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....................but recently I've had a good hard look at what went on during the harder times of the Unions and concede that without them it would be a very different world indeed. Australia was a country of layed back individuals with lots of rights and plenty of brains and intellectuals. these days it seems that Australia is less inclined to house our own intellectuals and we are the most overworked populace in the world. Gone are the days of the 38 hour week, that's if you can even get a job. And you are struck off the unemployment if you are able to obtain 1 hours work a week. Award wages are so low it takes a family with two working parents to uphold a household. More and more women are having to work rather than choosing to work. We need our Unions back and we need our Unions to be strong. A lot of people would disagree with this because of the scare tactics of the government

Here's a parody of what did the unions ever do for us?

and it did happen . Kids now that wnat to get a job have a choice of playing sport or working. If they play a sport on Saturdays or Sundays they won't get a job, because big companies want to exploit the hours young people work.

Any Australian here (or indeed others overseas) Answer me this one question.

Is there any weekend that all members of your family are NOT working?

fuzzywuzzy;1225350 wrote: Any Australian here (or indeed others overseas) Answer me this one question.

Is there any weekend that all members of your family are NOT working? the Unions here were scorned upon but they do protect from exploitation.

How's things Meggs? Got any spare Lobster from your lovely man? :-6

If unions really wanted to help their membership they should have spent some of that huge amount of income from dues into helping the membership upgrade their skills. Mechanization replaced many of the old labor intensive jobs of the past. They spent way too much time on increase wage and benefit issues and little or none up upgrading skills to enable their members to be more employable in a modern society.

oscar;1225380 wrote: the Unions here were scorned upon but they do protect from exploitation.

How's things Meggs? Got any spare Lobster from your lovely man? :-6


got a new gold watch. Looking for footage of his dad and Mao at the moment .

anyway Lon .........be very careful what propaganda is put out there. where do you get the notion of the unions being responsible for lack of skills in the workforce.

and are you telling me that a computer does the work of a labourer?

They spent way too much time
what would you expect them to spend time on ?

[quote=fuzzywuzzy;1225444]got a new gold watch. Looking for footage of his dad and Mao at the moment .



anyway Lon .........be very careful what propaganda is put out there. where do you get the notion of the unions being responsible for lack of skills in the workforce.

and are you telling me that a computer does the work of a labourer?





Lon said:



What propaganda?? Haven't you noticed that machinery has been put into use to do certain jobs that were done by hand or could have even been done by monkeys. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that some jobs will be replaced by machines and unions instead of assisting the upgrading of their members job skills fought mechanization in some cases.

the unions push for compnaies to upgrade the skills of their workers all the time. Instead of making them redundant and tossing them to the street .............then the companies readvertise their job at half the wages the original workers were getting.

fuzzywuzzy;1225350 wrote: Any Australian here (or indeed others overseas) Answer me this one question.

Is there any weekend that all members of your family are NOT working?


No there isn't ,sad but true.

I am for unions though:-6

what I'd like to know is why my children are recieving the same rates of pay I got as a youth in the eighties. If I was to go back into childcare I would be recieving less than I did in 1996......why?

fuzzywuzzy;1225860 wrote: what I'd like to know is why my children are recieving the same rates of pay I got as a youth in the eighties. If I was to go back into childcare I would be recieving less than I did in 1996......why?


I don't know the answer to that

We have a special needs student who was working for a few weekends & I got on to the Dept Fair Trading & checked to make sure he was getting the correct wages,he wasn't so I told the Dept & got that fixed quick smart:-5

I hate people who treat others like that.

"A hard days work should earn you a good days pay".

That was wonderful of you to fix that problem for him Mrs K.:-6:-6:-6:-6

fuzzywuzzy;1225849 wrote: the unions push for compnaies to upgrade the skills of their workers all the time. Instead of making them redundant and tossing them to the street .............then the companies readvertise their job at half the wages the original workers were getting.


It's no more the responsibility of the companies to upgrade the skill of workers any more than it is their responsibility to see that they can read and write.

fuzzywuzzy;1225887 wrote: "A hard days work should earn you a good days pay".



That was wonderful of you to fix that problem for him Mrs K.:-6:-6:-6:-6


What's a hard days work? Mental? Physical? Doesn't it vary?

You make a difference between physical and mental? What difference does it make? all should be payed appropriately. are you saying that one is more highly valued than another in a society built on both?

lon;1225892 wrote: it's no more the responsibility of the companies to upgrade the skill of workers any more than it is their responsibility to see that they can read and write.


yes it is!!!! Always!!!!!

fuzzywuzzy;1225917 wrote: yes it is!!!! Always!!!!!


Who is responsible for upgrading the skills of a carpenter, plummer, accountant, teacher, shoe shiner, street sweeper, janitor, window cleaner, doorman, taxi driver, etc.?

Ahh I see you're talking the American workforce I'm interested only in Australian.

All companies and services in this country are responsible for paying for the upgrading of skills in all that you have mentioned. PERIOD. Under worksafe laws they are responsible.

You don't like it? Tough!!!

fuzzywuzzy;1225914 wrote: You make a difference between physical and mental? What difference does it make? all should be payed appropriately. are you saying that one is more highly valued than another in a society built on both?


No---what I am saying is that what one person considers a hard days work is up for discussion. Digging a ditch with a shovel 50ft fong and 5 feet deep would be in my opinion a hard days work. Standing at machine and inserting sheets of cardboard to be rolled with wax for 8 hours isn't hard work (I did this union job in a factory as a teen). I aso loaded box cars with 80 lb. boxes of tomato sauce as a teen. That was damn hard work.

Unions served their purposes long ago. Now they only serve their own purposes. :-2

fuzzywuzzy;1225925 wrote: Ahh I see you're talking the American workforce I'm interested only in Australian.



All companies and services in this country are responsible for paying for the upgrading of skills in all that you have mentioned. PERIOD. Under worksafe laws they are responsible.



You don't like it? Tough!!!


Ah---you are getting contentious-----no need to. I just happen to believe that people must take responsibility for not only their own actions, but in improving themselves, otherwise, they can be manipulated and controlled.

Accountable;1225934 wrote: Unions served their purposes long ago. Now they only serve their own purposes. :-2


Again that's where political propaganda comes in . There was a certain premier of our state that needed Union support to get elected. A particular Union leader told him to go screw himself. So when eventually when this politician came to power he went on a witchhunt and destroyed this particualar union and imprisoned the leader on trumped up charges.

this is not related to the above account.

I first heard about the problems of the residents Carlton when I was approached by Councillor Fred Hardy who requested the union to place a ban on the railway land. I also was approached by the developer not to place a ban on the railway land. I'd met the developer in the union office back in the executive room and he did say that if I could see my way clear not to place a ban on the railway land, we could all be running round in Rolls Royces. My immediate reaction to that was 'Well look, there's the door get out.' I took the matter to our union executive. They were very sympathetic. I could see a lot of value in having that land made into a park. Of course the union was very conservation minded and we decided to place a ban on the land. That's how it came about that in placing the ban on the land one didn't really see the problems that we were going to have. We certainly had plenty of problems but I think one can say that the people's action won out in the end. The people especially the Carlton Association and the people of Carlton, put social problems before the developers of this world, who are out to make a quick quid, who wanted to build a factory.

So that's how all the trouble started. As a result of that I was involved in a scuffle up on the land with one of the sons of the developer, which resulted in me getting a couple of busted ribs when the police put the boots into me when I was on the ground. I approached the concreters that were there. The developer's son came up to me and went to push me. With that I just grabbed hold of him so he couldn't throw a punch. Next minute I was on the ground and the coppers were there putting their heels into my ribs. I eventually got fourteen days' jail out of it, and as I walked into Pentridge they started playing 'I Never Promised You a Rose Garden'. I often have a bit of a laugh about it.

It just wasn't the Builders' Labourers' Union that saved the park, it was people's actions. That's very important especially in these sorts of areas where the environment has been affected. Conservation it's only people's actions that saved it in the end. There's no doubt that the developer had the backing of the police, that they wanted to try the union ban on. I was quite confident that we could win out in the end, that it was just a test of strength. They thought that they could get away with pouring the concrete early in the morning when everyone was sleeping.

I really think that dispute was a very important dispute, not only for the people of Carlton, but other conservation groups. They could see what could be done when the people and the unions stick together. Legal action wasn't any use. I can remember a debate I had with some of the Carlton Association people up at the Malone's place one time. I just told them that if they were going to pursue the line of legal action to stop the development at the site, then it wasn't going to get them anywhere. I learned that experience through years in the union that what you can't win on the battlefield, you won't win at the conference table. It was important that we took action to stop the job. Once we'd done that, then you had a better chance of winning a legal argument in the court. If you'd just relied wholly on court action, you were doomed to failure. At the time there was a solicitor involved in the Carlton Association and I remember having that discussion with him. I saw him later on. He admitted that the union was right in the end. My experience with courts is that unless you win the battle outside, you don't win the battle inside.

I can remember when I was charged with assault. I got fourteen days' jail over it and a fine. They brought a magistrate down from Shepparton to hear my case. I was told over the Christmas period I think I was due to come up before the courts in February that the Cabinet had met and I was going to get fourteen days. My reply to that was, 'I haven't even been to court!' The information I got was true I did get my fourteen days! I wouldn't have done it any different. Actually, I think when you look back on that issue, it was the real foundation of the conservation struggle. After that there were issues that developed in Sydney. The Carlton Association were very well respected in the community for what they had done. I've got no regrets whatsoever for what I've done. There were other people who went to jail. There was Mick Lewis. He was found guilty of destroying some steel reinforcing up on the job. I think Mick got seven days.

The unions always had a social conscience. I've tried to get the union away from the narrow economic issues, to involve it in people's actions. My view of the Carlton Association was that the issues they were taking up were correct issues, and I felt that they needed some support. The union has been known to support those types of commit tees in the past.

That's probably one of the reasons why we're so disliked by governments. I can remember, over the question of Royal Parade, we finally got a letter from the Premier, Mr Hamer, whom we wrote to, to say that those boulevards ought to be protected. He wrote back and said that he agreed, and that his Government would make sure that those boulevards remained as they were. So there are many other issues that we've involved ourselves in.

It was a team effort, and only teams win premierships. Dedication, discipline I think that it was a team effort. The union got its encouragement from the Carlton Association, the people of Carlton. They, in turn, got encouragement from the union. So it was a team effort.

Our union had a long history of concern for the environment. The Sydney union in the early seventies raised the question of the name 'green ban'. We were a bit old fashioned. We still call them 'black bans'. For instance, we were involved in the conservation issues as far back as 1940 when they were going to build a small goods' factory opposite the Royal Melbourne Hospital. We put a black ban on it, said that it would destroy the environment of that area. It would have had an effect on the patients of the Royal Melbourne Hospital. We put bans on plenty of other places long before the Jack Mundys of this world came on the scene, but I think his word of 'green bans' helped to lift it. The other thing that we were different in is that we used to take these issues to the members. That was one of the weaknesses in the Sydney situation that it was all done on top. As I said though, we were putting 'green bans' on, in the name of black bans 'round about the 1940s.

I also often go up past the old railway land and have a look at it. I must say it's a very nice park. It's an exceptionally good little area there, which has been preserved for the people of Carlton It was the real basis for the conservation struggle As I said, I'm just happy to have been given the op portunity to play a part in it.




the park is named after this individual.

Lee Street

Lon;1225939 wrote: Ah---you are getting contentious-----no need to. I just happen to believe that people must take responsibility for not only their own actions, but in improving themselves, otherwise, they can be manipulated and controlled.


Nope not getting contentious because i know what went on and what goes on and for evey statement you make I sit here and smile. People are lazy and don't go into the whole of the facts. They watch TV, hear a politician make a statement and think to themselves "It's on TV it must be true".

Australians are in dire need of our unions. Labour sold out, we may as well have the liberal party in. gosh even they know hte importance of having a union rep in Parliament even if it is just for political reasons

YouTube - Chasers War - Fixer: Union Bosses Trick or Treating

I can't speak for Australia or even for the U.S. for that matter, but I am of the opinion that in both countries after the Industrial Revolution when there were not as many as now with at least a high school education nor the opportunity to obtain some form of higher education on one's own, unions became necessary to protect the unschooled worker. That's hardly the case today where there is opportunity for everyone (if they choose to take advantage) to learn and upgrade on their own initiative. The young person from a middle class family that voluntarily leaves school and is relegated perhaps to pumping gas or some other low paying job until he smartens up and learns a trade. I feel sorry for those that are led by the nose by their unions and manipulated on who to vote for as well as other social issues. We can't all be leaders but we can and should think for ourselves.