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Issue No. 136 | 17 May 2002 |
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Modern Labour
Interview: Licking the Wounds Industrial: The Accidental Tourist Unions: Stars And Stripes International: The Un-Promised Land History: Mate Against Mate Politics: Reith's Gong Poetry: You've Got a Friend Review: War on Terror: Now Showing Satire: Burmese Regime Makes Genuine Commitment To Pretence Of Change
The Soapbox The Locker Room Bosswatch Postcard Week in Review
 Gangsta RapMore May Day Hate MailWhat Women WantChucking a WobblyIs Caustic Costello the Despot of Despair?East Timor: Independent Or Mendicant?
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The Soapbox Border Solidarity
************* It's been dubbed the khaki budget. It follows the khaki election and is a fitting name for Federal Treasurer Peter Costello's seventh budget, which has increased spending on defence by a massive 10 per cent, bringing total defense spending to $14.1 billion. While trying to justify the defence spending at the expense of Australia's more vulnerable - disability pensioners and the ill - the Treasurer appealed to people to remember September the 11th and the real threat upon the security of our national borders. The Treasurer told us that out of the massive $14.1 million defence purse some of the funding will be used to tackle the issue of people smuggling. About $200 million will go towards a detention center on Christmas Island with an extra $123 million a year to run it. It's all part of the so-called pacific solution. But herein lies one of the Howard Government's greatest inconsistencies on border and national security. This inconsistency also ties in with what I want to talk about - the recent CSL Yarra shipping dispute, which has involved the Australian Workers' Union. There are two critical issues at the heart of the CSL Yarra dispute. The first, which has had much media coverage, is about protecting jobs and Australian employment conditions from ships of convenience. If foreign crew can work in Australian waters on previously flagged Australian ships where will the poaching of Australian jobs end? At the AWU, we represent the cement workers who unload ships such as the recently reflagged CSL Yarra. What is to stop foreign seafarers going the next step and unloading the ships they crew? The good news is that in the Australian Industrial Relations Commission last week the cement industry shared many of our concerns about foreign flagging, and agreed where practicable to give preference to using Australian flagged ships. It was a commonsense victory for Australian jobs. The second issue, as I have hinted at, relates to national security. This week it was revealed that according to the shipping publication Lloyds List of London as many as 25 Islamic extremists have traveled to the United States as stowaways abroad commercial cargo vessels. Islamic militants are also said to have breached security through the ports of Savannah, Miami and Long Beach according to the US Coast Guard. Last year an alleged al-Qaeda operative was discovered in a container at the Italian port of Gioia Tauro. The London Times has also reported that Osama bin Laden has hidden his operations behind Flag of Convenience shipping to export explosives and operatives.
As John Howard has been at pains to remind us, if terrorism can happen in the United States it can happen here. And this is why the Federal Government has acted hypocritically on security issues. On the one hand the Government increases defence funding in acknowledgement of the increased threat to Australian security post September 11th, and yet on the other it fails to address the wider security concerns created when Australian ships are reflagged and staffed with foreign crew. When you compare the Government's controversial stance on border protection and asylum seeker issues, it is incongruous, at best, for the Government to allow a rising number of foreign ships and foreign crew to work in Australian waters.
However when a delegation of Maritime Unions, The president of the ACTU Sharan Burrow and myself spoke to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Transport, John Anderson, last week about this critical issue he provided no real solutions. And yet he is the Minister of the department that is responsible for issuing continuous and single voyage permits to these ships.
The Australian Shipowners Association has found that our reliance on foreign shipping to carry our goods caused a net deficient of $3 billion in 1999-2000, which amounts to about 9 per cent of our nation's current account deficient. And yet CVPs and SVPs continued to be issued with the number of SVPs granted to foreign ships under the Howard Government rising from 4 per cent to 15 per cent.
But other than security issues it also makes economic sense for the Federal Government to show more interest in this issue. The Australian merchant navy is a highly skilled and trained workforce with skills that our nation cannot afford to send offshore. In both world wars the merchant ships were requisitioned for troop transports, for hospital ships and for the carriage of cargoes for war service. Merchant navy engineers also provided invaluable knowledge and experience to the Royal Australian Navy in the Second World War. A local merchant navy is an inexpensive but vital resource that can be used if Australia needs to bolster its naval fleet at short notice.
After a tough fight the union movement has had a victory in the CSL Yarra dispute this week, with the shipping line agreeing to drop court action and agreeing to send its foreign vessel out of Australian waters. And the union movement and cement industry have shown their commitment to using Australian flagged ships. What is needed now is a commitment from the Howard Government to ensure our borders are protected and this important Australian industry survives.
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