The Official Organ of LaborNET
click here to view the latest edition of Workers Online
The Official Organ of LaborNET
Free home delivery
Issue No. 227 02 July 2004  
E D I T O R I A L

A Place To Call Home
These days the Great Australian Dream is closer to a fantasy, where the chances of owning to your own home depend on either inheriting property or winning lottery.

F E A T U R E S

Interview: Power and the Passion
ALP's star recruit Peter Garrett shares his views on unions, forests and being the Member for Wedding Cake Island

Unions: Tackling the Heavy Hitters
Tony Butterfield became a State of Origin gladiator at the unlikely age of 33. Even that, Jim Marr reports, couldn�t prepare him for the knock-down, drag-em-out world of modern IR.

Industrial: Seeing the Forest For The Wood
Proposals to flog off NSW�s forests have raised eyebrows and temperatures amongst some of the key players reports Phil Doyle.

Housing: Home Truths
CFMEU national secretary John Sutton argues for a radical solution to the housing affordability crisis.

International: Boycott Busters
International unions have issued a new list of corporations breaching ILO sanctions to do business in Burma.

Economics: Ideology and Free Trade
The absurdities of neoclassical economic assumptions has never stood in the way of their being trotted out to justify profiteering and attacks on the rights of citizens. The AUSFTA is the latest rort we are supposed to swallow, writes Neale Towart.

History: Long Shadow of a Forgotten Man
Interest in JC Watson's short time as Labor's first Prime Minister should not detract from his more substantial role as Party leader, writes Mark Hearn

Review: Chewing the Fat
As debate rages in Australia about Fast Food advertising, Julianne Taverner takes a look at a side of the industry that Ronald McDonald won�t tell you about in Supersize Me.

Poetry: Dear John
Workers Online reader Rob Mullen shares some personal correspondence with our glorious leader.

N E W S

 NRMA Reverses Over Turnbull

 Privatisation Kills

 Crikey: Irwin Feeds Staff AWAs

 Nurses Telegraph Fight Back

 "Sexiest Man" Plays it Safe

 Eureka: Bug Swats Hadgkiss

 Macdonald Ponders Asbestos Blue

 Latham Gets Late Mail

 Murdoch Faces Discrimination Rap

 Boss Goes Postal

 Oberon Survives Bomb Threat

 Howard Out On CD

 Telstra Hangs Up On Staff

 Activists What�s On!

C O L U M N S

Politics
The Westie Wing
As the NSW Labor Government sells its first budget deficit in nine years, the real concern for the union movement is the devil in the detail, especially when it comes to procurement agreements, writes Ian West.

The Soapbox
Rubber Bullets
Labor's IR spokesman Craig Emerson launches a few characteristic salvos across the Parliamentary chamber

The Locker Room
Tears After Bedtime
Phil Doyle says that it's all fun and games until someone loses an eye

Postcard
Postcard from Vietnam
APHEDA's Hoang Thi Le Hang reports from the north of Vietnam on a project being fund by Australian unionists.,

L E T T E R S
 Letter From America
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


Labor for Refugees

BossWatch



News

Eureka: Bug Swats Hadgkiss


Building Industry Task Force boss, Nigel Hadgkiss, is ducking questions about a listening device found on a Melbourne construction site.

Three hundred building workers walked off Grocon�s Eureka Towers development after the bug was found in their shop steward�s shed.

They handed the device to Victorian Police and returned to work, last Tuesday, sceptical over employer and Task Force efforts to distance themselves from illegal eavesdropping.

The discovery came after CFMEU official, John Setka, was prosecuted by the Task Force following a bitter union-Grocon dispute that drew the attention of leading Coalition politicians.

Hadgkiss' Task Force is also at the centre of allegations levelled in the Senate that it "illegally" and "covertly" bugged workers on a Perth construction site.

Hadgkiss told a Senate inquiry he didn't believe it was illegal for "anybody" to covertly record conversations under WA law.

Last year, a former undercover policeman told another parliamentary inquiry that Hadgkiss had recorded conversations, without authorisation, at the time of the NSW Wood Royal Commision.

Victorian CFMEU spokesman, Jesse Madisson, said workers were particularly upset about the Grocon listening device because of last month's death of a workmate in a motorcycle accident.

The union brought counsellors to the site and they used the shop steward's shed to hold one-on-one sessions with distressed former workmates.

"Our members were shocked to discover their private conversations were being recorded," Madisson said. "The guys would be upset by that at any time, it's an invasion of privacy, but this situation made it that much worse."

Hadgkiss refused to confirm or deny his organisation's involvement in bugging, in general, or planting the Eureka device.

""It's a matter before the Senate Inquiry and departmental inquiry and I am not going to comment any further," Hadgkiss said.


------

*   View entire issue - print all of the articles!

*   Issue 227 contents



email workers to a friend printer-friendly version latest breaking news from labornet


Search All Issues | Latest Issue | Previous Issues | Print Latest Issue

© 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/227/news6_bug.html
Last Modified: 15 Nov 2005

Powered by APT Solutions
Labor Council of NSW Workers Online
LaborNET