Around 1000 workers rallied in Musgrave Park on April 20 to oppose the Howard government's Work Choices legislation, under the theme "Time's Up".
The rally, organised by the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, and the Electrical Trades Union, heard rugby league veteran Tom Raudonikis and various union officials condemn the anti-worker laws and call for the defeat of the Howard government in the next federal election.
The protest organisers put a motion to the rally that included a "call on the ALP national conference to adopt a fair industrial relations system and congratulate the ALP's federal parliamentary leader, Kevin Rudd, on his recent IR policy speech, which is a step in the right direction.
"We also call on the federal ALP, after it is elected at the next election, to repeal, as a matter of utmost urgency, the Howard government's outrageous industrial relations, building and construction industry and immigration laws, and restore people's rights at work through agreed ALP policy."
While the motion was passed strongly by a show of hands, supported by the union leaders present and without debate, a number of union members in the crowd clearly disagreed with the sentence "congratulating" Rudd.