
Issue No 23		23 July 1999

News

Olympics Jobs Shortage Looms

Olympic organisers have backed off a mooted plan to import up to 1500 hospitality workers to work at the Games, instead asking the union movement to help them find labour locally.

Liquor Hospitality and Miscellaneous Workers Union assistant national secretary Tim Ferrari says there's a latent pool of labour with the required skills who could be coaxed back into the industry.

"A lot of people leave the industry because of the lousy wages and conditions, but they may be brought back in on the basis of better conditions in 2000 and into the future," Ferrari says.

SOCOG officials have assured the LHMU that media reports that they were seeking up to 1500 visas for foreign workers were not official policy and have convened a meeting to discuss the labour shortage for later this month.

Ferrari says the union may be prepared to activate old membership lists to trace former industry workers, while the Labor Council is planning to promote work on the Games through existing members and their families.

He says the principle should be to "employ Australians first" and only then think about importing labour from overseas.

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  Issue 23 contents

Interview: An Economic Wet
Dr Christopher Sheil on economic rationalism and the 1997-98 water failures in Adelaide and Sydney.

Unions: The Stench from the South
In 1997 the entire Adelaide metropolitan area was drenched in foul, sulphorous, sewerage odours, emanating from the Bolivar waste water treatment plant.

Environment: Trading into Trouble
Seattle, USA, is shaping up as demonstrator mecca in the lead up to World Trade Organisation talks.

History: Eveliegh Rail Reunion
Former workers and their families from the historic Eveleigh Railway Workshops in inner-Sydney are holding a picnic reunion and folk music festival on the site on Sunday, August 29.

International: Bosses Use Armed Gangs to Break Russian Picket
On 9 July 1999, eighty masked, uniformed gunmen accompanied by the local prosecutor and other officials tried to storm the Vyborg Pulp and Paper Mill, under occupation by workers for the past eighteen months.

Satire: New Refugee Crisis: Journalists Flee Peace Zone
The camps are once again full in the Albanian border town of Gruntiez.

Review: 10 Reasonably Interesting Moments in Film
Cultural theorist Snag Cleaver flies off the handle again..

» Water Staff Pull Plug on Pay Talks

» Hotel Survey Warns of New Years Labour Crisis

» Pfizer Jerks Workers Off

» Shafted: Howard Squibs on Entitlements

» Olympics Jobs Shortage Looms

» Nurses Change Tack on Public Health Campaign

» Actors Save Conditions from Reith Attack

» Global Mariner Shines Spotlight on Howard Shipping Policy

» New Currawong Deal Ends 25 Years of Trying

» Hands off Workers Comp

» Scully Off the Rails Over Contract Security

» PiersWatch and The Chaser in Mega Merger Deal

» Apology to Dr Bridget Griffen-Foley