Maritime Union of Australia: Campaigns: General: Send a letter to John Howard

Work - No Choices - One Year On: Send John Howard an Anniversary Card
The MUA is behind the ACTU campaign to restore workers' rights and campaign against the Howard Government. Members not already on the ACTU Rights of Work internet campaign are encouraged to join now.
Check out the you beaut You Tube short films now via the link below

John Howard is feeling pretty pleased with himself right now. It's the one year anniversary of his unfair IR laws being enacted in Parliament.

While he's throwing a party in Canberra and patting his fellow Government ministers on the back, working people and families all around Australia are struggling to cope with a less secure, drastically less fair nation. If he thinks we've forgotten the IR laws and their impact, he's dead wrong.

Sign John Howard's Anniversary Card on our website. If we get more than 7,000 signatures, ACTU President Sharan Burrow will fly to Sydney and personally deliver it.

This anniversary is certainly not a happy occasion for the many people who have been treated unfairly at work as a result of the new laws. Good, hard working people have been sacked without warning and in some cases, humiliated or discriminated against. Time with family and friends has been cut as workers adjust to the new Australian workplace, where it's all about "take what you're given or take a hike."

The cost is not just emotional. Hard economic evidence shows pay rises for workers have not kept pace with cost of living increases. Around 300,000 employees have been put onto an AWA individual contract in the last year, all of which took away at least one formerly-protected award condition.

Almost six in 10 people are still opposed to "loathed" workplace changes, according to an ACNielsen poll for The Age today. Fifty-nine per cent of people aware of the IR laws were against them, including 25 per cent of Coalition voters.

Use our website to send John Howard a message: one year on, your laws are hurting workers, cutting pay and conditions, and diminishing the rights of all Australians.

If we get more than 7,000 signatures on the card, ACTU President Sharan Burrow will personally deliver it to John Howard, so make sure you send all your friends this link:

In the plush surrounds of his parliamentary offices, surrounded by cheerleaders in the form of big business and his Liberal colleagues, Mr Howard may feel insulated from the human cost of these laws. But he should not be too comfortable. In the recent NSW state election, industrial relations was the top issue that people used to decide their vote. A federal election will be held this year.

Happy Anniversary Mr Howard: by the end of 2007, we'll be sending you a farewell card.

PS: we have produced a detailed report to mark "WorkChoices" one year on. It contains facts, figures and case studies and is well worth a read. You can view it here.

Contact	:	Maritime Union of Australia
Phone	:	+61 2 9267 9134
Fax	:	+61 2 9261 3481
Email	:	muano@mua.org.au
WWW	:	http://mua.org.au/

Public Campaigns: You can view MUA's publicly available campaign information in a variety of ways. Please select one of our public campaigns indexes.

View All Latest Campaigns | View Campaigns Archive by Date | View Campaigns Archive by Subject ]