Australia
Australia: Journalists to strike against job cuts
After the announcement that 550 jobs would be cut by Fairfax Media in Australia and New Zealand on August 26th, journalists at The Age (Melbourne, Australia) and Sydney Morning Herald newspapers have decided to go on strike until Monday.
A Fairfax spokeswoman announced that both papers would come out on Friday, but refused to comment on whether weekend papers would be affected.
Melbourne postal workers in wildcat strike
Postal workers in Melbourne returned to work today after taking unofficial action yesterday (June 12th) against a bonus cut.
Mail into and out of Victoria was also be affected by the snap strike by mail workers at the Dandenong letters processing centre, which normally is staffed by up to 1200 people. The workers walked off the job yesterday afternoon over the loss of special Sunday shifts that took about $160 out of their pay packets.
The Industrial Workers of the World in Australia - Ian Bedford
A short critical, but generally sympathetic, assessment of the Australian Wobblies.
From; Labour History no. 13, (Journal of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History), Nov. 1967.
THE INDUSTRIAL WORKERS OF THE WORLD IN AUSTRALIA
IAN BEDFORD
Memoirs of the I.W.W. [Australia] - Bill Beattie
Recollections of struggles in the years around the First World War - by a former Australian Wobbly.
From; Labour History no. 13, (Journal of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History), Nov. 1967.
MEMOIRS OF THE I.W.W. [Australia]
Bill Beattie
Mount Isa: the great Queensland strike - Solidarity
Pamphlet by the UK Solidarity group on the 1964-1965 strike and lockout at the Mount Isa copper mine in Queensland, Australia, which placed miners in direct opposition to their union, employer and the Queensland State Government for almost seven months.
New Zealand: International solidarity as miners launch indefinite strike
Australian miners refused to cross a picket line yesterday at the Spring Creek coal mine as indefinite industrial action there entered its fourth day.
About 140 Reefton and Dunollie miners were due to meet in Runanga at 1pm to decide their next step.
In an escalation of previous action, the Spring Creek miners walked off the job on Friday morning.
Strike Across The Empire, 1925 - Baruch Hirson and Lorraine Vivian
A fascinating and detailed account of a little known international seamens' strike in 1925, lasting over 100 days and spreading from Britain to Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.
The strikers confronted the shared hostility of governments, employers and union leaders alike. The text also deals with how the racism prevalent in the labour movement affected the conduct and outcome of the strike.
"THIS IS A STRIKE that has vanished from history. In August 1925, the seamen of Britain, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand walked off their ships in protest against a ten per cent wage cut. It was one of the few genuinely international strikes, directed against a powerful international cartel. One would have expected it to be widely debated. Yet, newspaper coverage apart, history has largely been silent.
The Chinese mining industry - cheaper lives mean cheaper coal; so Australian bosses threaten relocation
Last week the Chinese media reported that on average one mining accident every week is being covered up by management.
Quote:
[i]Those responsible for safety had sabotaged scenes, destroyed evidence and moved bodies, Xinhua News Agency quoted Li Yizhong, head of the State Administration of Work Safety, as saying, adding that most had been brought to justice.
In one 10-day period last month, 72 people were killed in four separate accidents.
Australia: three-day lockout at Bridgestone ends
Union members at the tyre maker, Bridgestone, in Salisbury, South Australia have returned to work after a three-day lockout without pay.
There has been no progress on their pay dispute as the company refused to negotiate in good faith.
“The company is refusing to negotiate with its workers and their union, and is hiding behind Howard’s laws to deny their workers a collectively negotiated agreement.”
Duke, James Herriott, 1939-1992
A short biography of Australian anarchist poet, James Herriott Duke, who also lived in the UK.
Remembering Jim Duke
"I started performing poems as a timid person with a stutter but the spirit of the times soon converted me into a bellowing bull." Jim Duke
“The voice played like a human saxophone.” Nicholas Zurbrugg
Australia: Railway workers walk off over safety
Pacific National railway workers went on unofficial strike on Sunday, reportedly over safety issues.
Alison Ribbon reported that the strike was apparently unplanned and dubbed a "wildcat strike" by the railway union.
Safety issues surrounding Pacific National have been in the headlines recently, with three derailments involving the company's trains in less than a year.
A train carrying paper from Hobart to the Burnie port derailed near Ulverstone a week ago.
1914-2000: The Australian IWW and 'Direct Action'
A history of the once highly-influential Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) union and its publication Direct Action in Australia.
Direct Action, later a monthly magazine, was first published by the US-founded Industrial Workers of the World union in Sydney in January 1914. They borrowed some dough from a member and bought themselves an archaic printing press so that all restraints upon expression of ‘clear cut revolutionary principles’ were removed.
1883-today: The radical history of Aussie rules football
A history of Aussie rules football and its intersection with working class politics since the first football strike in 1883.
Scabs, coppers, strikes and footy
1989: Australian pilots strike
An account of the 1989 strike of the highly democratic and self-managed Australian Federation of Air Pilots union, which was the biggest industrial struggle of the period.
John Pilger in his book Secret Country wrote about graft and corruption in Australia Today. He mentions several various powerful individuals. These same individuals – Sir Peter Ables, Rupert Murdoch, Bob Hawke all were involved in the conspiracy to smash the Australian Federation of Air Pilots.
1986: Victoria nurses' strike
The history of the second state-wide strike of nurses in Victoria, Australia against cuts and over wages, conditions and staff/patient ratios, which won its demands, with the solidarity of other workers.
Nurses are often seen as the archetypal ‘handmaidens’ of men. Yet if there was ever an experience that demolished this image, it was the Victorian nurses’ strike of 1986, in which a predominantly female workforce took on and defeated the State Labour government.
1985: Victoria nurses' strike
The history of the first state-wide strike of nurses in Victoria, Australia over wages and staff/patient ratios.
It ended in a partial victory, despite the unions' lack of militancy and more importantly layed the groundwork of rank-and-file organisation which was to play a key role in the 1986 nurses' strike.
1981: Kortex sweatshop strike
The history of a victorious strike of 300 mostly female immigrant workers in an ultra-exploitative textile sweatshop in Australia.
Sweatshop rebels
How quickly people can change. The December 1981 Kortex strike illustrates how women’s oppression and their exploitation as workers combine and interact. A struggle in the workplace can spill over into the home and family life, with remarkable consequences.
1972: Broadmeadows Ford workers’ strike
In June 1972 workers at the Broadmeadows Ford factory exploded smashing up their workplace, facing off police and forcing union bosses into endorsing a strike they had attempted to abandon. This is a short history of the events.
The dispute was only one of the hundreds that tore across Australia that year, but was remarkable for the strikers ability to circumvent official control, gain widespread community support and push the needs of migrant workers onto the national agenda.
1971-1974: Green bans by builders in Australia
A history of the massive campaign of industrial action by building workers which protected the environment and local communities by enacting green bans - refusals to work on harmful construction projects.
1971: The Kelly's Bush green ban
A short account of how construction workers saved the Kelly's Bush area of park land in Australia from development by refusing to work, and kick-started a movement of environmentally-minded industrial action.
