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Issue No. 187 18 July 2003  
E D I T O R I A L

Hearts, Minds and Other Body Parts
Thanks to advances in technology, workers are being asked to expose more and more of themselves to their employer: their emails, their genes, even their urine.

F E A T U R E S

Interview: As They Say In The Bible ...
One the movement�s great characters, Public Service Association general secretary Maurie O�Sullivan, is calling it a day. He looks back on his career with Workers Online.

Industrial: Just Doing It
Sportswear giant, Nike, is the first company to sign off on an agreement that purports to protect Australian clothing workers, wherever they labour, writes Jim Marr.

Unions: Breaking Into the Boys Club
For a 23-year-old woman who has never worked in the trade, recruiting young construction apprentices into the union has its challenges, reports Carly Knowles.

Activists: Making the Hard Yards
Mal Cochrane came to the smoke as part of an Aboriginal avalanche that redefined the face of Rugby League. Today, he serves his community through the trade union movement.

Bad Boss: In the Pooh
What do you give a boss who makes his workers labour in raw sewage? A nomination for the Tonys.

Unions: National Focus
In the national wrap Noel Hester finds a Victorian Misso delo who is redistributing lucre from Eddie McGuire into workers� theatre, South Australian unions taking that Let�s Get Real stuff seriously, an American unionist fronts up at a distinguished �meeting of the brains� in Adelaide and a look at the line up for ACTU Congress.

Economics: Pop Will Eat Itself
Dick Bryan wonders if we can be insured against pop economists promising financial nirvana as well as financial market instability.

Technology: Dean for President
Paul Smith looks at how the internet is helping one Democrat candidate to the front of the primary pack

International: Rangoon Rumble
Union Aid Abroad's Marj O'Callaghan looks at Australia's weak response to developments in Burma.

Education: Blackboard Jungle
Lifelong learning shouldn�t mean cutting jobs, but that's exactly what the Carr Government is proposing, argues Tony Brown

Review: From Weakness to Strength
Labor Council crime-fighter Chris Christodoulou catches up with his boyhood hero, the Incredible Hulk

Poetry: Downsized
Resident bard David Peetz pens the song the Industrial Relations Commission needed to hear

N E W S

 Authority Shafts Excessive Mine Hours

 Insurance Quiz: Money or the Baby?

 Monk Lined up with Jihad Masters

 Rat in Ranks, Tubner Warns

 Hard Drug Stance Stoned

 Vote Snooping Bosses Out of House

 Termination Battle Hots Up

 US Actors Back Aussie Comrades

 TAFE Students Called to Arms

 Teachers Caught in Family Feud

 Longer Strikes Spark Picket Code

 Max Sets Athens as Airport Standard

 Indigenous First for Construction

 Call Centre Jobs Diverted From Delhi

 Activist Notebook

C O L U M N S

The Soapbox
Cleaning Up
Rabbi Laurie Coskey from San Diego adds her voice to the global campaign for just for cleaners in Westfield malls.

The Locker Room
The Name In The Game
In an age of the sportsperson as celebrity it seems that names are overtaking the games, writes Phil Doyle.

Postcard
The Beach
Southern Thailand�s terrorist activities: facts or fiction asks HT Lee

L E T T E R S
 Feedback on Feedback
 Sid Einfield Would be Proud
 Tom in the Manger
 Sermon on the Mount
WHAT YOU CAN DO
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News

Insurance Quiz: Money or the Baby?


New Dad Graeme Loaney wouldn�t swap the extra half hour a day he gets with baby Callum for quids � literally.

It�s one of the reasons he is sporting a FSU �I Have A Life� sticker and backing workmates� campaign to resist longer working hours Australia�s largest general insurer, IAG, is trying to force on them.

"Our boy's 10 months old, he's just at the age where he's open and aware of what's going on. If IAG had it's way, Callum would be going to bed when I got in the door," Loaney said.

He explained that workers from IAG's city offices had already given up 20 minutes or more a day to accommodate the company's March shift to Pyrmont premises. Its current campaign for lowest common denominator working hours, he said, was one step too far.

Loaney explained that some workmates used the flexitime system in operation at IAG to try and take a full day off with their families each month. An extra half hour a day would make that ambition, too, more difficult.

IAG has swallowed up a number of operations, along with different working hours patterns, in recent years. Some divisions have traditionally worked 37.5 or 38 hours a week, while workers formely with NRMA Insurance have worked 35.

When it came time for EBA renewal the company decided it would base its claim for standardised hours on the longest working day.

Workers from across the departments decided they wanted the shortest day, even ahead of the 7.1 percent pay offer the company has put on the table.

The feeling is shared by staff at IAG's Victorian arm, IMA. When 500 of them were surveyed by a joint management-union committee 420 voted no to the payrise when it was tagged to an increased half an hour a day at work.

Underwriting manager Loaney said he had been surprised and encouraged by the strength of feeling about working hours. He estimated membership at Pyrmont had surged by as much as 50 percent since the issue cropped up.

He accused IAG of failing to live up to its claim to be an "employer of choice".

"We can work 35 hours, get the job done, and spend good quality time with our families. That's the way we want it," he said.


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