Voices from the Chemist Warehouse picket line
Kath Larkin, transport union delegate and Victorian Socialists federal election candidate for Cooper: There aren’t many things that’ll get me out of bed voluntarily at 3am. But workers fighting against dirty bosses, insecure work, poverty wages and sexual harassment is definitely one of th...CONTINUE READING
Warehouse workers strike at pharmacy giant
Chemist Warehouse will be rocked by strikes the week of 11 March as hundreds of workers in Melbourne and Brisbane prepare to take industrial action for the first time. Members of the National Union of Workers (NUW), the union that covers warehouses in Victoria and Queensland, are fighting...CONTINUE READING
Strike action at Telstra
Telstra workers in the Communications, Electrical and Plumbing Union are set to walk off the job on Tuesday, 12 March. In June 2018, Telstra CEO Andy Penn announced plans to cut 8,000 jobs (around a quarter of the workforce) by 2022. The aggressive measure was intended to save the company...CONTINUE READING
Bureau of Meteorology workers back student climate strike
Behind the headlines screaming “hottest summer on record” is a ton of work, from technicians maintaining observation equipment to climatologists curating a climate record that reveals the alarming temperature statistics. The Meteorology Section of the Community and Public Sector Union repr...CONTINUE READING
Scabs blocked on Sydney wharves
Wharf two, Circular Quay, Sydney. It’s nearing 8am and a two-hour stoppage on NRMA’s Manly Fast Ferries is about to begin. A manager struts up and down the wharf as a ferry crewed by a scab skipper comes in to dock. A day prior, the boss had gloated that Manly Fast Ferries would suffer no...CONTINUE READING
Management stymied at Victoria Uni
National Tertiary Education Union members and staff at Victoria University in Melbourne have defeated a second electronic ballot on management’s proposed non-union enterprise agreement. VU management have aggressively pursued a non-union agreement for nearly 12 months. They have torn up th...CONTINUE READING
Workers protest privatisation in aged care
Opposition has flared against the plans of both the Maribyrnong and Hobsons Bay City Councils in Melbourne’s west to outsource their home and community care services to private companies. Fears were aroused among the workforce last year when the councils began secret discussions about hand...CONTINUE READING
Fighting laboratory evictions at Sydney Uni
A campaign has been brewing within the University of Sydney’s School of Anatomy and Physiology against the forced evictions of researchers from the Anderson Stuart wet labs. Staff learnt of the news via an email from Robyn Ward, dean of the newly amalgamated Faculty of Health and Medicine,...CONTINUE READING
Bosses on the attack in union heartland
Illawarra bosses are on the offensive. Workers at the Port Kembla Coal Terminal have been locked out for four weeks, and are facing dramatic cuts to wages and conditions after the Fair Work Commission terminated their enterprise agreement from next month. Negotiations at the Bluescope stee...CONTINUE READING