*****
Prime Minister Peter Costello is a scary thought.
The idea that this trumped up hypocritical martinet is one heartbeat away from the second highest office in the land proved to be more than the incumbent, Howard, could bear.
Howard scuttled home after receiving an Irish welcome with all the warmth of that which greeted Cromwell.
What he found on return was the dropkick with all the sincerity of a corflute real estate sign putting in his two cents worth.
Peter Costello is always on shaky ground when he lets go his loud guffaw, usually after saying something about as funny as a dead baby's doll.
Thus it was that he thought WorkChoices was terrific that you could get a 2-cent an hour pay rise by trading off sick leave, overtime, holiday pay, leave, decency, self esteem, humanity and your first born child.
He gets into this mode of 'just keep smiling' and it projects with all the integrity of Brad Cooper's coke dealer.
The problem for this Tool among Tools, our very own King of Diamonds, is that he increasingly erratic behaviour is starting to scare the kiddies.
How unhinged this economically illiterate inflatable lounge of a man has become after the years in the very small shadow of Dear Leader Howard is becoming a matter of much speculation.
Many out here in $1.45 a litre land, or anyone having to actually buy food and keep a roof over their head, are having some difficulty connecting Costello's utterances on this golden age we apparently live in with their immediate experience of what is going on in front of their faces.
Costello has never hid his lack of compassion for working people - actually, come to think of it, his lack of compassion for any people - showing all the humility of Paris Hilton as he swanned around filling Howard's very small shoes for the week.
Never in the history of Australian politics has someone presented who looked completely at sea in a leadership role.
Frank Forde was a statesman next to this bloke. His handling of the situation with our near neighbours showed all the diplomatic finesse of Reg Reagan.
The crowning achievement though of this galoot is his ongoing lie about the state of this country's finances.
Now, any idiot can go to a pub, bludge money and get pissed. The problem is that after a while, sometimes a very short while, the idiot might run out of people willing to continue to extend that sort of largesse
Yet this is the central underlying economic principle Peter the Lesser has adopted for Australia, the country he is allegedly treasurer of.
Now, no one can ever accuse Costello of being an intellectual giant, more an intellectual goldfish, (which, admittedly, is being a bit rough on goldfish), so no wonder he keeps grinning like a loon while the manufacturing sector is taken out behind the woodheap and shot, and the rest of the economy heading south faster than a consultant disappears at the first sign of trouble.
No one knows quite what Costello is on, but whatever it was it had a remarkable impact on his grasp of reality, which appears to be steadily diminishing from it's already tentative state.
Anyone who c an say this with a straight face obviously has serious delusional tendencies: "The government's Work Choices legislation enables employees to come to agreements with employers which suit both of them, with terms which are protected by the Australian Fair Pay and Conditions Standard."
To think that anyone would believe that is embarrassing enough. To think that someone could believe that and think they were fit to walk the streets is scary. That they may want to run the country when they patently couldn't run a tap is unbelievable.
This shambolic wreck of a tool has outlived whatever usefulness he may ever have had and we can only hope his end will be soon, swift and sudden.
Workers walked off the job at parcel delivery firm SWADS after corporate lawyer Meg Woods from Holding Redlich threatened to call the police on NUW officials.
Both Comcare and WorkCover are investigating how the Filipino forklift driver was killed.
Swads employees have been distressed since the incident, claiming it was the third fatality in four years.
Sixty workers from other Swad's warehouses quit work and estate joined those at Weatherill Park.
The NUW has accused Swads, recently bought by Australia Post, of hiding behind WorkChoices to avoid scrutiny of its safety practices.
"We went to get access to the site to ensure safety and that workers were adequately counselled," said NUW state secretary Derrick Belan. "One of our members has been killed here.
"It's an unbelievably horrible situation. The company is acting in a completely callous manner.
"What has this company got to hide?"
NUW spokesperson Mark Ptolemy said senior management had flown up from Melbourne and slapped a "shut up or get out" order on staff, hindering efforts to get to the bottom of the tragedy.
At the time of going to press the family of the deceased worker had attended the site and had received no notification from the company about the death.
In one instance, a builder turned a hose on a 64-year-old safety expert and tried to frog march him out the gate.
In another, a dodgy operator set a "human German Shepherd" on an authorised safety rep. CFMEU official Mal Tulloch was thrown across an office and had a chair thrown at him while he was on the ground.
They were two of three assaults on construction union officials, attempting to carry out safety audits on Sydney building sites in the last month.
The CFMEU and Unions NSW will meet with police in an effort to educate officers on the beat and stop the violence.
CFMEU state secretary, Andrew Ferguson, says the aggressive anti-union campaign mounted by Canberra has led to misunderstandings of the legal rights of authorised officials.
"Under state health and safety laws our officials have the right to carry out health and safety checks in the interests of members, and the public, when they have genuine concerns about standards," Ferguson said.
"In every one of these cases, our officials were proven right. When Workcover finally got on the sites, they issued prohibition or improvement notices."
Veteran safety expert, Dick Whitehead, 64, said he had never experienced anything like the reception he got from an IR manager at Mt Druitt, last week.
"I was talking to the project manager, showing him my right of entry permit, when the IR manager walked past and gave me a mouthful," he said.
"Next thing, he dials Triple 0 and tells the police he needs back up because people are invading his site. Then he picks the hose up, turns it on full bore and tries to hose me out the gate.
"I was angry but I knew what he was up to. He came over, forced my arm up my back and tried to march me out the gate.
"I know he wanted me to fight back because, for sure, I would have been arrested."
Whitehead, a former Workcover inspector, said when police arrived they took the IR manager's side, despite the legal rights of himself and a colleague.
It wasn't until a senior inspector arrived that CFMEU and WorkCover inspectors were escorted through the gate.
The state health and safety authority wrote out six notices identifying separate safety shortcomings that required attention.
Whitehead said didn't blame young police officers because they had never been educated about right of entry entitlements.
"We need police officers on the ground to understand the law," he said. "Construction is a dangerous industry and these right of entry provisions are about lives."
Tulloch told Workers Online he had been assaulted by a person he could best describe as a "human German Shepherd" when he had tried to investigate a Parramatta site that posed "obvious risks" to the passing public.
National Retailers Association (NRA) chief executive, Patrick McKendry, said other retailers would ape arts and craft chain Spotlight in embracing contracts, which eliminated weekend and penalty rates.
"Far from being defensive about it, the NRA applauds it because we think a lot of other retailers will follow Spotlight's lead," McKendry said.
But the union that covers retail employees, the SDA, says responsible employers have indicated they would stay away from condition-cutting AWAs.
"Retailers would do well to steer clear of this," SDA secretary Gerard Dwyer said.
Some of the retailers that have indicated they would support fair negotiations include Woolworths, Coles-Myer and Bunnings.
While condemning Spotlight's actions, Dwyer said the AWAs were legal under the Howard Government's WorkChoices laws.
The AWA, offered to new employers and some existing workers, trades away weekend and penalty rates - worth up to $93 per week - for an extra two cents an hour on the current base rate.
A Spotlight spokesman told the Australian newspaper said the company was just doing what it was told by legislators.
Questioned in Parliament about the contracts, Prime Minister John Howard said WorkChoices was good for the economy.
The ACTU said Howard's comments showed contempt for working families, already being slugged by petrol prices and higher interest rates.
"Mr. Howard's comments of support for Spotlight send a clear message to employers and working families - this Government is on the side of employers and profits, regardless of the costs to working families," policy officer George Wright said.
With 86 stores in Australia, Spotlight rakes in more than $600 million a year.
ETU Victorian secretary, Dean Mighell, is confident that, when the Australian Electoral Commission finishes its count, proposed industrial action will be endorsed.
"Look, we know our membership and we believe the ballot will get up," Mighell told Workers Online. "But it will be a close run thing.
"I'm picking there won't be more than a single vote in it."
Mighell bases his analysis on the fact that the lone ETU member at Amcor's can manufacturing plant will be forced to vote one-out by WorkChoices laws that forbid him joining workmates who are members of the AMWU.
The AMWU fought its way through WorkChoices red tape to win 53 members the right to resist clawbacks being pushed by Amcor.
It beat off days of Amcor objections in the AIRC, last week, and members responded with a 40-1 vote for action in a ballot supervised by the Australian Electoral Commission.
But the plant's lone ETU member was barred from that vote. Instead, the AIRC has ordered a separate "secret" postal ballot in which the electrician will be the only voter.
The Electoral Commission has consulted unions about how long the count would take and when the result might be formalised.
Mighell said the one-man ballot seemed like a joke but had serious implications.
"It's stupid, bureaucratic and expensive but it has its own logic in the context of legislation that is designed to destroy our ability to win," he said.
Former federal politician, Phil Cleary, said the one-man vote had WorkChoices Minister, Kevin Andrews, fingerprints all over it.
"Nothing dreamed up by Kevin Andrews would surprise me," Cleary said.
"I used to have to catch a plane back from Canberra with him in the 1990s and it wasn't a very pleasant experience.
"He spent more time whingeing about how he was being victimised by party factionalism than any politician I have ever met."
The Owner Drivers Association has plied MPs with drinking mugs and propaganda in a bid to overturn drivers' exemptions from the Independent Contractors Act.
At least some Coalition MPs, including Wilson Tuckey, are lobbying on behalf of a group dedicated to deregulation of the transport industry.
Melbourne's Sun Herald alleges its six-figure campaign is under-written by courier companies who would benefit from drivers being stripped of collective protections.
Now Workers Online can reveal that the Owner Drivers Association is a front for the employer-instigated Independent Contractors Australia.
A co-founder of the ICA was Bob Day who doubles as the owner of one of Australia's biggest home building companies and heads the aggressive employer body, Housing Industry Australia.
Day and co-founder Ken Phillips are extreme right agitators, affiliated with HR Nicholls Society.
The only other person named on the ICA website is its new chairman, Angela MacRae. She is an economist who worked in the Prime Minister's Office before being appointed to the Federal Government's Taskforce on Reducing Red Tape for Business.
The lone human identified on the Owner Drivers Association website is "Media Contact" Don D'Cruz.
Until recently, he was a "research fellow" with the notorious IPA.
For lobbying purposes, the Owner Drivers Association claims to have 500 paid up members but its website reveals it was only formed last month - when the federal government announced owner drivers would be exempted from the Independent Contractors Act.
It's mission statement reads: "For too long, owner-drivers in Australia have had our real issues ignored. It's about time a single association was created to look after our interests."
Its mugs, delivered to federal politicians of all persuasions, carry the legend: "I choose to be an owner driver, proudly my own boss delivering your goods."
But its website concedes it is a "division of the Independent Contractors of Australia (Click here for access to the ICA website and all information on ICA).
"Membership of the ODA confers automatic membership of ICA and access to subscriber member information on www.contractworld.com.au," it says
D'Cruz refuses to release the names of any members, citing "privacy" reasons.
But CFMEU official, Dave Noonan, says outfits like the ICA owe it to democracy to come clean about membership and finances.
"It is clear that these are the people who give this government its instructions," Noonan said. "They want another massive transfer of costs from corporations to Australian citizens.
"We are entitled to know who these people are but nobody knows who funds them or who supports them.
"They should be required to publish membership lists and finances as trade are, by law."
The AIRC endorsed all their sacking under WorkChoices laws that deny unjustified dismissal recourse to anyone with less than 100 workmates.
To bring itself into Canberra's sack-at-will zone, Port Melbourne outfit, Triangle Cables, restructured using dubious labour hire arrangements, and denied responsibility for workers scattered across the globe.
The AIRC, operating under new WorkChoices regulations, ruled all nine sackings were valid, last week.
The NUW said that in August, last year, Triangle Cable's chief engineer quit, reappeared as a labour hire operator, and won the contract to supply his former employer.
None of these people were included in the 97 employees Triangle claimed to have had at the time of the dismissals.
A Thai-based company of the same name, which employes 22 staff, was exempted when the AIRC ruled that, under the Corporations Act, it was not a related entity.
Workers Online can reveal that the official Triangle Cables website, lists that operation as part of the group.
The same website still boasts18 operations, worldwide, but the company successfully argued that none, outside Melbourne, employed any staff.
The nine union members, who had been active in industrial and health and safety matters, were all axed when WorkChoices came into effect in March.
Workers Online understands the NUW will now seek remedies in the federal court, arguing discrimination against its members on the grounds of their union involvement.
The CFMEU Mines Division rep called Andrews after the Minister again tried to argue WorkChoices did not prevent health and safety training.
"The Minister is splitting hairs and he knows it," Maher said, "while workers are losing their lives all around Australia.
"Trade unions provide the bulk of health and safety training because it wouldn't be done otherwise.
"It is widespread and effective because industrial instruments require employers to give workers leave to be trained.
"Kevin Andrews legislation makes that illegal and nothing he can say or do alters that fact.
"He wants employers to have the choice about whether their people undergo health and safety training and that means the worst employers will simply opt out, with his blessing."
A rash of workplace deaths have embarrassed the Minister into again claiming regulations that forbid the inclusion of health and safety training in agreements, do not prevent health and safety training.
"The provisions in the new Workplace Relations Regulations do not prevent a trade union or anyone else from providing OH&S training," Andrews said. "Nor do they prevent employers granting leave to their employees to attend OH&S training, or any other training."
Andrews' regulations label a series of matters "prohibited content". These cannot be included in any collective agreement, even if the parties agree.
Further, it is unlawful to even ask for them and any worker who does can be fined thousands of dollars.
His regulations are listed on the legal database austlii, under the heading Commonwealth Consolidated Regulations.
"A term of a workplace agreement is prohibited content to the extent that it deals with the following ..." they read.
" (c) employees bound by the agreement receiving leave to attend training (however described) provided by a trade union"
Unions NSW officer, Mary Yaager said unions in that state provided OH&S training for 10,000 workers every year.
Andrews has moved to allow large corporations to shirk state-based compensation schemes in favour of the Federal Comcare system though legislation introduced to Parliament.
Under Tasmania's compensation scheme, Knight's widow Jacqui is expected to receive $150,000 over two years, plus $196,000 from the Beaconsfield mine's insurers.
Comcare offered a larger payment as a lump sum of $206,000, but AWU national secretary Bill Shorten said Mrs Knight would not see payment for two years.
Shorten said the Knight children would also miss out on 10 per cent of their father's income.
"You certainly don't want your family to have to go through the Comcare system - it's just mean and nasty," Shorten said.
Under the new legislation, companies that join the Comcare scheme are also able to dodge state-based health and safety laws.
NSW Minister for Industrial Relations John Della Bosca said the laws allow a "workplace safety free-for-all for large employers".
Della Bosca said NSW's WorkCover had more than 300 safety inspectors, compared with just eight staff employed by Comcare in NSW.
"The incidence of workplace injuries and fatalities in New South Wales is at an 18 year low, but that is no reason for the Commonwealth to allow large companies to effectively self-regulate when it comes to safety," Della Bosca said.
The Office Of Workplace Services launched prosecutions against POW Juices following national media exposure of efforts to slash wages for teenage workers.
Phil Oswald, father of Amber Oswald - who blew the whistle on the franchisee's rort - said he believed the prosecutions were motivated by the publicity surrounding the case.
The OWS has initiated litigation proceedings against the Sydney-based retail franchise for alleged underpayment of twelve young employees.
Most of the workers were younger than 21, with the youngest 14.
In a statement, the OWS said it launched an investigation on April 10, the day Amber's story appeared prominently in the Sydney Morning Herald.
NSW Industrial relations minister John Della Bosca has slammed the OWS as being inadequate to protect workers.
"Alarmingly, the protections are to be enforced by the federal Office of Workplace Service, which is hopelessly undermanned and prosecuted a total of seven employers last year," Mr Della Bosca said.
The OWS has approximately one staff member for every 40,000 people in the workforce.
The new boss at Iplex Pipelines, Elizabeth, argued the flag breached "coercion" and "freedom of association" provisions of John Howard's legislation.
He wanted the scalp of popular workplace rep, Greg Wohling, and to take disciplinary action against two workmates who had helped him raise the standard.
"We talked it through and management changed their minds. Then they came back and said they wanted him on a technical breach of occupational health and safety rules," organiser, Mark Emmerson, explained..
"He got the flag up high but it was a flim flam argument.
"It shows the power managers think they have in this environment and, in my opinion, also reveals a personal antipathy towards Greg."
Eventually the company backed off but attempted face with a third and final written warning.
Given that Wohling has never had a first or second written warning, AMWU officials are scratching their heads about this one.
The actions came against the backdrop of Iplex Pipelines trying to impose "functional capacity testing" on all staff.
The AMWU has warned the testing could have unforseen consequences for employees, particularly in regard to Workcover entitlements and the empowerment of company doctors.
Emmerson says relations between workers and management at the plant have been "good" for the past decade.
The job is strongly unionised between the NUW which covers most production workers and the AMWU which represents the interests of maintenance staff.
The ghost gum, which stands over 10 metres tall, is legendary for being the first meeting place of the ALP in 1891, during the landmark shearers strike.
"It's apparent that someone poured probably up to 20 to 40 litres of chemical pollutant on the tree," says Barcaldine Mayor Cr Rob Chandler. "We get between 30,000 to 40,000 people visit every year for the tree. The town is shocked."
Tree specialist Adam Tom told council members to flood the large tree's roots with water and detergent in order to dilute the chemical poison.
But there is some hope. A cutting was grafted from the tree in 1990 and its clone is thriving in the grounds of the nearby Workers Heritage Centre.
Police are investigating.
"...we have decided that effective immediately: we will no longer share with the CEPU any information about robberies at corporate outlets," Post's Commercial Manager Mark Warren wrote in a letter to CEPU Secretary Jim Metcher.
But Metcher said Post was not sharing any information with the union to begin with.
"The CEPU learnt of the unacceptable level of robberies - 43 since last August - through concerns of our members and concerned management reps," Metcher said.
Of the robberies since August, 19 have involved guns - with other robberies involving knives, a machete, crowbars and a hammer.
"Instead of turning its back on workers, Australia Post needs to get pro-active about the safety of employees and the public."
A CEPU survey revealed one in four postal staff reported being victims of armed robbery and nine in ten saying Post was not doing enough.
Metcher called for an urgent summit of Post management, workers and security experts.
"If we can deliver world's best postal service then surely we can achieve world's best secure and safe post offices for postal workers and the general community," Metcher said.
The meeting was called to help build the June 28 rally against the laws at nearby Blacktown, one of Sydney's major industrial centres.
Robertson said values that define Australia are under attack by the Howard government in the interests of big business. Some 27% of working people now have casual jobs and this is expected to rise to 35% in the next five to ten years.
'If you are unemployed and knock back a job you lose your benefits for eight weeks - even if it means signing a contract with no rights,' he said.
Robertson said the campaign against the laws will continue to build 'so that by April 2007 we will have 150,000 to 200,000 on the streets'.
'The campaign is not simply about kicking out Howard because the ALP's position is not where it should be,' he warned. 'The Labor Party has to adopt an industrial relations policy based on fairness, equity and decency.'
Sharon Canty from the Parents and Citizens Association of NSW warned that young people were particularly vulnerable to Workchoices. She said the legislation had to be seen in the context of other attacks on basic rights such as the welfare to work laws, the introduction of voluntary student unionism and the changes to occupational health and safety.
Sister Libby Rogerson, the Social Justice Coordinator for the Diocese of Parramatta, said there were no choices in Workchoices.
'The laws impact on those sections of the community least able to defend themselves such as women, young people and migrants,' she said.
In the first of five week-long trips, the Jaffa will travel the NSW South Coast focussing on the impact of attacks on annual leave on tourism economies.
Itinerary:
Eurobodalla - Moruya - The ABCs of work today
How to stop you and your family getting ripped off
Community Discussion Night
Moruya Bowling Club
Shore Street Moruya Tuesday 30th May 6:30pm
Far South Coast
Information Street Stall
Where: Eden - Eden Post Office
When: 9:30am - 4:40pm
WorkChoices And The future of tourism on the Sapphire Coast
Dinner & Forum
Merimbula RSL 7:00pm
For ticket ($35) information Contact Dianne Lang 6495 9653
Where: Crn Market & Merimbula Drive
Bombala
Thursday 1st June
Your Rights at Work Public Meeting Main Street in front of PP Board 8:30am
Cooma
1st June
Your Rights at Work Public Meeting Centennial Park 12:30pm
Queanbeyan
Trivia Night (fundraiser), Thursday 1st June
Where: Queanbeyan Kangaroos Club
When: 7:30pm
Your Rights at Work Public Meeting
Open invitation to working families and the community of Queanbeyan to
attend.
Featuring John Robertson, Unions NSW
Queanbeyan Kangaroos Club Main Function Room
Crn Stuart St & Richard Ave
8:00am Friday 2nd June
Goulburn
Friday 2nd June
Your Rights at Work Public Meeting Belmore Park
2:30pm
A Bill of Rights for Australia? Speakers include Hon Bob Debus NSW Attorney-General & Member for Blue Mountains Susan Ryan New Matilda (former Senator and Minister) Professor George Williams Director, Gilbert and Tobin Centre of Public Law UNSW Saturday 27 May, 4.30pm to 6.30pm Katoomba Civic Centre For more information contact John Derum, 4751 3298 Inner West IR forum to fight WorkChoices Greens MP and industrial relations spokesperson Lee Rhiannon says an upcoming public forum in Annandale, with high profile speakers like environmentalist and unionist Jack Mundey, is designed to help overturn Howard's WorkChoices laws. "The Greens will be using our local community networks to bolster the ongoing campaign against WorkChoices, with the aim of winning back the working and living conditions that unions have established over the past century," Ms Rhiannon said. "Following on from our major forum last June, before WorkChoices became law, we have organised speakers from a broad range of areas including the church, academia and the union movement. Greens Ban leader Jack Mundey said John Howard has with one fell swoop destroyed every person's right to fight for better working conditions and the environment. "The movement against WorkChoices is far from over. We need to keep mobilising support in the community for unions' right to represent workers," Mr Mundey said. Greens Councillor for Leichhardt and candidate for Balmain in the 2007 NSW elections, Rochelle Porteous, said the Greens were committed to working with unions and the community to oppose the Liberal's attack on wages and conditions. "We are inviting the community to come to our forum and help build a broad based movement to defeat these regressive WorkChoices laws," Cr Porteous said. Community and Unions: Defeating Howard's WorkChoices Forum: 2-5pm, Saturday 3 June 2006, Annandale Neighbourhood Centre, 79 Johnston St. Speakers include: Jack Mundey, Rev Dr Ann Wansbrough Uniting Church; Professor Frank Stilwell; Adam Kerslake Unions NSW, Brett Holmes General Secretary NSW Nurses' Association, Rochelle Porteous Greens Councillor Leichhardt and others from transport, building, hospitality and cleaners unions. Pre-forum photo opportunity: Lee Rhiannon, Jack Mundey and Rochelle Porteous handing out forum leaflets to Inner West residents. Banner Making Workshop A banner making workshop is being held in preperation for the June 28 rally in Blacktown. Where: Katoomba Neighbourhood Centre When: 2pm, Friday, June 16 For more information call Dianne on 4782 1117 Work, Industrial Relations and Popular Culture Conference Monday 25 September 2006, Brisbane Work and Industry Futures QUT, and the Department of Industrial Relations Griffith University are convening a one-day conference that explores Work, Industrial Relations and Popular Culture. David Pope, the cartoonist behind the Heinrich Hinze cartoons will be Keynote Speaker with his presentation - "Is the pen mightier than s356? Cartoons and Work" (www.scratch.com.au) We welcome any paper that explores the manner in which popular culture is used by unions, management or policy makers or alternatively, how work and industrial relations is represented within popular culture. Sub-themes for the conference include: - Policy, Influence and Modern Mediums - Which is Reality, Work or TV? - Popular Music: Is it the End of the Working Class Man? - Working in the Movies: What do we see? - Popular Culture as a Teaching Tool. Call for Papers. Abstracts are due 14 July 2006 Full papers are due 11 September 2006 Location; Southbank, Brisbane.
The convenors would welcome participants to submit proposed titles earlier to assist in preparations. For further information please contact Keith Townsend ([email protected]) or David Peetz ([email protected])
Rekindling the Flames of Discontent: How the Labour and Folk Movements Work Together
A CONFERENCE / DINNER / CONCERT
The Brisbane Labour History Association is holding a Conference/Dinner/Concert on Saturday 23 September. This event will explore the historical relationship between the labour movement and the folk movement in Australia with a particular emphasis on Queensland.
Why? To celebrate the history of the interaction between the Folk and Labour movements, and promote its longevity.
When? Saturday 23 September. Conference from 1pm. Concert from 7pm.
Where? East Brisbane Bowls Club, Lytton Rd, East Brisbane, Next to Mowbray Park
It is still in the formative stages, but to date the following are confirmed:
1-5pm CONFERENCE (will include music with the presentations):
Doug Eaton on John Manifold & the Communist Arts Group in Brisbane, Brisbane Realists
Bob & Margaret Fagan on Sydney Realist Writers
Mark Gregory on trade union & labour songs/music, nationally/internationally
Lachlan & Sue on international perspectives
5 - 7pm Drinks followed by DINNER
7 - 11pm CONCERT
Combined Unions Choir
Bob and Margaret Fagan
Mark Gregory
Jumping Fences
For more information contact the BLHA President Greg Mallory on [email protected], or Secretary Ted Reithmuller on [email protected], or Dale Jacobsen on [email protected]
I recently read about Spotlight's new AWAs they are going to offer new employees.
At Spotlight, the minimum hourly award rate is $14.28, and serving employees get paid overtime and penalty rates of time-and-a-half and double-time if they work Thursday nights, weekends and public holidays.
New employers would get paid $14.30 an hour for all hours worked and would not get other entitlements including shift loadings, rest breaks, bonuses, incentive payments and annual leave loadings.
This is disgusting. I think we should set up an email campaign and tell Spotlight what we think of their new AWAs.
Shame on you spotlight and shame on the federal government for giving them the power to do it.
Allen HIcks, Qld
Has any public faces, personalities, sportsman, actor or perfomers been asked there opinion regarding WorkChoices?
Surely someone like Shannon Noll for example would be willing to voice there views once informed.
Many avenues still are availble to expose this dangerous
WorkChoices bill. Keep up the good work.
Glen Cunningham, NSW
Thanks for dipping into the debate starting on Labor Tribune (http://www.labortribune.net) about the nature of class in modern society.
My main issue with commentators such as Richard Florida (Rise of the Creative Class) is that they barely rise above the level of sociology.
Left at this level, the various social aspects of class formation appear on the horizon as epistemological bumps or breaks with previous understandings of social class. There was Daniel Bell's "post-industrial society''; or Peter Drucker's "knowledge workers''; Pierre Bordieu's concept of "cultural capital''; "technocratic class''; "new class''; and so on.
And now Richard Florida and his "creative class".
I haven't read the book, just reviews of it. No doubt there are points of interest here about the nature of the modern global economy and the creative talent it seeks to engage in its relentless pursuit of profit, niche markets, individualised marketing, advertising and so on.
However, fans of such fly-by-night theories usually set up a straw figure of Marx and his analysis of class and the process of its formation. Garry, you seem to be from this stable too. You say: "Some intellectuals of the left haven't read anythying since Marx or Marcuse.'' I'd venture that some haven't read Marx at all.
Further you say: "Older ideas of class analysis are all well and good, but over time what constitutes the classes of society might well change.''
To me this says that your understanding of class doesn't extend much beyond the sociological.
A Marxian understanding of class is more dynamic and more profound than mere sociology. Capitalism changes, its productive forms change. I'm happy to accept the concepts of Fordism, post-Fordism and so on. And of course the nature of class formation reflects such shifts in the way capital reproduces itself. But such a process is contested. As Marx said, "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.'' For Marx, class struggle was the motor of history; and class struggle is contingent on human agency.
Marxism allows for such change in the nature of classes. Indeed, it is predicated on such a dynamic process. For Marx and the best of his epigones, class is not a category or a static structure, but a social relationship and a contested historical process.
E. P. Thompson, in his seminal Making of the English Working Class, gives a wonderful introduction to understanding class formation as a process that is contingent on broader social relations.
He says: "There is today an ever-present temptation to suppose that class is a thing. This was not Marx's meaning, in his own historical writing, yet the error vitiates much latter-day 'Marxist' writing. 'It', the working class, is assumed to have a real existence, which can be defined almost mathematically - so many men who stand in a certain relation to the means of production ... [But] if we remember that class is a relationship and not a thing, we can not think in this way. 'It' does not exist, either to have an ideal interest or consciousness, or to lie as a patient on the Adjustor's table.''
Such an approach neatly differentiates between a sociological understanding of class as opposed to a political or Marxist understanding. Class, therefore, is a process and a relationship. As the capitalist mode of production changes (and only a fool would argue that Marx thought it was a static system), the various sociological forms of class change.
The point, however, is to understand the essence of the system and the capital-labour relationship, not merely document its surface phenomona. What doesn't change is the fact that labour power is a commodity in capitalist society and that there is a (growing) class in world society that can only rely on the sale of this commodity for its daily existence: the working class. And it is ultimately in the interests and power of this class to rid itself of the mode of production that turns its daily life into a grind of alienated work.
I have no doubt that Florida, self-styled as "one of the world's leading social theorists and public intellectuals'', has some interesting observations to be made on creative workers in modern society. However, I suspect his 'theory' will go the way of other such book-selling gimmicks. And I suspect the working class and class struggle will outlast it, too.
Marcus Strom
Editor, Labor Tribune
[email protected]
www.labortribune.net
An extremely biased article on Gerry Hanssen. Rubbish.
Ken Skinner, WA
The new work laws are an attack on the long standing Australian principle of the "fair go". I watched the show called "You're Fired" on SBS. It was clear that this fight isn't just a legal battle. It's about how we go about our daily lives. No wonder unions are being attacked the hardest. All of us union members have a story about ourselves or a workmate needing a helping hand or a second chance. Whether it's a Mum who needs to negotiate a part-time work agreement or a young worker who needs to get together with everyone on site and push for permanent jobs or an older workmate who needs help with a compo claim - we all want a fair go.
Paul Monro who used to hear matters at the industrial Commission spoke on the show about how industrial issues are just as much about fairness as they are about the law. In my workplace we are trying to get the boss to recognise that casuals are just as entitled to some paid maternity leave as the permanents are. It's about being fair. We haven't sorted it all out yet. But without most of us being in the union and having a union agreement we wouldn't even have a chance.
The Your Rights at Work campaign is about fairness. The next big day of action is June 28th. We should all get active that week and stand up and defend our right to a fair go. If you missed the "You're Fired" show you can find it at - http://news.sbs.com.au/insight
Cindy O'Connor, Tas
But here in Australia we are again whistling to his Dixie. The lame duck leader of the free world gives John Howard an energy tip on his victory lap - go nukes. And we all fall under the spell.
The re-emergence of the uranium debate is particularly confronting for someone politicised by the nuclear disarmament movement in the early 1980s.
The issue was the Cold War and the doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction - the spectre of the apocalyptic power of enriched uranium to end life on this earth.
The treat hung over us as we picketed the USS Missouri, voted for Pete Garret and challenged a doctrine where two men's fingers dictated our collective survival.
Today's world is less simple - our enemies don't wave flags, they are the indoctrinated and dispossessed, not armies but individuals, who will invoke the spirit of MAD and apply it to their personal lives.
Today there and more nuclear powers - a growing club of established nuclear states as well as the shadowy networks of interests shipping around the substantial and still unsubstantiated assets of our vanquished Cold War competitor.
Today we are consumed by that other threat - global warming - or the more feel good 'climate change' as the oil industry has termed our addiction to their wares.
And now, bizarrely, as weather patterns break down - despite the industry-sponsored research telling us it was all just peacenik scaremongering - we have come the full circle. The answer is nuclear.
No, we have not found safe new ways to dispose of uranium; no, nuclear incidents from poorly maintained facilities have not ceased to occur; and no, young Ukranian kids have not stopped dying from the blow back of Chernobyl.
But this is industry's answer to the crisis bought on by our use of a dangerous earth-threatening power source - to turn to another dangerous earth-threatening power source.
If nuclear is the answer we are asking the wrong question.
If the question is: how can big business profit from the global environmental crisis that it has sponsored, then the answer might be nuclear.
If the question is: how can a government feeling exposed by its attack on workers rights, divert attention by attempting to wedge its political opponents, the answer may be nuclear.
But if the question is: how can a nation secure a safe energy supply for its kids future, the answer can not be nuclear,
There is no nuclear debate to be had in this country. It is a con job. We should not be sucked in.
Peter Lewis
Editor
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