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  Issue No 89 Official Organ of LaborNet 23 March 2001  

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Interview

Paddy Takes the Helm

Interview with Zoe Reynolds

Irish, internationalist, republican, socialist & seafarer - Paddy Crumlin intends taking the old traditions of the labour left into the 21st century, the community and cyberspace.

 
 

What are the main challenges for the union this year?

Obviously, there are two industrial issues - the Patrick EBA and shipping. Moving into a new EBA that has the full support and involvement of the membership is important.

Everybody is generally aware of the difficulties facing the union during the negotiation of the EBA following the Patrick Dispute. There was tremendous pressure on us from the liquidators, political pressure and legal pressure. And there were some disadvantages in the agreement.

This year, the union is very keen to ensure that there is strong participation of the Patrick workforce. I think the main issue is permanency - ensuring that stevedoring workers have the protection that workers deserve - things like annual leave, long service leave and other entitlements. Workers need stability of employment, protection for them and their families. Generally they should know they will be working next year and the year after. Job security is fundamental to the dignity of workers.

Patrick should see it as good for business. If you have workers that go to work with fear in their belly not knowing what their status may be from day to day or from ship to ship, that's no good in developing a business outcome and productivity. It is fundamental to the stevedoring industry that these matters are resolved in the upcoming EBA.

In shipping, the fundamental issue is the Federal Government's determination to destroy the Australian shipping industry. They've got an inherent hatred for organised labour and they are prepared to destroy an industry to get at the workers.

We have to make sure that the Australian domestic industry continues to be serviced by Australian flagged and crewed ships and not by ships registered in tax havens employing subsidised guest labourers in violation of the Migration Act and other Australian legislation.

That's a tremendous challenge for us. The government policy is to weaken the commercial resolve of Australian shipowners in the industry - to drive them out.

The first thing they did was remove ALP legislation in support of Australian shipping. Six years later they have done nothing to replace it.

Australian shipping policy has become the laughing stock in the world of shipping regulators. Seven or eight years ago, after the ships of shame inquiry, Australia was seen as a world leader. Howard and Reith - that gang has decimated our shipping reputation.

It is an enormous challenge for the union to maintain the support that the industry needs to ride out this political cycle.

How are you going to convince someone like Corrigan that you are going to get better productivity by giving people more permanent jobs when he's been boasting for the past two years that it's because he sacked the workers and changed work practices that he's got the crane rate up from 15 to 25.

I'm not sure he boasts about sacking people.

He does claim that the dispute led to high productivity and changed work practices.

That places him in a very ambiguous position because he's been saying very loudly that productivity in his workplace is best practice, that these things have been delivered and the workers have delivered them.

If the workers have delivered higher productivity, the workers also have entitlement to some of the wealth that they have created. And if Corrigan wants to make productivity sustainable, then he has to give workers conditions of employment, including stability of employment, so that they are able to make a long term contribution to the business.

Chris Corrigan has talked up his share price and said very widely how well his business is doing. From the MUA's point of view, workers have got a right to share in that wealth. We're prepared to maintain productivity as long as the workplace is safe. This has always been the case. Productivity in the modern world should be welcomed because it should translate into job security and decent conditions of work.

Corrigan has got some responsibility in meeting us in the next round agreements by insuring that the conditions of employment for stevedoring workers are improved. Our fundamental position is permanency for the workforce.

Job security?

Job security. True permanency and the stabilising of the home lives and working lives of workers and their families. Otherwise we will be in fundamental disagreement.

How about shipping. How are you going to change a government that is just not interested in maintaining Australian shipping - or is it a matter of changing government?

Well, that's obviously one of the fundamental political challenges for the union this year - a change in Federal Government. I believe this government has relinquished its moral and political right to govern. They have cynically divided and manipulated the Australian community. They are racist, sexist and anti-labour in the truest sense. Anti-worker. They have diminished, isolated and polarised Australians.

It is extremely important that people identify the vacuum of moral, political and intellectual leadership residing in Canberra so the Australian electorate does something about it.

Australian shipping is fundamental to the Australian economy and our national interest. The government position is contradictory. On one hand they are prepared to put tens of billions of dollars into defence to maintain John Howard's 'Fortress Australia', on the other hand they allow the wealth of this country - the imports and exports - and the fundamental business of this country to be controlled by foreign interests that their defence policy is supposed to be protecting us from. So there's tremendous hypocrisy.

In the US shipping is a bipartisan policy. Republicans and Democrats identify the US can't be an economic powerhouse without having fundamental safeguards in protecting their shipping services.

Given that there are now two state elections in progress and the federal election later this year, how are we going to get involved in helping change the government?

The wonderful conference of MUA and miners delegates in Newcastle in December committed to furthering the interest of members of both unions by joint activity, particularly in the upcoming federal elections. It's got to be a priority for miners and maritime workers to throw these bastards out of office.

We are able to draw together our resources. Miners have pledged $450,000 for that election campaign already. Having levies and making sure that Labor has got sufficient funds to get their message across is very important.

Have we allocated money to this campaign?

That is something that National Council is going to have to consider very carefully in April. Our resources are being diminished by the Howard Government. Our legal bill last year was $600,000. Another three or four years of industrial debacle or legal debacle would mean tremendous amounts of the workers' resources wasted in the Federal and the High courts defending members in the only real way the Workplace Relations Act give us, which is legally.

How are you to go about overcoming problems like falling membership, casualisation, infiltration of non-union labour in ports and other sectors of the industry, rising costs, the union deficit?

For all those problems, the union is in very good shape. I would say that in the trade union movement in this country, the MUA continues to be one of the better organised and viable unions. We've got tremendous loyalty and sense of identity inside the union, a great history and tradition, a very hard working and loyal team leading the union and good relationships with the rank & file.

I think that those other issues are generally facing all trade unions in the modern world. That's because capitalism is more powerful and resourced and strategic in its thinking than ever before. And they often target unions as a business virus, seeing us as an impediment to their continuing drive for growth at any cost.

We're dealing with some pretty big economic outfits here. Some of these big multinationals have got the economic horsepower of Australia. Their campaigns tend to be constructed in the boardrooms of London and New York and are basically about eliminating any opposition. This is what I call economic fascism. It is increasingly unacceptable to the world community.

Transnationals are not democratic. They are very ruthless in their corporate determination. They've got absolutely no values other than the so-called shareholder values. There is a tendency to do nothing about the environment or human rights unless they are forced to.

Unions are not about individuals, they are about families, working men and women with limited resources. Their fundamental resource is their capacity to come together in their own collective interest.

So we have unions@work. We are going back to the rank and file, making sure that the delegate system is functional and important in the workplace and in the union structure, making sure that the branch structure is a fundamental unit, that there is proper training and involvement and debate and organisation at that level.

We are taking our union back into the workplace, back into the home and back into the community with the focus away from the Sussex Street offices.

Think of the Viet Cong tactics against the US during the Vietnam War. They did not have the same resources and capacity as the US, but they had a great belief in themselves, a great moral fortitude that what they were doing was right. People were fighting for what they believed in. The international community understood the nature of this struggle, finally. This was important in bringing the war to a close.

The difference between unions and some of these big transnational employers is that we believe in what we're doing. So even a small union like the MUA has a tremendous moral advantage.

I'm optimistic about the future. The world has changed for good. There will be a response from the billions of human beings who are increasingly being put under the hammer of the so-called new world order. The MUA should continue to be at the forefront of this community response.

Where do you get your inspiration from?

I am a socialist. Things like (super funds) SERF and the SRF demonstrate that collectivism works. Workers combine their wealth, organise management structures so that their wealth is properly administered and so are able to improve their lives wonderfully.

There is no difference between the management of cooperative efforts like the Maritime Workers' Credit Union, the SRF and SERF and broadening our perspective into a much larger economic model. It is the ability of workers to actively and cooperatively be involved in a process of creating wealth in our own interest. That is fundamental to my belief. How capitalism deals with these challenges will shape this century

Who has been your greatest source of inspiration?

People who have put other people ahead of their own interests. It happens at every level. In literature writers like Charles Dickens, Manning Clarke, Germaine Greer and Grahame Green who developed a compassionate understanding of the human condition.

Marx had a clear vision of positive human development at a critical time in history. Suffragettes like Pankhurst and Baynes. Revolutionary leaders like Nelson Mandela and Ho Chi Minh. Black leaders Martine Luther King, Pat Dodson and Kevin Cook from Tranby.

People as diverse as peace activist Helen Caldicott, artist Micheal Lunig and singer Bob Geldoff. Hard working and consistent politicians like Tom Uren and Carmen Lawrence.

My family, especially Gail, who has perservered with the ugly side of political life and still believes in its greater purpose.

Of course, maritime leaders Jim Healy and Elliot V Elliot who led maritime workers out of poverty, have been a great source of inspiration, as have Pat Geraghty and John Coombs.

And it's not necessarily just people on the labour movement who inspire me. A bloke like Governer General WIlliam Dean bring much solace to people due to his compassion.

There's people dotted all over the place that help you keep your chin up and keep going. The Patrick workers and all those people on the picket. The green protester up in Cairns and the MUA member down in Adelaide who covered themselves in oil to draw public attention to ships of shame.

It's all a matter of conscience and ticker. That's what I find inspirational.

Can you think of anything back as a boy that you can still remember vividly that headed you in this direction?

I come from a strong Irish Catholic tradition - a republican tradition. In our family Catholicism was all about people accepting some sort of moral responsibility. A number of people in my family have gone into following the church as priests and nuns due to philosophical commitment.

Moving in that environment and having been in contact with people who believe in a liberation philosophy affected me. But these days I don't consider myself to be religiously inclined in a structured way. I'd rather direct my energies towards building a practical and effective community of interest.

Can you think of something that was formative in making you who you are now?

I think it is mainly coming from a big working class family where there were very few resources. My father and mother were both strong trade unionists. She was a teacher and he was a seafarer. We always understood that the ability to put shoes on your feet or to get an education is about people working collectively.

I come from Peakhurst in Sydney. It is a working class suburb. People had community models that would keep you out of the nick or out of the pub 24 hours a day.

Could you give an example of how that works?

I would call it the Australian fair go, which is tending to disappear in Howard's Australia. For example, the street that we lived in was a housing commission area. And I remember whenever there was personal tragedy that struck within a family, like the boy who died over the road, his family's struggle to meet the funeral expenses as well as the emotional loss at that time drew the whole street together.

These days they send you to counselling or therapy. But in those days you'd come together in the backyard and knock the top off the flag ale and eat the cakes. Kids would be playing cricket on the road because there were very few cars and that was a way to draw together all sorts of different religious and political backgrounds.

If there was a serious domestic dispute, the community would go out and support the battered wife in very real ways, sometimes by confronting the drunken husband or by giving refuge to the children.

So those are the things that resonate very deeply in me. If workers are going to be able to meet their needs, then they need to pull together in this traditional sense.

Going to sea and joining the Seamen's Union was also a big influence on me. Up until then I'd been a casual worker. I did some fishing, making surfboards, seasonal work.

To come into the Seamen's Union and see the level of protection and get an aggregate wage as a young man with a young family and secure my first home almost immediately on gaining permanency affected me tremendously.

It demonstrates clearly some of the dramatic reversals ahead for stevedoring and seafaring workers. Employers are seeking to casualise jobs and to take away the things that changed my life as a young parent going away to sea.

My exposure to the old Marxist leadership of the Seamen's Union and the ability to travel overseas and get experience in international political work was tremendously invigorating. It opened my eyes to class struggle - the great polarisation of wealth and poverty endemic to the modern world.

What brought that home to you?

Working alongside unionists from Chille who were subsequently murdered. Meeting people who lived in fear of their lives for no other reason than that they were seeking better working conditions or their right to bargain collectively.

Being exposed to people committed to international workers' rights and human rights changes your life. So I am very keen on having the rank & file of the MUA continue to be involved in a very real and meaningful way internationally. Otherwise you can't combat the worst excesses of global capitalism.

Would you say that probably your greatest personal challenge is coming across to the membership, not just as a seafarer but as a leader of both wharfies and seafarers? Some wharfies out there might think - oh, he's just a seafarer it's going to be a seafarer's union, now. How are you going to overcome these perceptions?

I always hope that being elected unopposed in the 1999 election demonstrated that the membership had some understanding of me and had drawn some conclusions. I'd like to think that.

Like all officials, I was actively involved in the Patrick Dispute and managed the Fremantle picket line. As everybody subjected to the trauma of the Patrick picket line, I developed an understanding of issues facing stevedoring workers. I formed great friendships. The Patrick dispute was not about S&W it was about workers' rights.

I intend to be involved in the negotiation of the Patrick agreement and stevedoring policy. As national secretary, it's my responsibility. I am happy to assume that responsibility and in doing so I'm going to have to deliver together with Mick O'Leary, Mick Doleman and Jim Tannock.

One person doesn't make a union. The team includes the delegates and the branches, national council, our special meetings and other forums.

The reality of things is that S&W is now gone in the union. Workers in an amalgamated union have a responsibility to put the most effective person in office. And it is the responsibility of the union to make sure that that person is properly trained in every aspect of the union's operations.

In some areas, you find officers still tend to stay in their traditional areas of industrial involvement. But in South Australia, Port Kembla, Tasmania and Newcastle where there is a single full time officer, we see a tremendous amount of integration and a respect from every element of the workers.

I intend to continue to build momentum and go forward with that agenda with the National Council.

Does that include amalgamation?

Future amalgamation? Time, circumstance and place would determine what workers want in the union. If we are unable to have a militant union, fully capable of going and protecting our life in the workplace legally, industrially and economically, if we are unable to go and support and defend workers in this country and internationally, well then we need to build and strengthen our union by bringing in more resources.

That decision will be made by the membership.

I know that there are organisations out there - the miners and others, willing to work alongside us. And we are strongly supportive of working alongside them to make sure that amalgamation is only a word. Sharing resources and working collectively in the community of interest is more fundamental to me than some notion of another marriage. If we are able to get those collective efforts with the miners, other maritime unions and other like minded people within the community, the future will look after itself.

As one of the youngest blokes to head the union what are you bringing to the union in the 21st century.

I believe that the union must go back to a strong rank and file organised and collective effort. Our resources should be focused on giving the delegates training and all the other resources needed so that they can be effective defenders and advocates of workers' rights.

I'm a strong believer that the future of trade unionism in this country is about workers identifying that the union is real, available and supportive in their daily lives and in their work. I don't think that is different to the way the union has operated previously.

What about the internet? How do you think the union movement can use this new technology?

The ability of workers to use the internet is very important. All of this new technology is not just a tool to make money. One of the great things about the internet is it has created a more democratic and communicative world. People can get information and find out things without having the Murdochs and the Packers of this world filtering information.

The internet is a wonderful opportunity for the union to actively communicate and be involved with the members and the members with each other. All of these issues of communication and education are tied around a very strong IT policy - a strong, creative and active internet policy.

The website, a regular news service, the ability for workers to talk to each other and their officials and communicate via an international network from sea or remote areas, places workers in a strong position. Virtual organising is very important.

The Patrick Dispute showed us that you can't take unions out of the community. You can attempt to remove their right to industrial action, but there are always alternatives out there. And the community pickets - the willingness of people to take civil action, demonstrates that if unions are going to continue to be effective, they need to be community based.

Unionism is a force in the community and a form of collective interest. We need to continue to go with the green movement, in particular. It has an obvious synergy with our Ships of Shame campaign. The environment is our common home to be nurtured and protected.

In other areas we need to strongly identify in our campaigns that unionism is community. This not only greatly energises the union movement, it energises the community. It gives people an alternative analysis of the world they live in. It helps unionism and it helps community politics.

Could this philosophy of living amongst the people be extended to the environment?

We live in a world of diminishing resources. Somewhere along the line our world will collapse in upon itself unless fundamental issues, like unregulated economic growth, are dealt with.

The signs are there - pollution, global warming. The world is finite and globalism is now being met by a global people's initiative. This places unionism in a very strong leadership position, with very grave responsibilities. It's got to be accepted that unionism goes far beyond the needs of the workplace. It goes down to the needs of people who are seeking answers in a rapidly changing and crisis-ridden world.

We realise that the answers are out there in a much larger collective and I'd like to think that that's going be an important priority of my stewardship in the union.


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*   Issue 89 contents

In this issue
Features
*  Interview: Paddy Takes the Helm
Irish, internationalist, republican, socialist & seafarer - Paddy Crumlin intends taking the old traditions of the labour left into the 21st century, the community and cyberspace.
*
*  Unions: Breaking the Mould
Mark Hearn looks at how women union delegates are helping to change the culture in the traditionally male bastion of glassworking.
*
*  Legal: Washing Their Hands
Mark Morey outlines how Liberal neglect of the working visa system has led to exploitation of guest workers.
*
*  International: Violence Betrays Shangri-La
Shangri-La hotel union members carrying a coffin marked Robert Kuok have been assaulted and beaten by police in Jakarta.
*
*  Economics: Corporations: Different Than You and Me
Corporations are fundamentally different than you and me. That's a simple truth that Big Business leaders desperately hope the public will not perceive.
*
*  History: The Steel Octopus
Be prepared for a flood of Nostalgia from the media about the �Big Australian�, as it prepares to flee our shores and finally internationalise its digging operations. Workers won�t forget BHP�s less than worker friendly past and present (and no doubt it�s future).
*
*  Review: Mean Nation
John Allen charts the fall and fall of philanthropy in Australian society.
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*  Satire: Ryan 'A Big Wake-Up Call For Me': Beazley
The narrow victory to Labor in the Ryan by-election has delivered a big slap in the face to Leader of the Opposition Kim Beazley.
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News
»  Abbott and �Drinking Buddy� Under Microscope
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»  Working Visas: Ruddock Sells Dump to Abbott
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»  Tourist Guides Bussed In
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»  Fair Wear Holds Breath as Carr Celebrates
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»  Labor to Restore Public Sector�s Dignity
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»  Its Time for Carr to Act on Safey on Building Sites
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»  Bread Maker Slices Workforce
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»  Workers Show Grace Under Pressure
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»  Engineers Win BHP Redundancy Case
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»  Transport Drug Pushers Not Charged
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»  Training Body Needs $150 Million to Cope with Growth
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»  HIH Urged To Safeguard Employee Entitlements
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»  Carr Proposal For Public Schools Flawed
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»  Human Smirk Returns to Spiritual Home
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»  McGauchie Appointment Draws MUA Fire
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»  Bove Loses McDonald's Raid Appeal
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»  James Hardie Called to Account
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»  Australasian Union Organising Conference
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»  Activist Notebook
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Columns
»  The Soapbox
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»  The Locker Room
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»  Trades Hall
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»  Tool Shed
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Letters to the editor
»  AXA Has Form
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»  Leichhardt Debate Hots Up
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