Affiliates to the NSW Labor Council last night backed the Construction Union's for a review of the Crimes Act, while expressing outrage at the decision by Chief Industrial Magistrate George Miller.
John Poleviak pleaded guilty to a charge of failing to ensure the health, safety and welfare of his employees, Dean McGoldrick, who fell 12 metres from a roof to his death on a building site in Broadway in February, 2000.
An investigation found that the employer had provided no safety harness, no safety bar and no safety training. Yet the Court fined Pleviak just $20,000 - against a maximum fine of $250,000.
In the wake of the decision, the Construction Union says there needed to be a specific crime of industrial manslaughter "against employers whose disregard for safety causes the death of a worker".
Loophole Closes Common Law Rights
A separate building site accident has prompted a call for changes to workers compensation legislation to protect the employees of companies that avoid their WorkCover premiums.
Currently, a worker injured whose employer is avoiding premiums can not launch common law action against the employer.
While there is protection of weekly benefits through the WorkCover Uninsured Workers Liability Scheme, there is no provisions for common law actions.
The Construction Union has raised the call for review of the plight of uninsured workers in the wake of an accident in early May on a demolition site in Manly.
David Clews, was seriously injured on the site, but has since discovered his employer Modern Demolition had no workers compensation policy.
Hearing on Government Responsibilities
And in another important Test Case, the Labor Council will intervene in a case to test whether the Carr Government is bound by its own health and safety laws.
A Full Bench of the NSW Industrial Relations Commission is due to hear legal argument on June 1, raised by the Department of Public Workers over the operation of the Occupational health and Safety Act..
While trade unions have since raised the issue with Public Workers Minister Maurice Iemma and Industrial relations Minister John Della Bosca, the hearing will go ahead to establish the legal principle.
"It appears a ludicrous proposition," the Labor Council's Michael Costa says. "If a major employer like the Crown is not covered, what point is there in having health and safety laws?"
Pat Portlock hands over Petition to Parliament |
The print outs of the online petition were amongst more than 21,000 petitions tabled in the NSW Legislative Council by Labor MLC Ian West on Tuesday.
But when West went to officially present the petitions to the procedural Office of Legislative Council, he was told the Parliament "does not and has never" accepted email-generated petitions.
The Labor Council's Michael Costa says it's time the NSW Parliament entered the 21st Century and recognised Internet activism.
"Our campaign on workers compensation had a strong focus on online activism and many ordinary workers used the technology to email MPs directly with their concerns and also used the online petition facility," Costa says.
"The Federal Parliament already accepts online petitions - the NSW Parliament should follow suit as a matter of urgency if it wants to be a credible forum for public debate.
Talks Continue as Workers Keep the Heat On
Meanwhile, L:abor Council negotiator have been continuing to talk turkey on the proposed Della Bosca changes to the state's workers compensation system.
Labor Council has now put some detailed propositions on their preferred dispute resolution process to Della Bosca this week. A response is expected next week.
On Tuesday, the government was sent a reminder of the depths of worker anger, when an estimated 5,000 construction industry workers braved horrendous conditions to march on State Parliament.
While a planned statewide strike had been deferred after the Government agreed to refer contentious areas of the Della Bosca package to further consultation, the building industry unions rallied to raise their specific concerns over workplace safety and employer non-compliance.
by Jim Marr
With 1400 workers uncertain about wages, super and holiday pay, the CPSU's Wendy Caird has called on business to shoulder its responsibilities.
Caird points out that multi-millionaire One.Tel founders, Rich and Keeling, had paid themselves $7 million each in bonuses just months before their operation struck trouble.
"Those bonuses came on top of $500,000 salaries," Ms Caird explained, "alone, they would cover the money owed to 1400 people who have been left in the lurch."
Caird insists the demand was no stunt, arguing it was high-time that business accepted "moral and ethical responsibilites as well as legal ones". NSW Premier Bob Carr and Treasurer Peter Cotello today.
The principle, she said, should be extended to Optus who worsened One.Tel's position by giving customers seven days to transfer accounts if they wanted to retain existing phones and numbers.
Caird says the commercial advantage of taking the ailing telco's business should be balanced by accepting liability for its staff.
She made her claims after the union met One.Tel staff in offices around Australia and representatives of administrators, Ferrier Hodgson, late last Thursday.
The administrator was unable to give assurances about holiday pay or superannuation entitlements.
Caird says One.Tel's failure high-lighted the short-sightedness of Government competition policy based around under-cutting pay and conditions.
Since the part-privatisation of Telstra, telecommunications companies have used the Workplace Relations Act to slash wages and conditions, and try to and keep unions out of their workplaces.
The CPSU's communications section has retaliated by signing up hundreds of workers and pushing for a benchmark industry award.
"Last week it was Vodafone lay-offs, this week One.Tel looks like going out of business. It is becoming increasingly clear that unions are as important in telecommunications as anywhere else," Caird says.
"The industry will not stabilise until workers have a meaningful say in what is happening.
"These events have only increased our determination to win a binding award so that companies focus on business practises and customer service, rather than attacking workers for their competitive edge."
E-mail your support to One.Tel workers at mailto:[email protected]
Qantas has confirmed reports that 75 middle managers were being trained to perform 'ramp work' - such as loading and unloading aircraft in the event that there is industrial action
While Qanatas claims the work is standard practice, the ACTU's Richard Marles says that the timing appears linked with current wage negotiations.
"The whole thing is completely bizarre," Marles says. "You wouldn't believe it but for the fact that Qantas has confirmed it."
"A senior manager has done a course on IR, done the chapter on the MUA dispute and got very excited. Unfortunately they skipped the final chapter."
The ACTU will work with airline unions to ensure the current round of pay deals are negotiated in good faith.
"What we want is a cooperative relationship with Qantas, sensible industrial negotiations," Marles says. "We believe the chances in baggage handling area are actually pretty small, but the climate is not helped by this sort of activity.
Assistance Offered to Impulse Staff
Meanwhile, representatives of Sarina Russo Job Access have met with sacked Impulse staff today to offer free job search assistance and employment opportunities.
Australian Services Union acting Branch Secretary Mary-Anne O'Neill says the former Impulse staff had received a groundswell of public support since they were sacked last week as a result of the Qantas take-over.
"The public and the business sector have given a lot of support to these workers in their struggle for a fair outcome since they were sacked, which has really buoyed their spirits," O'Neill says.
"The provision of job search assistance from Sarina Russo Job Access is a great example of the encouragement and support that has inundated these people since they were sacked because of the Qantas take-over," she says.
"Qantas has failed to provide any assistance whatsoever to these sacked workers, so it's great to see other organisations get on board and help out," she said.
"Likewise, the Queensland government have refused to give any support to the sacked Impulse workers, which is particularly disappointing given the Premier's commitment to job creation," she said.
The IRC accepted the Labor Council of NSW's argument that wage increases approved by the federal IRC last month should flow through to the state award system.
The Full Bench of the IRC granted parallel increases of:
- $13 per week for workers earning under $490 per week
- $15 per week for workers earning between $490 and $590 per week
- $17 per week for workers on wages above $590 per week.
The decision will deliver pay rises to workers on minimum rates awards in industries including retail, hospitality, clerical workers and the agricultural sector.
"This is a fair result to NSW workers facing uncertain economic times," the Labor Council' Michael Costa says.
"It also highlights again the importance of trade unions. Without our involvement, there would be no wage increase for anyone.
Employers True to Form
Unsurprisingly, Employers First chief executive Garry Brack slammed the rise and said they would ultimately lead to job losses.
"There's no doubt about it ... it's just a question of how many and that will be dictated by the state of the economy over the next six to 12 months," Brack was quoted as saying.
"If you are moving into a period of economic difficulty, it's unwise to go handing out pay increases - even though there is talk of the low paid.
But Costa says Brack's claims are as facile as they are predictable. "There has not been a safety net pay rise in living memories that employers have not opposed," Costa says.
"Despite their claims that modest increases to lowly paid workers will lead to financial ruin, the economy stubbornly refuses to collapse."
The full bench decision granted the ACTU's Parental Leave Test Case application giving 12 months unpaid maternity leave to casuals who have worked regularly for the same employer for a year or more.
The decision has instant ramifications with over 1.2 million Australian workers immediately eligible for this new right.
It vindicates the ACTU's long standing belief that casual workers should receive the same entitlements that the rest of the workforce take for granted.
Lodged by the ACTU last November, the application was initially opposed by major employer groups, who eventually were forced to bow to the weight of intense community pressure and lend their support to the measure.
"This decision is an important step in the union's ongoing campaign to improve both the job security and living standards of the growing number of casual workers in the modern economy," the ACTU's Greg Combet says.
"The conditions of casual employment need to be further improved, as many long-term casuals are employed in circumstances for which casual work was never originally intended."
Shadow Minister for Industrial Relations, Arch Bevis and Shadow Minister for the Status of Women, Dr Lawrence, have both welcomed the decision of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission to extend parental leave to casual workers, heralding it as long overdue.
"The fact that the peak employee and employer unions had reached agreement
on this matter is to be commended.," Bevis says
"However, the Federal Government has been dragged kicking and screaming to this decision, and their attempts to ensure that these rights be awarded case-by-case and award-by award, rather than by incorporation in the parental leave test case standard, shows just how far out of touch they have become."
"On its face, this budget stands in stark contrast to Howard Government's shifty budgetary bribe from last week," the Labor Council's Michael Costa says..
"We do have concerns about a projected rise in unemployment - but we recognize that this is largely due to the impact of a down turn in the economy due to the GST and other Howard Government policies.
"And once again, the Labor Council reiterates its call for a social audit to gauge the real distribution of need across the state.
"It's difficult to gauge the merits of any budget without an understanding of the underlying needs of different regions and sectors of the community.
"A clear and transparent social audit would allow all sections of the community to decide whether the spending priorities are fair or otherwise.
"On its face, we welcome the following initiatives:
- the abolition of the regressive debits tax on bank transactions
- $1.5 million for outworker projects
- $1 million to improve farm safety to install tractor rollover protection
- $5.6 million for train teachers in new technologies
- $21.6 million over four years to set up email and Internet access for public school students and teachers.
"Once again the need for WorkCover to provide $21.3 million on uninsured workers confirms our concerns about non-compliance by employers.
"We are also unable to find any spending commitment to implement pay rises in the Social and Community Services sector - which have been approved in the NSW Industrial Relations Commission."
"But on the whole, this is a sensible Labor budget that maintains and enhances key Labor priorities."
by Andrew Casey
" The doctor looked at my roster and said it was like being under the influence of alcohol," Paul O'Hanlon who signed an AWA, to get his job at the Army barracks working for UK multinational Serco.
Poor, unfriendly, rostering arrangements mean that no sooner have the security workers finished a shift they are back in the saddle doing access control. All the workers are complaining of headaches, dizziness, nausea.
" I wake up and lose balance. I have trouble sometimes driving even a short distance," Paul O'Hanlon, an LHMU Security Union said.
AWA individual employment contracts, introduced by the Howard government, have cut back workplace rights and increased the feelings of job insecurity.
" When we signed our AWAs the company, sure they sat us down and read it to us, but they didn't explain what I see as the hidden traps," Paul O'Hanlon said.
Paul had been unemployed when Serco offered him a job in January, so he was really happy and prepared to accept almost any working conditions.
Serco, who have a big government contract to supply security workers at defence bases, regularly insist workers sign AWAs - rather than operate under a collective award with union rights.
In Port Kembla, where Serco have just won the security contract at the BHP steelworks, union members went on strike last week to protest out-sourcing and the use of individual employment contracts.
There are half a dozen security guards employed at Randwick and they have all now joined the Security uniontration with the AWAs.
" Trying to get changes in rostering is almost impossible. They don't seem to listen.
" They promised to act but two months later they still have not changed the rosters."
Paul has had to see the doctor so often and take time off from work that he has used up the little sick leave available to him in his AWA.
Julie Power, from the LHMU Security Union says these guards hadn't been forced to sign AWAs they would come under the Security Guards Defence Contracting Award.
" The company would have had to introduce proper monitoring procedures for the rosters months ago - and changed them to protect the health of their workers," Julie Power said.
" The sick leave rights under the individual employment contract AWAs are way below the Award.. On their AWAs they can be expect to be paid as much as $6 an hour under the current Award provisions."
" I don't feel proud going on sick leave, using workers compo but I have got to look after my health. When I found I couldn't even drive properly I knew that I had to act."
by Mark Hebblewhite
A staggering Ninety-two separate incidents involving a firearm or knife was documented by the study, while 40 per cent of metropolitan respondents and 30 per cent of rural respondents reported either an actual physical intimidation or assault.
According to a recent study by the Australian Institute of Criminology found that in terms of violence against staff in NSW, the healthcare industry was the worst affected and that nurses and other health workers were amongst the worst affected occupational groups.
It was also found that nurses faced severe levels of verbal intimidation in the form of threats or intimidation. The worst culprits were found to be patients or their relatives
NSW Nurses - along with the NSW Government - this week launched a television campaign to raise awareness of Ward Rage. It will be seen on screens across NSW with the message that violence against nurses will not be tolerated under any circumstances.
"A zero tolerance policy on violence against nurses achieves two aims," says Brett Holmes, from the Nurses Association. "It provides a happier nursing workforce, as well as a better, more efficient health and aged care system."
"The NSW government, health department and NSWNA will ensure a zero tolerance policy will be enforced in all NSW health and aged care facilities. Violence against nurses will not be tolerated under any circumstances," Holmes says.
The problem, raised by the Municipal Employees Union, is that the NSW system offers stronger protection and conditions than the Victorian system - gutted as it was by the Kennett Government in the nineties.
This raises the prospect that workers in Albury could lose hard-won benefits if the merger proceeds under the Victorian - or federal - IR systems.
The MEU's Brian Harris says there are also questions about workers compensation legislation, child protection regulations and environmental health and safety issues.
The Labor Council has backed a call by the MEU that "no employees at Albury City Council or Wodonga Rural Municipal Council should suffer any loss to rates of pay or conditions of employment or access to their current Industrial Relations Tribunals (in the case of NSW) as a result of the merger of the Council services.
It's also stated that any merger "should not remove jobs or reduce regional employment opportunities in the two Councils."
The MEU views the merger as an important precedent, with similar cross-border discussion underway between Mildura (SA) and Wentworth (NSW) and Tweed (NSW) and Coolongatta (Qld) also on the drawing board.
Premier Endorsement for Maternity Leave
Meanwhile, Premier Bob Carr has given his personal support for council workers pushing to gain paid maternity leave rights.
The workers staged a spirited protest outside the Shires Association conference in Sydney this week. Rural councils are refusing to recognise the principle, despite recent agreement by city councils.
The MEU argues that local government workers deserve the same employment conditions as state and federal public services - who are entitled to 15 weeks paid maternity leave.
On his way in to address the conference, the Premier stopped to address the workers and told them it was "the right issue" to be campaigning around.
Late yesterday the Federal Court handed a significant victory to the Meatworkers Union for workers involved in a long-running dispute at the O'Connor Meatworks in Pakenham, Victoria.
The Union had argued that the workers were entitled to be paid under their Enterprise Agreement signed in 1992 which gave wages up to 60% higher than those being paid by O'Connor's.
The workers were locked out for 9 months without pay, then returned to work on lower wages and conditions with the employer paying them under another Award. Many of the workers lost 9 months wages and then, according to the Union, hundreds of dollars a week under the regime imposed by the employer G&K O'Connor.
The decision of the Court was that the Union was correct in its argument that the 1992 Agreement applied.
The Meatworkers' Graham Bird says that the Union had been fighting this battle in court for over 2 years.
"The decision handed down by the Federal Court is a huge win for our members, and a vindication of the Union's position." Bird says.
"There are many families whose livelihoods have been depending on this decision, and they will hopefully finally see some financial relief after 2 years of hardship and intimidation imposed on them by their employer."
Bird also says that the decision raised questions about the role of the Federal Government in this dispute.
"There are still hundreds of secret documents in Tony Abbott's office on this dispute. We believe these documents would reveal Government advice and assistance to this employer."
"Given this decision, there are serious questions to be asked about whether the Federal Government has given advice to an employer that has assisted them in fundamentally breaking the law in order to cut workers wages and conditions."
Senate Forces Full Disclosure.
Meanwhile, the Senate has ordered that 850 documents relating to the meatworkers dispute be released by the Department of Employment, Workplace Relations and Small Business. In a vote on 24 May, the Senate voted that files relating to the Meatworks be produced.
Labor Senator Kim Carr, who moved the motion in Senate, said that the documents may contain information about how 120 trainees, under the Federal Government's New Apprenticeship Scheme, had been used to displace long standing employees who were members of the Union.
"The New Apprenticeship Scheme should not be abused as part of an industrial campaign to reduce wages and conditions. Federal Ministers have become serial offenders in denying any involvement in this affair. With the release of these files, we will now have the opportunity to discover the true extent of the Government assistance and advice."
The LHMU Hospitality Union says material tabled in the Tasmanian Parliament has linked the AHA in a direct financial relationship with the tobacco industry.
'The LHMU condemns employers who would put sponsorships before the safety of workers in the industry," the unions's Brian Daley says.
The Hospitality Union this week set up a passive smoking register as the first step in a public campaign to make hospitality workplaces smoke free.
Daley says the AHA has an unhealthy relationship with the tobacco industry and were being disingenuous by displaying a relaxed and comfortable attitude to the issue of environmental tobacco smoke when they know the overwhelming facts meant they should have been in support of the union's call.
Those facts include:-
� Undisputed medical evidence on the hazards of passive smoking
� Medical research in Australia which has shown residual toxins in the blood of hospitality workers who were exposed to a polluted passive smoking environment
� International and Australian research which has shown that there is no economic loss to hospitality establishments when non-smoking environments are introduced
� Expert evidence which says controlled ventilation systems don't adequately protect workers from the hazards of passive smoking
� The AHA's own research that shows more than two-thirds of the community in Victoria support of a ban on smoking in hospitality establishments
'Despite all this evidence the employer body has steadfastly remained in support of voluntary codes of conduct with ineffectual solutions such as asking patrons not to blow smoke at workers," Daley says.
The Hospitality Union has also called on the Victorian Government to extend its smoke free dining laws to include all hospitality workplaces.
Daley says the union will put a resolution to the ALP State Conference tomorrow in Melbourne to support the union's call to pursue further steps to make the hospitality industry in Victoria smoke-free.
The ACTU's Sharan Burrow has made the call to coincide with last week's National Sorry Day events.
"A treaty as an agreement between all of us will provide a fundamental basis of understanding and commitment to the distinct rights and independent aspirations of the first Australians," Burrow says.
"On this day and at the beginning of this week of reconciliation, unions commit themselves to solidarity and support to ensure justice for Indigenous workers, their families and their communities."
Details of National Reconciliation Week events can be found at the Journey of Healing website http://www.journeyofhealing.com
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Blair's Britain : An Insider Speaks - Lessons For Labor
Michael Jacobs is the secretary of the British Fabian Society and a prominent New Labour identity. Hot on the heels of the British election he will be in Australia to meet with Labor frontbenchers to discuss policy direction particularly environmental policy.. His only public speaking engagement in Sydney is at:
Place: The Function Room, Gleebooks, 49 Glebe Point Road.
Date/Time: Tuesday, June 26. 6pm for 6.30 pm
Charge: $10 for drinks and finger food. ( $6 : students and non-wage earners )
To assist catering please advise attendance . Email :
The talk will be followed by questions from the floor.
About the Forum: As Blair wins another election the Australian Fabian Society has arranged this Forum to ask what is the secret of New Labor's success and where to now?
Michael Jacobs discusses the state of British Labour and the Left in the UK - both philosophy and policy. What is "New Labour" ?
Does the Third Way exist and if so where did it go? What does Blair mean when he says his second term will be more 'radical' than the first? (This does not equal more left wing!) What will be the big debates on the left of centre in the UK over the next five years ?
What are the lessons for the Australian Labor Party as it approaches a Federal Election?
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Howards Gotta Go! Concert
Friday June 15
MC: Phil Free
8 til late - Newtown RSL
$10.00 waged/$7.00 unwaged
This concert is being organized by Grayndler and Sydney Labor as a way to support our local bands, promote a sense of community & send John Howard a message that his days are numbered!
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Saharan Action
The Honourable Janelle Saffin MLC, President of the New South Wales Parliamentary Amnesty Group, cordially invites you and a guest to attend an "Evening in the Sahara" at NSW Parliament House.
The night will include cocktails, surprises, and a rare exhibition and auction of photographs taken live at the Saharawi refugee camps. All monies raised will go to help the women and children whose rights continue to be violated in the Western Sahara.
Special guest speaker will be Mr. Kamal Fadel, POLISARIO representative in Australia.
He will be joined by:
* Honourable Justice John Dowd AO,
* Senator Lyn Allison Democrat Senator for Victoria,
* Mr. David Raper, President of Amnesty International NSW Branch
Wednesday June 20, 2001 6.00pm. for 6.30pm.
The Jubilee Room, NSW Parliament House, Macquarie Street, Sydney
Tickets - $45.00 Each (Please contact Tracy on the number below if concession is required)
RSVP - Tel: (02) 9230-3306 Tracy Weiss
or Margherita Tracanelli
by Tuesday June 5, 2001
Please see attachment which is an example of the beautiful photographs by UK photographer Danielle Smith that will be auctioned
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Two Wise Men Visit The Holy Grail On The Central Coast
Trish Moran, ALP Candidate for Robertson invites you to an evening of wit & wisdom with The 2 Barrys - Jones & Cohen
Legendary Australian quiz master and former Federal ALP Parliamentarian Barry Jones will join local veteran Labour Movement luminary Barry Cohen in an evening not to be missed.
Both will share their views on a number of key issues facing the electorate as a Federal Election looms on the horizon.
When: Wednesday June 13 2001 Time: 7.00pm
Where: Central Coast Leagues Club, Auditorium, Dane Drive, Gosford.
Cost:Tickets $40 for a 2 Course Dinner, Drinks at Club Prices
Please send cheques to: Trish Moran Robertson Campaign Account, PO BOX 609 GOSFORD NSW 2250
RSVP date - Wednesday June 6
Phone: Joy 02 4362 1141; Kym 0243 65 0830; Tim 02 4341 0274
How can Mark Hebblewhite do a review of ideologically sound pop music without including the Bard from Barking Billy Bragg? Billy was a founder of Red Wedge in Great Britain in the 1980's which was an alliance of entertainment industry types (including Paul Weller from the Jam)formed to fight Thatcherism. Billy was a huge supporter of the Miners strikes in the UK and continues to write songs with a political message today.
Billy has launched a tactical voting web site to encourage Labour and Liberal Democrat voters in his two nearest parliamentary constituencies, South Dorset and West Dorset, to agree to vote for each other's candidates in order to unseat the two Conservative MPs in the current general election.
In 1990 Billy released an EP called The Internationale. The EP contained songs such as The Internationale , The Marching Song Of The Covert Battalions and The Red Flag.
Billy released an album in 1986 "Talking to the Taxman about Poetry" which contained the song 'Power in a Union'.
There can be no discussion of ideology in music without Billy Bragg.
Peter Rawsthorne
Dear Bruce Gray re the Chaser Satire
Satire is a humourous (hopefully) attempt at making a serious point. The serious point in that satirical piece is that there are NO SIMPLE ANSWERS to children's drug abuse.
Now Bruce may think that the millions of dollars the Federal Government has spent on an advertising campaign that basically says "talk to your children about drugs" is money well spent, but where I live and work I see the results of drug addiction on the streets every day. The same Federal government that spends up big on ad campaigns has spent lots of money to try to stop serious alternative approaches to drug abuse being tried in Vic and NSW. And the simple approaches eg. zero tolerance, lecturing etc do not work. And never will.
So lighten up (don't light up though) a bit Bruce. Satire is not for you if you don't have a sense of humour. Workers and unionists are entitled to a sense of humour in my book and in this era of worker entitlements being wound back we need to laugh any chance we get.
Mark
An ASU member
PS Whether that piece was good satire is a separate question.
Re: Toasting Mayday
1 May 2001
M1 protest attracts a crowd of 2000 in Sydney
6 May 2001
Official May Day march called off by 20 blokes in the rain
The people turned out for May Day. Whose side are you on?
ER Macnamara
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Many thanks to you for pursuing an editorial practice based on open and honest dialogue. I would like to elucidate on a few issues raised around May Day 2001 and the ongoing discussion.
I expected to find commentary and opinion in relation to the cancellation of May Day 2001 in WoL following the event (or unevent). As stated in my original letter, upon discovering that the march had been cancelled my emotions ran high and I appreciated the actions of FBEU members on the day. Others I have spoken with are also very disturbed about the march being cancelled.
I am grateful to Comrade Mark for raising the issue (WoL 95) although it is fortunate for me that I peruse all letters sent to the Editor otherwise I might have missed his letter under the heading "Compo: the great tradition." Perhaps the Editor did not want this contribution to be lost in the rather lengthy discourse around M1(titled May Day The Great Debate. WoL95). Thanks again.
That said however, it is lamentable that this discussion has detracted somewhat from the original issue; that being: how did it occur that May Day 2001 was cancelled? I am surprised that as yet no reply has been forthcoming from either the May Day Committee or a representative of that committee. A response from the committee would be well within the bounds of progressive democratic principles and practices � things I have always thought May Day and the May Day Committee represent.
It is remiss of me if I have given the impression that those who contribute to WoL will leave themselves open to personal attack (Cde ML, WoL 97). This was not my intention and I do apologise to Comrade Mark.
I look forward to a response from the May Day Committee in this or the next issue of WoL.
In Unity
Sharny Chalmers
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Ed's Reply:
Will ask someone form the committee to reply in a similarly comradely spirit next issue!
Dear Editor
The recent edition raises HIH's involvement with seeking privatsation of WorkCover and that it should be dealt with in a Royal Comission.
Surely the most glaring issue is the involvement of NRMA and its association with the Government.
In 1999 in the CTP area it had over one third of the market and somehow got the government to cop the mutilation of the rights of motor vehicle accident victims, whilst maintaining all the profits of insurers!
Then in 2001, NRMA suddenly enters the Workcover market by picking up HIH's business for a song.
At the same time we see the most draconian changes to the scheme being proposed. The original proposal was as bad or worse than what Terry Sheehan put up and which became law in 1987 when he was Attorney General.
Now we see Justice Terry Sheehan being tagged to head an inquiry into the matter, when it was his intention to do away with common law in 1987.
It took a Liberal (and Nick Greiner at that) to restore common law rights! It took another eight years after that to bring back commutations, which has caused the statistical blip which all the current shenanigans is about(suddenly insurers were paying out lump sums to close liability, which till then they couldn't).
So NRMA picked up a premium workers comp portfolio, but was not required to take with it the associated risk of public liability (Many work injury common law claims are brought against in effect the public liability insurer.
When insurers negotiate a package it will include Workcover, public liability and associated risk. Yet NRMA picked up only the risk covered by the workcover fund!).
Surely the time has come to stop the annual attack on workers rights (the present modified proposal is just more change for no real benefit) and look at what is behind the move for change.
A Royal Commission into these issues would probably bring forth some very important information.
Yours truly
Martin Bell
PS Some readers may recall the appointments made Attorney-General Sheehan Comp Court - Judge O'Toole, Turner C, Butchard C, District Court - Downs J, McDevitt J
by Peter Lewis
Lindsay Tanner |
Is the challenge for a Labor Finance Minister different to that of a conservative Finance Minister?
It is different because Labor is essentially the party of "Active Government". Of using government to improve people's lives. And that means the onus on us is heavier to achieve better outcomes. The Liberals are essentially the negative party and their role I think is to unravel the things that Labor does. We, in a sense have a stronger onus on us in terms of managing the public sector to produce decent outcomes because we are the Party which says you can actually make people's lives better in areas like health, education and childcare, through collective provision.
I think the great lesson of the past 20 years of Labor Government at a State and Federal level, is that if you want to achieve the kind of outcomes that pretty well every Labor person is dedicated to - better schools, better universities, better opportunities for people, better public hospitals, stronger universal health coverage, better childcare opportunities - all of those things - a necessary precondition is sound budget and economic management. There is just simply no way around it. That is the ultimate pitfall for Labor Governments. Because as soon as you allow your fiscal position to deteriorate and as soon as soon as you start trying to patch up with bandaids an unsustainable position, then you are politically finished, and your ability to deliver things that you are committed to delivering is basically wiped out.
So, I think that is the great lesson over the last 20 years. That, therefore means that my responsibility will be a fairly important one in a government of making sure that the foundations are laid soundly and that we can deliver the improvements in people's lives that we believe are possible. And also, improve the overall position of the nation relative to the rest of the world, which clearly has an indirect impact on people's lives as well.
Without intelligent fiscal management then those things just simply won't be possible.
The Liberals have got much greater leeway than us. We are always marked down much more heavily for bad fiscal management than they are. In the current circumstances had a Labor Government produced the Budget that Costello has just produced, we would have been absolutely politically massacred. We would have had the markets selling the dollar down; we would have had a whole range of negative consequences. $20 billion has been shaved off the surpluses projected for the next three years compared with what was projected for those same budgets last year, and yet there has been barely a flicker of backlash to that. That is because there is an assumption there that Liberal governments are sound managers. But we, of course don't get the same leeway.
That means that our performance has to be better than theirs.
What is your main priorities in terms of handling your portfolio in the lead up to the election?
My first responsibility of course is to publicly advocate Labor's approach to the management of the Budget. There is a range of issues there. One of the things that is starting to become more significant is disclosure of information. Two big issues there. One is the increasing issues of the 'commercial-in-confidence' excuse for refusing to disclose information about government spending. The Auditor-General has just handed down a report criticising the Government about that.
We have adopted a pretty hardline position on that for when we are in government, following on in the footsteps of some State Labor Governments that have taken a pretty strong, open approach to publishing contracts on the Web and making sure that there is full public disclosure. That is an important issue.
Similarly, with the introduction of accrual accounting for the Budget, which is what we supported, they have managed to reduce the amount of information that is available in the Budget on detailed issues, which therefore makes it harder for particular groups of people in the community to understand what the government's plans are for the next few years.
There has been a range of reductions in available information there. So reversing that is pretty important, and focussing public opinion on some of those accountabilities is a pretty important responsibility for me. But I also have the much broader responsibility, and that is being part of the main economic team for Labor, and clearly my responsibilities there are focussed pretty heavily on fiscal policy and what our relative positioning would be with respect to the surplus. And also, I have got responsibility for asset sales - things like the sale of Sydney airport. Although the transport issues are obviously with the Shadow Minister for Transport, but the actual sale process and the detail of how that would unfold are my responsibility as well, so there are issues there.
Ultimately of course I play a role in the broad economic debates as well because of my portfolio.
One of your predecessors, Peter Walsh, was a Finance Minister who prided himself on his ability to say 'no' to all the hare-brained ideas that his colleagues came up with. Is that part and parcel of your job? How do you make that criteria of which program in potpourri of good well-intentioned programs are the ones to get the green light?
The Finance Minister plays a pretty fundamental role in that regard in Opposition as well. So that my role within the Opposition has been to try to prevent us from making promises that aren't funded, or haven't been assessed in relative terms in order of priority, compared with other schemes, and also to scrutinise commitments that people wish to make or indeed, responses to what the Government is doing. So there is that fundamentally negative role of the Finance Minister, or Shadow Finance Minister, which is extremely important, because you do need a Devil's Advocate in your decision making processes. It is quite easy to get carried away with particular proposals without having them properly assessed; without comparing them against all other available possible uses of a particular pool of money.
People in individual portfolios are understandably very heavily focussed on their own area, so that if somebody in the Education portfolio or the Community Services portfolio, or the Health portfolio, or the Transport portfolio comes up with a particular proposal, you can't expect them to be measuring that against an alternative use of the same money in another portfolio, over which in many instances they may have fairly limited knowledge of.
My job is to perform the gatekeeper role and to have a reasonable working knowledge across all the portfolios so that when we are making assessments about committing money, be it from Opposition - making promises about when we are in government - or actually spending it in government, there s some mechanism where we can actually say well, yes it would be good in isolation to spend $200 million on this program, however, if we are going to spend $200 million, then spending it on something over here, something different, is actually a much higher priority.
And also, putting people to the test, because in politics people often make assumptions which are widely shared, which are not necessarily automatically true.
The other thing that I am very keen to do in office, that is associated with this, is to improve the degree of benchmarking of public sector spending. At the moment there is this huge tendency within the public sector that has been there forever, to assume that if you spend $50 million on something, you are by definition getting $50 million worth of value, when in fact in many instances you might be misdirecting the spending. You might have only been getting a limited amount of value, and it might be much better directed somewhere else. So one of the key things that I would be very keen to do as Finance Minister will be to improve the level of benchmarking and continuous assessment of how much impact spending is actually having.
If we decide we want to spend an additional $100 million on aboriginal health, for example, which is the sort of issue that governments of both persuasions are often confronting, I think we need to have some sense that it is actually going to produce $100 million worth improvement where we are spending it. There is a much greater need for - aboriginal health is just a random example - labour market programs - there is a whole array of expenditure where I think all too often governments of both persuasions have tended to assume that the headline of what we are spending equals outcomes, when it doesn't necessarily equal outcomes.
Just on pre-election promises. What percentage of proposals slip through your net?
Well, that process actually isn't over, so you couldn't actually put a percentage on it, and it is a bit of a false comparison in a sense because there are some proposals that have no costs or a very, very limited cost, but are worthwhile doing and that you judge according to other things. There are other proposals that are expensive, so it is a bit hard to take that percentage of numbers of proposals. It doesn't tell you very much.
But inevitably I think in most areas we will see a fairly limited number of major initiatives. Not just because there is not that much money to play with, but also because it is important to have a sense of priority and to be actually able to say to people, well, here is where it really matters. These are the best ideas. These are the best approaches to producing some improvements in Health, in Education, or whatever. I don't think we will see a huge list of initiatives - there will be a relatively concentrated list of specifics that are designed to produce outcomes.
Does that make it difficult with that sort of policy - lazy charge that has been levelled against you by the Howard Government, and the fact that there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of money in the kitty to actually come up with something that looks like a platform of an alternative government?
I think this situation is a problem for whoever is in Opposition to a degree, ever since "Fight Back". Because inevitably what happens is that if you come forward 18 months before an election with this vast number of detailed of initiatives with costings and whatever, then after the initial positive response then the fact that it is going to be all in one direction, and circumstances change - budgetary circumstances change - incumbent governments can do the things that you were thinking of doing. There are a number of initiatives that the government has in this Budget that are basically a direct steal from things we have advocated and things we had under consideration for our set of commitments. For example, the superannuation being included in the income assets test for people over 55 who are applying for unemployment benefits, which they introduced in 1996 - now they have just removed that. So there are a lot of practical difficulties in bobbing up 18 months before an election with a whole set of detailed promises.
Secondly, there is a tendency in the media to report sweeping, big positive things once, and then ignore them forever after because they are not new anymore. So, you haven't seen much in the media in spite of Kim's best efforts, about the Medicare Alliance, since National Conference last year, because there is a mentality in the press gallery in particular that that had been reported and is now old news, when in fact it is a centrepiece commitment. Ultimately, they will have to report it, once we get into the heat of an election campaign.
So, there are some practical reasons why it is not particularly smart to be putting forward your wares out there on display early on. However, clearly there is a balancing factor. You need to build some momentum, and the closer you get to an actual election campaign, the more people have to have a sense of differentiation. What are the positive things that you, as a political party, are intending to initiate that will improve their lives in circumstances in this country.
And we are doing that bit by bit, and Kim announced a few more initiatives in the course of the Budget Reply Speech the other night. So, we have got quite an amount of initiatives out in the public domain. There will be more to come and obviously there will be some that will be announced during the election campaign. So there is just a gradual process of putting these into place, while at the same time maintaining a degree of flexibility to make sure that by the time we get to the election we haven't boxed ourselves in to, for example, a set of fiscal unsustainable commitments.
The last thing I want to see happen is for us to put ourselves in a position where we get all these wonderful promises that can't be delivered. And that, I think, is another great lesson that we need to learn from the last 20 years of Labor's experience State and Federally.
It is critical that we don't artificially inflate expectations and then find ourselves in a position we can't deliver. That is what has happened with John Howard. That is why he has got One Nation, because he allowed people to think that all of the change that had occurred in the previous 10 or 15 years in Australia was all Paul Keating's fault, and that all you had to do was take away this nasty Labor government and you would be nicely back to the 1960s . That didn't happen and what you got was massive disillusionment.
So, it is also important that when we do finally go to an election, we will set a policy direction that will be deliverable, and that we are not going to promise the earth, and three weeks later turn around and announce, sorry we can't do what we promised. We cannot afford to do that sort of thing.
Speaking of costings, I'll ask the 14 year old schoolboy question. You have got a rapidly shrinking surplus; you've got a commitment to roll back the GST; and a commitment to the Knowledge Nation. Where is the money going to come from?
The ultimate response to this of course is that none of this is going to happen the day after the election, and Kim has always made it plain that the fiscal circumstances will have a big role in determining how quickly these things are done. We still haven't made final decisions about the shape of these initiatives - the magnitude of them - and in some cases those final decisions won't be made until close to the election, because then we are absolutely certain about what the fiscal circumstances actually are.
But I think it is also important to understand that people I don't think trust large sums of moneys. So in the areas like "Knowledge Nation" and improving the health system, what matters most is ideas. New ways of doing things. Yes, money is required. We will not be able to build a knowledge nation on zero dollars. But we don't need to have some vast program with billions of dollars attached to it either.
If we do advocate something of that kind the community's response will be predominantly one of concern that this will be unsustainable. It will blow the budget. It will increase interest rates.
So the real premium in these areas is on the quality of our years of being able to improve the use of existing expenditure and get maximum value out of relatively modest amounts of additional expenditure. That is where the ultimate answer lies. That we don't need to spend large additional sums of money, and it would be dangerous to promise to spend large additional sums of money. The real question is: Can we get substantially better value out of existing expenditure, and limited additional expenditure. I think we can do that.
And with the GST -although we would like to obviously do all the things to make it fairer and simpler as soon as possible, that process will clearly be in accordance with overall fiscal circumstances. Now, I have no doubt that we will make some substantial and very worthwhile changes to the GST, but it will all be in the framework of fiscal responsibility. It has to be. There is simply no alternative.
There is also a perception out there that the GST is going to realise a lot more money than anyone really expected so far. Surely that gives you a bit of flexibility in your position?
The evidence is actually a bit mixed on that. The initial figures that we have now got suggests that that is probably not the case. There is no big additional GST dividend. The government has hinted that there is a GST dividend on the income tax side of things. They thought they would gain a windfall from the informal economy - the people who are not paying any tax - but they haven't actually substantiated that and it is very hard to tell to what extent that is true or whether it is other factors that have produced a bit of a boost in income tax receipts over the past year or so.
We can't rely on any assumptions about the GST. Keep in mind of course, that given a few years, the effect of the GST -- but within a few years we get to a point where all the GST goes to the State and it doesn't matter from the point of view of the federal government fiscal position, whether GST is over-stated or under-stated.
What matters that the federal government is committed to deliver catch-up funding because the initial receipts from the GST over the first few years are calculated to be lower than otherwise would have been the case from the old system of financial assistance schemes. Therefore the Commonwealth has to maintain payments to the States, and of course if the GST revenue is higher than projected, then the fill-in payments that the Commonwealth has to pay are reduced accordingly. Now there was some indication of that in the mid-year economic and fiscal outlook papers in November last year. They were reduced, but that may have simply been because of higher than expected rates of growth.
So, I think the answer to your question is that there is not any evidence that that will be an increase in GST revenues of such a magnitude that it will make a big difference to an incoming Labor government's position
In terms of the "Knowledge Nation", you are from a trade union background yourself. How well do you think this concept is resonating amongst Labor's internal base?
I think there is a sense in the community, pretty much right across the board, that investment in education, in schools, in TAFE, in university, in these sorts of developments, is increasingly important for Australia's future.
Different kinds of people have got different levels of interest on that, so if you are talking to someone who is a research scientist, well they are almost inevitably going to say it is the most important thing in the world and everything else pales into insignificance.
Amongst blue collar workers you may get a lesser degree of interest in terms of some cases, but I think it is still pretty well understood that our level of skill and our level of knowledge, and our level of innovation, are fundamental to our economic future, including the areas like fairly traditional manufacturing.
So, I don't think there is strong resistance to the agenda from the point of view of people saying this is wrong, or this is bad. There is no group in the community that is homogenous either. There are some blue-collar workers whose work is relatively knowledge-based in terms of manufacturing, who will see the practical outcome in their day to day work experiences, or in the skilled area or the R&D area. So, I don't think there is a uniform view of it, but one thing that I do think is extremely important is that we need to ensure that the strategy is broadly based, and it should involve TAFEs as well as universities.
Compo Rally |
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Andrew Ferguson's words were chilling. Just a day earlier he reported, a building worker in Manly had fallen down a lift shaft and severely injured his back. Admittedly, it wasn't the ideal day to hold a rally, but these words reinforced the concerns plaguing ordinary workers in the building industry- and all of a sudden, the weather didn't seem that important. Let me explain.
Monday 28th May, 2001 was perhaps one of the most perfect crisp, clear autumn days the city of Sydney has delivered in a very long while. Tuesday 29th May was another matter altogether.
A timeline: 7:00 AM- Rain 8:00 AM- More rain 9: 00 AM- Even more rain- and it was getting heavier 10:00 AM- This isn't rain, it's a flood. Surely it can't get any worse? 11:00 AM - The speaker of previous statement was at this point forced to eat his words, it wasn't a pretty site.
Initially, things weren't looking good for the CFMEU's day of industrial action to protest changes to workers compensation and the shocking state of workplace safety in NSW. From an original estimation of between 10- 15
thousand construction workers, the more pessimistic amongst us were muttering something about 'being lucky if a couple of hundred people turn up'. Yes, the weather was that bad. Originally, the idea was for members across Sydney to stop work at 11AM and make their way to the rally. But with the disastrous early morning weather many sites had closed and many workers were beginning to go home. The question now was should the rally continue as planned?
The majority of voices said yes. It was felt that although an in principle agreement had been met between the Labor Council and the State Government over most of the proposed changes to Workers Compensation, it was important for the building industry to register it's protest over safety concerns and employer compliance issues unique to the industry.
With this in mind, the decision was made to soldier on, and upon reaching Town Hall Square at 11:30 a miracle occurred that rates somewhere between Lazarus and Canberra's 1989 grand final victory. The rain actually stopped. With one
miracle under our belt, things were beginning to look a little more promising, and I guess miracles beget miracles because we were suddenly sliding into second. That's right, people began to stream into Town Hall station until the square was literally overflowing with people. Co-ordinated by the CFMEU on behalf of the building unions, the rally was a collage that represented all facets of the organised labor movement. After a traditional Maori Haka the march began it's trek up George Street; ultimate destination the hallowed halls of the State Parliament. Over 5,000 strong we turned the city streets into a sea of colourful banners as we wound through Pitt Street mall where the Maori contingent gave another rendition of one of New Zealand's most famous cultural exports.
Upon reaching Macquarie Street a number of speakers were on hand to address the rally including State Secretary of the CFMEU (Construction) Andrew Ferguson and ACTU Secretary Greg Combet. A petition signed by over 20,000
workers was then handed to Labor MLC Ian West registering their opposition to the proposed changes to Workers Compensation in NSW. But before proceedings came to an end, there was one speaker left, a speaker who perhaps had the most profound impact on everyone in attendance. Todd Philpott is one of Australia's premier wheelchair athletes. Before tragically losing a leg in a motorcycle accident, Todd had worked in the construction industry for many years in a number of roles. While addressing the rally, Todd said something that that made me realise just how important the Union movement's quest for workplace safety is. 'In the mid 1970's when I began work, I saw a man fall to his death on a building site. A quarter of a century later, these unnecessary accidents are still occurring," pointed out an obviously sad Todd. Later I was able to talk to Todd one on one where he told me a story that is unfortunately par for the course in many industries.
"Many of these companies care about profits before people," said Todd. "That's why a strong union presence in the building industry is so important, it's the only way workers can be assured of getting a say," said Todd, who also wanted to point out that the CFMEU had not only contributed to his working life, but his personal situation as well. "I was having trouble with the financial commitments that go along with being a wheelchair athlete," explained Todd. "The CFMEU saw my plight and offered to sponsor me and other paralympians so we could represent our country. I think their actions in this case really shows the commitment the union movement has to its rank and file members, and I don't think this fact is recognised enough by people such as the media," pointed out Todd.
These words got me thinking, so I decided to abandon my original plan of cornering the union leadership for candid commentary and instead set out to talk to some of the rank and file members that had taken part in the rally. The results were interesting to say the least.
"All I want is the chance to work in safety," said Steve, a bricklayer. "But sometimes I get the feeling that my employer couldn't give a stuff about my working conditions. This is my life and I'm not going to lose it because an
employer has decided to cut corners on safety- it's simply not on".
"Our union has been working hard to remedy this situation though," said his brother John, also a bricklayer. "Our delegate has made sure that regular safety meeting are happening on site and we've got to build on this good work - that's why I'm here today. Along with workplace safety, the proposed changes to Workers Compensation also seemed to strike a chord among many members.
"I'm really worried about changes to Workers Compensation," confided Andrew, an apprentice. "These changes aren't just an attack on workers, but also our families."
Despite the awful weather, May 29th was a remarkable success with over 100,000 building workers on strike in Sydney. With this action behind them, I asked Andrew Ferguson what would be next for the CFMEU?
"The issue of Workers Compensation, and of course safety in the building industry has galvanised our members," said Andrew. "We're going to remain vigilant on both these issues and take whatever action is required to protect workers rights". And what of Tony Abbott's claims that union misuse safety claims in the building industry?
"Tony Abbott has never been on a building site in his life and he doesn't have any right to criticise building workers. If he was even handed he would crack down on the behaviour of employers who cut corners and jeopardise
workers safety. Our members see through his anti-union hysteria and won't stand for it," said Andrew.
Oh, by the way, just for the record: May 30th: A perfect sunny day. Figures.
by Mark Hearn
Unionists giving Blood |
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The blood is pumping out of Glen Camenzuli's arm. In fact, it pumps out every three months, and has done so on at least nine or ten separate occasions - so often Glen is starting to lose count. Glen, a Customer Service Officer with Leichhardt Council, has a gift for giving, and encouraging others to do the same. Through persistent jaw-boning, arm-twisting and emailing over the last three years, Glen has regularly encouraged a small army of his work mates to join him in a pilgrimage of blood - giving theirs, to help others live. It's that simple, and that necessary.
So necessary that the NSW Municipal Employees Union has commenced a campaign to include Blood Donation Leave in the Local Government (State) Award 2001. MEU General Secretary Brian Harris says "the MEU believes that it is a vital community responsibility to ensure that adequate blood supplies are maintained. The union also wants to ensure the safety of all our members who freely offer to make blood donations."
The MEU is seeking dedicated paid leave for travel, blood donations and a standard two hours rest period following each donation. Workers using heavy machinery should have twenty-four hours rest. The MEU's application reflects Australian Red Cross recommendations. "It's not much time, when you consider the importance of giving blood", Brian Harris says.
As Glen Camenzuli stresses, "only a certain number of people can give blood." There are so many necessary restrictions on blood donations these days, prompted by fear of spreading diseases like AIDs, Hepatitis or CJD (Mad Cow disease), or because of the particular medical conditions of potential donors (for example, high blood pressure). A large percentage of potential donors are excluded. Which of course leads to chronic shortages, and only confirms the vital importance of the entirely voluntary effort put in by people like Glen.
And donors like Geoff Lussick, a compliance officer (control of building and development sites) with Leichhardt Council. Geoff has had his blood bottled on no less than thirty-two occasions. Geoff is just one of fifteen Council staff to give at the Red Cross's temporary donation facility at Five Dock RSL on May 2nd. MEU members from Canada Bay and Burwood Councils also donated. These donations keep elective surgery on track in NSW's hospitals, and help maintain vital emergency supplies.
MEU Organiser Carolyn Moore acknowledges that some councils, such as Leichhardt and Canada Bay, are willing to allow staff time to donate blood - usually their own time. Staff may use their lunch hour, and perhaps another half hour tacked on, to give blood. As Glen Camenzuli comments as he's prepared for his donation: "I'm going straight back to work, not having had anything to eat, and no proper rest break."
Carolyn Moore also points out that Leichhardt Council's tolerance of blood donations by staff is a casual, unregulated concession: "it's not a right". Putting blood donation leave in the award will make it a right, and will encourage other staff to take the time to perform a vital community service.
Photo: Leichhardt Council Customer Service Officer Glen Camenzuli is prepared for his donation
by Gina Preston
Checklist for Women�s Voters |
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Australian women are fortunate to live in a society where they earn equal pay, can easily balance paid work and family life, and occupy a fair share of highly skilled jobs. Right? As any working woman would know, this is far from the truth.
There are many inequities in life today for Australian women. Within months, Australians will go to the polls to elect a new Government - unions and the ACTU want to know women's views so we can campaign effectively to ensure that women's issues are high on the agenda.
Unions are calling on women to nominate their top priorities for the federal election by completing our Checklist for Women's Voters. The Checklist is part of a campaign to raise the profile of issues the ACTU and unions believe are relevant to the lives of many Australian women voters within the context of work, family, health and community services and education.
Unions will distribute the checklist pamphlet around workplaces seeking feedback from women about the key issues they expect the government to act on. Women can also send us their three key issues by email, post or fax (see below for details). The information will be used in a media campaign to highlight the importance of women's issues and women's votes in the election.
ACTU President Sharan Burrow says issues such as work-family balance, job security, family-friendly workplaces, equal pay and having more control over working hours affect all working people, but women in particular.
"We want to make sure that the major political parties are aware that these issues impact on the quality of life of most voters," said Ms Burrow.
"Women can push for change by helping us to gather this information. To speak for women, we need to know about the issues that impact on women's lives so we can all campaign for improvements."
Equal pay
Even though equal pay was awarded in an Arbitration Commission Test Case more than 30 years ago, most women are not being paid the same as men for work of equal value. While this year marks the 50th anniversary of the International Labour Organisation's Equal Pay Convention, Australian Taxation Office data released in April shows that men earn, on average, 46 per cent more than women. Figures for 1998-99 show that the average taxable income for men ($34,460) is 46 per cent higher than the amount paid to women ($23,599).
Despite women doubling their participation rate in traditionally male dominated areas such as law, accountancy and policing, the gap between men's and women's average weekly earnings has increased nationally by $64.50 over the past 10 years. Non-managerial women earn an average $17.50 an hour - $1.50 or 8 per cent less than their male counterparts who average $19.00 an hour (ABS 1999).
The daily juggle
The Australian birth rate is declining at a rapid rate. To simply sustain current population levels the average number of children born to Australian women needs to be 2.1. In 1961 the rate was 3.6 children; by 1999 this figure had dropped to 1.75, and women are now waiting longer before having children.
Part of the answer to arresting declining births levels is to look at why women are delaying having children or not having them at all. A survey of 14,000 Australian women aged 18 to 23 years revealed that nearly one in three want to return to work part-time after giving birth, and 60 per cent want to combine parenting with a full-time career. Only 4 per cent of women wanted to stay at home full-time, showing that women expect more creative solutions to the problem of balancing work and family.
She Works Hard for the Money
Women are mostly found in lower paid and lower skilled jobs and are far more likely than men to experience periods out of the labour force.
Australian Bureau of Statistics from 1999 show that 23 per cent of all women workers earn $12 or less an hour, or $23,713 a year. Nine per cent of all women workers earn $10 or less an hour, or a paltry $19,761 a year.
Forty-four per cent of all part time employees (of which 73 per cent are women) in organisations of five or more employees are paid at the minimum Award rate compared to only 13 per cent of full time employees (DEWRSB Award and Agreement Coverage Survey 2000).
Given that 32 per cent of adult women workers earn less than $12 an hour and a significant proportion of women working part-time are paid minimum award rates, it is therefore imperative the tax system be made fairer for women. The effects of the GST must be compensated for and public interest campaigns such as the Living Wage must receive government support.
Choose your priorities
In a recent ICFTU survey to which 629 Australian women responded, the three top priorities for women at work were:
� More control over working hours (accounting for 15% of all answers);
� Job security (13%)
� Career development and training (12%)
Control over working hours was one of the top three priorities for almost half of the respondents.
Please choose your top three priority areas from the list below:
� Family-friendly workplaces
� Job security
� More control over working hours
� Family leave and paid maternity leave
� Affordable and accessible child care
� Equal pay
� Fair workplace laws
� High quality health, housing, aged care and other community services
� Pay increases for low paid workers
� Equal access to quality, fully funded education and training opportunities
Send your three priorities (or alternative priorities) from the list of 10 above to: mailto:[email protected]
May Day 2000 |
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Comrades and Friends, May Day Greetings! Here is 'the day.' The day we long to become a "journee'," those days of the French Revolution when a throne would topple, the powerful would tumble, slavery be abolished, or the commons restored.
Meanwhile, we search for a demo for the day, or we gather daffodils and some "may" for our loved ones and the kitchen table. We greet strangers with a smile and "Happy May Day!" We think of comrades around the world, in Africa, India, Russia, Indonesia, Mexico, Hong Kong. With our comrades we remember recent victories, and we mutter against, and curse our rulers. We take a few minutes to freshen up our knowledge of what happened there in Chicago in 1886 and 1887 before striding out into the fight of the day.
So during this moment of studying the day, I'm going to take a text from Frederick Engels, Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, and I'll ask you to take it down from the top shelf of the spare room where you stuck it when Reagan came to power, or to go down into the basement and dig it out of a mildewed carton whence you might have disdainfully put it during the Clinton years. Nowhere does Engels mention the slave trade. Nowhere does Engels mention the witch burnings. Nowhere does Engels mention the genocide of the indigenous peoples. He writes, "A durable reign of the bourgeoisie has been possible only in countries like America, where feudalism was unknown, and society at the very beginning started from a bourgeois basis."
Dearie me. Dear, dear, dear!
He has forgotten everything, it seems. He has swallowed hook, line, and sinker the whole schemata of: Savagery leads to Barbarism leads to Feudalism leads to Capitalism which, in turn, with a bit of luck, &c., &c., will be transformed, down the line, in the future, when the times are ripe, &c. &c. into socialism and communism. He has overlooked the struggle of the Indians, or the indigenous people, of the red, white, and black Indians. The fact is that commonism preceded capitalism on the North American continent, not feudalism. The genocide was so complete, the racism so effective, that there is not even a trace or relic of memory of the prior societies. So we fling him away as another Victorian European Imperialist and white male, to boot.
But, wait. Look again. Check out the essay at the back. He called it "The Mark." It's only a few pages. Perhaps you are misled by its German localism - its Gehferschaften and its Loosgter. The former term is the way the commoners of the Moselle Valley practiced the jubilee and the latter term is a land distribution system based on periodical assignments by lot. Engels is describing the Commons of his neighborhoods. It is as substantial as Maria Mies in The Subsistence Perspective. You can smell the barnyard as you walk down the lane arm in arm to pick berries in the commons. Engels becomes a scholar of that "feudalism" which we thought he was discarding. But, no, in describing the pigs, the mushrooms, the turf, the wood, the unwritten customs, the mark regulations, the berries, the heaths, the forests, lakes, ponds, hunting grounds, fishing pools, he has quite forgotten his polemic against the economics professors (which is what inspired his tract) and he is relishing, shall we say? his very own indigenous self. I dare say he has had a few encuentros himself among the Germans. And we'll never forget that it was the criminalisation of customary access to the commons which first drove Karl Marx to the study of political economy.
No, Engels is full of contradictions. I say get him back from the mildew and air your copy. He has a political purpose. Engels is not that theorist we tossed off as hopelessly politcally incorrect, and, taking all in all, a bad case for tenure. Part of his book he wrote for the professors of the SPD, but another part he wrote for the commoners and indigenous people - the peasants - who fled to the industrial towns. Moreover, he listened to them. They had lost their commons. Engels records the "traces," the "relics". These survive because of the French Revolution, and the German one, which once again produced a free peasantry. "But how inferior is the position of our free peasant of today compared with the free member of the mark of the olden time! His homestead is generally much small, and the unpartitioned mark is reduced to a few very small and poor bits of communal forest. But, without the use of the mark, there can be no cattle for the small peasant; without cattle, no manure; without manure, no agriculture." That is the living commons. Engels knew of it. Engels is a free man; he knows that communism is possible. Engels is a revoutionary; he knows that it is not scheduled.
I say this not to rehabilitate Engels. I personally am less interested in him that I am in Tecumseh who refused to enter the house of Governor W.H. Harrison in August 1810 insisting on meeting in the open air. "The earth was the most proper place for the Indians, as they liked to repose upon the bosom of their mother." Having thus reposed himself, he asserted the society of the commons: "The way, the only way to stop this evil is for the red men to unite in claiming a common and equal right in the land, as it was at first, and should be now - for it was never divided, but belongs to all. No tribe has the right to sell, even to each other, much less to strangers ... Sell a country! Why not sell the air, the great sea, as well as the earth? Did not the Great Spirit make them all for the use of his children?"
But Engels had a global class politics, That is why we are interested in him again. What destroys the commons in Europe is what destroyed the commons of Tecumseh. Engels writes in 1880 "the whole of European agriculture, as carried on at the present time, is threatened by an overpowering rival, viz., the production of corn on a gigantic scale by America ... The whole of the European agricultural system is being beaten by American competition." It is true that Engels recognizes the commons in Germany but not in America. However, having said that, Engels also recognizes that the preservation of the commons depends on an international struggle.
Now, we return to May Day. What was responsible for that productivity of American corn? First, it was the fertility provided by a millennium of native American corn culture on the common land (remember the mound-makers who made thousands of tumuli, learn about the Hopewell people who brought corn from the Maya one thousand years ago, visit the fabulous serpent mound of Ohio during your summer travels). Second, it was the members of the Moulders Local 23 at the McCormick mechanical reapers' works of Chicago who went on strike for the eight hour day in 1867 and whose struggle directly resulted in the Haymarket demo of 1886. And then the hangings.
So, now as they gather in Seattle and Windsor and Prague and Brazil and Quebec, precisely to sell the air, the water, the earth, we pose the common alternative, under many names, untheorised and common, oh! how so, very, very common, common to the slaves, common to the indigenous peoples, common to the women, common to the workers. Here is the light and the heat of the day.
I shall miss you, dearest comrades, at the launchings in New York and Boston of the Auroras of the Zapatistas.
Peter Linebaugh is the author (with Marcus Rediker) of The Many-Headed Hydra: Sailors, Slaves, Commoners, and the Hidden History of the Revolutionary Atlantic.
(reproduced with permission from Peter Linebaugh and Counterpunch, edited by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St Clair. "America's best political newsletter"; Counterpunch is"must reading" according to Noam Chomsky.)http://www.counterpunch.org
President Abdurrahman Wahid |
During Wahid's short time in power the democratic space for the operation of free trade union movements has grown dramatically .
The concern is that President Wahid will be replaced by a more authoritarian style possibly influenced by the powerful Army faction.
This group will want to clamp down on the new unions as they would favour the old-model unionism, the tightly controlled state-sponsored union which was weak and unresponsive to working peoples' concerns.
It would probably be a return to the Suharto-era of state run unions. Independent unions were banned, operated under other names, such as legal-aid institutes, or were just not recognised or given any legal status to represent workers.
The Indonesian Vice President Megawati Sukarnoputri has, unfortunately, aligned herself with the authoritarian and pro-Army groupings inside and outside parliament.
Few people believe she will act warmly towards the democratic unions even though many of the key players in the new unions were close to her father....the founder of Indonesia.
Huge strikes are threatend throughout Indonesia over the next few weeks as the new democratic unions flex their muscles to protect some of the small industrial and legislative gains they have made under Wahid.
For the last three days unskilled labourers throughout Indonesia have been holding protest rallies and strikes to show their anger at an attempt by Indonesian politicians to roll back hard-won severance pay rights.
The union leaderships - who often bicker among themselves - have come together on this issue and warned the parliamentarians that if they try to revoke this right long mass strikes will start from the middle of June.
One of the issues in dispute in the five month long Shangri-La Hotel dispute - which has received a lot of international attention and support - is the right to decent severance pay for all those workers who have been struggling against this company.
The Shangri-La hotel dispute has become an international symbol of the new struggles by working people in Indonesia for decent wages and conditions.
Indonesian disputes can be very ugly with many documented accounts of employers bringing in thugs to threaten, standover or even kill union activists.
The employers have also been able to use a corrupted police and judicial system to beat workers who are brave enough to stand up to their thugs.
However since the collapse of the Suharto-regime the bosses have not always had it their own way.
Wahid has introduced a whole raft of pro-worker laws which have improved pay and conditions and allowed workers to self-organise to raise their demands.
The Indonesian working class has not held back. They have eagerly organised and campaigned in sometimes flamboyant and anarchic styles.
President Wahid has also recognised the problem of corruption in the police and judicial system and has started to fight it - and started to reform it...but as yet it still has a long way to go.
Whether Mr Wahid will have a chance to complete these reforms is now in doubt.
Debunking Economics |
*************
Why have we handed over the running of the world to economists?
It is hardly because economics has won the intellectual equivalent of a popularity poll or election. In fact, if anything, economics is deeply unpopular, and its unpopularity spans all social spectra. The demonstrations against the IMF and other institutions in Seattle, Washington, Davos, Melbourne and Prague were fundamentally demonstrations against the proposition that the world should be reshaped in accordance with economic theory. Those events were simply the most dramatic of many protests which have frequently cut across the standard Left-Right divide of political debate, uniting the most unlikely of bedfellows against the policy recommendations of economists.
Only parties of the middle - the Democrats and Republicans of America, the Social Democrats or Christian Democrats of Europe, England's Conservative Party and 'New Labour', Australia's Liberal and Labor Parties - espouse the policies of economics. Parties which are more avowedly Left and Right often express economic attitudes which are diametrically opposed to policies of centrist parties, but are remarkably similar to each other - with their similarity derived from a shared disdain for conventional economic thought. However, because centrist parties have almost always been in power, the economic policies they champion have shaped the modern world.
At the level of 'grassroot' politics, in countless disputes around the world, social groups, which normally oppose each other, have also found themselves united by a common opposition to economic policy. Unionists opposing how economics treats labour as a mere commodity have found themselves standing, figuratively or actually, shoulder to shoulder with businessmen chafing against its anti-monopoly dogma. Farmers bemoaning the decline of rural communities have found themselves united with ecologist denying that a dollar value can be placed on nature. Feminists decrying its lack of respect for household labour have found themselves allied with Christians fuming at its portrayal of people as innately hedonistic.
And yet economics has swept all these opponents aside.
Nor is the political success of economics explicable because, though its message may occasionally be unpalatable, its opponents have to concede that it works: that the world has become a clearly better place because of the policies followed by governments that have followed the advice of economists.
The global economy of the early 21st century looks a lot more like the economic textbook ideal than did the world of the 1950s. Barriers to trade have been abolished or dramatically reduced, regulations controlling the flow of capital have been liberalised, currencies are not valued by the market rather than being set by governments; in so many spheres of economic interaction, the government's role has been substantially reduced. All these changes have followed the advice of economists that the unfettered market is the best way to allocate resources, and that well-intentioned interventions which oppose market forces will actually do more harm than good.
With the market so much more in control of the global economy now than fifty years ago, then if economists are right, the world should be a manifestly better place: it should be growing faster, with more stability, and income should go to those who deserve it.
Unfortunately, the world refuses to dance the expected tune. In particular, the final ten years of the 20th century were marked, not by tranquil growth, but by crises: the Japanese economic meltdown, the Long Term Capital Management crisis, the Russian crisis, the Mexican crisis, the Asian crisis, and many more.
Economists are prone to 'point the finger' and blame these crises on particular economic policy failings by the relevant governments - closed capital markets in Japan, fixed exchange rate shenanigans by the Thai government prior to the collapse of the baht, and so on. Yet many non-economists harbour the suspicion that perhaps these crises were in some sense caused by following the advice of economists.
This perspective was recently supported by non other than Joseph Stiglitz, a renowned economist who has had an intimate involvement in public policy via his roles as Chief Economist and Vice-President of the World Bank. Speaking as an insider and an economist, he asserted that these crises were indeed often precipitated by economists.
The most extreme case Stiglitz discusses was the collapse of the Russian economy, as Russia attempted to move from a command economy to a market economy in a timescale measured in days rather than years. While he notes that there was a group of eminent economists, including himself and Kenneth Arrow, who favoured a slow transition with an emphasis upon institutional reform, he says that the day was won by another group
Whose faith in the market was unmatched by an appreciation of the subtleties of its underpinnings. These economists typically had little knowledge of the history or details of the Russian economy and didn't believe they needed any. The great strength, and the ultimate weakness, of the economic doctrines on which they relied is that the doctrines are - or are supposed to be - universal. Institutions, history, or even the distribution of income simply do not matter. Good economists know the universal truths and can look beyond the array of facts and details that obscure these truths. (Stiglitz 2000)
The outcome, as Stiglitz details, was far different from the expectations held by these economists. Rather than enabling Russia to rapidly transmute from moribund socialism to dynamic capitalism,
The rapid privatisation urged upon Moscow by the IMF and the [United States] Treasury Department had allowed a small group of oligarchs to gain control of state assets ... While the government lacked the money to pay pensioners, the oligarchs were sending money obtained by stripping assets and selling the country's precious national resources into Cypriot and Swiss bank accounts. (Stiglitz 2000)
In other words, the end result of the IMF's Russian 'capitalist revolution' was not a vibrant, efficient market economy, but a capitalism of crooks - and a drastically impoverished nation. As Stiglitz observes, "standards of living remain far below what they were at the start of the transition. The nation is beset by enormous inequality, and most Russians, embittered by experience, have lost confidence in the free market." Indeed, this free market experiment may have done more to rehabilitate Karl Marx - and even Joseph Stalin - in the eyes of the average Russian, than anything positive done by Russia's socialist rump.
Stiglitz tells a similar tale of the impact economists had on the Asian crisis, where the IMF's enforcement of austerity seriously worsened a crisis which had been initiated by the international capital markets (Stiglitz 1998 and 2000).
Where I and a significant minority of economists part company with Stiglitz is on the explanation he gives to the question he was often asked, of "how smart - even brilliant - people could have created such bad policies". Part of Stiglit'z answer is that "these smart people were not using smart economics". This book puts the case that even the best, latest version of the type of economics Stiglitz describes as smart is not smart, but fundamentally unsound.
UNSMART ECONOMICS
The belief that economic theory is sound, and that it alone considers 'the big picture', is the major reason why economics has gained such an ascendancy over public policy. Economists, we are told, know what is best for society because economic theory knows how a market economy works, and how it can be made to work better, to everyone's ultimate benefit. Its critics are simply special interest groups, at best misunderstanding the mechanisms of a market economy, at worst pleading their own special case to the detriment of the larger good. If we simply ignore the criticisms, and follow the guidelines of economic policy, ultimately everybody will be better off. The occasional failures of economies to respond as economic theory predicts occur because the relevant policy-makers either applied in theory badly, or were using out-of-date economics.
Bunkum.
If this proposition were true, then economic theory would be clear, unequivocal, unsullied and empirically verified.
It is nothing of the sort.
Though economists have long believed that their theory constitutes "a body of generalisations whose substantial accuracy and importance are open to question only by the ignorant or the perverse" (Robbins 1932), for over a century economists have shown that economic theory is replete with logical inconsistencies, specious assumptions, errant notions, and predictions contrary to empirical data.
These critical economists are neither 'ignorant' of economic theory, nor 'perverse' in their motives. As this book shows, they have a far more profound understanding of economic theory than those economists who refuse to peer too deeply into the foundations of their dogma. Far from being driven by perversity, they hoped to improve economics by eliminating notions which were illogical, internally inconsistent, or irrelevant to the actual economies in which we live.
When their critiques are collated, little if anything of conventional economic theory remains standing.
Virtually every aspect of conventional economic theory is intellectually unsound; virtually every economic policy recommendation is just as likely to do general harm as it is to lead to the general good. Far from holding the intellectual high ground, economics rests on foundations of quicksand. If economics were truly a science, then the dominant school of thought in economics would long ago have disappeared from view.
Instead it has been preserved, not via greater knowledge, as its advocates might believe, but by ignorance. Many economists are simply unaware that the foundations of economics have been disputed, let along that these critiques have motivated prominent economists to profoundly change their views, and to consequently themselves become, to some extent, critics of economic orthodoxy. Names such as Irving Fisher, John Hicks, Paul Samuelson, Robert Solow, Alan Kirman and Joseph Stiglitz are famous within economics because they made major contributions to modern economic theory. Yet to varying degrees, these and other prominent economists have distanced themselves from conventional economics, after coming to believe, for a range of reasons, that the theory harboured fundamental flaws.
Unfortunately, in a classic illustration of the clich� that 'a little knowledge is a dangerous thing', lesser intellects continue to build the economic edifice atop foundations which many of its architects long ago declared suspect.
There are many reasons for this failure of economics to accept fundamental criticism, and to evolve into a different but richer theory. As I discuss later, these include the undeniable complexity of economic phenomena, and the impossibility of conducting crucial experiments to decide between competing theories. But a key reason - the one which motivated me to write this book - is the manner in which economics is taught.
Educated into Ignorance
Most introductory economics textbooks present a sanitised, uncritical rendition of conventional economic theory, and the courses in which these textbooks are use do little to counter this mendacious presentation. Students might learn, for example, that 'externalities' reduce the efficiency of the market mechanism. However, they will not learn that the 'proof' that markets are efficient is itself flawed.
Since this textbook rendition of economics is also profoundly boring, many student do no more than an introductory course in economics, and instead go on to careers in accountancy, finance or management - in which, nonetheless, many continue to harbour the simplistic notions they were taught many years earlier.
The minority which continues on to further academic training is taught the complicated techniques of economic analysis, with little to no discussion of whether these techniques are actually intellectually valid. The enormous critical literature is simply left out of advanced courses, while glaring logical shortcomings are glossed over with specious assumptions. However, most students accept these assumptions because their training leaves them both insufficiently literate and insufficiently numerate.
Modern-day economics students are insufficiently literate because economic education eschews the study of the history of economic thought. Even a passing acquaintance with this literature exposes the reader to critical perspectives on conventional economic theory - but students today receive no such exposure.
They are insufficiently numerate because the material which establishes the intellectual weaknesses of economics is complex. Understanding this literature in its raw form requires an appreciation of some quite difficult areas of mathematics - concepts which require up to two years of undergraduate mathematical training to understand.
Curiously, though economists like to intimidate other social scientists with the mathematical rigour of their discipline, most economists do not have this level of mathematical education.
Instead, most economists learn their mathematics by attending courses in mathematics given by other economists. The argument for this approach - the partially sighted leading the partially sighted - is that generalist mathematics courses don't teach the concepts needed to understand mathematical economies (or the economic version of statistics, known as econometrics). This is quite often true. However, this has the side effect that economics has produced its own peculiar versions of mathematics and statistics, and has persevered with mathematical methods which professional mathematicians have long ago transcended. This dated version of mathematics shields students from new developments in mathematics that, incidentally, undermine much of economic theory.
One example of this is the way economists have reacted to 'chaos theory' (discussed in Chapter 8). Most economists think that chaos theory has had little or no impact - which is generally true in economics, but not all true in most other sciences. This is partially because, to understand chaos theory, you have to understand an area of mathematics know as 'ordinary differential equations'.2. Yet this topic is taught in very few courses on mathematical economics - and where it is taught, it is not covered in sufficient depth. Students may learn some of the basic techniques for handling what are known as 'second-order linear differential equations', but chaos and complexity only begin to manifest themselves in 'third order nonlinear differential equations'.3
Economics students therefore graduate from Masters and PhD programs with an effectively vacuous understanding of economics, no appreciation of the intellectual history of their discipline, and an approach to mathematics which hobbles both their critical understanding of economics, and their ability to appreciate the latest advances in mathematics and other sciences.
A minority of these ill-informed students themselves go on to be academic economists, and then repeat the process. Ignorance is perpetuated.
The attempt to conduct a critical dialogue within the profession of academic economics has therefore failed, not because economics has no flaws, but because - figuratively speaking - conventional economists have no ears. So then, 'No More Mr Nice Guy'. If economists can't be trusted to follow the Queensberry Rules of intellectual debate, then we critics have to step out of the boxing ring and into the streets.
DOES ECONOMICS MATTER?
Economics is often popularly compared to the weather, for two good reasons. Firstly, just as the climate would exist even if there were no intellectual discipline of meteorology, the economy itself would exist whether or not the intellectual pursuit of economics existed. Unlike something that is consciously constructed, such as an aeroplane, the economy is a product of humanity's evolving systems of production and distribution. We don't need economics in the same sense that we need engineering to design planes, etc. Instead, economics shares a fundamental raison d�tre with meteorology, that of attempting to understand a complex system.
Secondly, like weather forecasters, economists frequently get their forecasts of the economic future wrong. But in fact, though weather forecasts are sometimes incorrect, overall meteorologists have an enviable record of accurate prediction - whereas the economic record is tragically bad. Farmers, sailors and ordinary folk who rely on weather forecasts are more often than not beneficiaries of meteorological science. Politicians, businessmen and ordinary folk who rely on economic forecasts are far more often than not misled.
This implies tat it would be possible to just ignore economic - to treat it and its practitioners as we these days treat astrologers: as a source of distraction and amusement rather than as a guide to what the future may bring. Unfortunately, there are two ways in which economics differs from meteorology, which mean that this lazy option is not possible.
Firstly, economics, unlike meteorology, is a social discipline. What we believe about economics therefore has an impact upon human society and the way we relate to one another. Its effects upon interpersonal relations matter.
Secondly, while human activity is clearly having an impact on the earth's climate, no meteorologist in her right mind would suggest that we should modify the physical environment to make the climate work better. But economists, despite the abysmal predictive trace record of their discipline, are forever recommending ways in which the institutional environment should be altered to make the economy work better.
Because politicians and bureaucrats have believed that economic advice is soundly based, this system-altering advice of economists has been taken seriously and acted upon - despite the frequent opposition of many other segments of society. Thus most of Europe has entered a monetary union that consciously restricts the freedom of its member states to undertake expansionary fiscal policies - because economic theory argues that government deficits are bad. Around the world, governments frequently oppose minimum wage laws - because economists argue that such laws increase unemployment. Tariff barriers have been reduced or eliminated - because economics argues that free trade achieves higher social welfare than regulated trade. Indebted Third World governments have been forced to abandon subsidies on basic commodities - because economists argue that these subsidies reduce economic growth by distorting the price mechanism. Russia was rushed into privatisation - because politically influential economists believed that a rapid transition to capitalism was both possible, and preferable to a gradual transition. And the Western world's middle class has been encouraged to entrust its future security to the ups and downs of the stock market - because economists believe that finance markets are inherently 'efficient'.
Economists would contend that these changes have made the world a better place, not because economists have actually verified that the changes have been beneficial, but because the changes have made the real world look more like the hypothetical world of the economic textbook. Since, in economic models, they hypothetical pure market performs better than the mixed economy in which we live, economists are confident that economic reform makes the world a better place. Where problems have occurred, economists normally assert that this was because their advice was not followed properly.
But this confidence in economic reform begs the question - is the hypothetical world of the economic textbook actually a better place than the real world, with all its 'distortions'? This is only possible if the economic theory that describes the economist's ideal world is internally consistent. If the theory is internally inconsistent - if it requires impossible conditions to function - then the economic ideal may actually be an entirely useless guide to how the real world works, let alone to how it might be improved.
Economic reform could produce a manifestly worse system than the one which it alters.
This book presents the wealth of intellectual evidence which proves that economic theory is internally contradictory. These contradictions are so extreme and pervasive that there is little if any chance that reforms guided by this theory will actually improve the economy or society. Though economists have championed economic reform for the quite altruistic reason that they believe these reforms improve social welfare, their recommendations are far more likely to have made the world a worse place, not a better one.
Thus, the economic conditions imposed to achieve monetary union in Europe could enforce a permanent recession upon Europe, and compromise the ability of its governments to counteract any severe downturn in world economic activity. Trade liberalisation could reduce global economic welfare because the rapid opening up of markets could destroy productive capacity. The abolition of price subsidies could retard economic growth by amplifying class conflict in the highly unequal societies of the Third World. Rapid economic change could lead to social breakdown, rather than the development of vibrant market economies. And America's middle class could find its retirement nest eggs eliminated by the collapse of a wildly speculative stock market.
Mainstream economists might deride these statements, but as this book shows, their arguments to the contrary are specious.
The public could still afford to ignore economics if the discipline had the ability to correct its own excesses. But it does not. Despite its record at forecasting, despite the evidence that economic theories are not consistent, and despite negative outcome from 'economic reform', the intellectual discipline of economics shows no tendency to reform itself. Instead, unsound theories continue to be taught to students as if they were incontrovertible. Economics cannot be trusted to reform its own house. Therefore, just as politics is too important to leave to the politicians, economics is too important to leave to the economists.
Excerpt from, Debunking Economics - The Naked Emperor of the Social Sciences' by Steve Keen. Pluto Press 2001
by The Chaser
The Chaser |
In a statement to the worlds press Prime Minister Clarke unveiled her "Great step nowhere" plan. Launching the plan Clark suggested that reports that their armed forces had been forced to say "bang, bang" during war exercises had been the final nail in the coffin for the once-almost-proud nation.
"For years now we've been doing nothing of value. All our really profitable industries have gone overseas. Music, kiwi fruit, Russell Crowe. After that it's basically just a bunch of sheep and a once proud rugby team. Even the Cricketers are poor by world standards" Clark said.
Clark went on to outline the timetable for disbanding the nation following the sale of the Navy's two dinghies and after the Army gives its shotgun back to the British.
In a sometimes emotional presentation Ms Clarke outlined the difficulties facing the former country. "Every nation has it's problems but, as the leader, you can always look at some other loser nation and say "They're worse off than us". We finally realised that we could no longer do that."
The final nail in the coffin came last Monday when the New Zealand treasury tabled a report that found that Adam Gilchrist's new contact with the Australian Cricket Board had him earning more than the entire New Zealand GDP.
"When that hit us we realised that the ship of state was pretty much Gunwale deep in sediment and it was time to turn off the bilge pumps and move to a real country," a treasury spokesman said.
All industry and businesses are expected to have left the Island by the end of June and all Government responsibilities will cease at the first of July. Any farmers wishing to remain will do so on a purely subsistence basis with the possibility of a feudal system developing by the end of September. The All Blacks will maintain a training facility near Otago until the end of August after which time New Zealand in all it's forms and pursuits will cease to exist.
When asked how the loss of the entire nation of New Zealand will affect the region a world bank spokesman called for an atlas.
by Susan Sheather
Addictive? |
********
Since the introduction of Channel 10's new "reality-entertainment" program, Big Brother, I have followed with interest the unfolding events that have occurred. The Big Brother phenomenon has happened in the UK, Holland, Belgium, the USA and Denmark to varying degrees of success. Now its here, in Australia.
The concept: To place 12 complete strangers of differing personalities inside a house, isolate them from the outside world, give them ridiculously stupid tasks to frustrate the hell out of them and then evict them, one at a time, until just one person is left with the prospect of winning $250,000. The reason? So that Channel 10 can finally compete in the ratings war. The problem? They couldn't have chosen a combination of 12 more na�ve (and, argue some, boring) castmates if they tried. The fact that this week they've brought in two extra cast members (allegedly to "spice the program up a little") has dampened the enthusiasm that many viewers have for the program.
Not only are the cast under constant surveillance by 25 cameras in and outside the Big Brother house, even in the shower and toilet, their every activity and even private body parts are placed on display for the whole of Australia (in Big Brother Uncut) to have the benefit of. They are also put under constant psychological pressure not only to complete tasks but to nominate each other to be evicted at the end of the week, voted out by the viewing public until only one is left.
Channel 10 has made oodles of money in sponsorship - Pizza Hut, Telecommunications Company iPrimus, Sony, Lynx and Murdoch's company News Limited among others have poured big bucks into sponsorship this program. The costs of setting up and maintaining the program, while substantial, have probably been met by the people attending the "live eviction shows" in Dreamworld - they're being charged between $10 and $20 a pop, not cheap just to have the thrill of hearing a 10 minute live interview with the evictee, getting to shave your head like Gordon or wear bunny-ears like Sara-Marie and being treated to a super high-quality performance by Australian music stars (who seem to need a little bit of a publicity boost) such as Leah Haywood or Deni Hines.
The show has spawned websites such as www.blaircentral.com (which even allows Blair fans to go to "fundraisers" to keep the site going), a save Gordon site, and News Limited has its very own Big Brother News website - which enables readers to keep up to date with whats going on, in fact, you can hear it there first! And there is also Big Brother's very own website, which, despite a poor review from Labor Council's resident web-geek Paul Howes, is actually pretty interactive. You can win competitions, vote on your favourite housemate, chat with the evictee and even vote to evict your chosen housemate, as well as viewing the activities as they happen in the house.
The housemates are na�ve because, what they don't realize, is the level of publicity and money that Channel 10 is making out of them while they're hanging around a house trying to complete inane tasks which, if they fail, means that next week they go hungry (ha ha), is enormous. And, apart from the person who wins, they aren't making a damn cent. Maybe its not costing them anything to be living in the house, but even Playboy and Hustler pay their people to bare their bodies. Gordon's apparatus (earning him the nickname of 'Donkey-boy') was put to air on free-to-air television for the sum-total of NOTHING. Of course, dominatrix Andy, first voted out of the house, is rumoured to be baring it (again) for FHM magazine, at least she knows how to make money out of her experience. And, considering the amount of money, Channel 10 is making through sponsorship and advertising, a small payment to each house member for their troubles seems only fair.
Big Brother has even given radio DJ's something 'noteworthy' to talk about - Triple M was able to run the "Save Andy" Campaign in an effort (aborted by the viewing public) to keep the house interesting. It also enabled 2Day FM and Nova 96.9 to talk about something apart from the Kylie Minogue concerts (and I'm sure, saved listeners from listening to more Kylie Minogue than was already excessively played on commercial radio as well as giving us all a break from celebrity survivor).
The Final Analysis? Channel 10 should be subject to a picket by the MEAA and fans of the program in an effort to ensure that exploited housemates are paid for their efforts. They're hard at work 24 hours a day! Maybe they are saying now that 'its only a game show' but its more than that. The marketing machine is laughing all the way to the bank while we sit back on our couches, or at our computers, watching the exploitation of some of the greatest Australian entertainers we have ever seen grace Channel 10s screens.
Arthur Rorris |
**********
Full marks to Lance Hockridge for keeping a straight face when he announced to the media that 'heavy handed' tactics, 'intimidation' and 'harassment' were being practiced during the 72 hour BHP stoppage last week. I kept a pretty good eye on the peaceful assemblies and can honestly say that the most threatening and intimidating thing that I saw was a savage short ball bowled by a union delegate in the cricket game outside the north gate.
Suspecting, however, that the Big American's PR machine was going to try some Joy Mining style tactics I made a point of approaching several of the covert surveillance teams who, from within their unmarked cars and a distance, were spying on the workers. After their initial shock, I invited them up to the peaceful assemblies where they could get some better quality footage and maybe even a cup of coffee. They politely declined and explained that they had a job to do.
So friendly was the atmosphere that many BHP essential services staff, who the unions exempted from the stoppage in the interests of safety and the efficient maintenance of the plant, actually hung around at the peaceful assemblies and shared their thoughts on the dispute. They too have fears for their own jobs given the outsourcing approach of BHP management.
So why does BHP management feel threatened, harassed and intimidated? The simple answer is they are not physically or personally under threat, the only threat is to their power, and they don't like it one little bit. The master does not expect his servants to disobey orders so when workers unite and take action to protect their jobs the boss feels a little powerless because the workers take control and call the shots.
Workers do not go on strike and form peaceful assemblies outside the gates of their employer to exert their physical strength. They do so to send a strong message to management and to inflict economic pain when that is the only language the boss will understand. It is the display of unity, determination and collective power, not the imaginary threat of violence, that scares the hell out of the boss. This, combined with the solidarity and principles of other workers who refuse to scab on their mates, isolates and ultimately forces the employer back to the negotiating table where such issues should have been dealt with in the first place.
The reason, however, why the BHP spin doctors resorted to creative stories about the peaceful assemblies was to divert attention from the issues at the heart of this dispute. Frankly, I don't blame them. It is pretty hard to convince the people of Wollongong that sacking 50 loyal protective services workers and allowing the wages of the remainder to be slashed by 20 to 40 per cent by a contractor is good for this town.
When Lance Hockridge tries to justify BHPs ongoing attack on the jobs, pay and conditions of their employees at Port Kembla, he talks of the pursuit of "excellence" and draws the distinction between "core" and "non core" services. It's an unfortunate choice of terms because it was the same excuse that Prime Minister John Howard used when he broke his 'non-core' promises to the Australian people. Like the Prime Minister, BHP has a credibility problem and its not just because of the local boss's proven track record of "excellence" in closing down steel plants.
In his article on May 24, Mr Hockeridge stated that he had "no intention of moving to individual contracts for our employees". That may sound strange given that this dispute is largely about BHP's protective services employees being told that unless they signed an individual contract with Serco they would not keep their jobs in protective services. But as Lance points out, by contracting the work out, they won't, technically be BHP's employees they will be Serco's.
What BHP is really saying is if you want to cut costs by slashing the wages and conditions of your workforce but you are bound by industrial agreements which protect the rights of your employees there is another way. Contract out and get another company to do the dirty work for you. That is the real agenda here and it has nothing to do with "excellence", it has everything to do with BHP's bottom line.
If BHP was fair dinkum they would use The Steel Industry Development Agreement (SIDA) to which they are a party as the vehicle to resolve this dispute. The fact that they chose confrontation as opposed to negotiation illustrates the change in management style in BHP and the Americanisation of what was once known as the Big Australian.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, BHP won't get very far in this dispute by insulting and accusing its unionised workforce of self-interest. Mr Hockridge, these men and women have seen their numbers slashed from over 20,000 to 6,000 in a decade all in the name of efficiency, productivity and the survival of the steel industry in our region. This process was undertaken with the cooperation of the steel industry unions who didn't like it but committed themselves to it for the sake of the industry and long term employment opportunities for our community. The steel workers, their families and the trade union movement will remain in this town and part of this community long after BHP Flat Products spins out of Wollongong in the next year. So forgive us Lance for our selfishness in protecting the rights and promoting the interests of workers in our region.
Arthur Rorris is Secretary of the South Coast Labour Council. This piece was first published in Forum, Illawarra Mercury, Monday May 28, 2001
by Peter Moss
Sally McManus |
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Working for the union movement can be all-consuming. The stress, long hours and travel required of officials can push personal priorities way down the list.
And while many union people find time to watch sport, few seem able or willing to find the time to play themselves.
But according to GP Doctor Con Costa - National Vice President of the Doctors Reform Society - unionists can improve everything from their negotiating skills to their sex lives just by playing sport.
'Why do you think corporations make their executives exercise at lunchtime,' Dr Con asks.
'They spend billions on inhouse fitness programs because they know it pays off. They get better performance, better productivity and better stamina.'
It's a good question: Why aren't unions ensuring their officials are as fit and sharp as the bosses?
If any Australian union has a serious fitness program going, well, they're not advertising it.
And we're yet to see the ACTU Organising Centre sending in the personal trainers with their lead organisers.
It could be argued that health and fitness are personal decisions - that only the individual can make the decision to lift his or her game.
Perhaps, but there are compelling arguments that individual officials, and therefore their unions and the movement, can think smarter and campaign harder if they simply commit to regular exercise.
'All people need to do at first is walk or swim energetically for 30 minutes twice a week,' Dr Con says. 'Start slow and build up.
'Anything which makes you sweat and gets your heart pounding will do - dancing for half an hour is great.
'Soon you'll have more energy - your concentration, your productivity and your resistance to illness will all improve - I guarantee it.'
On the day you exercise your body produces a hormone which calms the brain.
So you need less alcohol and nicotine to relax. You will sleep better, and your libido and physical performance in every regard will improve.
Dr Con cautions that people with heart or other problems should get medical advice before strapping on the lycra.
And he strongly recommends attention to diet - in particular cutting back on carbohydrates and sugars which make calories. Lean meat is 'not too bad'.
And Dr Con swears by fish oil as 'medicine for the body'. He says it's the reason Eskimos have the cleanest arteries on the planet.
'Do yourself a big favour and stock up on tuna, mackerel and the like - fresh or canned,' says the Doc. 'Or just buy fish oil capsules as a supplement.
'It's a great cholesterol fighter and fish oil balances out the bad fats and the good fats, without putting on the fat.'
Not surprisingly, Dr Con also emphasises the importance of an ongoing relationship with your local doctor.
'Don't just see the doctor on a knee-jerk basis, and don't see a different doctor every time,' he advises.
'It's a two-way street. You will get more from your doctor if you build a relationship.'
Dr Con, whose practise is in Hurlstone Park, adds a few words from his own perspective as a political activist.
'We're in this struggle for the long haul,' he says. 'If you're going to be involved it has to be satisfying and sustainable for you. We can't just burn people up.
'Regular exercise or sport is not a luxury. It needs to be seen as a necessity by every union official and activist.'
What sporting unionists say
Workers Online asked three union officials about their sporting lives.
Case study 1: The black belt organiser
Name: Sally McManus
Union/positions: Organiser, ASU Services
My sport & fitness weekly routine: I walk my black staffi dog Xena every day for an hour. And twice a week for three hours I do Tae Kwon Do training. I've been training and teaching for 10 years and I'm a second dan black belt
How I make time: Martial arts is flexible, I can go different days. With Xena, I just have to be disciplined. She needs her walk. If I have lots of meetings, I try and do more on the weekends.
What I get out of it:
Personally: I get fitness obviously, and self-confidence. My sense of personal security and safety is higher and I get stress release. When you push yourself, your body makes endorphins which give you a natural high.
Professionally: Well the personal benefits follow on to my work. As a woman organiser, male bosses try to use their size and power over you. It doesn't get anywhere with me. But I don't play the game back - martial arts teaches you that. Martial arts has something in common with unions, you are supposed to use your skills to defend the weak.
Are desk potato officials holding the movement back? Yes, but they're not the only ones. You see so many chronic problems among union officials - smoking, alcoholism, heart attacks. It's really sad to see what is self-inflicted. If you're not fit, you can't cope with the job.
Case study 2: The swimming secretary
Name: John Robertson
Union/position : Secretary-elect Labor Council of NSW
My sport & fitness weekly routine: Swim one mile - 32 laps - of North Sydney Olympic pool each morning
How I make time: I get up before the chooks. I leave home at 5.15am and jump in the pool at 6am.
What I get out of it:
Personally: Personal satisfaction - I feel better in the day and really miss it if I don't
have the swim
Professionally: It's a chance to think about the day without being interrupted. Once I get to the office, I'm awake and ready to go.
Are desk potato officials holding the movement back? If you are physically fit, you are mentally fit as well. There's no doubt some of my colleagues could be fitter and probably feel better for it.
Case study 3: The cycling organiser
Name: Bob Carcary
Union/position: Organiser, ETU
My sport & fitness weekly routine: I'm into cycling. I try to ride 60 kilometres every Saturday and Sunday. I train alone, but I also enter public rides a few times a year, including a three-day race from Newcastle to Nelson's Bay and back.
How I make time: It's very hard during the week. That's why I do my cycling at weekends.
What I get out of it:
Personally: It's a great release. It gets you away from the pressure of your job. I get more physical energy and I'm fresher mentally.
Professionally: At work, you're able to think quicker and clearer because you've had that release. And you can go longer because you're fit.
Are desk potato officials holding the movement back?: No, but the movement would be better served if they were fitter. They'd last longer, they'd be less stressed. They'd also find an improvement in the quality of their lives outside work.
Peter Moss is a Director of Lodestar Communications
UK Election Madness |
London Calling
With the UK General Election just around the corner, I thought I would take some time out to list the best locations on the web to watch all the election fun.
The BBC Online Vote 2001 site located at http://news.bbc.co.uk/vote2001 has, in my opinion, the best wide-ranging coverage of the elections, with plenty of humor, links to all the parties, webcasts with candidates, chat/message boards, profiles on individual electorates, plus much more, you need not go any where else the get your election fix.
The Guardian Online has downloads of the "key" party television broadcasts which are quite interesting http://www.guardian.co.uk/graphics/0,9749,491797,00(you need RealPlayer http://www.real.com to watch the broadcasts).
If you want to go straight to the horses' mouth here are the links to the major parties:
Labour http://www.labour.org.uk
Conservatives http://www.conservatives.com
Liberal Democrats http://www.libdems.org.uk
Scottish National Party http://www.snp.org.uk
Plaid Cymru (Party of Wales) http://www.plaidcymru2001.com
Ulster Unionist Party http://www.uup.org
Social Democratic Labour Party http://www.sdlp.ie
Democratic Unionist Party http://www.dup2win.com
Sinn Fein http://www.sinnfein.ie
Greens http://www.greenparty.org.uk
Socialist Alliance http://www.socialistalliance.net
Scottish Socialist Party http://www.scottishsocialistparty.org
The Commission goes Virtual
The Federal Commission launched a re-vamped website earlier this month located at http://www.airc.gov.au. The new site is fantastic for all those Industrial/Research Officers out there, with easy navigation, simple search facilities and information that is easy to access this is defiantly now the leading Industrial Relations site in Australia, hopefully the State Commission can follow suit.
Thats what Friends are For
Several anonymous emails were recieved by some Labor Council Officers this afternoon from a site called Just A Hint http://www.justahint.com . Basically what the deal is you can go to the site pick a problem that one of your friends (or enemies) ie. too anal, too cheap, too angry etc and then enter your friend's email address and they get a message from the site outlining their persoanl defects.
A handy resource for the Labor Movement.
Our Traditions ... Online!
A group of unions, activists and the like have got together in the U.S. and launched a virtual museum of Labo(u)r History. The site is called Labor Arts http://www.laborarts.org and is well worth a look, they describe themselves as "a work in progress" and no doubt the site with provide Australia Labour historians with plenty of ideas.
US Union Busters
The Burke Group is a US Based Firm which specialises in "Labor Relations Consulting to Management" aka destroying unions. Their website located at http://www.tbglabor.com proudly boasts of their recent accomplishments in de-unionising workplaces especially in Health Care. It is a scary insight into American IR practice. While I'm on the subject of union busting ... a fantastic book was written several years ago by and ex-"union buster" called "Confessions of a Union Buster", it's a fantastic read, unfortunately you can't purchase it in Australian Bookshops but you can get it from Amazon.com by following this link: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0517583305/qid%3D991281489/002-0068986-5088057
If you have any sites you want Paul to review or add to the LaborNET links section let him know mailto:[email protected]
The man responsible for upholding the Workplace Relations Act's anti-discrimination objects and provisions - told a conference last week that a "value-free" approach to prospective employees with body art was "counter-productive".
He told the Jobs Australia conference in Melbourne last week that society was "chronically shy of making value judgments about even the most self-defeating individual behaviour".
He made the comments in the context of welcoming the fact that job placement organizations were no longer bounded by public sector requirements - and therefore could make judgements about 'body-art'.
"Job Network staff generally understand how counter-productive a 'value free' approach can be. And usually find it easier than public servants to explain how 'body art' might strike many employers as self-mutilation," he is quoted as saying.
Abbott's spray now begs the question - who in the Coalition is hiding a tatt? And will the Mad Monk promise to demand that any inked Coalition member stand down as unfit for public service?
And if there are some Tatts in the Howard front bench, what would they be? Is it true that 'Sloppy ' Joe Hockey has an 'H' tattooed on each buttock, so when he bends over he gives a prominent Liberal doner free advertising? (old joke, I know)... Has Reithy really embraced the naval culture and placed the name of his One True Love on his bicep - and if so, can the words 'labour market deregulation' fit on one man's arm? And what of Howard 0- is there a seductive 'Fifties Rock' over his heart? Nothing short of a Royal Commission is required to get to the bottom of this.
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On its face this is just another sign of Abbott's knee-jerk conservatism and propensity to sound off about issues he knows little about.
But we do our research at Workers Online, and have uncovered what we regard as conclusive proof that the Mad Monk has a long and enduring history of 'body art'.
Indeed, a reading of the lyrics from some of the hits by those doyens of the inked torso, 'Rose Tattoo' shows the Monk to have been something of an inspiration.
We'd go further - nearly 20 years ago Rose Tattoo we believe that correctly predicted the Monk's stellar rise to the heights of power through their own songs.
What follows is an analysis of the text of some of those songs:
They were so damn glad when I left school/Said I was crazy 'cause I broke the rules/Time to start livin' my teenage dream/Out on the streets it was rough and mean/That's why...they call me one of the boys (One Of The Boys)
Abbott was somewhat a firebrand in his days at Riverview College - a pugilist and rugby front-rower. Rose Tattoo correctly predicts Abbott's early decision to train for the priesthood.
Well I went around just to see my chick/I found her room and it was candle lit/She's makin' love to another man/I shot 'em both and they locked me in the slam/I'm a bad boy...a bad boy for love/I'm a bad boy...a bad boy for love (Bad Boy for Love)
This refers to Abbott's struggle for pre-selection to federal parliament. The 'chick' is obviously Bronwyn Bishop, with whom he initially schemed, but then fell out with. Also nice references to his head-kicker image on the floor in Federal Parliament.
You insult my intelligence/While you pat me on the back/You give me something with one hand/While the other hand takes it back (TV)
Here the Tatts successfully predict the bitter war on the Waterfront. We all remember the image from Federal Parliament after the Patrick workers were confronted by men in balaclavas and dogs on chains, Howard leans over to Reith, pats him on the back - and the young about shouts 'hear. Hear', knowing the role of union-basher will soon be his.
There's trouble in the streets tonight/Short tempers heat to boil/Tension like a cobra snake/Set to strike and stiffly coiled (Out Of This Place)
This is clearly a reference to Abbott's assault on the CFMEU and threats to call a Royal Commission into the building industry. They are a trade union prone to street action and occasionally anger. They wear T-Shirts displaying a Cobra with the slogan 'when provoked, we will strike".
Astra Wally he's a real mean cat/He gets around with caps in his hat/He looks at pain with a nod and a wink/Oh Astra Wally you're a super fun thing (Astra Wally)
Finally, the Tatts foreshadow a bid by the Mad Monk for the federal leader's position, following their upcoming demise in the federal election. The text imples Abbott will betray Costello and mount his own bid. But there is also a warning: 'Astra Wally' rearranged, spells 'Law Astray', implying Abbott could well face some sotrt of charges of electoral fraud after the election.
***************
So there's the proof, that Abbott's comments on tattoos are an absolute smoke-secreen, an attempt to lure us from the trail that inevitably links the Mad Monk with Angry Anderson. You read it hear first in the Tool Shed.
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