Sue Bolton, Melbourne
Press reports on October 20 announced that the notorious Johnson Tiles factory in Melbourne's outer-eastern suburb of Bayswater will close in December and move offshore. One-hundred workers will lose their jobs when the factory closes.
Johnson Tiles was also the centre of a battle over jobs in 2001 when it sacked 29 maintenance workers and provocatively brought in scabs from anti-union labour-hire firm Skilled Engineering to replace them.
When the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union mobilised to defend the workers' jobs, the employers and the state government saw an opportunity to threaten the unionists with criminal charges.
Despite 40-50 people participating in the protest to save the jobs, and despite it being non-violent, 18 unionists were charged over the dispute. However, the employers and the state government targeted AMWU state secretary Craig Johnston, jailing him for nine months. His crime was being too committed to defending the rights of manufacturing workers!
It is ironic that some conservative sections of the union movement, including current AMWU state secretary Dave Oliver, are calling on the state Labor government to do something about Johnson Tiles, Kodak and other factories closing down, yet they refused to support Craig Johnston and his fellow unionists when they faced the court system for trying to defend jobs at Johnson Tiles.
From Green Left Weekly, October 27, 2004.
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