4Q2x has tweeted a wonderful and strongly opinionated but o-so-true mini article about the- frankly- useless Unions….WE say, you KICK BUTT 4Q2X!!!
WTF do you unions do nowadays?
WTF do you unions do nowadays? I mean individual workers are doing more than Unions check out @WCVictimsdiary and the blog #auspol
— Azrael (@4Q2x) March 28, 2012
#ausmedia @WCVictimsdiary @MaritimeUnionAU @howespaul @AWUnion @Member_Connect Unions are useless in Australia. I remember the good old days when Unions actually stuck up for all of their members and workers in general.
Unions have been withering and dying away, the losing members by the hundreds if not thousands has any Union stopped to ask why? We have all heard the nice, warm and fuzzy motherhood statements, one for all for one, united we are strong, the Union is only as strong as its members etc etc. Yet in recent years if not the last couple of decades Unions have been losing members has anybody in the Union movement stopped and asked why? Well let me tell you why, because Unions no longer stand up for the working person.
Let me qualify that statement for you. How could you Unions any and all Unions possibly state that you stand up for the worker when you have allowed Workers rights be torn away by various governments in throughout Australia. Look at the various Schemes for Workers Compensation, look at NSW and Victoria I mention those two States because that is where the majority of Workers in Australia live.
WorkCover, WorkSafe or whatever you want to call it is a sham, hundreds if not thousands of your former members are living on the poverty line because YOU FAILED TO TAKE ACTION. Is it the case you are only interested in financial members? As long as people are in work and pay their membership every fortnight and you, the Executive Management of each Union have enough cash for your wine and cheese lunches and meetings?
Your junkets at various resorts just talking the bullshit talk but never walking the walk? I use to be a Union Delegate in my day and I am ashamed of what the Union movement has become. How can any of you justify allowing various Governments strip Injured Workers Rights? Don’t get me wrong I am NOT an INJURED WORKER, but I know many that are worse off than a Maid at the Schwarzenegger House, that is they are being screwed by the various systems, and what do you do?
I am angry you know why I am angry because I contacted the SDA Union today and told them that a particular Employer is hiding the fact that Casuals have Sick Leave entitlements, very few if any of their Casuals actually know that they are entitled to some form of sick leave. The bloke I spoke to couldn’t give a ratz, his response, “I’ll let the powers that be know” ? I mean WTF is that.
I told him possibly hundreds of their members could be in a situation where they are being ripped off and he repeated his earlier reply? Individual’s with very limited means are doing far more for workers rights than any Union in the Country at this point in time is. For example, @WCVictimsdiary check out this person’s blog, http://aworkcovervictimsdiary.com/
When the WorkCover/Safe system is so broken, it’s worse than Humpty Dumpty all the Kings horses and all the Kings men couldn’t put it back together again what are the Unions doing ? Management is organising the next conference where it should be what the menu should include what alcohol should be drunk, whilst more and more of your members become victims of this crooked system of WorkCover.
Hey but then again once they stop paying your fortnightly contributions they aren’t members are they so it doesn’t matter to you. Wake UP UNIONS if you want to survive and continue improving workers rights instead of thinking about the next conference DO SOMETHING TO IMPROVE WORKERS RIGHTS SO PEOPLE BELIEVE IN UNIONS AGAIN.
Shortlink: http://aworkcovervictimsdiary.com/?p=6170
I am not surprised. After almost 15 years of loyal membership to my bloody union, I asked them for URGENT assistance during my last return to work. I mean URGENT. I could smell an unlawful sacking coming and I had already been bribed by my (now former) employer.
Guess what, they rocked up TWO (read 2) whole months LATER in-spite of my distress calls and emails, begging for emergency help. By then it was too late! Oh, yes, sorry, I forgot to mention they offered to extend the bribe from $5000 to $6000, what a f*cking joke, and were so stupid as to text me the full details of the bribe via text message (phone).
In the end I chose NOT to be bribed and guess what I was unlawfully sacked and I have NEVER EVER heard from my union since, not a peep.
Unions can be helpful but sometimes they need a little prod along.
Having said that, it is the place of the unions to keep the workers’ compensation systems in check. This is a job they have failed to do.
I hate to say it, but it seems that many in the unions have simply been lining up for Labor jobs, you know, to prop up Juliar’s fat arse, than to be worrying about their members who may have been injured on the job.
I’ll never forget in the 70′s when my father came home from work early one day, I asked him what’s up he said the company he worked for had “Changed the Biscuits” for cribb break without asking the workers. Can you believe that the Company provided biscuits for cribb breaks and they changed them without asking the employees so they went on strike until the original biscuits were brought back. Now that is frivilous and wrong, I am not suggesting that Unions should pull workers out on strike for a change of biscuits. What I am saying is that the solidarity was such that they would all stick together for their smallest rights being infringed.
Nowdays forget sticking together for the most important issues like Workers Compensation matters there are way too many ready to fill in the places of the workers on strike. They don’t realise by doing that they are ripping themselves off and tearing away what rights everybody had, which was won over the decades through blood, sweat and tears of workers long since gone. Until he Unions and people starting thinking in terms of Unity the employers, Govt, Insurance companies will always divide and conquer and you end up with the system that is currently in place. I doubt very much this would have been the case if there was a huge general strike from Police, Teachers, Transport workers, Maritime Union, CFMEU, etc if they all went on strike no govt would be able to water down and rip workers off.
Very true. If only we could revert to those good ol’ 70′s, miracles would and could be achieved. Even current small unions can achieve the unthinkable, I am just thinking of the nurses union of Victoria who managed the great pay increase for nurses and maintained their rations despite the threats of Mr David and Mr Baillieu.
Maybe WCVictimsdiary could become such a small but highly venomous union? WCV – here we come – brace yourselves! And why not?
Its just a buisness boys i once had pride to say that i was a member of a union, rape pillage and plunder and as useless as a tit on a bull these days
A union friendly solicitor once told me that my case manager was my
get this…”BEST FRIEND” during my ordeal with workcover
No wonder I feel like I,m livin la vida loca :_(
curiouser and curiouser
Collinew
Unions once fought for the little guy, the worker. The poor men being shut out on the wharves. The laborers who were treated like slaves by their employers. Like anything though, power corrupted them. They are useless opportunistic thugs now…