Latham’s FTA sell-out confirms: unions shouldnt give a cent to Labor

3 August 2004

"There’s zero left for Australian workers and pensioners in the Australian Labor Party", Tim Gooden, the Socialist Alliance candidate for Corio in the upcoming federal election declared today. Gooden, who is also the assistant secretary of the Geelong and Region Trades and Labor Council, was commenting on the federal Labor caucus’s decision to endorse the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with the United States.

"Now we know that Mark Latham’s show of concern over the FTA was all a cynical pretence, a joke to fool pensioners dependent on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and workers like those in the manufacturing industry around Geelong into thinking that Labor was taking their concerns seriously." Gooden explained that the Labor caucus majority never had any intention of opposing the deal. He referred to a "prominent business figure" quoted by journalist Jennifer Hewitt in today’s Australian Financial Review.

According to Hewitt ALP trade spokesperson Stephen Conroy had told this business identity "not to worry about all the public statements, that it was all under control and that Labor would pass it in the end".

Hewitt likewise reported that "US officials were similarly privately assured by Labor figures it would all be OK in the end".

Gooden called on the trade union movement, especially those unions like the Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union, which had been in the forefront of the fight against the FTA, "not to give a cent to the ALP" for its forthcoming election campaign.

He said: "The only clear beneficiaries of this deal are Australia’s big corporations. As for the economy as a whole four out of the five studies made of the FTA have concluded that it will at best bring only very slight overall benefit—and that’s without measuring its social impact."

Gooden called on the ALP parliamentary left and the ACTU "to finally put their loyalty to a very important cause above their loyalty to the ALP". Gooden added that rank-and-file unionists were becoming increasingly fed up with the thin excuses offered by these people for abiding by caucus discipline and for supporting the ALP financially and politically.

"It’s all very well for the AMWU’s Doug Cameron to say that 'there are some politicians in the Labor Party who because of their lack of courage, because of their lack of spine, because of their lack of commitment to the overall situation for working people, will not get our support', but nothing will change until unions like the AMWU stop feeding the hand that bites them — the ALP as a party."

The Socialist Alliance candidate said that it was now clearer than ever that "Australian workers need a party of their own", rather than the non-choice between the conservative and liberal variants of the one "pro-corporate political machine".

"Socialist Alliance is at the centre of the fight for a new workers party in this country and we have just launched our Charter of Worker and Trade Union rights to push this movement forward. Labor’s betrayal over the FTA shows just how urgently working people need that party", Gooden concluded.

Tim Gooden is available 0418 290 656.

The Worker and Union Rights Charter is available on the Socialist Alliance web page.