Workers & unions

The statement below was initiated by the Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM), in solidarity with workers' rights and pro-democracy activist Somyot Pruksakasemsuk ― jailed in April last year under the lese-majeste (insulting the monarch) law. It has been signed by the Australian Socialist Alliance, the Party of the Masses in the Philippines, the Indonesian People's Liberation Party, the Confederation of Congress of Indonesian Unions Alliance (KASBI), Indonesia, and the Labour Party Pakistan . * * *

A Labor MP, escort services, huge salary packages, allegations of nepotism and police probes have all been connected to the ongoing Health Services Union (HSU) scandal. The scandal involves allegations against top HSU officials, who are claimed to have misused union funds paid by union members such as ambulance drivers, nurses and health support workers.

The Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) was forced into compulsory arbitration in December over the primary Victorian Public Service Agreement (VPS), but continues to campaign on several other agreements.   There is still no outcome of the compulsory arbitration from the VPS, which covers 30,000 state public servants.   For agencies such as the Victorian SES, parliament and parks, enterprise bargaining agreements expired mid-last year. But negotiations were stalled because the government still insists on a cap of 2.5% a year on public sector pay rises.  

The Socialist Alliance released the statement below on April 20. * * * In the space of a few days, 350 Toyota workers, including some who have spent decades working for the company, have been axed in appalling scenes at the Altona plant, west of Melbourne.

Mental health workers have been striking for two hours at a time in rolling stoppages around Victoria since April 10. The campaign is in support of a new enterprise bargaining agreement. Key elements of the claim include a 16% pay rise over three years and improved staffing. After seven months of negotiation, the government has still not budged on its position of capping pay rises at a below-inflation 2.5% a year. The union covering mental health workers, the Health and Community Service Union (HACSU), has negotiated with the employers via Fair Work Australia.

Green Left Weekly's Rachel Evans spoke to Damien Cahill, vice-president of the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) at the University of Sydney about the campaign against staff and other cuts. Cahill is a senior lecturer in the Political Economy department at the university. What level of cuts to teaching staff is Sydney University trying to make?

Pay Justice Action released the statement below on April 19. * * * Pay Justice Action (PJA), a grassroots activist group campaigning for equal pay, applauds the initiative of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) for making insecure work a focus for the whole union movement.

Power loom workers in Faisalabad, a big industrial centre in central Pakistan, launched a series of strikes and demonstrations in mid-2010. Six leaders of the organisation of power loom workers, the Labour Qaumi Movement (LQM), were arrested by the police. The six were charged under anti-terror laws and sentenced to a total of almost 490 years' jail (served concurrently). The jailed LQM leaders are also members of the Labour Party Pakistan (LPP).

Venezuela’s national minimum wage is to rise 32.25% this year, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said on April 7. In a televised address from Miraflores presidential palace in Caracas, Chavez said the wage rise would take place in two phases, ― first on May 1 and then a further rise on September 1.

Coalmine workers employed by the BHP Billiton Mitsubishi Alliance (BMA) in central Queensland's Bowen Basin are standing firm in the face of escalating attacks by their employer. In the latest round, BHP has announced the closure of its Norwich Park coalmine, south-east of Dysart. The move is clearly aimed at putting pressure on the mineworkers to settle their longstanding industrial dispute.

In the largest protest so far in a campaign that has grown steadily since the start of semester, 1500 University of Sydney students and staff rallied on April 4 to protest against the university management's move to sack 360 academic and general staff.

“The Tsolakoglou Occupation government has literally crushed my prospects for survival, so far based on a decent pension, which I alone (without supplementation from the State) financed over 35 years.” That was how the suicide note left by 77-year-old retired pharmacist Dimitris Christoulas began. It likened the current government to the collaborationist regime during the German occupation in World War II, led by Georgios Tsolakoglou. He was arrested and tried for his role.