Industrial Relations Protest!
This is the first time I have updated in ages. The basic reason being that it is exam time for me – and it’s really the crunch this time. I’ve had to pull out of the Fabians’ inaugural conference, Magic tournaments and virtually every other extra-curricular activity to prepare for perhaps the most important exams in my life. The next two weeks will decide whether I am indeed going to be a doctor in a couple of years time or destined to go to the scrapheap.
I should have stayed home and studied, but today’s industrial relations protest was just too important to miss – as an activist for fairness and equity it was an overriding priority. It was perhaps the largest single organized protest in Australian history with turnout for the Melbourne demonstration nudging a quarter of a million – far higher than even the ACTU had expected. The crowds stretched through dozens of blocks along the mile-long route from Federation Square to the Exhibition Gardens which are next to my house.
My comrades from Young Labor Left and I marched with the LHMU and I was pleasantly surprised to see the teachers at my old primary school marching too. Most of them from when I went to school have retired, but it was gratifying to see that those who were still there kept the red flag flying.
The Reactionary Forces, of course, dismissed the protests, saying that over 95 percent of workers chose to remain at work. I’m sure that they can offer any kind of wording manipulation to spin the situation in their favour. What cannot be argued with is that time and time and time and time again every single opinion poll about the industrial relations issue shows that the vast majority of the Australian population are against the changes. I believe that even less people will be impressed with their spending tens of millions of taxpayer money on a deceptive advertising campaign of propaganda and deliberate moves to gag debate while rushing through the laws in the shortest possible time.
People from a non-English speaking background will be even more vulnerable as employers will have more scope, through Australian Workplace Agreements (AWAs) to exploit those who have migrated and have less knowledge about the legal system as it pertains to employment and industrial relations.
The Howard Government will PAY at the next election. I have plenty of confidence that this issue will continue to hurt them. In New Zealand, when similar moves were introduced in 1990 by the National government, the incumbents suffered a 13 percent swing against them in 1993, even in the face of an ineffectual opposition and virtually no union resistance. This is more than enough to throw out the present regime.
Our mission now is to maintain the pressure on the Government, to maintain the pressure on Barnaby Joyce to water down the changes, keep the IR “reforms” a big issue in the media, perhaps by mounting a high court challenge, give the regime as little time away from it as possible before the next election. More importantly, our mission is to remind the Labor Party, especially its darker factions, that the only way to winning is to vehemently differentiate ourselves from the evil, inequitable and sadistic regime of the Howard Government!
posted by Max Soy @ 2:54 AM
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