En Passant

Government condemnation of a massive protest by students over climate change has shown us where the real intelligence lies, I write in Independent Australia.

This was published in today’s Canberra Times. Support for uni strike The forthcoming strike at the University of Canberra highlights a reality not often mentioned in discussions of higher education. (“Canberra Uni staff to strike for first time in decade’, October 11, p3) Our universities are built on the unpaid labour of their workers. A […]

If the Fairfax bosses win this round, we’re on the way to almost complete mainstream media Murdochisation in Australia, writes John Passant in Independent Australia.

From ACTU Secretary Sally McManus: Do not cross the Fairfax picket line. No buying, sharing, clicking Fairfax while journalists are on strike.

With 180 million workers on strike in India it is the biggest mass strike in history. Let the ruling classes tremble. To read about it, because our media won’t cover it – it might send the ‘wrong’ message to workers in Australia and the rest of the West – click here.

I had been going to title this story ‘In defence of the workers in the greyhound industry’, but of course one man with a keyboard cannot defend those workers or their futures. Those workers and their union can, if they take industrial action across the various racing industries and in other workplaces where the AWU is strong and can stop production.

It would be good to see the Labor Party, the ACTU and the Greens unite to defend these workers and to mobilise their members to do just that.

How then can we show solidarity to these brave unionists? Other unionists could ban supplies to Fairfax.

If there are picket lines, join them. If there are protests, attend. Send messages of support and money to the MEAA if they ask for it. If there are any striking Fairfax workers who want to publish their story, email me at en.passant@bigpond.com I will print your stories (with you remaining anonymous if you want) on my blog to get the truth out there about the sackings.

If left union leaders are serious about defending their members, themselves, and their position then the general strike in 1969 to free Clarrie O’Shea and smash the penal powers shows a real way to win the right to strike. Union members could begin to organise in their unions now to run any campaign to smash the modern day equivalent of the penal powers.

Just as changing Liberal leaders won’t change the fundamentals, neither will dumping Shorten for a fake leftie like Albanese or Plibersek, or promoting a smooth right-winger like Tony Burke.

There is a message for activists and socialists in the fall of Abbott. It wasn’t Labor who defeated him. It certainly wasn’t Shorten. It was those Aboriginal, education, refugee, Medicare, feminist and other activists, the gay community and their supporters, the teachers, nurses, public servants, wharfies, building workers etc etc etc actually fighting against Abbott and his rotten policies and sending a message to the wider community about Abbott’s rotten policies and the fact you could reject them and resist them.

It is the same message we need to develop in fighting Turnbull’s neoliberalism and that of whoever is leading Labor at the next election. On to the streets to fight for equal love, against the closure of remote communities, against climate change, to free the refugees, for women’s liberation and so on. Close down our workplaces to defend jobs and wages.

It says a lot about the role of women in Australian society that the Matildas, one of the most successful, if not most successful, international sporting team in Australia at the moment, is paid $21,000 a year, which is about two/thirds of the minimum wage in Australia and about half the poverty line. Women’s soccer in Australia is the 7-Eleven of elite sport.