POSTCARD FROM QUEENSLAND
to where we used to be,’” says Bill. “We were in negotiations, so I kept quiet, but I thought to myself, ‘Surely not back to a time when some involved in government ended up in jail.’” If anyone is qualified to put into context the first year of the Newman Government, it’s Bill. A Queensland man through-andthrough, he was born in Longreach and schooled in Brisbane, before returning west to earn his keep as a shearer. As an AWU member, organiser and district secretary, he survived almost 20 years of the corrupt Bjelke-Petersen regime from 1968 to 1987. “It’s their culture. They’re great haters and they’re all about privilege,” Bill says of the Liberal National Party. “I remember well the terrible days of Joh [Bjelke-Petersen] when we were almost a police state. They have this attitude, and it still runs through them today: we’re in charge, we are the government, we can do whatever we like.” The same fear that underpinned BjelkePetersen’s regime is beginning to affect the psyche of many Queensland workers in the key industries of health, education and transport. Bill is rightly concerned that the backward policies of the dark, dangerous days of Queensland state politics are being recycled. “This is anecdotal, but I was told that up north a group of health workers were informed by management that some of them were going to have to go. Well, this one bloke panicked a bit. He put his house on the market and it sold. Then they came back to him and told him his job was safe. That’s the sort of fear that’s running through the place. They won’t tell workers how many are going.” No one is spared this uncertainty with aged care facilities being closed or relocated across the state. As Bill points out, the people affected are being unnecessarily stressed in the twilight of their lives, often powerless against the government’s demands. “These people are in their nineties, and they don’t know what’s going on,” he says. It’s not all bad news. Bill can guarantee the AWU will be fighting every inch of the way to ensure that members’ entitlements are not affected and that outsourcing of jobs is limited under the Newman premiership. “When we meet with our members, the first thing on the list every time is job security. Over the years, we’ve traded off a bit to get job security as our number one priority and that means no outsourcing of jobs,” says Bill. “When Goss [Wayne, Labor premier 1989-1996] got in, we made the case that
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THE AUSTRALIAN WORKER www.awu.net.au
ABOVE LEFT: Legacy Way Tunnel ABOVE RIGHT: Parmalat RIGHT: Craig Koski.
those jobs were never costed, they were just given to Joh’s mates. We ran some business cases and we won all the work back. They never costed any of the outsourcing, and we proved that our permanent staff stacked up just as well financially.” Despite the Newman Government’s “back to the future” declaration, Bill remains as parochial as ever, especially when it comes to his state-of-origin Maroons. “Brisbane’s a great place to live as long as Queensland keep winning,” he says, smiling. “We’re pretty good at football, you know.”
UNION TO THE CORE For Ben Swan, it started back in 1989 when as a 14 year old, he landed a school holiday job at a local Brisbane dairy. While his mates were playing video games and crashing BMXs, the now AWU Queensland Branch Assistant Secretary signed up as an AWU member. “I guess it was a bit of old-school expectation: no ticket, no start,” Ben says,
a wry smile. “At the time my mother was an official with the Union, working with Bill [Ludwig], so we lived and breathed politics at home. I wouldn’t have had it any other way.” This early enthusiasm for the cause has remained, his strong sense of social justice and fair play shaped around the kitchen table. Ben says his grandmother also left a deep impression on him. “She was a single parent raising six kids, working as a teacher. After hours, she worked a second job as a cleaner. The reality of that situation had an impact on all the kids, particularly Mum who was the youngest.” Ben clearly has a deep affection for his mother. A legend of the labour movement, Dee Swan was elected as the AWU’s first female official in the Union’s history and the first female AWU delegate to National Conference. She is currently Deputy President of the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission and Fair Work Australia. “She became an AWU member in the