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  Issue No 58 Official Organ of LaborNet 16 June 2000  

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Letters to the Editor

In Defence of Rallies


Indeed, dear editor, just who do you think we unionists rally and demonstrate for? I rally for my class and my allies, not the television cameras. I do not tailor my demands to fit in with Packer's or Murdoch's idea of what makes worthwhile news. You clearly believe we should all rally for your class and your allies . . . unfortunately, I don't think these are the same as mine.

Perhaps you might not be so confused if you got off-line, out of your Sussex Street comfort zone and into the real workplaces, onto building sites, chicken processing factories and outworkers' sweatshops. Maybe you do need to meet some real workers, not hand picked puppets of the Labor Council.

Are you so unaware of the class forces in this capitalist economy, that you cannot understand that media images are manipulated to suit the bosses? Your editorial has made it clear that you and the Labor Council are not interested in building a mass movement of workers to challenge the bosses.

The latest editorial makes it clear the Labor Council is not genuinely interested in engaging rank and file workers unless they can provide the "correct" media colour and image, to shore up your pathetic beliefs that "If we let some token rank and file unionists give a speech at a stage managed rally, then the rank and file will come back to us, the Labor tops, all our craven capitulation to capital during the Hawke-Keating years will be forgiven."

Interesting that you admit the "off-putting" building workers made up the majority of the rally. Interesting that the Democrats responded to those nasty, brutish, loud and angry building workers. If your new organizing model is what so many people allegedly want, how come they aren't responding to that model by turning out onto the streets? Why weren't the tidy, pliable "general public" at the rally, outnumbering the building workers? Perhaps it's time to tweak the model a bit!

Why do you think the union movement is losing members? It's not because people have all embraced your personally profitable new model of work -- where we get to pick and choose our jobs and pay and conditions. The union movement is losing members precisely because of the "new model" of work -- casual, poorly paid, no security. Yet the union movement bureaucrats like yourself trumpet this "new model" as an advance in working conditions!! The "general public" are pissed off because of this sort of betrayal by the Labor Council, the Labor Party and the Labor bureaucrats. We don't need bread and circuses, we need leaders who will not patronise us, attempt to stifle our initiative and courage or sell us out at every turn.

Out here in the real world, we don't actually have your "choices." We can't afford tertiary education, so we can't skill up to be cyber-unionists, we can't participate in our communities, because we can't afford the costs, our kids' bread is rationed because there is too much week left at the end of the pay packet. How real is any of this to you? And how much do you even care?

The current Labor Council has become a sad copy of the parody of the chardonnay-sipping, cappuccino-quaffing, skivvy-wearing stereotype of the inner city dilettante who dabbles in left-ish politics, until it comes to the crunch and their actual class allegiances are revealed.

We rally because we believe in strength in unity. I don't think the general public is afraid of us, I think the Labor Council and the ALP are afraid of workers they can't control any more. Maybe the Labor Council had better do some more research . . . into why we are angry, hungry and getting louder.

Sincerely yours,

Susan Barley

Member: PSA (NSW)

Member: Bakery, Confectionery and Tobacco Workers Union (USA)


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*   Issue 58 contents

In this issue
Features
*  Interview: After the Gold Rush
NSW building union leader Andrew Ferguson on life after the Olympics and why Che Guevara is his political hero.
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*  Unions: MUA Women's Policy Back on Course
A hard hitting report by the Maritime Union's women's delegate Sue Gajdos prompts the union to, once again, promote its female members.
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*  Politics: Raising the Rafters
Opposition leader Kim Beazley delivered a stirring address to last weekend's NSW ALP State Conference. Here's every word of it.
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*  History: Time and Tide
Greg Patmore surveys the themes of Working Lives in Regional Australia in this introduction to the latest issue of 'Labour History'
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*  International: Fair in the Land of the Free
More than 20,000 immigrant workers, union members and community and religious leaders packed a Los Angeles Sports Arena on June 10 in support of immigrant workers' rights.
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*  Environment: Life's a Beach
Workers are invited to join an environmental campaign to protect the coastal communities and coastline from exploitation by multinationals.
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*  Satire: More Pacific Coups Forecast
The popular holiday resort of Great Keppel Island is bracing itself for a bloody coup, following the rash of rebel uprisings in other parts of the Pacific.
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*  Review: At the Barricades
Denis Evans' photo essay on the Patrick dispute captures the camaraderie on the Melbourne picket lines - solidarity that, like solder, welded workers and their communities together into a human barricade.
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News

 Crackdown on Fiji Workers Intensifies

 Building Industry Braces for Post-Games Slump

 Call Centre Battle Hots Up

 More Sackings Spark Entitlements Showdown

 Carr Establishes Labor Hire Inquiry

 High Court Puts Workers At Reith's Mercy

 Miners Hit the Streets Over Death Threats

 Unions Urged to Reignite Republic Debate

 Tips Rip-Off Sparks Hotel Picket

 Community Workers to Lay Siege to Parliament

 Water Workers Accept 14% Pay Rise

 Counselling for Workplace Accidents

 Korean Food Festival is Union Business

 Che Helps Doctors Save Lives

 Maude Barlow Public Lecture - Sydney June 27

Columns
»  The Soapbox
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»  Sport
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»  Trades Hall
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»  Tool Shed
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Letters to the editor
»  In Defence of Rallies
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»  The Cost of Activism
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