Socialist elected to local council

By Dave Andrews

ROSEBERY — This mining community on Tasmania's west coast has sent a strong message to the state Liberal government by electing three new members to the nine-member West Coast Council.

Included on the new council is Ian Jamieson, chair of the Rosebery Hospital Action Committee which successfully campaigned for a new hospital in Rosebery last year. The committee re-formed after a threat to close the hospital in May.

Jamieson, a miner at Renison Bell tin mine, has been heavily involved in miners' union activities and is a founding member of the Democratic Socialist Party. He told Green Left Weekly that the poll is a clear indication of the community's continued willingness to fight for government services.

"We hope the council can be used as a larger base to stop the privatisation of our health care", Jamieson said. "If the council can be pushed to involve broader layers against government cuts in rural Tasmania, then the election will have been a real success", he said.

The government wants to privatise Rosebery hospital, and is threatening the district's other hospital in Queenstown. Medical services on the west coast are already inadequate: a man in Queenstown died recently after being refused ambulance service for two days, and in Rosebery a boy who had severed his arm had to be driven to Burnie by his mother because of pressure on local hospital staff not to admit patients is so severe at present. "For a mining community serving five major mines it is clearly not good enough", Jamieson said.

Jamieson also campaigned for opening the council to young people and women, and for a democratic council which represented all interests, not just those of small business.

From GLW issue 252