     |
|
|
||
|
|
||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
           Shipping Stevedoring Port Services Hydrocarbons Diving  Jul-Aug 2008        |
|
Surprise visitBy MUA election campaign news
John Howard made an unscheduled visit to the Maritime Union rooms in Sussex Street, Sydney yesterday.
He was politely ushered into the building by Dean Summers MUA/ITF and Glen Wood, Sydney Branch after a brisk walk around Darling Harbour handing out cash and chatting to passers-by. "Are you from Bennelong, Ballarat, Bendigo, Blair Bass Bonner Braddon Bowman Boothby Page, Petrie, Paterson or Parramatta?" he asked the lunchtime crowd. "Here you go." John Howard reassured MUA officials he had no secret agenda to introduce WorkChoices mark II, just like he had nothing at all to do with the waterfront conspiracy, the dogs on the docks and the sacking 3000 MUA members in 1998. He also explained that it was nothing personal but he preferred foreign ships and guest workers to carry explosives and other cargoes around the coast. Australian workers, he said, especially MUA members posed a much bigger threat - to the government. On allegations of pork barrelling the PM strongly denied any accusations the government had ever funnelled millions of dollars into projects in marginal seats against departmental advice. A flurry of election-eve handouts - not me, he said. Accusations that the Regional Partnerships Program was a pork barrel to buy votes are completely unfounded no matter what the Australian National Audit Office says. The PM said it was just coincidence that the 10 electorates that received the most funding are all Coalition seats. If parliamentary secretary De-Anne Kelly rushed through approvals for 16 projects worth more than $3.3m last election they must have been really urgent. Mr Howard also said it was just coincidence that 21 of the 28 federally funded multi million technical colleges "just happen to be seats held by the Coalition". Likewise the $11 million palliative care grants funding scheme. It is accidental that the grants are split 40 to Coalition seats and 15 to mostly marginal Labor seats. The same goes to the $41.2 million National Respite for Carers Program that is going to 20 Coalition seats and 12 marginal seats. Not to mention the pulp mills in Tasmania and NSW marginal seats. Mr Howard also stressed the government had not misused the $280m taxpayers money on ads. "Trust me," he said. "It was all for very important information campaigns on WorkChoices etc." "We're not an arrogant and out-of-touch Government using millions in taxpayer funds to buy votes in the run-up to the poll," he said.
For further information
Public Campaigns: You can view MUA's publicly available campaign information in a variety of ways. Please select one of our public campaigns indexes. |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
  |
    |
This page: http://mua.org.au/campaigns/general/surprise.html Site proudly designed and engineered by Social Change Online |
© 2001 Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) |
