The following article was published in "The Guardian", newspaper
of the Communist Party of Australia in its issue of Wednesday,
February 27th, 2002. 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>
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Notorious Union-basher buys rail network
Rail workers beware!
With the acquisition of FreightCorp and National Rail by Toll and Lang
Corp, Chris Corrigan, one of Australia's best known anti-worker,
anti-union zealots, will be set to wreak his brand of terror over rail
workers. The man responsible for the unleashing of savage dogs and
balaclava-clad goons onto them in 1998 is set to "reform" these rail
operations.
The Federal, NSW and Victorian Governments announced on August 24, 2001,
that the "best outcome for profitable freight carriage" was a sale of
their assets to one private owner. The three governments are
stakeholders of the main interstate freight rail carrier National Rail
Corporation (NRC) and the NSW freight rail carrier FreightCorp.
FreightCorp and National Rail hold up to 70 percent of the
standard/broad gauge rail freight rolling stock in Australia. In Sydney
they hold the monopoly at Port Botany terminal, where FreightCorp runs
the PortLink service and is the major container operator into Port Botany.
Lang Corp and Toll will pay $1.17 billion for the assets, except the
tracks that are owned by the state governments.
Other bidders for the public assets included Rail America and the
consortium of Wesfarmers/Genesee and Wyoming (US) joint owners of the
Australian Railroad Group.
On September 5 last year Toll and Lang announced they would form a
consortium for the combined rail freight sale.
Toll, a major Australian transport and logistics company, is the main
customer for National Rail. Toll has a substantial trucking fleet in
which the majority has been contracted out to small operators. It would
be no trouble to alter these contracts so as to cater for an increase in
rail freight.
Lang Corporation is the parent company to major stevedoring company
Patrick Stevedores. Chris Corrigan is the managing director in
Australia. Lang Corp can now improve rail links to the ports for a
continuous service in import and export. Control of the terminals will
increase their profits and could be used to Lang's advantage against
competitors using rail services.
National Rail profits
The Commonwealth injected $680 million into NRC over the last eight
years to upgrade terminals, replace the locomotive fleet, introduce
information technology, which saw it increase its rail freight
(predominantly from road to rail) at 16 billion net tonne/kilometre in
1996/97 to 17.1 billion net tonne/kilometre in 2000/01.
National Rail Corporation began operations in 1991 when freight was
running at a loss of $321 million annually. The announced sale of
National Rail came at a time when it was headed toward its first profit,
$2.3 million before tax. Federal Minister for Finance Nick Minchin
gave his support for the sale by saying NRC never made a profit.
The ALP and Liberals are up to the same old tricks. Use public ownership
to make an efficient operation then sell it to their mates. Events like
the takeover of these two rail bodies highlight the utter corruption,
greed and allegiance of these political parties to the bosses.
Making a profit for your mates comes before the possible expenditure of
revenue on services so badly needed by the people, including health and
education. The sale of FreightCorp and National Rail is nothing but
theft from the people as is the case with all privatisation.
The NSW Government sold both its FreightCorp and the NRC shares for $809
million, of which $439 million went to pay off debts. The Commonwealth
made $220 million on the NRC sale, which will be used to maintain the
tracks used by Corrigan and Toll and to pay off outstanding debt.
The prized rail assets are now controlled by the anti-worker union
basher Chris Corrigan and Toll's Paul Little. Since Corrigan's infamous
attack on the MUA four years ago, Lang's shares rose from $1.43 each to
$13.50, with expectations that they will reach $15 within the year.
Toll shares have also experienced a similar rise from $3.50 three years
ago to $30, with expectations of hitting $40 within the year.
Union bashing, cuts to workers' wages and conditions and good deals from
governments certainly swelled profits.
RailCorp and NRC were recorded jointly as earning $25 million last
financial year, after tax and depreciation.
Within a few years Paul Little reckons he wants this new business to be
making $250 million in earnings.
Other big earners from this sale were the consultants who will get a
substantial cut of public assets. The NSW Government is being advised by
Credit Suisse First Boston and the Federal Government has retained
Macquarie Bank.
Public is best
Australia needs a publicly owned, integrated transport system. Rail,
sea, road and air transport are all suffering because they are in the
process of being broken up and sold off, being underfunded by government
or have already been privatised in part or whole.
Instead of a system of moving goods and people across the continent,
with each mode of transport complimenting and supporting the other, we
have a mish-mash of competing interests.
Governments, both state and federal, sell off transport systems (and at
bargain basement prices) and subsidise the non-profit parts, such as
track maintenance and non-profit airports. Services to the public are
cut while taxpayers bail out bankruptcies caused by the incompetent and
short-sighted private owners.
At the same time the rate of exploitation of workers in the various
branches of the transport industry has been increased. Victoria's
privatised rail and bus systems are an example of a
government-subsidised, for-profit failure, with the conditions and wages
of its workers being eroded, services taken away and fares increased,
all to maintain profit levels.
The Howard Government's massive reduction in funding is killing
Australian shipping. The use of foreign ships in Australia has grown by
293 percent since 1994, with only around 45 major Australian flagged and
crewed vessels still operating in Australian waters.
In aviation, Australia's national airline Qantas is in private hands.
The Ansett debacle continues and the sell-off of Sydney Airport is near
the top of the Howard Government's priorities.
All this is the planlessness and chaos of the private sector in action.
Privatisation of Australia's transport system is against the public good
and a burden on the economy, and the Toll and Lang Corp takeover
confirms its anti-worker nature.
Acknowledgements: "Railway Bulletin", produced by the Maritime and
Transport Branch, CPA:
www.geocities.com/cpamaritime
.
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