both sides now

Back to the old spleen. One Sharon will be happy!

The utter cockup at Cowra has not necessarily proceeded to the Government's advantage. It's been 'fixed' - yeah, 'fixed' - and now we wait for the next one. As I said a couple of posts ago, the leadup to the next election will be littered with for and against vignettes from the workplace. Because I'm a 'bleeding' heart, it's bleedingly obvious to me that the legislation, premised on a desire to do away with unionism in the country once and for all, is an utter shambles because it uses a proxy to do away with said unionism, and it's very hard to legislate effectively for a proxy outcome. The list of egregious bastardry is growing, what a shame that only WorkChoiceLess has any traction. Crikey's running hard on Rob Gerard but the mainstream media aren't touching it, the abolition of the staff rep on the ABC Board (ooh those evil unions again) gets a bit of sympathy (regrettably mostly from the Friends of the ABC who are easily lampooned as effete elites) but AWB is just too distant and too arcane. On the other hand, I wouldn't be surprised if the sale of Medibank Private gets a fair of sympathy, as the sale of the Snowy Mountains Scheme is rightfully doing. And the Nats are up in arms about media policy and lessened competition in regional areas. I love it that a lot of their constituents are supporters of the ABC, which doesn't tend to give out wrong information, with potentially fatal results.

The problem for Labor in all of this, of course, is that party's equal enthusiasm for privatisations in the heady days of 1989 and after when global capitalism had conquered all. So if they object now, the inevitable response is "well you did it too so there".

But notwithstanding, the tide is beginning to turn. I loved this letter, in the SMH today:

It's all about respect … for those who earn it

I am 65 and have seen many governments come and go. I don't remember one for which I had as little respect as this one. Integrity, truthfulness and loyalty don't seem to matter at all. I am so disgusted with the new industrial relations laws that for the first time in my life I am writing to a newspaper. The men of my father's generation battled for years for decent working conditions, and they succeeded. Along comes a little man with an overinflated ego and with the stroke of a pen he takes the country back 100 years.

The working people are, and always have been, the backbone of this country. In disasters such as fire, flood, Granville and Thredbo, it's the average Joe and Joan who get out and do the hard yakka, putting things to rights. Sure, governments and the business sector give cash, but very few from these areas get dirty hands and aching backs.

The new industrial relations laws are an abomination and anyone who had anything to do with them should hang their heads in shame. The workers are entitled to, and deserve, respect for what they do; deserve a decent wage; deserve overtime, sick pay and holiday loading, and, most of all, deserve job security. Without them, the country would grind to a halt.

Fred Daly once said there are the needy and the greedy, and it seems to me the needy are getting needier and the greedy are getting greedier. John Howard and Peter Costello carry on about the enormous surplus. The Government is not a bank to hoard taxes; taxes are there to run the country. People don't want piddling little tax cuts. They want a great health system and a great education system and the infrastructure in top shape.

As for the economy, sure, there is plenty of money about - for the ones who already have it. But there is not much joy for people on low incomes or pensions. Besides, the economy was turning around when Howard was elected Prime Minister. Mention tariffs or 9 per cent compulsory super or floating the dollar and giving control of interest rates to the Reserve Bank. Does Howard's name come up? Don't think so. Guess it was a bloke called Paul Keating.
Fay Finucane Kariong

Go you good thing, Kay.

In other news, the coffee with the mentoree went swimmingly as expected. She's got lots of tricky questions for me and is a really good listener. Being a good mentor is a bit of a hard act: have to restrain from coming over all omniscient (not hard, lack of knowledge on most things gives me away usually within a few minutes of any conversation), just being a good listener, trying to help her understand how things work (ahh, large bureaucracies and their intricacies) and trying to contribute perspective and context. Oh I love context.

And I had yet another deep and meaningful, at a level between bogan and academic, with the other staff member I mentioned, on the issue of international aid to developing countries and why it doesn't work. Good stuff. Helen Hughes would have been pleased.