Australian "Workchoices" Bill

[Commie Rat]

We needed a thread on this

Can we get a hard copy of the bill?

can we put out the pros and cons in an adult manner?

Clear and unbiased judgment is what is needed for something like this

[Clutch]

From what I've heard, we won't get a hard copy until the motion is put before paliament.

Even without reading it you can bet that I and millions of other workers will whole-heartedly oppose it. :angry:

Edit: It would be a safe bet that the often extravagant lifstyles of the bourgoisie will be protected at the expense of the worker's lifestyles.

[rioters bloc]

argh, have you seen the govt ads about this?

i'm fucking keen to know how they're planning on protecting workers' rights as they so adamantly claim.

need to get a copy of one of those 'workchoices' booklets - whats the bet its full of bullshit rhetoric that, once stripped of the pretty pictures and talk of 'fairness' and glossiness, will illuminate once more just how much the govt loves to suck up to big business and how much it wants to put down workers?

[chebol]

Check out:
http://mediacentre.dewr.gov.au/mediacentre...es/2005/October (http://mediacentre.dewr.gov.au/mediacentre/AllReleases/2005/October)

PM me if you want more info.

Also, don't forget to build for Nov 15.

[rioters bloc]

Originally posted by [email protected] 21 2005, 12:39 AM
Also, don't forget to build for Nov 15.
have been doing so ;)

i wanted to volunteer to hand out the pamphlets and stuff but i have exams/assessments for the next few weeks so :(

[GiveITall]

Pros Nothing!! (Unless you are a CEO or have your own business)

Cons Employers can sack employees that do not accept a reduction in their rights that are supposably "protected by law"

It is so depressing that John Howard is still prime minister of Australia :(

Australia will soon be a country in which you can get sacked for no reason and get detained indefinitely without access to a lawyer or being able to notify family where you are (the new counter-terrorism laws)! YAY for democracy :rolleyes:

[CrazyModerate]

Australia is America's lap dog. People always say it's Canada, but we've done a better job to avoid this kind of garbage, and we don't follow them into every war.

[RevolucioN NoW]

These laws will indeed decimate the Australian trade union movement and take away what meagre rights the working class has in this nation, our primary focus in this period should be to pressure the ACTU into taking some form of mass action on November 15, not just its ussual sky channel hook ups (the socialist alliance has been doing a very good job with this).

But in a time of crisis its always good to have some humour so:

Introducing SerfChoices
October 19, 2005

http://www.smh.com.au/news/heckler/introdu...129401251\ (http://www.smh.com.au/news/heckler/introducing-serfchoices/2005/10/18/1129401251\)
669.html

New work laws offer a brave olde worlde, writes
Charles Purcell.

The Government is proud to unveil its new industrial relations program - SerfChoices. You may have seen the ads for it already: smiling peasants plough the fields while soothing mandolin music plays. You wouldn't believe how hard it was to find peasants with full sets of teeth for those ads, this being the Middle Ages and all. Or ones that remembered how to smile. But I digress.

SerfChoices features exciting changes to the way your lord handles your employment. In the past, there were many ways you and your lord negotiated. Some lords liked to beat their serfs with maces; some cudgels; some preferred the rack. The Government is pleased to announce there will now be one standard method for beating peasants with large sticks, making it a simpler and fairer system.

SerfChoices also changes the way you, the peasant, negotiate your weekly payment of turnips.

In the past, you negotiated your turnip ration in the presence of your lord and the Government's official torturer, Dagmar the Terrible. The Government is pleased to announce it has eliminated third parties such as Dagmar. Now your lord will beat and torture you directly as you beg for scraps. Once negotiated, your contract will be cast in iron. You can't get much more cast-iron than manacles.

SerfChoices guarantees that many of your employment conditions remain unchanged. As a peasant, you're not entitled to holidays, so there's no change there. Your medical benefits remain intact - when you pass out in the fields from exhaustion, you will be left until you recover or the wolves take you.

The Government has made it illegal for your lord not to beat you because of race, colour, sex or age. Everyone will be given the same number of beatings, making it a better system for all.

The maximum number of working hours a day will be fixed at 23. One hour is permitted for sleeping, smoking noxious weed from the West Indies, and turnip
consumption. Casual peasants will earn a quarter of a turnip and a piece of weevil-infested bread for each hour they work over 23.

Your protection from unfair dismissal will depend on your individual bargaining power - that is, whether or not you can talk your lord out of shooting you with his crossbow. Yet another way the Government is rewarding individual talent.

Thanks to SerfChoices, Sunday will no longer be a day of worship, but of work. Your lord is your living god - you may worship him whenever you please. Collective
bargaining - otherwise known as peasant rebellions - will be treated in the usual manner, with the king's horses using the dissenters for speed bumps until they
drop their demands.

Over time you may notice that your daily turnip ration goes down. That's because peasants in Upper Saxony and Timbuktu are willing to work for less. SerfChoices
will allow us to build foundations for a stronger, more prosperous kingdom. If we don't act now, soon there'll be no turnips for your children and your children's children. And no one wants that.

[Commie Rat]

Thanks!

Excuse the ignorace Nov 15? is that the day that the bill is released?

[rioters bloc]

haha my friends ordered 99 of the workchoices booklets, to try and deplete their resources. i dunno how effective that would be but he seemed adamant it would work :P

so i thought, why not culture-jam all of them and then distribute them to people's homes? might take some time - and i'm fair busy with exam period coming up - but would be heaps of fun. i think the limit is 99 or something, so im gathering together a bunch of friends to order as many as we can.

CR, november 15 is a national day of protest against the IR reforms, in the form of a 'nation-wide hookup'. i distributed some eaflets about it today and the response was amazing. i dunno if you know sydney well, but i was handing them out in the devonshire tunnel during peak hour when streams of people are going through to the station. loads of people walking past were taking one, heaps even leaving the flow of people or cutting across the crowd to come and take one and talk about it. we ran out of leaflets half an hour before our predicted time, it was great to see people take such an interest

you can find out more here: http://actu.asn.au/work_rights/news/1126138297_642.html

[Commie Rat]

shu-weet

me thinks some culture jamming is nesssicary