entered my consciousness when I was nine years old. Sent down to get the Sunday papers from the corner shop I was faced with the news banner 'Draft Dodger Ali Stripped Of World Title'. For a young Kiwi kid deeply imbued with the ideology of sport it was a serious challenge to understand why this supreme athlete at the peak of his powers would sacrifice the prime years of his fighting life in a political stand against war.
Grappling with this confronting thought lead to another. Did Ali's pronouncements about the plight of black people have relevance in my own country. White New Zealand in the 1960s and 70s, smug and content in its fragile economic prosperity, was deeply deluded by its own Orwellian propaganda as a happy little multiracial society. The reality - that beneath the wafer thin surface was a seething racial tension borne of oppression - wasn't hard to fathom once the idea was put.
That Ali could sow the seeds of a political consciousness in a skinny little white boy in far off, isolated New Zealand is a small example of the extraordinary global and political impact of this human phenomenon.
Of course his real impact and his substantial political significance has always been as a symbol and warrior of black consciousness. This film, makes an admirable attempt to explain Ali's life in this context - that he was part of the vanguard of black leaders that tried to liberate their people from the self-hatred that underpins racism and makes it effective. It's all here - Malcolm X, Martin Luther King and their murders. Birmingham, the state surveillance, the whole racial cocktail that characterised America's brand of apartheid in the 1960s. For many people, especially the young, Ali is seen in his present state - as a physically debilitated, genial old man revered for reasons hazy and sports obscure. This bio will do something to introduce Ali, the political activist to new generations still living in a world populated with racist demons. And what style, courage and wit he brought to that role! Ali had an almost incomprehensible political impact but he was also so much fun.
Ali as the ultimate boxer is sketched thinly but this bio highlights the two milestone bouts against the two badass braulers Sonny Liston and George Foreman that bookended his career. There were always an Ali the Fighter Mark 1 and Mark 2 and these fights reasonably represent each. Ali Mark 1, before his suspension, was the perfect boxer - super quick to be almost untouchable, an arrogant style with hands held low and a mobility that defied his bulk. The young Ali was pure boxing brilliance, backing up his bravado with breathtaking speed of hand and foot and sublime skills. The bravery that Ali the Elder later depended on was also there in abundance in that fight against Liston when he first won the crown aged 21. The Foreman bout saw Ali, slower but nail-hard and with the bagful of fight tricks employ the biggest gamble in sporting history, the rope-a-dope, to cement his sporting greatness. Raw courage, strength of will and ring cunning combined to topple the goliath.
What I've always loved about Ali is that he showed what you can do with a life. 'I'm not afraid to be what I want to be,' he said with pride. Martin Luther King's maxim that the arc of history tends towards justice should resonate personally with The Greatest seeing his transformation from public enemy to Hollywood hero.
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The Fox-Lew consortium says it has a proud history of attempting to save Australian institutions that are clearly doomed. The pair has assured Dr Hollingworth that they will give him every impression that his position is safe, before unexpectedly abandoning him at the eleventh hour.
"We've told Peter we're absolutely committed to making this deal work," said the wealthy Melbourne businessmen in a joint statement. "Not only will we save his job and rescue his reputation, but we'll also be the first to deny any responsibility when it all comes unstuck."
Fox-Lew said the rescue bid is dependent on securing vital leases at Yarralumla. The deal will also rely on substantial co-operation from the Commonwealth government. "We're relying on them not to sack him," Hollingworth's administrators said.
Lindsay Fox said the government has so far indicated its support for keeping Hollingworth in the air, but questioned whether their rhetoric might not contradict their real intention of keeping their options open and secretly wishing for a different outcome.
Formally launching their rescue bid yesterday afternoon, Lindsay Fox and Solomon Lew characteristically put on T-shirts that were far too small for them, and jointly squeezed their heads out of a tiny church window for a photo opportunity.
Analysts claimed that the rescue bid may fail due to a market oversaturated by gaffe ridden liars.
"The government alone can sustain the public demand for leaders who continually let them down," said one analyst.
A rival rescue bid for Hollingworth by Richard Branson's Virgin company is now unlikely to proceed, amid concerns that Virgin and Anglican Bishops rarely go together.
by David Peetz
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Psst...wanna see some photos?
With these I've really scored!
They show a certain High Court judge
Threw children overboard!
He wrote a book that proved that
Revolution was his aim!
I've got it and...and ...and the fool
Can't even spell his name!
Now just because the photos are so
Ever slightly blurred,
And the documents look dodgey,
I'm sure you'll take my word.
My running dogs and heifers
Libel all who disagree.
I'm the King of Coward's Castle
And you can't catch me!
David Peetz
[email protected]
It was the mid-eighties and the super-powers were facing each other off with the geo-politics of MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction).
In our tie-dyed T-shirts and masseur sandals, we'd debate US foreign policy with lapsed CIA operatives who Bay of Tonkin incident was a set-up.
We took our peacenik signs down to Woolloomooloo Bay when the USS Missouri was in town, but got stampeded by the Mums and Dads taking their kids to climb all over the military hardware as if it was a fun park.
And every year we would march through the streets on Palm Sunday, along with the families and churches and community groups who believed there must be an alternate way to run the world other than threatening to blow each other up.
Without realising it at the time we were arguing for globalisation before it had become a term to be demonised. We believed we were all in it together and no cowboy on an A-bomb had the right to end the party for all of us.
We weren't very cool and we weren't very electorally successful, but we were right.
When the Cold War ended so did the super-power face off and the imperative of the movement seem to be resolved. The marches stopped and Palm Sunday just became a weekend before the Easter break.
Now more than a decade on, we have a US President drawing up a nuclear hit list against a swag of 'rogue' states that may or may not have their own capability.
In the post September 11 environment we have a military-industrial complex again in the ascendancy, with a US administration committed to expanded defence spending.
We have an Australian government elected on 'border security', now shown to have manipulated the issue and misrepresented its advice from the military to feed the populous;' fear and ignorance.
Underneath it all we have forgotten the truth that drove the peace movement of the eighties - we are all on this planet together and until we can show compassion to the Other we can not expect security at home.
That's the message behind the Palm Sunday march and it is why the organisers are to be congratulated for reviving the event. I look forward to marching with you on March 24.
Peter Lewis
Editor
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Although there has been much concerned discussion in Australia about the events of September 11 2001 and their aftermath, Australian society still has not fully embarked upon the process of engaging in rigorous debate about the implications of those events, including our involvement in the 'war on terrorism.' On one hand this is understandable, given the shocking nature of the events of September 11 (perhaps especially to those living in nations, like Australia, whose modern history does not include organised terrorist activity, and whose 'mainstream' population has been largely untouched by acts of politically-motivated violence). On the other hand this is a matter of concern, given the potentially serious international and domestic consequences of both the September 11 attacks themselves and the nature of the subsequent US-led 'war on terrorism' - consequences that demand scrutiny and debate.
Loyalty and Independence
The post-September 11 environment has been characterised by the 'for us or against us' approach of the Bush Administration, followed by the announcement of its 'axis of evil' agenda. Again, apart from and until recent criticisms by some European political leaders, there has been a dearth of critical response to this approach within nations allied with the US in the 'war against terrorism.' Perhaps this is unsurprising, given the apparent implication in the rhetoric of the Bush Administration that dissent on the terrorism question necessarily amounts to (punishable) disloyalty. But there is a distinction between loyalty and blind obedience.
The absence of a sustained critical debate is unfortunate because there is a genuine and proper basis for Australia to support a strong and co-ordinated international response against terrorism. It is inevitable that the United States will be at the forefront of any such effort. We should be glad of that. Australia (and the left within Australia) need have no qualms about sharing in genuine efforts to combat terrorism.
However, the kind of unilateralism inherent in the Bush Administration's approach to fighting terrorism, and its possible expansion to address other aspects of the United States' larger geo-political agenda, is not inevitably in Australia's interests. Do we want to support a United States attack on Iraq? On Iran? On North Korea? Do we share the United States' apparent determination to proceed with its missile defence system and with an expansion of its battlefield tactical nuclear capacity? Do we side with the US in any conflict between China and Taiwan? Paul Keating's recent speech included a criticism of the desirability, and workability, of unilateralism as a model of strategic or economic leadership in an age of globalisation. In relation to the current Australia-US relationship he commented:
... for much of the 20th century Australia had a British century. I hoped that the 21st century would be an Australian century. But John Howard and his conservative supporters are determined to make it an American century by virtually surrendering any real strategic policy independence to the United States and doing it unthinkingly. Surely our sense of nation demands that we have our own role in world affairs, and not allow ourselves to be cast as an extra in the stage play of American unilateralism.
Unless Australia develops more independence from the Bush Administration in the post-September 11 environment, Australians may well pay the price of attaining less, rather than more, national and personal security:
� It is possible that a too-close identification with that administration's analysis of and response to the September 11 events will make Australia part of the strategic target of terrorist activities directed at people or places seen to represent US interests, to a greater extent than was the case before September 11.
� Failure to develop a more independent approach may make us complicit with exposing Australian nationals (wherever they may be) to inappropriate attention and/or punishment by the security, military and law enforcement organs of the US. This argument has been raised already in the ongoing debate surrounding the fate of David Hicks, but could also apply in the case of Australians accused of a far wider range of behaviour deemed by the Bush Administration to be against US interests.
� It may not be in Australia's interests not to become too entwined in advancing aspects of the foreign policy agenda of the Bush Administration, at least insofar as they were subject to considerable domestic and international criticism before the events of September 11. This is particularly relevant to our relationship with China and our near neighbours.
� It is possible that Australia's security and foreign policy interests will not be consistent with support for unilateral US military action against Iraq, Iran or North Korea. What, if any, undertakings regarding prior consultation have we, or other allies, sought or been provided.
Interestingly it is former Prime Ministers Paul Keating and Malcolm Fraser and former leader of the Opposition John Hewson, rather than any current senior member of the government or opposition parties, who have begun to place these and other concerns about Australia's seemingly inevitable identification with the United States' foreign policy on the public agenda.
I reject the idea that those sharing such concerns are expressing knee jerk anti-US sentiment. Automatic anti-Americanism has always been absurd, and remains grossly so in the wake of September 11. Yet the assumption that Australia's interests will at all times remain the same as those of the US is implausible. The terms of our engagement in the war on terror needs ongoing hard headed debate. This is not treason. Pretending that we do not need to discuss such questions will not make the dilemmas and hard choices that are looming for Australia go away.
Domestic Anti-terrorist Legislation
The most important domestic consequence in the aftermath of September 11 has been yesterday's introduction of the Howard Government's package of anti-terrorist legislation. The legislation is complex and includes the Security Legislation Amendment Bill (Terrorism) Bill 2002, the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism Bill 2002, the Criminal Code Amendment (Suppression of Terrorist Bombings) Bill 2002, the Border Security Legislation Amendment Bill 2002 and the Telecommunications Interception Bill 2002. The provisions include measures that will permit the Attorney General to proscribe organisations and outlaw membership of them . An extension of ASIO's powers, foreshadowed to include the right to detain incommunicado for 48 hours people, not themselves suspected of having committed an offence, but who may have relevant information, is not included in this package, but the Attorney General has said he will introduce that Bill next week.
It is inevitable that debate about Australia's proposed anti-terrorism legislation will include comparative reference to laws of this kind passed since September 11 in other Western English-speaking democracies whose legal systems, like Australia's, stand broadly in the common law tradition, especially the United Kingdom and the US. But, unlike both these nations, Australia's domestic legal framework lacks anything approaching a comprehensive 'bill of rights' against which measures restrictive of individual liberties can be readily challenged. Because of this parliamentary and public scrutiny of proposed domestic anti-terrorism laws in Australia needs to be stringent. The political and historical backdrop against which domestic anti-terrorism laws have been enacted in the United Kingdom (specifically, the bombing campaign mounted in mainland Britain and Northern Ireland by the IRA) and the US (specifically, the bombing of the World Trade Centre by Islamic terrorists in 1993, the destruction of the Federal building in Oklahoma City by right-wing extremists Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols in 1995, a range of attacks in recent years on US diplomatic or military personnel and citizens abroad, and the September 11 2001 attacks on the World Trade Centre, Pentagon and Washington) is also very different. This difference may lead those countries to adopt legislative approaches that are not appropriate or required in the Australian context.
Spokespeople for civil liberties groups and prominent members of the legal profession have been the most vocal on this issue, urging the Government both to justify any measures of this kind and to ensure proper safeguards are included, to ensure an appropriate balance between 'security' and 'liberty'. The Law Council of Australia has argued that the onus is on the Government to ensure, and establish that, any domestic anti-terrorist laws pass three crucial tests:
� Why are existing powers inadequate to combat the potential terrorist threat?
� Will the additional powers strike the right balance between public security and the rights of the individual?
� Are there adequate safeguards to protect against abuse of the powers?
The Bills that were introduced by the Howard government will be scrutinised, in the first instance, by a Senate Legislation Committee. Parliament must insist, as a minimum, that the basic tests put forward by the Law Council of Australia are satisfied before giving passage to them.
'Security', 'the national interest ' and 'terrorism' - a content-free zone?
One potential consequence of the post-September 11 environment risks jeopardising full and frank public debate about the content and desirability of proposed domestic anti-terrorism laws. This is the risk that the blanket use of terms such as 'security', 'the national interest' and 'terrorism' will be resorted to, in order to justify measures that are, at least partially, politically motivated; in the sense that they give the current Government a political advantage vis-�-vis organisations and individuals who oppose it or its political agendas. The risk of this is greatest when this language of security/terror is used without specific justification and explanation. Such terms can become a 'content-free zone' into which almost any cause, organisation or individual can be inserted, and thereby characterised as a threat to Australia and/or its allies.
This would not be a new phenomenon in Australia - recall, for example, the anti-Communist rhetoric and political measures of the Menzies era, and Australia's history of interning 'enemy aliens' living in Australia in times of war. Nor it is a new phenomenon elsewhere. Notorious and extreme historical examples internationally include the uses of propaganda and targeting of political opponents as security threats by ultra-fascist states such as Nazi Germany and Franco's Spain, ultra-communist states such as China during the Cultural Revolution and the Soviet Bloc under Stalin, and ultra-nationalist states such as apartheid South Africa and the emerging nations of the former Yugoslavia in the 1980s and 1990s.
There are worrying signs today that tolerance of the suppression of dissent is increasing. Amnesty International has expressed concern that many countries have already seized on the events of September 11 to justify action that would otherwise have been condemned. Egypt has clamped down on public gatherings and demonstrations and detained opponents without trial under emergency legislation. China has intensified its crackdown on Uighur opponents of Chinese rule in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region claiming their opponents who they accuse of being 'separatists' were linked with international terrorism. Malaysia is claiming the events of September 11 justify it retaining its notorious Internal Security Act. The usual allies of Amnesty International in condemning these excesses now condone them or stand mute as they undertake, or at least consider, similar actions.
There is of course a world of difference between, on the one hand, an essentially liberal/democratic/open society that introduces necessary and appropriate security measures to counter real threats to the safety of its citizens and institutions; and, on the other, an essentially illiberal/totalitarian/police state that uses security measures as a front for implementing the political agendas of the powers that be, in the process turning its citizenry and institutions against one another. Between these two extremes, however, lie many shades of grey. One of the greatest challenges of the post-September 11 environment is discerning exactly where along the spectrum between liberalism and repression any proposed domestic security measures will move our society, and in the process shift societal norms regarding what is an acceptable level of surveillance, detention and punishment of organisations and individuals whose behaviour is deemed subversive.
Notwithstanding historical precedents here and abroad, there is no doubt that contemporary Australian society stands firmly towards the liberal rather than the repressive end of this spectrum. We cannot take this for granted however. The 'shock reaction' to the events of September 11 has created a kind of critical vacuum that could be readily filled by draconian legislative or executive action.
We need both strenuous parliamentary scrutiny of any proposed new anti-terrorism legislation and the inclusion of a 'sunset clause' in any such measure to give us some critical distance and the opportunity of later reassessment. Executive action may prove more difficult to check, however, as the recent furore surrounding the 'children overboard' affair illustrates. The most worrying aspect of that affair is the role played by senior public servants - or, more correctly, the role they did not play - in allegedly failing to challenge the accuracy of a version of events used by the Government to considerable political effect before the Federal election. Former Prime Minister Paul Keating recently argued this incident represents the consequences of a political agenda characterised by attacks on the integrity of a range of key institutions upon whose effective functioning a civilised society depends - such as the High Court, the Australian Public Service, the Australian Defence Forces, the national broadcaster and the position of Governor General - and that the net result is a moral depletion of Australian society that will have long-term costs.
Any Australian response to the events of September 11 demands an acute appreciation of the vital 'check and balance' roles played by an independent judiciary, public service and media in protecting Australian democracy, and perhaps most especially at times of political or national crisis. We should demand they uphold their institutional independence. We are entitled to expect this. But we are far too complacent if we take it for granted.
Spin and Fear
The immediate and understandable reaction to the confronting events of September 11 was a heightened sense of national and personal insecurity. But as more time passes and as it becomes clearer to our political leaders what is, and what is not, a source of legitimate fear in relation to those events, the more their consequent responsibility grows to speak honestly--not only to warn but also to reassure.
Many, myself included, believe the Howard Government has failed to meet this obligation. To date, public discussion of this important question has been mainly confined to questions relating to the Government's treatment and portrayal of asylum seekers - especially at the times of the Tampa incident, September 11 itself, the 'child throwing' incident, and during recent unrest at Woomera detention centre. Critics of Australia's approach to asylum seekers have variously accused the Government of vilifying refugees by having recourse to racial/cultural stereotypes (especially anti-Muslim prejudice); suppressing and distorting information about the plight and behaviour of refugees to render the Australian public less sympathetic towards them; and inappropriately inferring linkages between asylum seekers and terrorist groups. Critics have argued that the Government accordingly manipulated many Australians' subjectively real but objectively irrational fears about the 'threat' posed to Australia by 'foreigners' - fears fanned by feelings of insecurity arising both from the events of September 11 and from the economic/social uncertainties that stem from globalisation and economic rationalism . On the available evidence it is hard to escape the conclusion that the Howard government sought to harden Australians' views against a relatively defenceless target group, to advance a border protection policy agenda designed to appeal to those views, and thereby shore up its own electoral support. These manipulated fears have had a destructive effect on the cohesion and tolerance of Australia's multicultural society. Rising hostility towards Middle Eastern asylum seekers in particular has overspilled to be directed against members of these communities already living within Australia, and indeed against members of other NESB communities, increasingly characterised as 'the enemy within.'
To date, however, sceptical responses to the Government's claims about the extent and nature of any terrorist threat to Australia have not extended beyond the asylum seeker issue. It remains to be seen whether broader scepticism will be in order. It may be. The Howard Government has shown itself brutally willing to use wedge politics. We should not be surprised if they use this strategy to justify measures the Australian public would normally reject as infringements of their civil liberties. If the Government applies the kind of 'spin tactics' it used against asylum seekers to groups or individuals within Australian society, in order to portray them as security threats, we will not be able to say we were not warned. Australians should be vigilant to oppose any steps down that path. The difficulty of altering or correcting mainstream perceptions of issues, groups or individuals once they have become established in the public mind should not be underestimated.
This speech was delivered to a Pluto Institute Foprum this week
by Jim Marr
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As a nation we've watched on as sporting identities ran the gamut of life's experiences, from god-awful embarrassment to the immense satisfaction of hard yakka rewarded.
Icons, Wayne Carey, Andrew Johns and Shane Warne held up mirrors to our condition.
Only in a world awash with corporate bullshit, could sections of the media make a case for denying Andrew Johns the Kangaroo captaincy he so richly deserves on the basis of an argument with a team-mate, settled without resort to fisticuffs or anything or the sort.
Fair dinkum, what planet do these blokes inhabit?
The reality is that the ever-diminishing streak of larrikin in Johns is a point of identification with fans even if the suits at NRL headquarters don't understand. Maybe, because they don't understand.
This is, after-all, the sport that still theoretically eulogises past Test captains, Bob Fulton and Wally Lewis.
Johns got a smack in the gob from purveyors of an alien culture just as many others from his background do every day. His sport won't realise its potential until it celebrates Johns, person and player, any more than society will bloom until it recognises the thousands of dinkum Aussies prepared to make contributions on their own terms.
Wayne Carey earned headlines for succumbing to that most male of indulgences, the wandering willie. The media concentrated on his football club to the near exclusion of the universal reality that those most deeply hurt will be the families involved, not least his own.
Many people live with the humiliation of similar misadventures, very few though, in Carey's defence, with the whole country cut in on the act.
Then there was the irrepressible, sleek, new-look Shane Warne trundling his way through 70 probing overs in a man-of-the-match performance in South Africa. Deprived by time and injury of the freak factor which made the old-model leggie virtually unplayable, this was a victory for the tradesman, albeit a great one, putting in for his workmates.
Warne celebrated his marathon with well-chosen words that would resonate with most. He likened the effort to a big night on the turps - "you get your third and fourth wind," he explained.
"It gets past midnight and when you get to two o'clock in the morning, you get your third wind. You just start to find a bit extra."
On ya, Warney.
Jockeys, too, are human no matter what you might think on a blistering Rosehill day when the only thing you're losing faster than sweat is next week's rent.
They'll prove it next Sunday when they go in to bat for Alan Cowie, thrown from a favourite at the Gold Coast in January and now facing life as a paraplegic.
The 34-year-old is supported by his wife and year-old son as well as fellow Queensland hoops. Sydney-based jockeys will lend their support with a New Zealand-Australia cricket match at Kensington Oval to raise funds.
Slap-bang in the middle of the autumn carnival some of the biggest names in the game are padding up. Glenn Boss, Darren Beadman and Chris Munce head the Aussie line-up, while Brian York, Shane Treweek, Jimmy and Larry Cassidy will appear for the Kiwis. Greg Childs has also confirmed he will stay for the match if he has engagements on the previous day's Golden Slipper programme.
Such matches are rarely devoid of controversy and Australian skipper Mark DeMontfort is already putting question marks over the bowling actions of opponents York and Terry Marney.
New Zealand sources suggest the allround skills of apprentice Richie Whitworth will bamboozle DeMontfort's men.
The match, supported by the AWU and NSW Jockeys Association, has a serious purpose. Race riders, like construction workers, operate in a dangerous environment and are similarly disposed towards helping each other out in tough times.
Forget the money and hype, sport continues to reflect the lives we lead.
Fingering The Trigger
Former Texan oilman George Bush is a dominator on a global scale. He can, and does, dominate for his country and, as the man says, the rest of youse can join up or take a jump. Dissatisfied with ripping up years of international work on climate control, trade policy and missile tests, Bush's Pentagon unleashes another potentially devastating policy u-turn.
The Pentagon argues the US should plan to nuke seven countries, namely Russia, China, Iraq, North Korea, Iran, Libya and Syria, and consider first-strike attacks against states that do not possess nuclear weapons.
Bush reinforces the US' right to attack countries manufacturing "weapons of mass destruction" leaving commentators perplexed about how he might sell the policy domestically, given that the US is far and away the world's biggest producer of such armaments.
Under new security measures, designed to protect democracy, more than 1000 people have now been detained without trial in the US. Some have spent more than a month, incommunicado, in solitary confinement.
Meanwhile, arms sales to dictatorships in and around the Middle East escalate despite lessons that might be drawn out of earlier deals with, for argument's sake, the Taliban and Saddam Hussein. Still, they could argue it's not as overtly pro-terrorist as the money and hardware traditionally poured into places like Nicargua, El Salvador, Chile, Cuba and the like.
Dog Man Takes Flight
Chris "the Dog Man" Corrigan isn't quite in the Bush class but he is well on the way to dominating Australian transport. A masterly business strategy, involving sitting back while Ansett crashed, delivers half of Virgin Blue and most Ansett assets to his Patrick Corporation.
Virgin Blue fits nicely into the portfolio of the former merchant banker and share broker who, with massive Government support, already controls large swathes of the nation's port and rail freight operations.
ACTU chief Greg Combet urges unionists to put dogs, balaclavas and the waterfront stoush behind them and deal with Corrigan's new ventures on their merits.
Mercenaries Frozen Out
Meanwhile, efforts of industrial mercenaries to dominate the Australian waterfront, under the flag of the afore-mentioned Corrigan, peter out in the federal court. The revelation that one of two litigants, Christopher Murray, had been an undischarged bankrupt for two years up to January, sees their case frozen.
The would-be wharfies, foiled in their 1998 efforts to take jobs from MUA members, had turned their attentions to Patricks, the National Farmers Federation and a range of other one-time allies in a bid to turn a quid from the debacle.
Parties to the case argued that the plaintiffs were already unable to meet legal costs awarded against them during proceedings.
Hell in the Holy Lands
Israel ups the ante in its battle with Palestinians, pouring troops and tanks into refugee camps on the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Twenty two Palestinians are killed, hundreds wounded and hundreds more blindfolded and led away for interrogation.
Israeli military analysts say the aim is to win a "public" victory prior to negotiations. Palestinian sources pledge more death, by suicide bomber, in the Jewish state.
Israel lifts Palestinian leader Yasser Arrafat's house arrest but thoughts of a goodwill gesture are dismissed by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's office which insists "he can go from cage to cage, from the cage in Ramallah to the cage in Gaza. That's it."
The UN demands Israel's withdrawal and that Palestinians cease their attacks on Israeli citizens.
Foxtel Spin on Pay
Pay TV operator Foxtel fires its first shot in its battle to convince regulators that its Optus takeover will not be bad for competition. The company, comprising Telstra, News Ltd and PBL shareholders, explains its programming plan and the proposal for Telstra to bundle telephony, internet and tv services.
Under the proposed deal, struck last week, Optus will carry Foxtel content and Foxtel will shoulder Optus' $600 million US programming liability.
Viewers and major sporting bodies are said to be very afraid.
Beware the Bill Factor
Meanwhile, across the road and around a couple of corners, vexed South Sydney officials consider the prospect of returning to the big-time in a match controlled by Bill Harrigan.
Few referees have ever dominated the ebb and flow of footy, not to mention numbers on the scoreboard, like Harrigan - pilloried by Souths president, George Piggins, in his recently released autobiography.
Office tipsters, rusty after a summer of cricket and racing, would be well advised to bear the Harrigan factor in mind.
Mugabe Bowls Opposition
Freedom-fighter turned bully boy, Robert Mugabe, gets another six years in charge of crumbling Zimbabwe, courtesy of a hotly-contested election result. Officials award victory to the 78-year-old encumbent despite widespread claims of intimidation and vote-rigging.
Opponent Morgan Tsvangirai wins large majorities in urban areas where voters queue for days to cast their ballots but Mugabe cleans up in the countryside where intimidation is said to be at its worst.
The ICFTU fears for trade unionists, central to the opposition campaign. Australians, by and large, wonder what it will mean for Zimbabwean cricket, gurgling along at a very low ebb.
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