May Day 2014 round up

Thousands of workers who took to Sydney streets for May Day want the NSW premier to back away from privatising the state's $30 billion electricity infrastructure.

There were many messages the May Day marchers, numbering around 7,000, wanted the NSW government to hear but the loudest was a warning to new premier Mike Baird to: "Stop the NSW power sell off".

Paul Lester from the Electrical Trade Union (ETU) was among those who gathered outside parliament house on Sunday in a show of solidarity.

As the unionists marched their way through Sydney, with bagpipes blaring, Mr Lester's war cry was insistent:

"Mike Baird is his name 
Privatisation is his game
We all know what you're about, 
Come next May we will throw you out."

Mr Lester said the march had garnered the best turnout the union movement has seen in years.

"We want to show Mr Baird that no, we do not want power privatisation," he told AAP.

Among the other issues highlighted at the march were the recent watering down of workers' compensation and the push to privatise TAFE.

May Day march in Canberra

The president of the Queensland Council of Unions, John Battams, said if the minimum wage was cut from $16 to $12 an hour, it “would result in a huge pool of working poor”, as in the United States.

“About one-and-a-half million Australians depend on the minimum wage to actually make ends meet,” Battams said.

The Labor party leader in Queensland, Annastacia Palaszczuk, said the 25,000-strong demonstrations in the state sent a strong message to the government. “We can sense the winds of change. People are not happy with this government,” she said.

In Brisbane, many of the protesters’ placards criticised the premier, Campbell Newman, who has made deep cuts to the public service.

Most of the approximately 5,000 marchers in Melbourne were expressing their fears about the future of their pay and work because of the federal government's proposed changes, the city's May Day committee organiser, Len Cooper, said.

“People are pretty edgy about the future of pay, conditions, social conditions, work conditions. Everything is up in the air in their minds,” Cooper said.

Protesters also spoke out about the treatment of refugees, changes to Victorian laws concerning protest rights and the dangers of free-trade deals.

The Australia wide marches commemorate the events of May 4, 1886 when trade unionists calling for the eight-hour day in Chicago came under fire, with four demonstrators killed.

Sydney: 4 May - May Day March

May Day 2014

When - 11:30am on Sunday May 4th, 2014 

Where - Outside State Parliament House, 

Macquarie Street Sydney

What - Annual May Day March.

May Day History

May Day or International Workers’ Dayas it is also known, is the commemoration of the May 4, 1886 Haymarket affair in Chicago, in which the police were trying to disperse a public assembly during a general strike in favour of the 8 hour work day, when an unidentified person threw a bomb at them, the police reacted by firing on the workers, killing four demonstrators.

Why we fight today.

Again our working rights are coming under attack, both from our State Government, and our Federal Government, with the State Government changing workers’ compensation laws to cut injured workers off from support earlier than they are ready for, and the Federal Government is considering taking away workers’ rights such as penalty rates.

It is now more important than ever to celebrate our past wins like the 8 hour work day, and it is now more important than ever that we must fight hard for the future of our working rights and the working rights of our children, preserving the rights and conditions that we fought for in the past, and continue to enjoy today.

Join us:

11:30am Sunday May 4th 2014
Macquarie Street, outside State Parliament house, Sydney

Corporate Culture: Commission of Audit Posturing

Hockey’s audit report – the Draconian Wish List of Corporate Australia

• Cutting the real value and tightening eligibility to the age pension, disability support pension, carers’ allowance and other payments.
• Extending the retirement age to 70 by 2054.
• Privatising nine government agencies, including Australia Post, abolishing another seven and merging 35.
• Charging $15 for every visit to the doctor, while forcing more people to take out private health insurance.
• Establishing a ‘minimum wage benchmark’ of 44% of average earnings.
• Winding back redundancy payments under the Fair Entitlements Guarantee.
• Altering the Gonski reforms to primary and secondary education funding by reverting to a system that allows the states more control over schools policy and funding.
• Delaying the full introduction of the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
• Scrapping or reducing funding to a range of industry and trade promotion assistance programs, including those for the auto and steel industries, and the Clean Energy Finance Corporation.
• Slashing at least 15,000 public sector jobs, or 5% of the Commonwealth workforce.
• Requiring young job seekers to move to different parts of the country, even interstate, or lose their allowance.
• Expecting the elderly to pay more of their aged care costs themselves.
• etc etc ...

The shambles of recycled has-beens that now passes itself off as the Federal Cabinet is beginning to mumble that "we might not do any of these things" ... however they chose the top end of towners whose deliberations we can read above, and who no doubt received well above minimum wages for their sickening spew. Such a sense of entitlement to change society! Such a 1930s approach to economics! Such ignorance and arrogance! Such a "born to rule" hatred of the gains made in Australia since the middle of the last century.

This mob of bigots is about trashing everything that stands in the way of their myopic vision. And they claim to be doing it for our own good! Their intention is clearly the road to hell! As they treat refugees so they would clearly like to treat us! Reaction abroad breeds reaction at home and that's just one of their numerous "entitlements" we have to curtail right now!

We have somehow ended up with a triple A economy being run - or ruined - by triple A asses!

NSW: Workers Comp Cuts - Survey

For two years, workers and their unions have placed pressure on the NSW Liberal Government to reverse the cruel attacks they made to workers compensation in 2012.

It looks like the Government is starting to listen. On Monday they announced that they might consider changing some aspects of the workers compensation cuts.

Now is the time to let the Government know exactly how the workers compensation changes are impacting on the lives of injured workers. If you have ever received workers compensation please complete this survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/WorkersComp2014

This survey will be compiled into a report which will be presented to the Government and Opposition.

Even if you have completed one of our workers comp surveys in the past, we’d love to hear from you again. We understand that workplace injuries are never static and they change as your health and circumstances do. So please fill us in on your latest experiences.

The survey should take between 3-10 minutes depending on your circumstances.

For more information about the Workers Compensation changes please go to www.nswforall.org.au

In Union,

Mark Lennon
Secretary
Unions NSW

Corporate Culture: ATO Reveals Overseas Tax Dodges

Australian companies sent almost $60 billion to related parties in tax havens in 2012, with payments to Singapore and Ireland featuring high on the list, according to new data.

The data, never before released by the Australian Tax Office, provides an insight into how multinational groups shuffle money between countries and comes amid an international push to halt the use of tax havens by major corporations.

Due to their low tax rates, Singapore and Ireland are used by multinationals, especially technology companies such as Google and Apple, as locations for sales hubs or corporate headquarters.

In 2012 almost $40 billion was sent to Singapore, which led the payments table despite being only Australia's fourth-largest import market that year, according to Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade data.

At more than $7.5 billion, Ireland, which ranks 32nd among Australia's trading partners, was sixth on the payments table.

Mark Zirnsak, a representative of the Tax Justice Network, said the data demonstrated the need for Australia to be aggressive in its pursuit of companies that shift profits offshore. He said it highlighted the need for greater transparency around corporate transactions to establish which transactions were legitimate and not simply tax dodging.

''There are some very concerning transfers here that need an explanation,'' he said. ''If companies aren't going to voluntarily disclose this information to the public, then there needs to be an explanation as to why money is ending up in these exotic places.''

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