Kay McVey
It's the private sector that has failed
It's not enough to cast a vote at elections and then sit back for the next four years.
There is a clear message to both parties that significant numbers of workers are opposed to their economic rationalist policies; that we value the retention and extension of services delivered by the public sector; that we are opposed to all forms of privatisation and sale of the state's assets; and that we do not believe that the private sector can deliver.
New Right policies offer no solutions to the current economic crisis manufactured by the big banks and big business. As workers, we are not prepared to pay for the mistakes of the free enterprise system, which puts profits before the needs of people.
We do not want to live in a society that rewards greed and showers honours and accolades on the likes of the Bonds, the Skases and the Elliotts.
It is not the public sector which is inefficient and unable to deliver: it is the private sector. This debate has been turning reality on its head. Why does private enterprise want to get its hands on the state assets if they can't make a buck and turn a profit out of them?
We do not have to look very far to see the results of the economic rationalist policy or free market programs. Britain has been in the longest sustained recession ever, in New Zealand one of the fastest growing industries is the prisons, and in the United states racial tensions are at boiling point. Do we want Los Angeles-style riots here?
In eastern Europe and the old Soviet Union, the introduction of the free market has led to massive poverty and unleashed long-repressed national differences of which the grizzly situation in Bosnia-Hercegovina is the most horrific example.
Even the famines in Africa can be traced back to IMF policies. People starve in one part of the world while farmers in another are paid not to produce food.
The outpouring of support for the Somalia appeal shows that we do not support a society that allows these practices. Many people came to Australia to escape just these injustices, and Australia has continued to attract thousands of migrants looking for a better society, a society where everybody has a fair go.
Unfortunately, in the Victorian elections we are not being presented with a clear alternative. The practice of the Labor the New Right agenda. They have failed to confront this.
But the directions being set by Liberal policies promise even more draconian action. It is quite clear that a Liberal-National Party government would be determined to crush the union movement. This is the intent of policies such as the removal of payroll deductions in the public sector, the abolition of awards, the introduction of employment contracts and the attack on WorkCare.
In 1990 New Zealand workers were presented with a similar choice. Disenchanted with the Labour Party and Rogernomics, they voted in the Nationals, with the disastrous results we have heard so much about in recent weeks. We don't have to make that mistake, but like them we do have to be prepared to fight.
[Kay McVey is Victorian president of the State Public Services Federation. This article is based on her speech at the September 15 public service rally in Melbourne.]