Jul-Aug 2008

The Waterfront: two years on

APRIL, 2000: The timing could not have been better. On Friday, April 6, the eve of the second anniversary of the Patrick Dispute, Justice Marshall of the Federal Court rejected an application on behalf of Peter Reith, that disclosure of the secret waterfront documents "would be contrary to the public interest".

Reith's dock days draw nearer

The secret reports, which cost taxpayers more than $1 million, were provided to Mr Reith and the then Minister for Transport John Sharp in 1997 by Dr Stephen Webster, ACIL Economics, Minter Ellison and others. They are believed to contain strategic advice on how to provoke a waterfront dispute and the mass sackings of MUA members.

Federal Labor MP Lindsay Tanner, filed affidavits in the Federal Court in July last year for the release of government consultancy reports denied under two Freedom of Information applications. He is now even more determined than ever to expose Reith. We are now one step closer to learning what role Peter Reith played behind the scenes of the Dubai training debacle and the waterfront dispute. The people behind the balaclavas may yet be revealed.

World notoriety

How much more international condemnation can the Howard/Reith Government sustain before it achieves the international notoriety of the likes of President Slobodan Milosevic? On March 30 the International Labor Organisation delivered a severe blow the Federal Government. An ILO committee of experts examining a complaint against the government of Australia presented by the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, the International Transport Workers' Federation, the Australian Council of Trade Unions and the Maritime Union of Australia essentially found the government in breach of international conventions.

The committee upheld all union allegations of discrimination, interference with the rights of affiliation with international workers organisation, interference with strike and boycott action, restrictions on picketing and violation of collective bargaining rights, dismissing Government claims it was protecting Australia from 'national crisis', 'union monopoly' and 'threat to an essential industry'.

Damning judgement

In its 30 page decision the UN body delivered a damning judgement on the Federal Government, describing the attack on the MUA variously as a 'violation" "abuse", "anti-union discrimination" and "injury". It slammed Patrick's corporate restructuring as an act of forcibly expelling unionists in a coordinated action involving specially recruited personnel with attack dogs. It called on the government to prevent any future training of strike breakers or union busters.

The Geneva based watchdog found our so-called 'union monopoly' was in fact 'voluntary' 'trade union unity" and that the 'essential industry' argument did not apply to trade or ports. Only strikes which endanger life, personal safety or the health of the whole or part of a population can be outlawed. There can be no blanket ban on sympathy strikes.

Use of the Trades Practices Act (45bad and e), the it found, is no less than an abuse of union rights. The ILO has called for amendments to the Act,ensuring that workers are able to take sympathy action in support of lawful strikes. According to the ILO, not only were the MUA community pickets, sympathy strikes and international boycotts legitimate, the ACCC move to prevent the ITF or its affiliates taking sympathy action in support of the MUA, was an "interference" with the rights of association.

The ILO findings were based on conventions 87 (the freedom of association) and 98 (the right to organise). Both have been ratified by Australia. Consequently the UN body has called on the Howard Government to amend the Trade Practices Act and the Workplace Relations Act provisions linking strike action to interference with trade.

This page: http://mua.org.au/war/wfront_two.html
Last Modified: Tuesday, 15-Nov-2005 19:31:58 EST

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