The working class will rise again!

Workers' Liberty
the emancipation of the working class must be the act of the working class

                                     Workers Liberty Australia


Newsletter May 2000: the industrial front

Bosses press for new anti-union legislation

According to the Australian Financial Review (3 May), "A major industry group has embarked on an elaborate legal, political and public relations strategy to tackle an expected industrial showdown in Australia's manufacturing sector".

The Australian Industry Group " aims to convince the Australian Democrats and Federal Government to rush through special amendments to Workplace Relations Act to counter the metals unions' action". Under the banner "Campaign 2000", metal unions aim to synchronise industrial action for better wages and conditions in manufacturing businesses this year, in a bid to return the manufacturing sector to a system of industry-wide bargaining.

"Campaign 2000", reports the AFR, "will initially affect Victoria, with hundreds of manufacturing businesses which signed up to common expiry dates for enterprise bargaining agreements to be hit with co-ordinated legal strike. According to the AFR, the "AIG intends to pursue all available avenues to counter Campaign 2000, including options such as cancelling employer payroll deductions for union fees, secondary boycott action and a class action in the Supreme Court for manufacturing businesses damaged by union strikes". Contempt of court proceedings against three union officials and their unions have already begun in the Federal Court.

The bosses also plan to apply heavy political pressure to Victoria's new Labor government to make it curb the unions. According to the AFR "the AIG has already met the Victorian and Federal Governments several times over its campaign".

The Brisbane Defend Our Unions Committee

The DOUC was formed in 1998, and our first activity was to help organise solidarity with the Maritime Union of Australia during the waterfront dispute. In 1999 we worked to help build a rank-and-file movement against Peter Reith's proposed "Second Wave" anti-union legislation. We believe that continued vigilance is necessary. Big business has backed down only temporarily on its moves further to limit the ability of trade unions to organise in the workplace and to take effective industrial action.

In all our ongoing activity, the Defend Our Unions Committee aim to support trade-union struggles and trade-union rights by helping to create a network of rank and file activists able to assist and inform each other in their efforts. In the next few months we aim to organise a series of informational meetings and seminars on issues of labour history, trade-union strategy, and political economy, so that activists can develop links, exchange ideas, and acquire information for the struggles to come. We also runan e-mail list which trade unionists can use for information and debate. To join it, send an email to dou-committee-request@solidarity.infoshop.org.au with the message "subscribe".

All trade unionists and activists are welcome to join us in our efforts.

Queensland teachers fight Beattie government

Queensland state school teachers have started imposing 12 work bans from 10 April, following an 88% vote in favour of action by members of the Queensland Teachers' Union. The bans are a first step in action to push Queensland's Labor government to shift in enterprise-bargaining, where so far the Beattie regime has offered only 3 per cent pay rise per year over three years and nothing on the union's claims about educational and work conditions

The urgency of those claims is suggested by the fact that probably the most drastic of the work bans is one which will selectively impose what is on paper teachers' legally-enforceable award entitlement, a 45-minute continuous lunch break and a 10-minute morning tea break. So far is this "entitlement" from reality that union action on this point has been delayed to 8-12 May and will be taken only in one week of every month.

According to QTU president Julie-Anne McCullough, it is "very encouraging to hear that members in workplaces are keen to take industrial action in the form of full day strikes", and strikes will follow unless the government responds soon.

For many teachers, conditions - and especially class sizes - are the crucial issue. according to the union, over 1300 primary school classes, and over 2000 classes altogether, are oversize by official criteria - 25 in years 1-3; 30 in years 4-10; and 25 in years 11-12. the union's policy is for maximum class sizes of 20 or 25.

The union also points out that Queensland state schools have lost $17.5 million in Commonwealth funding since 1996 despite enrolments increasing by 21,000 students. The Commonwealth now provides state schools with only 42c for every $1 it gives to private schools. In 1996 state schools received 54c for every $1 given to private schools.

A new ginger group in the QTU, "Promotion of Public Education" (POPE), calls for "union officials [to] make reduced class sizes a non-negotiable part of the claim". Contact POPE at P O Box 854, Booval 4304, on 07 3282 6619, or via wantlaj@powerup.com.au.