Letters to the Editor

Viva Eavesdropping Jonesy

Dear Sir

What a Gem!

Jones is all Ears!

Can I make a trunk call?

Mr. Stephen Jones, National Assistant Secretary, of the Communications and Public Sector Union, is asking the public to make known their opinion to Telstra re:

The service provided to all stakeholders from it Call Center Staff, through the monitoring of the sometimes mediocre customer service. *(aap)

Well Mr. Jones! I am communicating! Are you Listening?

Your fears could and should be well founded. If complaints are made about the usual, and at best indifferent service, what better method of investigation than, "Check The Tapes", and if the "Customer Service Representative ", is not capable of performing the function they are being paid for, or more probably unwilling to provide - Should they not be dismissed?

This ridiculous "Red Herring", of privacy is just another soggy straw onto which Incompetent Unions desperately claw , as they sink into the "Sea of Industrial Irrelevance."

To answer your Question, Mr. Jones, I am delighted that Telstra has decided to monitor all customer calls. Perhaps now, our level on service won't depend on a bad hair day, and Telstra will find it unnecessary to re-locate these call Centers to New Delhi, Bombay, or perhaps even Fiji to obtain a reasonable level of customer service.

This "Customer Service" is something Australians appear unwilling to provide at any price.

It would appear the only qualifications needed for Australian Style Customer Service being a degree in proctology.

Tom Collins

Letters to the Editor

Globalisation and Maintaining Our Lifestyle

Globalisation too often means the transfer of jobs from societies that have good standards of wages, work safety, workers' rights and environmental protection to countries where these fundamental human rights are poorer. This is resulting in an erosion in living standards in Australia without improving the lot of people in the countries to which our jobs are transferred. The final outcome will be a world where standards are set by the poorest country, rather than one where the lives of the world's poor are bettered.

The solution does not lie in the "old fashioned" methods of tariff protection where a fixed percentage duty is applied to all foreign goods. Such a tax merely rewards businesses that further cut wages and conditions in foreign countries while propping up inefficient procedures in our country.

I propose a tariff based on calculating the value of a good if it was produced at the Australian award rate of pay, with all workers' rights, health and safety regulations, and environmental protection laws. Such a tariff would be reduced as the foreign producer met the rules that would be imposed if the good was produced here. In other words, it would not force living standards down in the other country, but reward it as these standards were improved.

I further propose that all funds raised by such a tariff, after administrative costs, be allocated to foreign aid projects. This would ensure that Australia would not be seen to be profiting from the tariff or using it to subsidise local inefficiencies.

Gordon Murray

Letters to the Editor

Crappiest Music Feedback

You forgot one category - the Rock Dinosaur Superannuation reunion/tour a la Rolling Stones, Sex Pistols, Yes, Hawkwind, Led Zeppelin et al.

Pieter

Interview

Greg Sword Unsheathed

by Peter Lewis

What will you bring to the ALP Presidency if, as expected, you are voted in next week?

Well, there is a long way to go and I am a candidate, and I suppose I'm the favourite at this stage but I think the President of the Labor Party has a number of roles to play. They need to be some person that's positive so I think it is preferable if they have good management skills and an understanding of a broad range of the Labor movement, whether it be business, the trade union movement or a political party. I think that I probably have experience in all of those areas.

My focus will be - as the whole of the Party's focus should be in the next period of time - on winning government. I think I have played a reasonable role in Victoria helping the Victorian branch of the Labor Party overcome Jeff Kennett. I played a management role throughout the past seven years in Victoria helping to bring about that result, so I think I can make a positive contribution to the Party at a national level in the strategy and campaigning details and into management generally.

Speaking of Victoria, what do you see as the similarities between the situation that Labor's facing nationally now and that which faced Bracks 12 months ago?

I think they are entirely different. I think that the Labor Party in Victoria since '93 - certainly in '93 was really discredited publicly and it had to fight its way back from a really very, very difficult position.

Labor nationally is certainly not in that position. I think Labor nationally has a very strong, positive image, and the polling says that Labor nationally has a real chance of winning the next election.

Before John Della Bosca withdrew from the race the talk was that he would play a very hands on role during the election campaign and that would be the focus of the Federal President's job. Do you see that as a role that you will now step into?

I probably wouldn't put it that way. I think John Della Bosca has got an extremely important, continuing role to play. He has a great grasp and sense of campaigning and strategies and I would think that the Labor Party would want to continue to have John make a contribution, so I think that will continue.

I think that if the President of the Party has those additional skills it helps. I mean, I have got some of those skills, but I think that we would want to continue to use John as well.

Do you think that his comments on the GST has made it harder for Labor to win the next election?

I don't think that is an area that I would like to comment on. I think all that has been said about that has been said and I think that it is better for the matter to be put behind us.

Since your name has been raised, the mass media has run a lot of rhetoric from Reith and Howard about union hacks running the ALP. What is your take on the relationship between unions and the ALP in the 21st Century?

I think of the labour movement really as a family that has two parts, which is the Labor Party (the political party) and the trade union movement. If we just think about it historically the trade union movement recognised a long, long time ago that there were certain things that could be achieved by industrial action and campaigning with the employer, either at a local level or at a general level, but that if you really wanted to make fundamental changes and make laws regarding the social objectives of the trade union movement, i.e. into the economy, education, health, equity, and all the social issues, then trade unions decided a long time ago that you had to actually win government to do some of those things.

The relationship between the trade union movement and the Labor Party is always one that is like a family and that is where blood is thicker than water. But from time to time there will be disagreements that occur. The most important thing about the relationship is not necessarily that you have disagreements, but that you have the capacity to work them out, and I think that is the track record of the labour movement. I think at the moment the relationship between the Party and the trade union movement is a good one.

No one is really talking about an Accord in government, but would you say that looking back the eighties, that the relationship is either closer or more distant than back then?

I think it is different but I think that the Accord was the appropriate thing to do at an appropriate time in history. People will argue about what its benefits were or weren't but my feeling is that the Accord was something that worked well for working people.

The circumstances are different. I think an Accord isn't something that is necessarily called for at the moment. I think the relationship between the industrial wing and the political wing of the movement is probably a little more sophisticated, and I don't think anyone on either side particularly wants to have a formal document recording the relationship, but the relationship is a good one and I think we work things through together well.

Do you think the continuing slide in percentage union membership in the country affects that relationship at all?

I don't think it has. I think that this is an issue for the trade union movement really that it has to address - and I know is addressing, and we have done a lot of work to identify precisely what are our problems and what we need to do to overcome them. And there is a report that the trade union movement put together and has issued: "Unions at Work" and we are all now busily trying to implement the recommendations and the strategies which come out of that.

So I think that the union movement's future is in its own hands - and I'm talking as a trade unionist. We have to deliver the goods and we have to turn things around. I think our problem will be that if we don't do that - our future is as much about the relationship with the ALP but if we slide to a percentage level that for example exists in the United States or some of the other countries, then we'll have problems with being taken credibly in the community in general.

I guess conversely the other question is, do you think the ALP needs a strong union movement to keep its bearings?

I have always been, and am still, a strong supporter of the relationship between the trade union movement and the ALP and I think it is a beneficial one both ways.

Finally, it is a week before Conference at the moment. If things go smoothly, what do you hope to see at the end of next week?

The ALP National Conference is a unique meeting. It provides a bit of transparency about the way in which the Labor Party develops its policy and debates it and makes decisions. The Liberal Party doesn't have such a showcase.

But when you hold a conference which is public and transparent, there is always the opportunity for arguments to be held publicly. I think what everybody will hope for from this conference is that the platform that will be endorsed will be a positive one - and that the experience of the conference will be a positive one and will form another plank or another foundation for the Party to go forward to the next election.

Unions

Phone Rage, Headaches and Stress

by Noel Hester

Working with

The survey results are a sobering reminder that beneath the glitzy fa�ade of this new, hyped, hi tech industry there are serious human problems that are being neglected by statistics-obsessed management.

Over half of respondents reported they were very stressed. A third took ten or more days off per year due to work related stress. 87% said stress was a workplace issue and 40% said they suffered from work related health problems such as headaches and eyestrain.

Stress came from a myriad of factors including oppressive call monitoring, equipment breakdown, and unsupportive managers. Phone rage was also a serious problem for workers who had to cop the flak for poor decisions made by company executives.

Employees had their own ideas about how call centres could be improved: managers listening to workers ideas and suggestions, a decreasing emphasis on statistics, a better management attitude and more support and training.

The survey covered workers in 658 union and non-union call centres. It was analysed by Monash University's Key Centre for Industrial Relations.

The survey results were announced as call centre workers from around Australia gathered in Melbourne this week to launch a campaign for a new national award.

The campaign was launched by new ACTU President Sharan Burrows. Sharan's involvement underlines the importance the new ACTU leadership gives to building union organisation in the new hi tech areas of the economy.

Australia has more than 4000 call centres employing about 160,000 workers. Industry forecasts predict the sector will grow by 25% per year.

ASU National Call Centre Coordinator Colin Lynch says the ASU campaign for a new award covers all states and focusses on contract call centres.

'Call centre employees are crying out for unions and for more rights for workers. They have a right to an award like anyone else. At the moment there are no minimum conditions for many workers in this growing industry,' he said.

Despite the serious problems in the industry employees maintain a bright attitude towards their careers. They see themselves as customer service professionals and expected to be treated as such.

Fiona, an employee for one of Australia's major call centre operators says call centres would be good places to work if they were unionised, conditions were improved and the oppressive environment was changed.

'If a good call centre can set up a career path and management treated call centre agents with respect and gave them direction there would be reason to be positive about the job. You wouldn't be thinking 'I've got to go to work and face these hundreds of calls,' she says.

'Unionising call centres is critical to achieve this. Now I can't talk freely. I can't stand up at work and say - 'these problems need to be sorted out.'

'Stress, call monitoring, the pressures of 7 day a week, 24 hour rosters, career paths and flexiblity for families are issues the industry has to face up to,' says Colin Lynch.

'A national award would go some way to addressing these issues for employees in a fair way.'

'Our survey reveals a high level of dissatisfaction with management among employees. This is reflected in the high turnover rate of staff. This is bad for employees and employers. Industry research has revealed each employee that leaves costs the industry $11,000.'

'An award gives minimum conditions for employees. Employers will no longer be competing on wages. An award will also give recognition to the skills required in a call centre.'

ACTU President Sharan Burrow said call centre management put workers under extraordinary pressure.

'Instead of focussing on the needs of staff and customers, call centre employers have a big brother obsession with call volumes, monitoring and statistics,' she said.

Economics

And the Winner Is .... Sydney?

*******************

"AND THE WINNER IS ....SYDNEY" were the words spoken by International Olympic Committee President Juan Antonio Samaranch when Sydney successfully won its bid to host the Olympic Games in the year 2000. It is less than a year before we let the games begin on 15 September, 2000. There is great anticipation (as well as much construction activity) in Sydney as we close in on the first significant world event of the new millennium.

But what will the Olympics do for Australia apart from providing one big party in Sydney for two weeks? Well, it has already provided a significant boost to construction activity, particularly in New South Wales and has been part of an improved level of confidence in the Australian economy. It is also likely to bring technology and knowledge to Australia that will remain with us after the big event is over. According to a study by Arthur Anderson and the Centre for Regional Economic Analysis (CREA) the Olympics will contribute an additional $6.5 billion to Australia's GDP for the twelve year period 1994-95 to 2005-06 (Arthur Anderson/CREA,1999, p2). In short, Australia has a lot to look forward to in 2000 and beyond in addition to some fine athletic performances at the Games themselves.

The economic benefits of the 2000 Olympics can be classified as direct and indirect. Direct benefits include the impact of the Olympics on exports, investment and employment.

In terms of exports, the main impact will be inbound tourism, sponsorship fees, media broadcast rights, and ticket sales.

The staging of the Olympics will encourage more international tourists to visit Australia. According to the Tourism Forecasting Council 1.5 million additional international tourists are expected to visit Australia over 1994-95 to 2005-06 because of the staging of the Olympics. This is estimated to generate an additional $ 2.7 billion in tourism exports (see Arthur Anderson/CREA,1999, p 2).

Sponsorship fees received from international sources will be strong leading up to the Olympics and according to the Reserve Bank of Australia, broadcast rights (approximately

$ 1 billion in value) will be recorded as exports in September quarter 2000. Ticket sales sold to overseas visitors (of up to $100 million in value) will also be recorded in the September quarter. The RBA estimates that the overall boost to export receipts will be equivalent to around 1 % of GDP in the September quarter of 2000. (See RBA, 1999, p27). Similarly, the Arthur Anderson/CREA study (p2) estimates a positive impact on the balance of trade from the Olympics of $0.8 billion in 2000 and $ 0.2 billion in the post- games period of 2001-02 to 2005-06.

In terms of investment infrastructure projects have greatly boosted domestic economic activity, particularly in New South Wales. The total value of Sydney's construction project is $ 3.3 billion of which $1.1 billion is funded by the private sector ( Olympic Co-ordination Authority (OCA), June 1999, p5.) According to the RBA this construction activity has already assisted the economy by contributing a little over half of one percent of annual Australian GDP over the five years beginning in 1995/96The largest stimulus to growth probably occurred in 1996/97 (RBA, 1999, p26).

The infrastructure spending not only includes spending on Olympic facilities such as Stadium Australia but also to upgrades to Sydney airport, roads and railway related investment. These improvements will benefit both local resident and overseas and interstate visitors to Sydney well after the Olympics as well as during the event.

The Olympics has provided an important boost to employment. The OCA estimates that more than 35,000 people have worked on OCA construction sites since the first project at Homebush Bay was started. It is estimated that since the OCA was formed in 1995, over 12.5 million hours have been worked on Olympic related projects. There will also be multiplier effects. According to the OCA, every job created on a construction site will create two more off site for suppliers, material producers and transport workers. (OCA,1999, p5.)

The Olympics are expected to boost NSW employment by 5,300 in an average year of the 12 years representing the Olympic period. In addition 2,200 jobs are expected to be created outside NSW over the same period (Arthur Anderson/CREA, 1999, p3).

It is also important to highlight the indirect benefits that the Olympics will bring. Certain export sectors will enjoy more profile and opportunity. The obvious one is tourism with an associated boost to the transport and hospitality industries. For instance, in aviation, the staging of the Olympics will bring significant benefits for Ansett and Qantas in terms of increased traffic, earnings growth and brand awareness (see Morrison, 1999). The Olympics will also opportunity for sports exporters . According to Australia Sport International (ASI), Australia exported $363 million worth of sporting goods in 1998 and is expected to increase its exports to Asia, North America and Europe with the help of the staging of the Sydney Olympics (see ASI, 1999).

Indirect benefits will also come from increased exposure to Australia as host of the millennium Olympic Games. Austrade is driving the Government's Australia Open for Business campaign which takes advantage of the heightened global interest in Australia at the time of the Olympics. A global promotion for Australia as a prime business destination is supported by a number of new business programs which capture new interest to turn it into export and investment revenue. The key program under Australia Open for Business is Business Club Australia. Also, managed by Austrade, Business Club Australia connects Australian exporters with overseas buyers and investors through a global networking club which also shares the excitement of the 2000 Games (see www.australiaforbusiness.com).

As well as the networking opportunities provided at the Olympics, Australia will benefit from the transfer of technology and knowledge as host of the Olympics. As a world class and internationally visible event, the Olympic Games have attracted innovation as countries try to better each other in terms of technology and technique. The Olympics is not just a competition of the athletes of nations but is as much a battle of the scientists, architects, engineers and artists of those nations as well. It is a 'knowledge Olympics' as well as an athletic Olympics. For example the Homebush Bay site and associated venues are examples of design excellence produced by Australian architects. Australia will benefit as many of these great ideas of the new millennium will be put into practice on our own soil in 2000. There will be a vast array of talented people in Sydney in 2000, which Australia can learn from. This will assist us greatly as Australia competes globally in the information age where knowledge and innovation are at a premium.

The hosting of the Sydney Olympics has already brought significant benefits to Australia in terms of environmental technology. For example Olympic Village has been designed to be a net contributor to local power generation in western Sydney. Similarly, the water retilication system has been developed to ensure an ecologically sustainable and economically efficient outcome from the Olympics. The environmental impact of the games are an important indirect benefit to Australia's stock of 'green' capital which will be crucial to future economic performance.

Of course, a note of caution should always be included. Some economists have warned the Australian public not to exaggerate the benefits of the Olympics because of past experience (See Dabkowski and Ketchell,1999 Gittins, 1999 and Mules, 1999). However, many poor results in the past occurred because of poor financing, unexpected geo-political events and a prior record of uneven economic development. The OCA and SOCOG are well structured so that the financing of the Sydney Olympics is shared between the private and public sector. Australia is an open economy currently experiencing good economic performance despite adverse international conditions. It is a stable, pluralist, multicultural country with a highly educated and skilled population. Accordingly, Sydney is well placed to avoid some of the pitfalls that affected host nations of the past.

In summary, the preparations for the Sydney Olympics in 2000 have already provided significant economic benefit for Australia in terms of export promotion, investment, economic growth and jobs. There will be big boost to Australia's trade performance, tourism and the economy overall in 2000 because of the event itself. Importantly, the benefits will continue well into the new millennium as Australia gets more international exposure for its exports and gains from the transfer of technology and knowledge from the world's best. Opportunity beckons for the athletes, for exporters, for artists, for scientists and for the whole Australian community.

Austrade's Australia Open for Business web site details how Australia is staging the 2000 Games, and specific business initiatives - http://www.australiaforbusiness.com.

International

Western Sahara: Referendum Or War?

Morocco's delaying tactics and the UN's inability to put due pressure on the occupying power have once again prevented the organization of the referendum. Kamal Fadel, the Australian representative of the Western Sahara independence movement the Polisario Front, fears this may lead to a resumption of hostilities, "We believe that if Morocco continues in its current irresponsible and provocative attitude a return to war is inevitable."

The referendum was originally to be organised in 1992 but has been delayed many times due to Morocco's fear of losing the referendum.

Despite the UN's efforts and the cooperation of Polisario Front, Morocco continues to sabotage the referendum under the pretext that thousands of Moroccan citizens are entitled to take part in the vote.

This conflict over voting entitlements is at the core of the disagreement. After a gruelling five-year identification process the UN published lists of those entitled to vote in the referendum in January of this year. Morocco has rejected the results of the voter identification process leading to an indefinite delay in the referendum process.

Former US Secretary of State James Baker III, has been working to break the stalemate in the UN peace plan. In May and June of this year he chaired talks between both parties in London. So far the talks have failed to produce any positive results.

On 20 and 21 July 2000, talks between delegations representing Morocco and the Polisario Front were held in Geneva under UN auspices, to attempt to resolve technical issues related to the referendum process.

Once again Morocco demonstrated its bad faith by refusing to seriously discuss these issues and on the second day refusing to attend the meetings.

Mr Fadel said, "Without the backing of the international community, the referendum is unlikely to go ahead. We call on the international community to put due pressure on Morocco in order to avoid a UN failure in Western Sahara and a return to hostilities."

History

The Union's Roots in Song

by Musical Traditions by Margaret Walters

Walter Pardon (1914-96) was a quiet, thoughtful, unassuming man who lived all his life in the village of Knapton in Norfolk working as a carpenter, and singing songs he'd learned from his Uncle's knee. He was a craftsman in a family that had been farm workers for many generations. He was an only child and remained a bachelor all his life. His mother's side of the family had a rich store of old songs, particularly her brother, Billy Gee who lived in the Pardon house for many years. The Depression threw Walter and Uncle together in a way, which ensured that he thoroughly learned all the family songs of the previous century. But there was no pub in the village and the tradition of singing the old songs died out in the immediate area, and was ridiculed. So - for twenty years Walter rarely sang outside the family home, treasuring these songs and singing them around the house and garden and keeping them alive in almost total isolation until his "discovery" by the English folk scene.

Stand Up Ye Men of Labour : The Socio-Political Songs of Walter Pardon was the title of an article by Mike Yates that leapt from the screen at the Musical Traditions web site and this piece draws from Yates' writing and from other articles about Walter (full details below). The songs and the stories Walter told to place them in context offer insights into aspects of nineteenth century social unrest and conflict.

Themes touched on include the effects of the Corn Laws, migration, child labour, resentment of farm owners who liked their workers to "show their obedience". The tenor of the songs is lifted with the growth of the union movement. Several members of Walter's family, including his father and Uncle Billy, joined the Trunch branch of the Union. Here are excerpts from two songs Walter sang (they appeared in an undated song book, 'National Agricultural Labourers' and Rural Workers' Union Song Book',which his Uncle owned.)

We Meet Today in Freedom's Cause

We meet today in freedom's cause

And raise our voices high.

We join our hands in Union song

To battle or to die.

Chorus:

Hold the fort, we are coming

Union men be strong

Side by side, keep pressing onward

Victory will come

An Old Man's Advice

My grandfather worked when he was very young

And his parents felt grieved that he should.

To be forced in the fields to scare away the crows

To earn himself a bit of food.

The days they were long and his wages were but small

And to do his best he always tried.

But times are better for us all

Since the old man died.

Chorus:

For the Union is started, unite, unite.

Cheer up faint-hearted, unite, unite.

The works begun, never to stop again

Since the old man died.

Needless to say, the farm owners had little time for union activity. Uncle Billy sang this verse to the tune of The Farmer's Boy:

I'll have no Union rascal, mind,

I've just sent them adrift.

And if the Union you're in league

I'll send you off as swift.

If you will work, do as you're told,

Nor use your tongue awry.

You can plough and sow, and reap and mow,

And be a farmer's boy, and be a farmer's boy.

It is interesting to note that most of the Union songs use hymn tunes - a fact in part confirming the thesis first proposed by the French historian Elie Halevy, namely that the growth of Methodism - in this case, by the use of Christian hymn tunes as settings for songs calling for social upheaval - had prevented an English revolution in the early 19th century. If so, then the Halevy thesis may be extended to the latter half of the 19th century as well.

The study of worker's music has been held back by the way in which middle-class Edwardian folksong collectors misinterpreted the beliefs and feelings of the people from whom they collected songs. Take for example the song 'We're All Jolly Fellows Who Follow the Plough', which is, on the surface, a simple enough song in praise of farm labour. In the mid-70's, while collecting in Sussex, two independent singers told Yates that they would sing this song at harvest suppers. It would be not only for the benefit of local dignitaries and guests of honour, but also for their fellow workers who were well aware that the song was not about a carefree country existence, but a medium for expressing all that was wrong in society. Despite what the farm owners might think, their workers were not jolly fellows. They did not enjoy rising at dawn to work all day in a wet plough field, and they were not happy about their employer's paternalism.

Most of Walter Pardon's socio-political songs are living proof of the tenacity, determination and creativity of the working class. They will probably not appeal to those folklorists whose outmoded, and basically bourgeois, conceptions cannot come to terms with that which is actually being sung by the working class. And yet, if we do have to use this terminology, there is little doubt that these songs are indeed real folksongs.

Recordings exist for much of Walter's repertoire. A double CD set (49 tracks), titled "Put a Bit of Powder on it, Father", and released recently, contains the union-related songs mentioned in this article. The set is available from: Topic Records by Credit Card for 15.72stg, inc. View and print the Ex-VAT Order Form at: www.mustrad.org.uk/top_ord2.htm and post it to Topic in London. Or phone them on: +44 20 7281 3465 and ask for Mail Orders.

Musical Traditions is an electronic magazine (http://www.musictrad.com.uk) that has three lengthy articles about the songs of Walter Pardon - and this article has drawn on them heavily with the editor's permission. Visit the site and seek on the Articles page the following: Stand Up Ye Men of Labour : The Socio-Political Songs of Walter Pardon by Mike Yates; Walter Pardon : Put a Bit of Powder on it, Father by Rod Stradling and Mike Yates - a transcript of the comprehensive booklet accompanying the CD; and a review of these two CDs by Roly Brown. There is a wealth of information about Walter's earlier recordings and details of his life and character.

Margaret Walters is a Sydney folk singer heavily influenced by Britishtraditional singing styles. She performs with song-writer, John Warner and together they have a vast repertoire of songs about history, industry andthe environment.

Albums and enquiries:mailto:[email protected]

URL: http://www.folkalpoint.freeserve.co.uk/ww/walters_and_warner.htm

Margaret also works as an Editorial Assistant for the journal, LabourHistory.

Media

Unchaining the ABC

by Tony Moore

The ABC is a case in point. Putting aside the ravages being perpetrated by the Coalition -Labor must ask is the ABC as an institution fulfilling its charter, and, if we are serious about being a knowledge nation ,what might be a better vision for public broadcasting in the future. Many younger program makers who have worked at the ABC were opposed to the creatively stifling Hill/Johns corporation and are clamouring for changes to block the bureaucratic constipation of the ABC so that it might better reflect 21st century Australia and draw on the talent of its citizens.

So many Australian stories are not being told in this important public space. When I criticise the ABC, especially television it is as a friend - someone who sat on the ABC advisory council and had the privilege of working in the ABC as a doco maker for nine years and of agitating through my union for internal reform.

While the neo-liberal right, the Coalition, and indeed sections of the Labor Party have run an often dogmatic privatisation agenda, the left side of politics has taken on the role of conservative, fighting a rearguard action to 'conserve' vital public institutions from being sold to shareholders. But in the process we abdicate the reform agenda to people who believe market forces are the universal panacea. While the left correctly saw that there are areas of service and production that are simply unsuitable for market control, the campaign has too often become a sentimental defence of quangos, corporations, boards and commissions that are in fact in dire need of reform. In opposition the ALP has tended to succumb to nostalgia about public institutions - defending them against the ravages of the coalition without questioning if they are still delivering.

It is because public institutions have often treated their consumers and workers in a shabby fashion - both the CES and Telstra come to mind -that the privatisation rhetoric gets a toehold with the public. Organisations can become bureaucratic and lose sight of their reason for being. A particular group may capture an organisation and use it for sectional ends. The social conditions in which public services were established have undergone rapid change. Reform is an ongoing process if institutions are to continue to fulfil their charters. Labor - because it cares about public institutions - should be interested in how they can be improved to better achieve social democratic goals such as equity in health, education, justice, information and creativity for all citizens in our changed times. This is the radical alternative to the crude dualism of market forces or a sentimental clinging to the status quo.

Thinking about our public institutions has a fine lineage on our side of politics. A century ago pioneers of public service and the welfare state like Sidney and Beatrice Webb, GDH Cole and William Morris who during the hight of the indutrial age wrestled with how to balance the interests of producers and consumers and whether state ownership in itself was enough to best deliver the good society. The challenge for us today is rethinking the public sector from the midst of the information revolution. Industrial age corporations entering a new century have to change the way they have traditionally controlled their assets, to move away from top down coercion. They must find personalities who can manage these businesses without stifling their potential. That's the challenge for the broader cultural industry as well: moving away from a control model. The state funded culture 'industries', particularly the ABC are still operating with out-of-date industrial models.

The industrial era was very much about hierarchies within hierarchies. There would be elite and popular broadcasting, there would be broadsheets and tabloids,. It was just assumed that one was better than the other. A cultural divide was institutionalised that was inherently anti-democratic, but it was also the enemy of real excellence. 'Quality' became just a matter of class prejudice, rather than something that had to be tested.

In the case of the ABC Labor has so far failed to articulate an alternative vision of how public media might operate for a changed Australia in which diversity is the central fact of life. We are entering the post-broadcast age where broad- casting to mass audiences is being replaced by narrow casting to niche interests. In the post-broadcast world, the coerced majorities of broadcasting break up and fragment. The industrial model with its two standard products, 'high' versus 'low', is already starting to split up. What you now get is cultural multiplicity. Technological developments make narrow casting whether digitally, through cable, the airwaves or the internet both possible and affordable, but it is the diversity of audiences which is driving the process.

Simultaneously new technologies reduce the costs of creative production and make obsolete both the factory systems and the corporate hierarchies that characterised television production -both private and public -in the second half of the twentieth century.

While rightly defending the principle of public broadcasting in the face of the Coalition's attacks the ALP fails to notice how even under the last Labor government the ABC was far from living up to what should be principles for a social democratic vision for public media.

So from the inside what did Labor do with the ABC

The ALP in government has often run a warmed over version of the right's privatisation agenda - either selling off the public's assets outright, or imposing 'managerialism' on public utilities such as the ABC, a kind of internal privatisation that combined fake market forces and costs savings with a top down restructure that gives all power to the bean counters. Rather than producing lean, mean machines responsive to consumers the result has been an intensification of old fashioned civil service hierarchy under the new corporatism but with the quality of service and public accountability often reduced.

Under Labor the ABC was subjected to just such a managerial make-over, bureaucracy and central control was strengthened and the organisations capacity to encourage creativity and reflect a changing Australian society greatly weakened. The growth in bureaucracy and management control over product was disguised by David Hill's energetic maintenance of funding under Labor. Keating's; dissatisfaction with Hill's ABC was seen in Creative Nation, which directed new funds for innovation to SBS where the money was less likely to fall victim to bureaucratic inertia. ABC radio, while not immune to managerialism, was immune, though the hands-on and immediate nature of its medium, from the worst excesses. But in television the combination of an old style public service nomen clatura with managerialism's elevation of the accountants produced a mule not unlike the Soviet Union in its dying days.

If Hill was an autocrat instilling paranoia Brian Johns was the well meaning Gorbachev. Despite the wiff of glasnost on his ascension Johns proved unable to starve off the Howard government's massive cuts to ABC funding and political attacks alleging anti-coalition bias and immoral material offensive to mainstream Australia. ABC management's response - an unprecedented downsizing of production staff in tandem with a "One ABC" re-structure that actually increased the number of senior and middle management; intensification of management's control over production; and a conservative programming and commissioning policy that provoked a flight of younger programme makers amid an orgy of British costume and police drama, hight arts and rural escapism to the delight of the good burgers of Mosman and their middle brow comrades in Balmain.

With the Coalition in power a not unreasonable desire by Johns and Mansfield to open the ABC's doors to the wider outside creative community as had been happening for years with the independent documentary makers became an ideologically driven obsession by management to outsource programme making to the big commercial players even less in touch with Australian creativity than the ABC. When the rushed and secret Mansfield inquiry failed to uphold the allegations of bias or argue for commercialisation the Coalition contented itself with natural attrition on the board and the end of John's term .Now with Shier at the helm there appears to be an agenda to dumb down ABC TV even further, to make it more like commercial television

Today I'm less concerned about what the Coalition is doing to the ABC than about the long term structural problems that allows a public asset to be so easily destroyed, and about how the ALP might re-imagine public media

Benchmarks for Labor should be:

- fair dinkum reflection of Australia's cultural diversity - in terms of class, generations, regions, aesthetics, ideas and especially ethnicity in both programming and recruitment; and

- real openness to and support for creativity and innovation, from both in house staff and from the wider community in order to enhance our creativity of our culture.

-training and nurturing of new talent and experimentation in technology and craft skills.

- accountability of cultural producers to taxpayers who fund it and consume it in their diversity. Measurements a bit better than a subjective idea about 'quality' or crude bums on seats -the ratings.

-internal work place democracy

Problems

The basic problem with the ABC for a social democratic party is that its corporate structure leaves it struggling to be creative and to respond to the diversity that now lies at the heart of Australia's social reality.

The ABC remains a fairly monocultural, upper middle class, ango-celtic institution. As well as contravening the ABC charter, this narrowness stultifies our public culture. The ABC can never be all things to all people, but it can be the means by which different Australians talk to each other. At the moment its the channel through which one section of Australia talks to itself- while a tremendous creative energy in our community -one that will always be ignored by the commercial sector - remains disenfranchised.

In practice the ABC charter and those of many other public cultural bodies is usually ignored for a sectoral appeal to the Anglo-Celtic upper middle class. The problem occurs when terms like 'public interest' or 'quality' or 'non-commercial' are masks for personal taste or class prejudices or outmoded aesthetics. Tax payers and consumers have a right to a say in how their cultural dollars are spent. Currently these institutions are run as if they are the property of the nomenclature who are in fact our servants. It is a far cry from the sort of cultural democracy that we should be promoting.

Even if many of its stars and managers are fashionably republican the ABC remains the great defender of British culture in Australia and persists in maintaining a colonial deference to the BBC as the benchmark for quality. More generally ABC culture adheres to a an old idea of Australian nationalism, where white Australians speak for the nation, and migrants and 'ethnic' Australians speak for their own groups and usually only about migrant and 'multicultural' issues. The opposing view argues that Australia is now ethnically diverse at its core, and the idea of what is the national culture is being contested - an unfolding story that ABC television ignores in favour of the usual suspects. This monoculturalism flows in part from the staff make up, the result not just of incumbency, but from a far from transparent recruitment process that continues to favour Anglo Australians and British immigrants.

The ABC's class bias towards the private schooled educated is shared with other private media industries, but they are not the concern of a social democratic government. The ABC is good at exhibiting working class individuals and communities as subjects with problems to be diagnosed or eccentricities to be celebrated, but always they are presented as 'the other' to an assumed middle class audience. As I was told on starting work at the ABC in 1988 on a doco called Nobody's Children :

"remember mate, your making films to titillate Pymble."

In Sydney it is rare for the ABC to consider the audience in the western suburbs where most of the population live. Or as Mike Carlton reported on taking the job as announcer on 2BL - "my manger told me to imagine I was talking to my neighbour over the fence in Epping." I don't recall, a member of the production staff or management that lived in western Sydney and anthropological trips 'out their' were generally the subject of snobby jokes - as was my own origins in Wollongong.

Ironically, though, the ABC is also loosing the younger middle class who live the inner cities whose tastes might be described as lowbrow/high brow Apart from 2JJJ, and radio National the ABC is too literal, pompous and well, middle brow and lacking in irony and sense of humour. The ABC has long suffered from a generational constipation that has seen younger programme makers within and outside the ABC either ignored or ghettoised in so-called youth programmes while an aging cohort continue to control 'serious' programmes in current affairs, the arts and drama.

The Gangland thesis has been well debated, but it remains true that the 60s generation who pioneered current affairs television have been loath to allow subsequent generations to meddle with the formulae or try new aesthetics or ideas with glorious exceptions like Beat Box. In fact the same people who invented cheeky, maverick programs like TDT have used their used managerial incumbency to enforce their revolutionary experiments as rigid dogma - so shows like the Simpsons now have more to tell us about our changing world than Four Corners.

What I mean is that ABC docs and current affairs continue to generalise about simplistic trends learned from 70s sociology - running trains down well worn tracks when many of us want to explore the interesting tangle of back lanes and clear new trails. This generational myopia extends to the choice of 'talking heads' where television,(unlike radio) persist in ignoring the diversity of new commentators who have been educated in our universities over the past twenty years- it's as if the world stopped in 1975.

The ABC has always played an important incubator role in discovering and fostering new talent, but it is hopeless at looking after that talent and allowing it to mature within the ABC's mainstream, which remains enslaved to old ideas of 'quality'. So the problem is not with youth programming, but in allowing a diversity of adult programming. Meanwhile the creative energies of several generations of talented Australians talks to itself in ejournals, independent and scholarly publications or beats a path to Foxtel or Channel 10 where younger ideas and aesthetics are appreciated. Public institutions have been blind to cultural change before -one only has to think of fate of the Angry Penguins modernists in the 40s- but Labor need not accept this conservative tendency.

Real porosity with the diversity of our creative community and audiences is not necessarily easy. Everyone supports innovation, but real innovation often offends or angers or leaves one underwelmed. Similarly with 'quality' - one person's quality may makes no sense to another person - appreciation may take particular cultural literacies which now days are not shared by a community criss crossed by aesthetic and attitudinal divides . This is the real challenge of multi-culturalism - and indeed a long lived population - that Australia is still to deal with.

The trouble for the left is that the ABC gives most of us what we love - sober, abstract discussion of public affairs, dramatisation of classic literature, truly intellectual radio programmes, the occasisonal sassy inner city comedy and bucolic soaps that buy into our child hood memories. But for us - unlike the Liberals - it is important to think about our fellow citizens left cold by this model of broadcasting. Surely its not postmodern wankery to suggest we see beyond our own personal interests and take into account other Australians with different tastes, icons, knowledge, humour, dreaming. Public broadcasting has always sought to identify the tastes of the tertiary educated upper middle class with a universal notion of 'quality'. A diverse society with many different ways of seeing de-stabilises this once sacrosanct notion of 'quality', throwing open the parameters to a wider, not narrower range of ideas, aesthetics, personalities and stories. Labor activists engaged in the debate about the ABC need to be culturally sensitive to the different tastes and positions in the community , and mindful about enthroning their own tastes as inherently superior.

The reform of a public asset like the ABC is too important to be left to the whims of this or that managing director .Perhaps Labor should look to another Dix style inquiry I don't claim to have all the answers but some issues to consider are:

o why should either the government of the day or a managing director and an appointed board be able to so wilfully toy with a basic public asset - surely this is a matter for Parliament or a proper public inquiry where the ABC's stake holders - the public can debate the issues. Despite Alan Ashbolt's description of the MD as a king, the MD is simply administering the ABC in trust for the future. A transparent process of perhaps 10 yearly public inquiry should be written into the relevant legislation and the powers of the MD decisively curbed.

oflatten management and re-invest in creative and production staff.

oABC management must stop over controlling both from senior and middle management. The ABC spends a lot of money making its TV boring, chopping, changing, recutting, rejecting TV is not a hospital - no one will die. Radio is again a case in point where the nature of the medium - low tech and immediate - escapes meddling and the results are good.

onarrow-casting - perceive audience in its diversity - a guiding principle should be understanding that ethnic diversity is not a side order tabouli salad, but the key unfolding story of contemporary Australia .

omulti-channel environment There are 5 radio networks. ABC TV cannot serve Australia's diversity with only one TV channel. Labor is right to champion the ABC as a player in the multichannel digital environment.

oOutsourcing needs to be governed by legislated rules and benchmarks and be transparent to the public and parliament. It matters less where and how programs are made than that this public commissioning is spread equitably and those taking the money are accountable.

Intersection with outside community is a good thing, but with the cottage industry and not just with the commercial sector. These days the cultural energy is in the cottage industry -this is where the indie docos are made and the explosion in short films, zines and web sites has come from. In the information age this growing area of cultural enterprise is re-making the conservative model of a small business.

-the ABC should range outside TV industry as well - Australian writers, film makers, performers, internet writers and designers.

oABC online - the public newspaper we always wanted - defend it at all costs

omeaningful indicators to measure the ABC success with different audiences rather than Executive's instincts or crude ratings designed for advertisers.

Rather than use ratings as absolute numbers as a benchmark for the ABC, it would be far better to use the spread of demographics as a measure of its success or failure. Something for the old, something for women, something for the country, something for Perth

orecruitment -much ABC employment is through a contract system where diversity principles and advertising requirements are ignored in favour of a 'mates' system that limits the gene pool. The so-called shadow army is a privileged group that hampers ABC ability to reflect Australia.

oThe current system of internal accounting is inimicable to the reality that the best TV and radio is created by teams that work well together. Bureaucratic convenience and accounting dogma mean that ABC TV employs an assembly line mentality that gets in the way of creativity. The rigidity of the in-house system has meant that working outside as an independent is the only way to get together an appropriate team. Can the ABC harmonise fiscal responsibility while allowing producers to assemble teams around projects as the do outside. About autonomy for programme

budgets.

2JJ example

Structural change does matter. Under the Whitlam government ABC radio embarked on a radical experiment to to create a contemporary music station for young people. The station was to give space to overseas, and especially Australian music not given air play by commercial radio locked into top 40 play lists and advertising. The station sought to recognise diversity among young people, and to intersect with the mushrooming independent music sector. It is now a matter of record that 2JJ was at least mid wife to the vibrant Australian music scene of the 80s and 90s, and was an agent of cultural renewal for generations of Sydney-siders in the areas of comedy, art and politics as well as music. 2JJ succeeded largely because it was given autonomy from ABC management, to do its own thing. What we would now call teams - at the time they were collectives- for a time ran the station almost independently of the ABC, and while management ultimately re-imposed authority, the 2JJJ retains a measure of freedom within the ABC Corporate structure.

ois a board of government appointees the best way to run a public corporation? Are there supplemenrreay ways of involving a diverse community in the decsion making and not least commissioning process. I was involved in consultation with young people for the ABC National Advisory Coucil and it at least endorsed the policie sthen being pushed by some left fioeld maveriks in the place. How can the current advisory council sytem - themselves appointed- be democratised and expanded as a public voice within the ABC and a checkon the board?.

At the time of writing Johnathon Shier has made some right noises - encouraging creativity to break through the bureaucracy; bringing an increased audience to the ABC as 'light' consumers rather than playing to a dedicatedupper middle class club- but he has taken the wrong actions :

trashing the only TV program devoted to ideas and debate and employing old fashioned commercial producers and executives steeped in corporate hierarchy. The craven hierarchical structure that makes the ABC a plaything for who ever sits as Managing Director is itself the problem. Simply changing the people who wield control in a top heavy corporate hierarchy will not change things, especially when these personalities are 'veterans' of 70s and 80s commercial TV - the high watermark of formulaic 'mass taste'.

Beazely's emphasis on the knowledge nation makes getting public media right in our own policy a priority. While a reform agenda for the ABC may not seem like a vote winner, once we return to government the vandalism of the Howard years will make rebuilding the ABC a national priority. As we rebuild its best we look forward rather than backwards.

This paper was presented at this week's Unchain My Mind forum in Melbourne

Environment

Motorways Fail the Pollie Test

by Lee Rhiannon

Members of both the big parties have gone to the last three state elections on a transport platform of more motorways. We were promised that the M4, M5 and M2 would accelerate us into the era of fast moving, modern transport.

But within a few short years gridlock has grabbed the motorways. Those strips of tar and cement, that bring such pleasure to RTA officers and state cabinet members alike, are now clogged with cars.

Now that the image of the motorway as a parking lot is becoming a symbol of Sydney, politicians from the major parties are desperate to show they have answers.

The people of Sydney are being told that with a couple of extra lanes, a few more kilometres and a toll free regime those trusty motorways will have us all whizzing along at optimum speeds again.

Once more the big party politicians have missed the point. Motorways attract more cars into our crowded city. Far from being the solution to our traffic woes, motorways are a large part of the problem.

Experience with motorways around the world tells the same story: when you increase the capacity of one part of the network more people want to use it. This means more vehicles on feeder networks and eventually on the motorways themselves.

The M5 East, the latest offering from our own Minister for Motorways Mr Carl Scully, is being promoted as the solution to traffic jams in south west Sydney. With a $1 billion price tag to the people of NSW you would think that the Minister and his RTA mates would be able to get it right.

But motorways have the perverse effect of increasing congestion, not solving it. The complaints about the M4, M5 and M2 are endemic to motorways in Australia and round the world. And this time the congestion has kicked in even earlier than the critics of motorway madness had expected.

Other countries have already travelled down the same dead-end highway and started to turn back. England, for example, has cancelled much of its motorway plans. The Carr government was well aware of the weight of international experience when it approved the M5 East and the Eastern Distributor. Obviously the pressure from its mates in the construction industry and their lackeys in the RTA was just too great.

If the NSW government would break with their fast-lane obsession, billions of dollars would be freed up for public transport.

Only a publicly owned and operated mass transport system integrated with community based transport and cycleways can meet everyone's needs, while doing minimal environmental damage.

If the Carr government doesn't abandon its motorway based transport policy, the Australian crawl * driving at about walking pace * could well become its swansong.

Lee Rhiannon is a Greens member of the NSW parliament

Satire

Murdoch Launches Bid for Under-9s Netball Team

by The Chaser

The Clontarf Nuggets, currently leading the league table by 9 points, look set to take yet another pennant this year, despite being dogged by injuries and allegations of steroid use by key goal attack, Jenny Reid.

The club has seen its share price depressed over the past 6 months despite strong growth in its merchandising and promotion budgets and the proposed launch of a website used to reach Nuggets supporters throughout the world.

'There's a lot of interest in the area, driven by the need to develop pay TV subscriber numbers in key markets such Abbey Street, Regent Street and Clontarf Road,' noted Macquarie Bank analyst, Gregory Simons. 'The Nuggets are a key asset in securing those customers.

News has chosen a clever time to strike, because the share price is flat because the market fears a likely slowdown in growing subscriber numbers outside its traditional suburban areas of Clontarf Junction and the three blocks west of North Sydney station. It's a classic Murdoch play.'

There was celebration last night at Clontarf Public School Hall where many initial investors have seen their stock rise from a pre-listing subscription price of 20 cents to over $6,000 since listing on the ASX. 'We're over the moon', said one shareholder, who preferred not to be identified. 'When we were deciding how to raise capital for the new uniforms, it was either the public float or a lucky dip. All I can say is, the investment bankers got it right. Woo Hoo!'

Not all shareholders are pleased at the prospect of a takeover by Murdoch. The Nuggets Supporters Association, formed at a rally today, dedicated itself to challenging this 'cynical attempt by an American billionaire to commercialise a grand Australian tradition.'

The NSA argues that, in any event, the offer grossly undervalues the stock. 'The poor showing in first quarter earnings was driven by poor sausage sizzle figures, on the back of poor spring weather', argues Brendan Thompson, 31, of Clontarf. 'The share price is temporarily depressed. With the approach of summer, we should expect to see an upward trend in sales of core service offerings, such as sausage-in-a-bun and cordial.' Parties opposed to the bid also point to current plans to move into high-margin e.commerce delivery systems, driving down production costs and raising revenue. Thompson described under-7's netball teams as having 'natural synergies' with the development of on-line services. 'With the Internet, we can cut out the middleman entirely. We expect savings to account for up to 30% of current costs. That's like 19 cents off every chocolate crackle sold on-line, instead of at the cake stall.'

Team manager, Hurbert Hurbert, was refusing to comment on the bid last night, preferring instead to focus on the last four games remaining this season. 'My players are concentrating on fitness, and ensuring that everyone remembers to bring their mouthguards on Saturday morning' said Hurbert. 'We're not interested in the stock-market bid, although lots of the parents are shareholders. We just want to get on and play netball.'

Review

Espionage a Trois

by Peter Lewis

Under the guise of 'Astro Tabasco', the seven-piece instrumental outfit has just completed an album that puts the OP back into sophistication.

While they insist that 'this is not lounge music' - their polished sound fuses jazz and swing with just the slight hint of kitsch of the martini sound.

But it goes way beyond a sixties spy film soundtrack - breaking into some seriously contemporary beats when you would be expecting more cheese.

The overall experience is a bit like watching a re-run of James Bond movie - the sounds are sixties but the context is so now. It's the shift in time that gives it the resonance, the ironic self-distance that makes it work.

Highlights of the album include such evocatively titled tracks as: The Streets of San Souci, Sanatana Lives in Surry Hills and Gringo Starr.

The band is no stranger to the union movement, having played earlier this year at the Radio free East Timor gig. They've supported us, so give them a listen.

'Espionage a Tois' is to be launched at The Metro on Saturday July 30.