Bernie Wunsch, Lismore
On July 19, Australian Council of Trade Unions president Sharan Burrow made a whirlwind one-day protest tour of the regional NSW town of Lismore. As part of the campaign to oppose the federal Coalition government's changes to industrial relations laws, the ACTU has decided to reach into areas where it has rarely dared to tread in the past.
Burrow's tour included a campus speakout to more than 200 people, some workplace visits, a 200-strong protest outside local National MP Ian Causley's office, a public forum of 70 workers organised by the Socialist Alliance and a trade union dinner.
For a regional community such as Lismore, which has few workplaces larger than 100 people, as well as 10% unemployment, the government's proposed changes to unfair dismissal laws will remove protection for the overwhelming majority of local workers. In the safe National Party seat of Page, the Lismore region is showing fierce and general opposition to the changes, directly challenging the inherited hegemony of conservative politicians like Causley. Page is the poorest electorate in NSW and one of the poorest electorates in Australia.
The public forum, which was also addressed by the Socialist Alliance's national trade union caucus convener Sue Bolton, allowed a rarely glimpsed insight into the machinations of a campaign that has quickly mobilised hundreds of thousands of workers and has swung public opinion firmly against the government in general, and in support of workers' rights in particular.
The ACTU's campaign strategy, outlined by Burrow, involves a mixture of lobbying politicians, a savvy advertising and media campaign, galvanising support from many different regional areas, and supporting mass mobilisations by state and local campaign organising bodies.
In the wake of the Howard government's recently attained Senate majority, Burrow presented a plan of targeting individual politicians, because "every politician is elected by its constituency". She explained that "the only counterveil is the people. If people stand up and ask their politicians to defend their rights, there will be a backlash against the Liberals and Nationals."
Burrow said the ACTU's lobbying of the Democrats had been successful because the Democrats had only passed two pieces of anti-union legislation since they passed the Workplace Relations Act. Bolton, on the other hand, argued that it wasn't lobbying alone that persuaded the Democrats to block some of the government's anti-union laws, but the massive display of public support for the wharfies during the 1998 maritime dispute that exerted political pressure on the Democrats not to vote for anti-union laws.
After discussion from the floor, Burrow conceded that the other elements of an ongoing campaign such as protest rallies, mass delegates' meetings and worker defence campaigns should continue if the laws go through parliament.
Bolton spoke largely about the prospects for building a protest movement to maintain opposition to the IR laws. She explained that we cannot expect the so-far successful ACTU media campaign to hold, as the Howard government is launching a $20 million media campaign, employer groups are pooling money for their own advertisements, and the government is threatening to de-fund groups like churches that are opposing the laws.
"Mobilisations are key because they demonstrate a higher level of commitment by workers to the campaign than just accepting leaflets, and action to back up the campaign means that you don't turn up for work", Bolton said. "We need more combined union mass delegates' meetings, as delegates are key members of workplaces and through union struggles we can maintain blue- and white-collar worker solidarity ... We need another national day of action and for the ACTU executive to agree to this."
Bolton also called on the ALP "to show its commitment to the campaign by pledging to repeal the laws" if parliament passes the changes. She urged the campaign to continue even if the legislation goes through.
Burrow, while promising that the ACTU executive would unveil its plan for the campaign in the coming months, did not give any guarantees that the ACTU would organise any further national protests.
Richmond Valley Unions convener and Australian Services Union organiser Michael Flinn said to much applause: "There has to be a campaign to defend workers and instantly respond to any employer in town who sticks their head up and uses the new laws." During discussion, it became clear that the ACTU will be one part of a campaign that includes many different individual unions, cross-union bodies as well as community campaign groups, but it does not intend to lead any series of mass coordinated national protests like those on June 30/July 1.
During discussion, Socialist Alliance members commented that the ACTU leadership should be giving confidence to ordinary workers by threatening industrial action and mass union and community pickets against any employer that wants to use these laws. It appears that while the ACTU will play a key role in this struggle, we need to rely on building our local and city-wide campaign bodies, and rebuild the industrial strength of the union movement to defeat the proposed IR law changes and the conservative Howard government.
[Bernie Wunsch is a NSW Teachers Federation member.]
From Green Left Weekly, July 27, 2005.
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