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           Shipping Stevedoring Port Services Hydrocarbons Diving  Jul-Aug 2008        |
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Don't be conned by the spin about the Sydney Ferries sale17 April 2008By MUA news -
Award winning journalist and film maker John Pilger joins the campaign to save Sydney Ferries. His letter featured in "First Word" in the Sydney Morning Herald today
The Herald's campaign against State Government corruption is missing one notorious breeding ground of corruption: government fire sales of public services, known as privatisation. Your report ("Privatise Sydney Ferries, department tells cabinet", April 14), in promoting the proposed sale of Sydney Ferries as part of the natural order, quotes the Tourism and Transport Forum without telling your readers this is, in its own words, a "CEO forum" that "advocates the public policy interests of the 200 most prestigious corporations ..." In other words, it supports the likes of those who will make a bundle out of a public service if it is privatised. I catch a ferry almost every day and whenever I am asked by friends around the world what is so great about Sydney, I invariably say the ferry service and the people who work in it. I have got to know many of them, if not by name. From the deckhands to the skippers, they are among the best of this city and of Australia: skilled, helpful, gracious people imbued with the idea of public service. I spotted two of them on Sunday handing out timetables to tourists at Circular Quay from a trolley because the ferry information office had been summarily closed on April 7, clearly in preparation for the sale. This, together with propaganda that the public is "unfazed" by privatisation, are old tricks that mark the coming destruction of a genuine public service - if voters allow it to happen. Having lived in Britain, I have seen how it works. First run down the service and manufacture a media outcry at its shortcomings, then deliver it into the hands of shareholders who under "public-private partnerships" fleece the public purse for years. Beware Sydney: don't be conned by the corporate spin. You have a treasure in Sydney Ferries and its workforce. If all that is needed is $400 million to replace the fleet, it is a bargain. John Pilger Drummoyne
For further information
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