Call for unions to end support for Labor
PERTH
When the state secretary of the WA branch of the Communications, Electrical and Plumbing Union (CEPU), BILL GAME, called on workers to vote for the Greens in the last federal election during a WA Trades and Labor Council media conference, TLC secretary Tony Cooke was quick to point out that this did not represent official TLC policy. Green Left Weekly's MARCEL CAMERON asked Game why he made the call.
"I resigned from the Labor Party many years ago because I just didn't see that it was pro-worker any more", Game said.
"My union was the first in Western Australia to disaffiliate from the Labor Party ... at the request of the membership. I suggest we're the only union that has really responded to the wishes of the membership."
Game said that the WA branch of the CEPU was the only section of the union movement that had consistently opposed the ALP's Prices and Incomes Accord between the unions, government and business. "In hindsight, we were right.
"There were many occasions, when the accords, one to six, were being negotiated, when our union took a very hard line in WA. We were criticised on talkback shows by other union officials.
"The Greens' industrial relations platform in the federal election was better than the Labor Party's, and I'm happy to debate that with any union official. No-one has taken me on."
Game argues: "The Labor Party was started as the political wing of the union movement, but it is no longer that. The unions, apart from a bit of posturing in every election, finally say, 'We know the Labor Party is not very good, but they're the best of a bad bunch. The Greens and all these other alternatives have no chance of forming a government, so let's go with the Labor Party.'
"I think that's a bankrupt argument.
"The union movement is well overdue to be shopping around to see who's got the best basket of goodies for workers. If they don't do that, they're failing workers."