Forget the ALP, time for a Greens/unions unholy alliance
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It was always a dead cert that Julia Gillard’s light makeover of the Howard government’s building industry laws would get through caucus, despite the opposition of Doug Cameron and some other antediluvian throwbacks who believe that a labour party should believe in equality before the law for everybody, workers included. The laws, however much they’re modified, are disgraceful, going beyond the old-right wing desire to restore master-and-servant law to the workplace, all the way towards using the state to treat a special class of workers as second class citizens, swathed in a series of official powers depriving them of the right to remain silent, among others. Will the unions make any sort of real protest, such as disaffiliation? Of course not. They never do. They’re great at printing T-shirts, not so much with the forcing Labor to act on its vestigial principles. There is one way however in which a select group of unions (even the building unions alone) could put a rocket up Labor for minimal cost, and a potentially major result. That would be to run independent workers candidates in the four key inner-city seats where the Greens have a chance of taking power from the ALP. The problem for the Greens in these seats has always been persuading over a residual five per cent or so of working-class people who simply cannot bring themselves to vote for the hippies against the mighty old Australian Labor Party. Though such people — contra Lindsay Tanner et al — are far to the left of actual ALP governments, and often angry and frustrated with their acts — and openly willing to admit their support of Green policies to Green campaigners — at the last moment, in their guts, in the ballot-booth, they just can’t shift away. However, if there were an independent workers candidate, with a phalanx of workers, unmistakeably unGreen, out campaigning for them, such a group might be willing to shift — even if they knew that such a group was preferencing the Greens ahead of the ALP. They would have been given enough of a gap between their vote and the chai-quaffing Celtic tattooed types (your cliché here) to preserve a version of their own ideals. Even a shift of 2% or 3% of the overall vote would be enough to finally get the Greens over the line — and bring the Labor nightmare closer, the day when a minority Labor government would have to rely on Green support to take power. Whether the building union leaders themselves have the long view and a willingness to get over their own frequent despite of the Greens (with exceptions) remains to be seen. But the Greens are the only major-minor party who have unequivocally stood against these laws. In that respect they are the Labour party. And it’s time the unions in question recognised it. |
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9 Comments
Groan - it seems its up to me today to correct the woefully misinformed journalists of Crikey about The Greens.
’ Hippies’ Guy Rundle calls us. some freakin’ weird hipppies man.
In my branch we have at least one lawyer (who is also a city concillor) a senior commonwleath government public servant, a psychiatrist, a communications consultant, even someone with ties to the formation of Crikey! I go on, several teachers, someone who works for the State Library……
Catch up Guy man, the Greens have the highest number of tertiary educated members of any party.
Not a wacky hippy in sight
Guy was clearly talking about a perception of the Greens rather than giving his own view, John. And it’s a great idea, Guy.
Its not going to happen. As a member of a very large Public Service Union which has zero support for the loud mouthed, big noting chest thumping miniscule minority in the union family, that see themselves as leaders of noone in particular, support for them will never be reflected in large numbers moving away from Labor. Ms Gillard knows this, she is no fool, she is going to war in a battle she knows she will win. Her popularity within the great majority of Unions has never been better. Rudd also knows this is one scrap he should stay on the fringes of and let his deputy handle the front line…..”We put them in and we can have them thrown out,” what a load of …..
What a great idea (about the affected unions running in the marginal seats and preferencing the Greens). It is managable enough to actually do, without the backing of the major unions that so quickly support Labor - and it may be that it ends up with actual results.
Who else should be reading this besides the converted?
Jim the major flaw in your entry into fantasy land is your failure to acknowledge there is no huge groundswell of anti Labor discontent, regardless of what the News Ltd press and the irrelevant Sky News would have you beleive. Its a noisy bunch of in the main, minority Builders Union heavies, well known for their lack of union within the union movement, from time to time. They will come to heel when the whip is cracked, usually do. They enjoy doing a Pyne, love the sound of their voices, boring but there it is.
RE: John Newton
Groan, another over-earnest soft-leftie with no sense of humour. Don’t worry John, ‘real’ hippies are increasingly aware that the Greens are just another bunch of middle-class wankers. They won’t come and spoil your Party. But neither will all those smelly workers and other non-tertiary educated oinks.
Interesting idea Guy. The ALP is now a party that does not believe in its own objectives or policies. It has no place for the democratic process as evidenced here in Queensland by the spate of centralised preselections prior to the recent state election. The problem is that both the general ALP supporting population but also the ALP branch members are not aware of the total control of the party by the right wing factional warlords which has resulted in so many decisions being made which are completely contrary to the ALP’s own policies. This being the case, the job for the Greens, Left wing unionists and Socialist Alliance is to increases our levels of activisim and let voters know that the ALP has lost credibility and no longers represents the interests of ordinary working people. If the Greens were to become as active in Queensland as they are in Tasmania, I see no problem with obtaining votes of 20% plus in any of the Labor held electorates.
I take it then Michael Crook you have no problem with union thugs as exist in the building industry. Obviously you want to take the union movement back to the 60’s. Thank God the majority have moved on from those unenlightened days. There is a new generation of union members out here, we dont see the employer/employee relationship as a battle ground. I doubt the greens would want a bar of your type of unionism either.
David1
You might remember the military trained thugs employed by Patricks on the wharves last decade. Planned, organised, financed at the highest levels, yet pretty much no comeback for the perpetrators. You’d have to be pretty naive to think that sections of the elite don’t operate this way systemically when they need to. Perhaps there are a few toughnut unionists, but not really of much account in comparison to the thuggery from those who run things. And as far as not seeing the employer/employee relationship as a battleground I can only agree with you that it’s not anymore - it’s a butchery, with precious little resistance from the lambs at slaughter….. a few t-shirts against work ‘choices’, a few grumbles at the ‘labor’ party’s attacks on employees, barely a murmur at the havoc wrought by the GFC. The class war has largely been won and the victors have the temerity to complain about murmurings of dissent…..