Workers Online : Issue No. 39, 12 November 1999


Issue No 39		12 November 1999

LaborNET	Ask Neale	Tool of the Week

Features
Interview: Let Sleeping Dogs
Republican campaigner Jason Yat-Sen Li dusts off after Saturday�s vote. We ask him: where to now?

Republic: Readers Speak - Kerry the Face to Deface
We asked and you have spoken; Sydney heiress Kerry Jones is the Workers Online choice for desktop doodling, as the official winner of our Defacement of a Nation competition.

Economics: Understanding the Economy
Who was voted thinker of the millenium in a recent BBC Online poll? Karl Marx shooed it in. And another socialist, Albert Einsten, came second.

Unions: Come Fly Away!
With just four weeks to go, Labor Council's Organiser of the year Award is up for grabs. We've only had the one entry ...

Work/Time/Life: Better Times for Casuals in the Sunshine State
The Queensland Council of Unions has mounted a case in the Queensland IRC to increase wages for casual workers by up to $2.00 extra per hour.

International: All Black Fate Looms for New Zealand Right
The New Zealand economic experiment � for many years the cherished role model of the Australian Liberal Party � is just about to face an angry jury.

History: Who Remembers Egon Erwin Kisch?
Egon Erwin Kisch was a well known progressive journalist living in Germany when he was invited by the Australian branch of the world committee against war and fascism to speak at a conference in Melbourne in 1934.

Review: Bizarrism - Strange Lives, Cults, Celebrated Lunacy
The strange story of Donald Crowhurst or how to cheat and become a God.

Satire: Support Surges for Armenian Republic Model
The assassination by gun crazed extremists of the Armenian Prime Minister has been cautiously backed by Ted Mack and the Direct Electionist lobby as a possible new Republican model.

Tall Tales and True

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News

Sydney heiress Kerry Jones - after the makeover

First Social Audit Win For Rural Road Workers
Rural council workers have forced the state government to conduct a social audit into the impact of competitive tendering of work on the state�s roads.
[ Full Story » ]

Y2K Bug Bites Rail Bookings
Reservations for country rail services have been plunged into chaos by the botched roll-out of a new Y2K compliant computer booking system.
[ Full Story » ]

Strikes Hit Schools - Before and After Class
Five hundred striking school cleaners surrounded the Premier�s office this morning to demand a moratorium on cuts to working hours, as teachers expanded their industrial campaign.
[ Full Story » ]

Olympic Uniforms Row Patched Up
Sydney 2000 organisers have agreed to transfer the manufacture of 15,000 business shirts from Indonesia to Australia as part of a deal to resolve a dispute over the production of Games uniforms.
[ Full Story » ]

Charges to be Laid Over Gretley Disaster
NSW Attorney General Jeff Shaw has announced that charges will be laid over the death of four workers at Gretley Colliery in 1996.
[ Full Story » ]

Jockeys Bucked On Compo
Hundreds of jockeys in New South Wales are working without workers compensation coverage while training horses.
[ Full Story » ]

Wag the Dog - Bosses Try the Back Door Strip
Hospitality employers are attempting to translate newly stripped-back federal award into the NSW jurisdiction, sparking claims of a backdoor strategy to overthrow the state system.
[ Full Story » ]

Labour and Alliance Vow to Dump Contracts Act
The two parties likely to form a coalition government in New Zealand in two weeks time � Labour and the Alliance - have vowed to repeal the notorious Employment Contracts Act.
[ Full Story » ]

Bank Workers Win $3000 Payment for New Years Eve
Workers at a leading bank have secured New Years Eve bonuses of up to $3000 as the Finance Sector Union moves to lock in millennium pay rates across the industry.
[ Full Story » ]

Union Organiser Thrown Off Bridge
A company organising tourist climbs on the Sydney Harbour Bridge is resisting union attempts to talk to their staff, according to the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance.
[ Full Story » ]

Justice at Last for Waterfront Asbestos Victims
Tens of thousands of Australian waterside workers exposed to deadly asbestos fibres stand to benefit by thousands of dollars from a High Court decision in Canberra this week.
[ Full Story » ]

Timor Update: Positions Vacant; Upcoming Events.
APHEDA - Union Aid Abroad is seeking applicants for a series of overseas postings, including Dili and Phnom Penh.
[ Full Story » ]

Fall of Communism as foreseen in 1931

Reith an Error of Judgment

Republic Post Mortem

The Boston Strangler

SOS From New York

Maguire@Work - Wasn't it Satire?

Defacing the Nation

All thinking people should be angry about the outcome of Republic referendum -not about the result which, in the long run will be reversed, but for the way it was defeated.

As voting figures show, the proposition to have an Australian Head of State was resoundingly rejected by lower socio-economic groups, while the more educated, urban electorates backed it in.

The response cut across traditional political barriers to create a new economic-political divide.

Commentators are interpreting this as a sign that working people are disengaged with the political process. What they have not got is that they have been cynically manipulated into this position.

The manipulation was conducted by a small group of determined Monarchists who realised their best chance of maintaining the Crown was by dividing the Republican majority.

They did this by turning the Yes Case into the "Politicians' Republic" and then building on the stereotype of politicians as devious bludgers to successfully build a sullen groundswell against change.

It was a brazen appeal to those who already felt disenfranchised from the changes that are transforming Australia, to punish the politicians that drive the process. A One Nation campaign, public funded and delivered with greater finesse.

What am I whingeing about? All's fair in politics! To a point it is. But the success of this campaign raises serious concerns about the future of our political system. The No case actively fuelled resentment of our leaders in order to maintain the status quo.

That they did so with such success shows that they were playing with fire. And if in future years they look at their country and wonder why so many of the population are disengaged, sullen, angry and cynical, they should look at themselves.

Yes, we lost the Republic. But we lost a lot more in the process.

Peter Lewis
Editor