Our Treasurer attracted a load of flack when he reminded Australian workers that the well off and wealthy sector of our society regarded the average workers as milking cows from whom they could extract as many dollars as possible to pay their very high salaries, bonuses and profits.
The comments after that speech grew to include the unions who were, of course, subjected to the usual example of class warfare in the old description of union official being thugs dressed in Jackie Howe singlets, shorts and boots and sporting a few days’ growth of stubble on their chins.
The problem is that Australian workers of today are not aware of the working conditions that those of us who have passed the three score years and ten were forced by our employers to comply with, nor do they understand that most of the conditions that they work under today are those that the unions fought for.
The period of some 20 years between 1930 and 1950 contained a world depression, brought on by greed and mismanagement on the part of ‘Big Business’, and the second World War. Both of these experiences gave employers generally and particularly ‘Big Business’ the opportunity to impose conditions on workers that were far from fair.
Around 1950 Servicemen from the World War were coming back to jobs they had been employed in before they had enlisted to defend Australia. They were used to working together they knew that they could achieve nothing on their own, so they joined unions and fought for improvements .
Describing union reps and union members as wearers of Jackie Howe singlets, shorts and boots was fair enough – they were, after all, workers who had come from factories, coal mines, building sites and all the trades we see today. However to say they where thugs was not a fair description but they did have to be able to fight physically as their ‘Big Business’ opponents were not backward in employing local criminal thugs to attack a too popular union group .
Around 1970 ‘Big Business’ saw that they were not winning the battles they entered into so they changed tactics to the well tried USA caper of encouraging workers to enter into debts that they did not have the ability to repay and live reasonably.
Workers in the US of A entered into huge debts that remained tied around their necks for all of their lives, they were economic slaves.
We have watched since that period as Australians swallowed the bait that Business set out for them and now they cannot afford to join a union or to lose a day’s pay while on strike…. they are now also in the economic slavery bracket.
Statistics are showing that Australian Workers are turning from spending money to SAVING. If they can keep it up, they will have the pleasure of actually owning their house, furniture and car. The other important change they need to put in place is to support the unions and unionists, remember that it is safety in numbers.
G H Gilmour
Stanthorpe
