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Why The User Should Pay
Unions have often been the victims of the user-pays ethos – the pointy end of the assault on the State by the Top End of Town that has left our public sector looking like the poor relation to the corporates.
Interview: Life After Keating
Labor's foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd looks at the world and wonders what might have been ...
Industrial: That Friday Feeling
Anthony Stavropoulos has been working six days a week for the last eight years and now he wants his weekends back. “Remember that Friday feeling?” he asks. “You just don’t get that anymore.”
Bad Boss: Begging to Work
They may put themselves about as the Saints of the Fourth Estate, but bosses at the Big Issue Magazine have been nominated by their own vendors for this month’s Tony award.
Organising: Project Pilbara
Sydney University’s Bradon Ellem reports on how unions are bouncing back in Rio territory
Unions: Off the Rails
The Federal Government is attempting to turn NSW Railways into a political football with a proposal that threatens the safety of freight and passenger trains in NSW and life in our rail Towns, writes Phil Doyle.
International: Brazil Turns Left
Union stalwarts throughout the American hemisphere are cheering the election of Lula – the peanut seller and shoeshine boy, turned union leader - who has been elected as the first working-class President of Brazil.
Environment: Brown Wash
Stuart Rosewarn argues the Johannesburg Sunmmit was a gripping showcase of Australia’s lack of a strategic vision.
History Special: Learning from the Past
Ray Markey looks at union membership growth in the 1880s & 1900s to argue that today’s unions must engage to grow.
Corporate: Will the Bullying Backfire?
Job insecurity, unemployment, a growing gap between rich and poor, massive global poverty and environmental danger are the big issues for the protests at the World Trade Organisation meeting in Sydney.
Technology: Danger Lurks For The Passive
If unions fail to exploit opportunities on the web to gain members, other organisations are likely to fill the void and provide services to workers on the internet.
History: In Labour’s Image
Neale Towart looks at a long-overdue initiative to around NSW through the eyes of the workers.
Politics: Without Power Or Glory
South Coast contributor Rowan Cahill gives his take on the Cunningham by-election result.
History Special: A 'Cosy Relationship'
Barbara Webster looks at Rockhampton between 1916 – 1957 to debunk the ‘dependence’ theory of trade union growth.
Culture: Blood Stains the Wattle
Former Queensland Treasurer Keith De Lacey has turned up in print with a rollicking tale of life during the famous Mt Isa strike of the 60s.
Satire: Iraq Pre-empts Pre-emptive Strike
Saddam Hussein has launched a pre-emptive strike on the United States to prevent it from pre-emptively striking Iraq first.
Poetry: The Executive Pay Cut
Executives accepting pay freezes, or even pay cuts? This outrageous proposal has been put on the table by some capitalists themselves, and taken up by our bard.
Review: Time Out
When a family man invents a new life after losing his steady job, Tara de Boehmler watches his charade escalate until there is no turning back.
 Bargaining Fees In the Dock
Deadly ‘Slave Labour’ Racket Exposed
Zoo Workers Buck Indecent Proposal
Cabinet Takes Stick To Abbott's Carrot
Cyber Action Behind Hilton Win
Aussies Back On Board
City Workers To Help Country Cousins
Sour Taste for Wine Workers
Government Grounds Ansett Levy
TAB Workers Winners as Cup Strike Averted
Aussie Post Gets Mail On Sick Leave
Council Backs Community Radio Venture
First Steps to Compo Clean-Up
Workers Out! Conference Opens In Sydney
Aussie Union Rep Power, Yes Please: TUC
New Burma Shame File
Activists Notebook
Month In Review
War and Pieces of Work
The Bali Tragedy dominated the news this month, leaving many questioning the motive and wondering if this is fallout from Australia’s unquestioning support of George Dubya’s ‘War On Terror’. The Soapbox
Beware of Greeks Bearing Historical Allusions
Roland Stephens argues that the current popular line that the USA is a modern day version of the Roman Empire is flawed. The Locker Room
Over The Fence Is Out
Phil Doyle warms up for another season of hard hitting and fast bowling in the park, making the rules up as he goes along. Indigenous
The Sea of Hands
Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation are five years old. Spokeswoman Dameeli Coates addressed labor Council to mark the event. Postcard
Tokyo Youth Call
Tokyo unions are relying on young organisers to infiltrate workplaces as part of a major organising campaign, which focuses on non-unionised companies, reports Mary Yaager. Bosswatch
Still Crazy After All These Years
With new research suggests CEO carry similar personality traits to psycho-paths, the AGM season is proving that there’s little room for logic in our nation’s board rooms.
Trashing the Siren Theory
More Bali Feed Back
Clean Election Laws Now!
And Now, Some Fan Mail!
Policy Vacuum
Tom's Postscript
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Editorial
Why The User Should Pay
Unions have often been the victims of the user-pays ethos – the pointy end of the assault on the State by the Top End of Town that has left our public sector looking like the poor relation to the corporates.
At the behest of business, we now pay to access our savings, pay to use our roads, pay to get a university degree, even, pay to watch international sport. You name it and someone's worked out how to make us pay for it.
Which makes the ongoing opposition by employer groups to bargaining agents' fees more than a little confounding.
It's a simple proposition couched in the finest arguments an economic rationalist could hope to make.
Workers join unions to pool their bargaining power. Unions negotiate improvements to wages and conditions. Thanks to that collective commitment wages keep pace with the cost of living - driven by all the other things we have to pay for (see above).
Those who choose not to join a trade union reap the benefits anyway, free of any of the necessary costs of achieving that outcome. It only seems fair to ask these freeloaders to make some contribution towards these not insignificant costs.
That's why when negotiating an agreement, the majority of the workers should have the right to ask their non-union colleagues to weigh in. After all, no one could seriously argue they could cut these sorts of deals one-off.
And it's not just the individual salary - what about the broader rights that form the safety net that have been negotiated over the past 100 years? The maternity leave, sick pay, annual leave and superannuation: without a union movement these would all be pipe dreams.
This is what some workers are now deciding to do - at a workplace level, with the support of the majority and the agreement of the employer: a genuine workplace consensus that all should pay their way.
But now the employers, those same employers who have sung long and loud about the need to devolve industrial relations in the workplace go rushing to the NSW Industrial Relations Commission and ask it to rule that this is not fair.
What is not fair is the corporate world deciding that the line in the sand on User Pays should be at the precise point where workers acting together begin to assert their collective rights.
Service fees are not about bullying or conscription; they are about turning the rhetoric of the rationalists back on themselves.
Peter Lewis
Editor
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Issue 159 contents
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