E D I T O R I A L

From Green House to Glass House
History tells us that towards the end of most reigns of power the regime stops listening to the people, stops talking to them and reverts to crushes dissent. Events this week suggest this is where the Howard Government is now.

F E A T U R E S

Interview: Common Ground
Nature Conservation Council director Cate Faehrmann on the fight against global warming and how unions and greens can learn from each other.

Industrial: A Low Act
The Low Paid. The Fair Pay Commission knows who pays them. We can do something about it as they will not.

Unions: The Number of the Least
Forget 666 - 457 is looming as the scariest number for Aussie workers and their families, Jim Marr writes.

Politics: The Smoking Gun
Hayek's henchman, Raplph Harris, goes to free market heaven, writes Evan Jones

Economics: Microcredit, Compulsory Superannuation and Inequality
They are supposed to ensure the wealth of well-being of individuals. Whats wrong with that? asks Neale Towart

Environment: Low Voltage
Nuclear Power and Prime Ministerial pronouncements are seriously short of a few volts, wrties Neal Towart

History: The Art of Social Justice
Tom Martin was a terrific cartoonist and part of a great tradition in labour movement history and culture, swrties Neale Towart.

Review: Work�s Unhealthy Appetite
It pays the bills � usually � but going to work should come with a warning, wrties Jackie Woods.

Culture: A Forgotten Poet
There is little information on the public record about the radical working class poet Ernest Antony, writes Rowan Cahill.

N E W S

Godfrey Hirst Carpets Workers

Lies, Damned Lies and the Shirkin' Gherkin

Guests Share Backpay Bonanza

Win, Win for Filipinos

Honey, They Shrunk Our Pay

No Sex Thanks, We're Asian

Green Jobs to Beat Climate Change

They're Going Out The Door

Medibank Staff Go Under Knife

Thompson Slams Door on Delo

Merchant Bankers Pull Entitlements Stroke

Green the New Black

Councils Fight Off Shoring

Acitivists Notebook

C O L U M N S

The Soapbox
Robbo Goes Green
John Robertson's speech to the Walk Against Warming

Parliament
The Westie Wing
Ian West takes a look at a former public institution and its contribution to NSW.

L E T T E R S

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They're Going Out The Door

The Public Service Association launched a 'cheap and nasty' TV advertisement highlighting the cuts, forcing Debnam to tell different stories to the general public and the business community.

Just one day after publicly denying he ever planned to cut the 29,000 positions from the NSW public sector, Opposition Leader Peter Debnam revealed to Liberal Party donors that his old plan still stands.

At a Liberal Party fundraiser in Sydney, Debnam told assembled ICT executives that he planned to cut up to $2 billion from the NSW 'bureaucracy'.

NSW Minister for Finance, John Della Bosca, says Debnam is exposed as a serial liar. "Do the maths," Della Bosca says. "If you're saving $2 billion from the public sector, at an average salary of $68,000, that's 29,000 people."

"Just one day after denying he had plans to gut the public sector, he is telling Liberal Party audiences in a coded message that this is precisely what he intends to do.

"This performance is straight out of the Nick Greiner Idiot's guide to getting elected - that is you keep one set of polices to be used in the lead-up to the election and in the other drawer you keep your real policies."

PSA general secretary John Cahill says the advertisements were a fun way to make a serious point - that the public service will be totally decimated by the plan for 29,000 job cuts.

"The public sector is already under stress and these sorts of cuts will tip it over the edge to the point where it will no longer be able to provide basic services to the NSW people," Cahill says.

"Our advertisement is deliberately cheap and nasty because we think this policy is cheap and nasty."

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Last Modified: 03 Nov 2006