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Title: Workers’ rights
Author: Melbourne Anarchist Communist Group
Date: July 2, 2005
Language: en
Topics: workers rights, Australia
Source: Retrieved on 10th October 2021 from http://anarkismo.net/article/834

Melbourne Anarchist Communist Group

Workers’ rights

Capitalism is the problem — not just Howard

Today is only the first step. The purpose of today’s rally is to

assemble our forces for the coming struggle. This needs to be the launch

of an ongoing campaign, growing till every workplace in Australia is

part of it. Talk to friends, neighbours, family, workmates. Get

organised and then act. We mustn’t stop until we win.

Howard will go as far as we let him. The laws the Government have

announced are just the first instalment. Howard has already said he’ll

be back for more next year. They want to make effective unionism illegal

and give employers total power in the workplace. The only answer is to

hit the bosses where it hurts — the pocket. We have to use direct action

to make the laws unworkable. The courts can jail or bankrupt a few

dozen, but they can’t do it to hundreds of thousands. If we make

Howard’s laws a dead letter, the bosses will turn on him savagely and

he’ll be history. If we let him roll over us, though, we can expect even

worse.

The rank & file have to take charge. We’ve already seen how the ACTU

had to be dragged kicking and screaming into this campaign — originally

they just wanted to run TV ads. The rank & file have to control the

conduct of this dispute, by demanding regular delegate and shop steward

meetings to decide the direction of the campaign. Don’t look to the

officials or (for heaven’s sake!) the ALP for leadership — it’s not

their wages & working conditions at stake. The only good union official

is one who seeks direction from the members.

Capitalism is the problem — not just Howard. If Howard didn’t exist,

the bosses would have had to invent him. Capitalism means competition

and hierarchy — poverty and oppression for many, wealth and power for

the few. Unions are built on opposite principles — solidarity and direct

democracy. To make solidarity and direct democracy prevail in society,

we need to take charge ourselves and get rid of capitalism.

THE RANK & FILE HAVE TO TAKE CHARGE