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Vigilance Bulletin No. 46, June 14, 2010
1) Israeli army attacks Freedom Flotilla Israeli army attacks Freedom Flotilla On the morning of May 31, Israeli commandos murdered nine pro-Palestinian activists after boarding the “Freedom Flotilla” of ships carrying aid to the Gaza Strip. The ships that were carrying 10,000 tons of aid (including food, medicine and building materials) and around 700 activists from over 30 countries, were boarded in international waters 60 kilometers off the Israeli coast. The Israeli commando attack in international waters is clearly illegal under international law. Yet most of the Western media try to portray the Flotilla activists, some of whom defended themselves, as being responsible for their own murders. The unarmed humanitarian convoy was attempting to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza, which began in June 2007. The Israeli government put it in place after Hamas (labelled a terrorist organization by Israel and the US) won the Palestinian elections in January 2006. This blockade has left 1.5 million civilians without basic sanitation, nutrition and medicine. It is illegal under international law. Israel can only continue to ignore international law because it has the support and financial backing of the US. Israel officially receives $3 billion a year from the US, with over 60% of this figure spent on defence. The Israeli Zionist state is the US’s political enforcer in the Middle East, which helps to control Israel’s Arab neighbours and justifies the continued interventions of the US in the region. The Zionist state was founded on inequality. It maintains a Jewish majority by excluding the Palestinian population: Arab citizens of Israel are denied basic rights, while five million Palestinian refugees are not allowed to live on the territories their parents or grandparents were expelled from. Regardless of the constant pro-Israel propaganda the media feeds us, the struggle of the Palestinian people deserves our unconditional support. SMH props up Israel and slanders MUA Sydney Morning Herald journalist Paul Sheehan has done his bit for the Israeli government. His June 7 opinion piece, “Beware the words of a wolf dressed in sheikh’s clothing”, slanders the MUA and paints all opposition to Israel’s May 31 attack as coming from either the “hard right of Islamic militancy” or the “hard left”. Sheikh Taj el-Din al Hilaly (of ‘women are uncovered meat’ fame) spoke at a Sydney protest the day after the attack. Sheehan tries to twist the Sheikh’s call for Turkey and Iran to stand with Palestine into a blood-thirsty declaration of war on Israel. The Sydney MUA’s Paul McAleer and Greens NSW MP Lee Rhiannon also spoke at the rally. In the eyes of Paul Sheehan, their presence is proof of the “common cause [that] the hard left has made with the hard right of Islamic militancy”. For good measure, the MUA is accused of “violence and intimidation” during the 1998 Patrick dispute (who brought in the balaclava-clad thugs and guard dogs? It wasn’t the MUA). Sheehan’s misinformation aims to undermine future protests against the Israeli government. In portraying those who support Palestine as dangerous radicals, he attempts to scare off the broader community who are otherwise appalled at Israel’s attack on the aid ships off the coast of Gaza. Swedish dockers boycott Israeli ships The Swedish Dockworkers Union (Svenska Hamnarbetarförbundet) are set to launch a week long boycott of Israeli ships and cargo in protest against the deadly attack on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla. The June 15-24 boycott is an excellent example of workers’ solidarity with the people of Palestine. It needs to be followed here as well. In October 2005 the Howard Liberal government created the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC). The ABCC’s draconian powers criminalise basic trade union activity in the construction industry. Despite the union movement’s long-running Rights at Work campaign, the ABCC still exists and continues to prosecute building workers. The ABCC and its draconian powers must go! The penalties for those who don’t cooperate with ABCC investigations are frightening. They include fines of up to $22,000 for stopping work over safety issues and six months jail if you don’t answer their questions. Ark Tribe will stand trial on June 15 for refusing to be interviewed by the ABCC. The rigger from South Australia faces a six month jail term. His case centres on an unauthorised meeting held in 2008 over safety issues (that Safework SA inspectors later ordered the company to fix). The ABCC has never confronted the employer over these safety issues. Neither has the ABCC – despite its talk of ending construction industry “thuggery” – bothered to contact the NSW Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union after their union office was firebombed on May 13. The ABCC is not a neutral “tough cop on the beat”. Its very purpose is to undermine union rights and workers’ safety. The Rudd Labor Government must abolish the ABCC – before another construction worker faces another six month jail term. Ark Tribe faces six months jail DP World Botany Labour Review: the good and the bad DP World (DPW) Botany’s long running labour review looks set to be finalised on June 16. MUA members will vote on a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) that offers 24 new permanent operations jobs, three new maintenance jobs and a new roster for 48 operations employees. The MOA also proposes the setting up of a joint employer-employee productivity forum, 24 staggered GWE to VSE upgrades linked to productivity benchmarks and changes to the VSE panel system. New jobs But only last year twelve maintenance jobs were lost as a result of the economic downturn. Along with the round of voluntary redundancies, around 20 jobs disappeared. These 27 new jobs only get us back to where we were before the downturn. But container volumes have greatly increased since then. DPW reports show that container volumes bounced back in the second half of 2009 and grew another 6% to 9% in the first quarter of 2010 (see www.dpworld.com). These new jobs are a big step forward. But is there scope for a continued push for more permanent jobs? Absolutely. New roster The problem is that this new roster opens the door to the phasing out of the current roster come EBA time. Productivity Forum? No thanks Industrially, such a forum can only lead to the company devising ways to make us work harder with less labour. Besides, any productivity gains that a company makes will not benefit workers. They will only boost profits. Ideologically, such meetings are based on the idea that workers and bosses have common interests. This is wrong. While we want higher wages, they want to hold our wages down. We all want job security, while they would prefer to undermine it. Workers have no common interests with the company. Their productivity should not be our concern. The MUA should have no involvement with any proposed Productivity Forum. Don’t link GWE to VSE upgrades to productivity Linking job upgrades to productivity encourages workers to speed up, cut corners and work unsafely. This is a dangerous precedent that must be stopped dead in its tracks. Don’t touch the VSE panels If we fight – we can win! It is possible that agreement between DPW and the MUA had progressed further than what we were told at the May 18 yard meeting. (One rumour suggests that the figure of 24 permanent operations jobs and a list of who will be getting these jobs was decided as far back as in March). Even if this is the case, the fact that the company did return to the negotiating table only a week after May 18 yard meeting point to one fact. And that is – if we fight, we can win. The 20 plus jobs on offer are a step forward. This number of permanent jobs has not been offered to us by the company for years. The new 35 hour Operations Roster is, apart from the extra weekend work, a step forward. On the other hand, the Productivity Forum, the productivity-linked GWE to VSE upgrades and the changes to the VSE panel system need to be knocked on the head. The way forward is to lock in the best parts of the Memorandum of Agreement now, and continue the fight to overturn the parts of the MOA that are of no benefit to us. Fight called off without a yard meeting vote On May 18 the MUA held a yard meeting in a bid to break the deadlock in the DP World Botany labour review (see previous article). The two-hour meeting voted in favour of a range of measures that would pressure management into handing over more permanent jobs. It appears that these measures had the desired effect. By May 26, the company had agreed to meet with MUA site committee members on June 4 and negotiate in good faith – as long as the measures that MUA members had voted for were lifted. This was agreed to and the workforce was informed of this decision. Problem is, site committee members should not have made such a decision. Basic union principle dictates that any vote made at a mass meeting can only be reversed at another mass meeting. |
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