The following articles were published in "The Guardian", newspaper of the Communist Party of Australia in its issue of Wednesday, Decembe� 6, 2000. Contact address: 65 Campbell Street, Surry Hills. Sydney. 2010 Australia. Phone: (612) 9212 6855 Fax: (612) 9281 5795. CPA Central Committee: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> "The Guardian": <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Webpage: http://www.cpa.org.au> Subscription rates on request. ****************************** 1. Fire Shier - Save our ABC 2. Rotten to the core 3. Govt powers to raid bank accounts of unemployed 4. Editorial: No alternative? 5. Who the EFIC are you? Export credit agencies, corporate welfare and a lack of accountability 6. Martin McGuinness on Ireland's peace process: Make politics work 7. TAKING ISSUE with Nathan Barnes: Ryan's real agenda: privatised policing 8. GMO Bill fails health and environment 9. Toxic DEW 10. Govt's misinformation on Jabiluka 11. Wattyl lock-out continues 12. Town revolts over <169>free trade<170> blight 13. Don't put brake on asbestos ban 14. ILO: Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention comes into force 15. Bush campaign uses mob tactics in Florida 16. US Army detains 1700 at School of Americas 17. Barak goes for broke 18. Mass abstentions in Czech elections 1. Fire Shier - Save our ABC ABC staff have turned up the heat on managing director Jonathan Shier over staff cuts, passing a motion of no confidence at stopwork meetings held on Wednesday last week, and putting strike action on the agenda. Shier has <169>demonstrated a manifest lack of commitment to the principles of independent public broadcasting<170>, said the motion, and <169>shown contempt for staff<170>. Shier met with the Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) and the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance (MEAA) last Monday. ABC management have been asked to hand in a list of <169>targeted redundancies<170> by December 15. Shier plans to get rid of around 200 more staff: 100 from television production, 50 from technical services, up to 20 from news and current affairs and 20 to 30 from radio, according to Colin Palmer, head of employment services for the ABC. These cuts are not the direct result of further budget cuts by government. They are part of a massive restructuring involving the commercialisation and destruction of the national public broadcaster. ABC staff are holding a national stopwork meeting as <MI>The Guardian<D> goes to press to hear a report-back and consider a nationwide strike in defence of the ABC and staff jobs. �The situation was further inflamed following last Wednesday's meeting when Shier announced the axing of the science program <MI>Quantum<D> (to be contracted out over the next six months) and the sacking of Walkley-award winning journalist Paul Barry from the highly popular <MI>Media Watch<D> program. Paul Barry is the third <MI>Media Watch<D> compere to be shafted <197> his immediate predecessor Richard Ackland exposed the <169>cash-for- comment<170> agreements between the banks and one of the most powerful corporate sector radio talkback kings. Interestingly, the final episode of <MI>Media Watch<D> this year featured a hard-hitting Barry interview where ABC chairman Donald McDonald was tackled over Shier's management style. Popular news reader Angela Pearman said goodbye to viewers after 12 years, another forced out by Shier and his political appointees. The Howard Government has further consolidated the corporate sector's and Liberal Party's grip on the ABC with the appointment of Maurice Newman to the Board. Newman is chairman of the Australian Stock Exchange and chairman of the Deutsche Bank Australia. He is also reported to be one of Prime Minister John Howard's closest confidantes and chairs a key financial advisory panel for Treasurer Peter Costello. Communications Minister Richard Alston has also revealed that the right-wing Gerald Stone, known as the <169>godfather of chequebook journalism<170>, will also be appointed to the ABC Board. These latest appointments further threaten the ABC's viability. The Howard Government had slashed $66 million from the budget by 1997, one year after coming to office. Overall its cuts to the ABC are around $90 million. These cuts led to a reduction in programming and the stripping of resources from a range of programs. Staffing levels were reduced by approximately 20 per cent. Most of the cuts occurred within radio and TV general programming. Since 1997, the ABC has increased the use of <169>repeats<170>, reduced the production of television programs and deferred capital and infrastructure expenditure. Community and Public Sector Union spokesman, Graeme Thomson, said the appointment of Jonathan Shier as Managing Director had worsened an already difficult situation. <169>Shier's structure is dysfunctional. Huge amounts of desperately needed funding have been squandered, firstly on redundancies, then on inflated salaries for a new, expanded executive team. <169>The net result is a massive cutback in the budgets available for program makers which will inevitably lead to cutbacks in programs and service levels<170>, said Thomson. The fear is that Shier's plans for the ABC may be the straw that breaks the camel's back. What you can do The unions and other ABC supporters are mobilising to: * defend the editorial integrity of the ABC; * oppose commercialisation; * secure better funding. If you would like to be involved in this campaign, contact your local CPSU office or e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] �Why not put your views on the ABC to your local MP and write protest letters to the Communications Minister Senator Richard Alston and Prime Minister John Howard. For more information phone or visit Friends of the ABC: http://www.fabc.org.au/ or CPSU: http://www.cpsu.org/abc END 2. Rotten to the core Rorts, backroom deals, bribes, electoral role manipulation and branch stacking have become entrenched and even obligatory behaviour in a political system corrupt and rotten to the core. It is the outcome of a culture of vote buying and big money politics, which have maintained the power of the two major political parties in Australia over a long historical period, that lies at the root of this political system. by Marcus Browning In order to reinforce their dominant position Labor and the Liberal/Nationals have resorted to various tactics at both state and federal levels, including proposals to change the voting system to exclude smaller parties, and the abolition of the federal Senate and its state equivalents. In local elections, in particular, the major parties have carried out the practice of buying preferences from other groups and standing bogus independent candidates to splinter the vote for alternative parties and real independents. And then there is the long list of cabinet members in the Howard Government exposed as rorting the system and having corporate vested conflicts of interests. In damage control mode the federal and Queensland ALP are striking all the right poses and desperately promising reforms and punishments. Labor MPs have resigned (Queensland Government's Grant Musgrave for signing false electoral enrolment forms) and stood down (Wayne Swan, Federal Labor, pending Federal Police investigations into a 1996 payment to the Democrats for voting preferences). Queensland Premier Peter Beattie has sacked a senior ministerial advisor after alleged irregularities in three ALP bank accounts, now being investigated by police. The adviser has since coughed up $30,000 to the ALP. Federal Labor leader Kim Beazley has ordered a national audit of ALP members over branch stacking and electoral rorting, and the Queensland ALP branch is reviewing all of its membership lists. <169>I make it quite clear that there is no room in the Australian Labor Party for people who break the law or rort the rules for personal or political advantage<170>, said Labor leader Kim Beazley. But it's all hot air. The corruption and criminal activity is systemic, with both the Liberal-National Coalition and the power brokers of right-wing Labor enmeshed in the corporate drive for profit, in a system based on theft and exploitation. The alternative to this political cesspool are the left and progressive forces <197> the trade unions, the community-based organisations, the environmentalists, the genuine Labor left, Indigenous people's movement and the Communist Party and other �left political groups and parties. The need is to work together not only in election campaigns, but for the formation of alliances based on agreed-upon principles and plans of action. Only in this way will it be possible to seriously challenge the corrupt rule of the corporate moneybags and those who represent their interests in parliament. EN� END -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Archived at http://www.cat.org.au/lists/leftlink/ Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
