E D I T O R I A L

With Prejudice
For anyone doubting the ability of an incumbent government to control the political agenda, this week's sitting of the Cole Royal Commission into the Building Industry made fascinating viewing.

F E A T U R E S

Interview: Class Action
NSW Teachers Federation general secretary Barry Johnson on Bob Carr's election budget and what he needs to do to win back the profession.

Safety: A Mother's Tale
Robin McGoldrick relives the tragedy that prompted her to confront Royal Commissioner Terence Cole over workplace story.

Unions: The Hottest Seat in Town
Nostalgia buffs should make a point of catching at least one session of Tony Abbott�s controversial, Royal Commission, playing to increasingly thin houses in Sydney. Jim Marr sat through the opening scenes.

International: Defensive Enterprise
How can men and women working in the unprotected "informal economy" be helped to better defend their rights? The ICTU grapples with the issue in The Congo.

Economics: A Super Deal?
Neale Towart looks at the debate raging within Labor circles around savings and investment.

History: A Radical Life
Stephen Holt gives an insight into one of the Australian Labor Party�s original true believers through his examination of papers held in the Manuscript Collection

Media: Cross Purposes
Stuart Mackenzie looks at the lines spun at the recent Senate committee hearing into media ownership laws.

Review: When the Force Is Unconscious
Cultural Theoritician Mark Morey reports on how a trip to the Sydney Writers Festival became a battle for intergalactic supremacy.

Poetry: Wouldn't It Be Loverly
For seven decades, Queensland aboriginal workers working under government control were 'paid' below-award wages which were placed into 'trust' accounts which were pilfered, levied, diverted and bled dry.

N E W S

Grieving Mum Turns Cole Around

Hamberger Grilled Over AWA Scam

Government Shrugs Off Death Sentence Charge

Action To Pay Foreign Crew Aussie Wages

Jockeys Face Insurance Crisis

Birds Get More Protection Than Workers

Budget Delivers - But Not For DOCS

Statewide Ban On Grain Loading

Howard Soft On Organised Crime?

UN Honours Building Union Drugs Program

Award-Winning Poet Wins Right To Write

Workers Out For Gay Games

Mahathir Told to Release Labour Activisits

Horta Backs Western Sahara Independence

Activists Notebook

C O L U M N S

The Soapbox
It�s The Members, Stupid.
Those officials obsessed with union voting power in the ALP are missing the point, writes Luke Foley.

The Locker Room
Too Good To Be True
Phil Doyle castes his withering gaze over a week in sport that featured origin square-ups, the World Game in all its glory and a few drunken jockeys.

Bosswatch
In The Cauldron
It was another week of pull-outs, profits de-mergers and takeovers in the corporate world; but some bright news with a plan to make executive pay more accountable.

Week in Review
The Black Letter
Legal mechanisms, national and international, are throwing up challenges to all sectors of our community but the law is a beast of many shapes and sizes as Jim Marr discovers.

L E T T E R S

WHAT YOU CAN DO

	About Workers Online
	Latest Issue
	Print Latest Issue
	Previous Issues
	Advanced Search

other LaborNET sites

Labor Council of NSW
Vic Trades Hall Council
IT Workers Alliance
Bosswatch
Unions on LaborNET
Evatt Foundation

Grieving Mum Turns Cole Around

Commissioner Terence Cole reversed an earlier ruling that he would not hear evidence of safety issues during public hearings after Robin McGoldrick appealed publicly for him to hear her story.

Robin's 17-year-old son Dean died on a Sydney building site in February 2000, just weeks after he had come to Sydney looking for work. His employer, who was found to have breached health and safety laws was fined just $20,000.

After a rally of injured workers outside the Commission building, Commissioner Cole took the unprecedented step of inviting Mrs McGoldrick to address him. She was joined by Pat Portlock, a crane driver who lost a leg in a workplace accident, in 2001.

Refusing to allow CFMEU lawyers to lead Mrs McGoldrick through a statement to the Court, Commissioner Cole directly questioned her on the impact of the accident.

"There isn't a day goes by when I don't have a reminder," she said. "I don't regard this as an accident, it was manslaughter."

Commissioner Cole assured Mrs McGoldrick he would review full papers of her son's death while compiling his report.

CFMEU state secretary Andrew Ferguson welcomed the fact that the Commissioner was prepared to look into safety. But he said the Commissioner must allow more workers to have their say.

"We have hundreds of building workers who have been involved in or witnessed workplace injuries," he said. "The Commissioner must give them equal time to the long line of disgruntled contractors, many of whom have broken the law, who are being allowed to have their say."

Touch One, Touch All

Meanwhile, NSW unions will rally next Thursday to send a strong message that the entire movement is behind the CFMEU.

The NSW Labor Council has organised the lunchtime rally outside the Goulburn Street hearing rooms, where Union Song Comp finalists Urban Guerillas will perform.

Labor Council secretary John Robertson says the first week of hearings highlighted union concerns that the Royal Commission was designed to attack the union movement, rather than look at broader building industry issues.

Robertson, who was himself called before the Commission, says the structure of the hearings makes it difficult for unions to challenge critical evidence.

  View entire issue - print all of the articles!

  Issue 139 contents

© 1999-2002 Workers Online
Workers Online is a resource for the Labour movement
provided by the Labor Council of NSW
URL: http://workers.labor.net.au/139/news1_coleybaby.html
Last Modified: 15 Nov 2005