BY SUE BULL
MELBOURNE The corporate media may have imposed a total blackout on the picket imposed by members of the Victorian branch of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU) against the union's national officials, but thousands of the members know about it and support it. Every day and night, scores of metal, food and printing workers visit the picket to express solidarity and learn the latest news.
The picket was set up on August 12 after the national AMWU leadership sacked printing division industrial officer Denis Matson. It is demanding Matson's reinstatement and the removal of assistant national secretary Dave Oliver as administrator of the branch.
This would mean respecting the decision of the Victorian AMWU's state council, which voted on July 8 to have assistant state secretary Bronwyn Halfpenny stand in for elected Victorian secretary Craig Johnston while he is being investigated for an alleged case of sexual assault. The nature of the police investigation into Johnston became public knowledge on August 21, after the Federal Court lifted a suppression order on the issue.
The picket is also demanding the establishment of consultation procedures between the national and Victorian AMWU offices and that the Victorian branch be able to implement a budget without staff redundancies. It is also demanding the dropping of all threatened legal action against AMWU officials and Green Left Weekly, which has reported extensively on the issue.
A state of open warfare now exists between the AMWU national office and the vast majority of the Victorian branch.
On August 16, all Victorian officials received a letter from AMWU national secretary Doug Cameron demanding to know by August 19 if they would recommit themselves to the AMWU and "not this disgraceful blockade". If they failed to respond, they would be removed from the union's payroll as of August 12 and could face legal action in the Federal Court.
The officials were also told that their union cars were to be returned and that they could not use union property (presumably their mobile phones were to be turned off). As of August 24, all Victorian printing and food division officials and the vast majority of metal division officials have rejected Cameron's ultimatum.
In a similar vein, Dave Harrison, Queensland state secretary (and soon to be acting national secretary when Cameron takes his September holidays), told organisers' meetings in that state that the union is prepared to sue the Victorian officials and even take their homes in an effort to recoup money lost in the dispute. The police would also be told that the union cars have been stolen if they were not returned. Victorian officials have said that they will continue to service members, using their own or their partners' cars and phones if necessary.
In response to these attacks some 300 Victorian AMWU shop stewards met at Trades Hall on August 22. The stewards attended despite phone calls from national office supporters and company managers arguing that the meeting was "unauthorised".
The mood of the meeting was very angry but disciplined. The stewards felt that the attack from the national office was unwarranted, undemocratic and totally against members' interests.
Jim Reid, Victorian secretary of the printing division, addressed the meeting first. He said: "Nothing we can do as officials matters without the support of the rank and file. When I became an official seven years ago, I never thought I'd be picketing my own union. But to see a bloke like [Denis Matson] being necked for daring to express an independent view is shocking."
Reid added that what was at stake was ability of the Victorian branch to run industrial campaigns which had won the best conditions of any group of AMWU members in Australia. He explained that this was in part due to the developing cooperation between the printing division, the food and confectionary division, the metals division and state secretary Craig Johnston.
Reid added that he had spoken to Cameron about his concerns regarding the intensity of the attack on Johnston and worried that it could destroy the union. According to Reid, Cameron's response was "I don't care". This reaction had intensified the alliance between the printers and the other divisions and helped explain the strong, united action taken by the three divisions in setting up the picket line upon Matson's sacking
Ray Campbell, food and confectionary division official, outlined how tragic the turn of events had become. Before 1998, when the Workers First leadership was elected to run the Victorian branch, his division had shrunk to only 2500 members. It now had over 6000 and was industrially strong. Yet the AMWU national office had cut its resources from seven organisers to five and the food division national secretary had not visited a Victorian site in two years.
Campbell said that no matter what the national office did to Victorian organisers, they would keep servicing their members.
When Johnston's turn came to address the overflowing meeting, he started by asking what the Victorian AMWU had been like prior to 1998. ("Shit" came the interjection from the floor.) "We were always being sold out. In 1996 Cameron told the Nestles workers to cop a lousy deal. In 1997 the Hoover workers went on a seven-week strike and the trucks went in and out because the members were told they were not allowed to stop them. In the end they won a lousy one and a half percent increase and gave up lots of conditions."
This had never happened under the Workers First leadership. He added: "I've made a lot of mistakes, I guess we all have, but if a union isn't about defending its members and pushing the limits, then what is it about?"
Johnston then broke his silence about the various court cases and criminal allegations he is facing. "I want to let the people who are important to me today know my side of the story."
Commenting on charges against himself and three other AMWU members in relation to an incident at the firm Skilled Engineering, Johnston said that they had not received a fair hearing from the AMWU national office, which had asked him to stand down as state secretary pending the outcome of the case.
"People are usually innocent until proven guilty", Johnston said. "But it seems that in the AMWU the boot's on the other foot. So I consulted everyone from all sides in Victoria. They all said to stay on. Two days later I was charged with gross misconduct by the national council."
Johnston then referred the stewards to an open letter he had written to Victorian members that morning. Referring to the AMWU national council's accusation of "gross misconduct" against him, the letter says: "Yesterday, August 21, everyone found out through the media what this 'gross misconduct' of mine is supposed to be the police are investigating allegations that I raped a woman organiser on November 25 last year.
"These allegations are lies and will be shown to be lies. They are simply one more shot in AMWU national secretary Doug Cameron's dirty war to remove all opposition to his rule, especially the democratically elected Victorian AMWU leadership."
Johnston explained that he had given statements to the police and that the alleged victim had signed a statutory declaration that had been tabled in the Federal Court saying that she had been pressured into making a complaint against him. The police had said that he would hear from them within a week as to whether he would be charged or not.
"Yet I have now been told that Doug Cameron has said that if the police say there is no case to be answered, that [the AMWU national office is] going to go ahead and charge [me] anyway. So what chance have I got?"
Johnston contrasted his situation to that of a NSW AMWU official who had recently been charged with intimidation and assault of a Victorian food division woman official. The incident was videotaped, yet the official in question has not been stood down, is still performing his duties and is having his legal expenses covered by the union.
What are the industrial implications of Cameron's attacks and their impact on union democracy? Johnston said: "You need a collective leadership and a state council which is made up of rank and filers. That's what makes us different from the bosses. Why are we under such major attack? Because we're a thorn in their side. Printers and foodies have won the best agreements in the history of their unions."
Johnston recalled how the Victorian AMWU's Campaign 2000 had produced 1000 agreements covering 40,000 workers and that in about 85% of cases the union's entire claim, including income protection, had been won. The AMWU national office's Campaign 2001 coordinated by Oliver had produced only 400 agreements and "Manusafe", an income protection scheme covering only about 500 people, half of them AMWU employees.
Johnston asked, "So who do you want to be running your campaign next year?"
Johnston also placed the attack on the Victorian AMWU in the context of the present general offensive against workers, from the 1998 MUA dispute through to the Cole building industry royal commission. "It's all about the same sort of stuff force workers to have a weak union and you can drive down their wages and conditions."
In question time, one delegate after another condemned the Cameron leadership. Typical were the words of a steward from the Richardson-Pacific factory: "I don't think it's any disloyalty for a leadership to lead from the front. It's an admirable leadership that says I wouldn't ask you to do anything I wouldn't do myself. We've got to go into bat for our state leaders."
The meeting unanimously expressed no confidence in the leadership of Cameron and Oliver and demanded they stand aside immediately. It also endorsed the picket and congratulated the Victorian officials involved in the dispute, noting that they were continuing to service the members despite the attacks. It demanded that resources be returned to state officials and no further action taken against them.
The stewards also authorised the elected Victorian leadership to explore all options to protect the membership from the politically motivated attacks from the AMWU national office. This could even include discussions with other unions, for example, the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, or setting up a Victoria-based manufacturing union.
A second resolution recognised the need for a new union office to be established or for the existing office to perhaps be reopened. It also called for the union to reverse the national office's cancellation of support to the community radio station 3CR.
The meeting ended with a lively march on ACTU headquarters, where Cameron and Oliver are operating from. The fighting spirit and discipline shown by the stewards confirmed that the elected Victorian AMWU leadership enjoys massive support and that the Cameron national AMWU bureaucracy may well rue the day it declared war on its most democratic and militant branch.
From Green Left Weekly, August 28, 2002.
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