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Issue No. 135 | 10 May 2002 |
The Costs of War
Interview: Squaring Off Industrial: Heroes Betrayed History: At The Coalface International: Wobblies With Chinese Characters? Politics: Dancing with Trotsky Economics: You Are What You Eat Poetry: Alexander's Bragtime Band Satire: Stott Despoja Celebrates Engagement With Minor Party Review: Painting Paradise
Gun-Runners Threaten Aussie Coast Kings Cross Date For Commissioner Cole Sunbeam Irons Out Sydney Grand Mother NSW Libs Open to Abbott Takeover Terror Bill Needs More Work, ACTU Burma Release Fails to Blunt Campaign East Timorese MPs oppose Timor Sea Arrangement Airport Screeners Face Men in Jocks Unions Push into Regional Queensland
The Soapbox The Locker Room Postcard Bosswatch Week in Review Tool Shed
No Choice Who Rules Australia? No Wrap for Song Comp Abbott's Contempt
Labor Council of NSW |
News Sunbeam Irons Out Sydney Grand Mother
After 30 years service at the company�s Campsie plant she was fired because of an injury sustained on the job and denied $70,000 in redundancy entitlements. Labor Council is informing affiliates of Sunbeam's behaviour in the lead-up to Mother's Day. ETU secretary, Bernie Riordan, said Karagiorga had had an unblemished work record before injuring her back and shoulder in May, 2000. Eleven months later the pain became unbearable and she filed a successful workers compensation claim. Karagiorga went back on a return to work program and the company steadily increased her hours. Then, in January of this year with the plant facing closure, Sunbeam sacked her, citing the injury. Riordan said Sunbeam had refused to pay $500 for a medical report it had insisted on, which declared her fit for employment.
"It is clear Sunbeam fired Rina after 30 years of loyal service, purely to escape their obligation to pay her her entitlement," Riordan said. The Karagiorga case, and Mother's Day, highlight Sunbeam's diminished Australian links. The company used to brand itself the Great Australian at this time of the year but, more recently, has stripped Campsie of plant and machinery for domestic appliance manufacture and shipped them to China. Irons and frying pans carrying the Sunbeam brand no longer provide wages for Australians and the entire Campsie operation is marked for closure on May 15. ETU organiser Steve Robinson has watched the site being gutted over recent years. "Sunbeam is as good as dead as an Australian operation," he told Workers Online. "All the appliances you associate with the brand are now made offshore. "They decided they could get a better return for shareholders by slashing labour costs and went ahead without any consultations."
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