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Safety First
This week's Safety Summit, called by the Carr Government, is a timely opportunity for the union movement to put occupational health and safety into a contemporary perspective.
Interview: Safe as Houses
Labor Council secretary John Robertson outlines the union movement's priorities in the lead-up to this week's Safety Summit.
Safety: Ten Steps to Safety
On the eve of the NSW Safety Summit, Workers Online went looking for the ten biggest workplace health issues and what needs to be done to address them.
History: Staying Alive
Neale Towart winds the clock back to discover that contemporary arguments that regulators should stay out of workplace safety and let the market do its business are nothing new.
Unions: Choose Life
While Commissioner Cole struggles with the concept of unions trying to improve workers’ wages, out in the real world, bosses daily thumb their noses at safety authorities, as Jim Marr discovers.
International: Seoul Destroyers
The rise and rise of the Korean national football team in the World Cup competition was more than matched by the rise and rise of the number of imprisoned Korean trade unionists.
Corporate: Crash Landing
Did Ansett workers’ productivity really crash Ansett? Jim McDonald weighs up the evidence.
Activists: The Refusenik
At 20, Rotem Mor has spent more time analysing how he will live his life than most people twice his age. A month in prison and another 18 serving in the Israeli army saw to that.
Review: Dumb Nation
Michael Moore's new book, 'Stupid White Men' exposes the rorts behind the Bush presidency with bitter humour, writes Mark Hebblewhite.
Poetry: Helping Out The Rich
From proposals to 'deregulate' (ie raise) university fees, to attempts to restrict workers' right to strike in the name of 'genuine' bargaining the Government's rhetoric about helping out the battlers is wearing just a bit thin.
 Redundancy Bonus for Members Only
Tax Office Backs CFMEU Case
Lib MP Named in Cole Commission
Sentencing Guidelines for Safety Breaches
Revealed: Costello’s Hit List
Virtual Cold War Over
Safety Lock-Out Enters Second Week
Unions Seek Talks With New Airport Owners
Journos Attacked by NRMA
Strip Bosses Face Dressing Down
Beattie Called Into Bargaining Impasse
Nurses Deliver Largest Ever Petition
US Braces for its Own Waterfront War
Activists Notebook
The Soapbox
Back to the Future
McKenzie Wark argues that the future of the book relies on the future of a sphere of public debate. Bosswatch
Chain Reaction
The Big Australian discovers a uranium mine it never knew it had, a corporate fraud sparks a worldwide market plunge and the price of investing ethically.
The Locker Room
Three Colours Blue
After a World Cup that saw post-colonial cultural theorists chanting 'we beat the scum one-nil' on the Terraces of Inchon, it was the natural order of things that prevailed, writes Phil Doyle Postcard
Poll Positioning
Unions Tasmania secretary Lynne Fitzgerald gives an overview of the State Election called earlier this week. Week in Review
The Weight of Office
Apart from the Teflon John, power walking at his own pace, would-be leaders everywhere turned in shockers as Jim Marr discovered.
Link Wages to CEO Pay
Voodoo Unionism
Good News from the Pilbara
Go Mark, Go
Double-Standards
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News
US Braces for its Own Waterfront War
Maritime workers worldwide are preparing for a lockout on the West Coast of the US on the scale of the 1998 Patrick dispute.
US wharfies are gearing up to do battle with employers as work contract talks stall over attempts to take away health, welfare benefits and working conditions. The existing contract expires on July 1.
The Maritime Union is pledging its full moral support for its American comrades.
Executive meetings of the world's stevedoring and seafaring unions at the International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF) in London this month passed resolutions in solidarity with the US West Coast wharfies, members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU). Both meetings included representatives from the MUA.
Any solidarity action will be two pronged as both dockworker unions and seafaring unions have pledged their full and unequivocal support.
"The MUA and other international maritime unions are determined we will not be stood over by multinationals slashing our job conditions," said MUA National Secretary Paddy Crumlin.
US employer group Pacific Maritime Association representatives at loggerheads with the ILWU have threatened to lockout workers along the entire West Coast.
PMA is made up of 80 shipping and port companies, including Wilhelmsen Line, Hapag Lloyd, K'Line, Maersk, OOCL, P&O Nedloyd, Zim Lines, COSCO and CSX - all of which also operate in Australia.
Meanwhile, further industrial unrest is brewing in Europe where the European Union Council of Transport Ministers has adopted a proposal to allow shipping companies to replace port workers with crew or private workforces to stevedore their cargo.
The ITF has warned this would create ports of convenience - substandard operations exploiting an unregulated labour market of cheap but untrained, inexperienced and unregistered workers.
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Issue 142 contents
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