USU members and their families should be proud of the part they played in campaigning against the former Howard Government's unfair WorkChoices legislation, however as 2008 has proved - the campaigns for a fair go at work continue. The first step
all unions must work to is reversing the damaging effects of
WorkChoices. A recent Senate Report confirmed that thousands of
Australian workers lost pay and conditions under Work Choices AWAs
through the loss of public holiday pay, annual leave loading, shift
allowances, overtime pay, penalty rates, redundancy pay & other
conditions.
It is now time to have those workers off AWAs and onto fair collective agreements.
Local Government in Limbo The
WorkChoices legislation has still left Local Government workers in
limbo and we have called on the State Government to exempt Local
Government from the Federal IR system. For more information on this I
urge you to read Aaron Neal's article.
Stop the Power Sell Off In
NSW the USU is facing battles on a number of fronts. Importantly USU
members have led the way in their opposition to the SELL OFF of the NSW
power industry. Unfortunately the Unsworth Review into Power
Privatisation delivered the outcome the Treasurer wanted, but skipped
around key public interest issues.
The USU has identified major
deficiencies in the proposed employment protection arrangements put
forward in the review, with workers in the female dominated retail
sector being exposed to the prospect of forced redundancy.
The
Government proposal does not provide any guarantee against the off
shoring of jobs overseas and does not provide for the retention of core
employment in rural and regional areas. The USU will continue its
campaign to stop the sell off. Find out more about the USU campaign here.
Protect Local jobs The
USU is also campaigning against the State Government’s plans to put big
business profits ahead of good local roads which would devastate
regional areas, costing communities funds and jobs.
Less than 12
months after the Iemma Government was elected on a promise to deliver
more services to regional communities the State Government could soon
strip regional councils of up to $100million in RTA funds used to
maintain good local roads. Find out more about this vital campaign to protect local communities here.
Leave Water Alone And
now less than 6 months after the NSW Premier Morris Iemma announced
plans to sell off the state’s electricity assets to big business the
State Government has flagged council-run water and sewerage services as
next on its list.
About 107 water utilities run by regional
councils have been targeted by the State Government in a Country Water
Utilities Inquiry that could see them sold off to private companies in
10 years time.
