Sam Wainwright

  • Royal commission attacks workers

    BY NICK EVERETT & SAM WAINWRIGHT SYDNEY — Since the Royal Commission into the Building and Construction Industry began sitting in Sydney in early June, lurid employer claims of Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU)

  • Dayson workers hold out for union rights

    SYDNEY — Twelve workers from the Dayson compressor manufacturing plant at Rydalmere have been on strike for more than four weeks. The strike began when seven workers, including two union delegates, were sacked without notice on

  • Carr and union leaders roll bus drivers

    SYDNEY — "If at first you don't succeed, try, try, try again" — this could be the motto of the leaders of the Bus and Tram division of the NSW Rail Tram and Bus Union. On May 20 they finally got the majority of Sydney and

  • STA bus drivers boilover

    Only one day after an angry March 14 meeting of State Transit Authority (STA) bus drivers voted to strike for 48 hours in pursuit of their wage claim, the executive of the Rail, Tram and Bus Union has deferred the action. The

  • Workers poisoned at Caltex refinery

    SYDNEY — In the small hours of March 4 two production workers and a contract fitter from the Caltex oil refinery at Kurnell were admitted to Sutherland Hospital suffering exposure to hydrogen sulphide gas. Prolonged exposure

  • Construction workers fight award stripping

    SYDNEY — On March 6 Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU) members employed on NSW construction sites went out on strike for 48 hours. They are defending a range of conditions that will be removed from their award under

  • MUA fined, what next?

    Lost amid the Howard government's refugee bashing re-election hype was the news of its success in trying to crush another one of its targets, the union movement. In November the long-running Federal Court case brought against

  • Sub-contractor rips-off workers

    SYDNEY — Before being forced to leave Australia, a group of six Korean building workers have won back-pay totalling nearly $100,000 owed to them by a sub-contractor installing paving for Burwood Council in Sydney's

  • Victory for Metroshelf workers

    SYDNEY — Seventy-two workers at the Metroshelf factory in Revesby, in Sydney's west, have won their jobs back after a two-month struggle. The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union had been pursuing an unfair dismissal claim

  • Metroshelf workers defy sacking, maintain picket

    SYDNEY — Striking workers picketing the production plant of Metroshelf, which builds supermarket shelving, were sacked en masse on June 15 — but have vowed to fight on. The strike, at the plant in Revesby, in Sydney's west,

  • Metroshelf sacks union workers

    SYDNEY — When the 165 employees of Metroshelf in Revesby turned up for work on June 28 they found security guards standing in front of the locked gates. Management told 50 of them that they had been sacked for

  • TWU fights for safety

    SYDNEY — Around 200 Transport Workers Union (TWU) members and their families attended a combined protest and service of remembrance outside NSW parliament on November 3. The action was to highlight the number of deaths in the