Victorian Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) vice president Noel Washington will now face the Geelong Magistrates Court on September 12. Washington was summonsed on June 19 to appear in court on August 8 for failing to comply with the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC). Lawyers acting for Washington contested the charges.
Margarita Windisch
A group of maintenance workers at the National Foods milk processing plant in Chelsea Heights has won a 21% pay rise after having been on strike for three and a half weeks from late July. They will resume work on August 17.
Victorian TAFE teachers voted on July 18 to take 24-hour strike action on August 20 in support of better pay and conditions after negotiations with the Victorian TAFE Association stalled.
The Victorian state government is considering far-reaching changes to workers compensation laws.
On August 6, Victoria University of Technology (VUT) hosted a seminar, “Pacific Islands Migration and Labour Mobility: Issues and Responses”, which discussed the potential for an unskilled guest worker scheme for Pacific Island workers. Some Pacific nations have called for such program to help alleviate high rates of unemployment.
An estimated 1500 shop stewards and union delegates met at Dallas Brookes Hall on July 30 to discuss the campaign against the charging of Noel Washington, the construction worker facing a jail term for refusing to hand over information to the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC). The meeting also discussed the ongoing Your Rights at Work campaign. It was called by the Victorian Trades Hall Council (VTHC).
More than 100 workers and union solidarity activists closed down the Yarraville CSR construction site on July 25. They were protesting against construction manager John Kints threat to dock the pay of any worker who talked to a union official. Kint is notorious for his anti-union stance. He was responsible for sacking a workers representative at Woodsides Otways gas plant in Port Campbell in 2007, which led to months of industrial unrest. There will be a community meeting in Yarraville to discuss the CSR dispute. For more information, visit http://www.unionsolidarity.org.
Labor won the November, 2007 federal election on the promise to “tear-up” Work Choices, abolish the hated Australian Workplace Agreements (AWAs — individual contracts) and overhaul the entire industrial relations system. Of course, all of this was promised to contain ample consultation and be in the spirit of balance.
On July 23, Australian Workers Union national secretary Paul Howes teamed up with a select group of CEOs of some of the richest companies and major employers of AWU members in a roundtable discussion on climate change.
A Galaxy poll of 1009 people nationwide found that Australian workers want the hated Work Choices legislation abolished immediately rather than waiting until 2010, the date set by the federal ALP for the repeal of the laws.
Figures from the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) show that since the election of the Labor government in November, the commission has upped the ante in its witch-hunt of building industry workers.
On July 14, the Victorian police moved in to remove a group of protesters from public land near the site of the proposed $3.1 billion desalination plant in Wonthaggi.
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