Alice M.
March 8th marks 101st anniversary of the International Women’s Day. On this day women around the world and their supporters celebrate the struggles and achievements of women’s long and hard struggles for equality and a better life for the people.
Today many of the hard won gains made by women over past 100 years for economic and social equality are being swept away by the deep capitalist economic crisis. Working people’s livelihoods are sacrificed on the altar of the mega profits of a tiny handful of the super rich global monopoly corporations and banks.
In the developing semi-colonial and semi-feudal countries conditions for women are getting harsher. Unemployment, poverty, exploitation, imperialist wars and oppression are deepening.
Resistance to imperialist offensive and the burden of the capitalist crisis is gathering strength. Women make up half of that mass resistance and the fight for their own economic and social equality is an integral part of the struggle against semi-colonialism and imperialism in the developing countries. Women of the developing countries are in the forefront of struggles to liberate their countries from the oppression of imperialism.
In most of the developed capitalist countries, previous gains made by women are under sustained attack. The global capitalist economic crisis is wiping out many improvements in social, economic and material conditions for women.
Capitalist governments’ austerity measures are shifting public funds from the people to the big banks and multinational corporations to protect their mega profits. Publicly funded and affordable child care, public health, community support and education services deteriorate or disappear altogether.
As primary carers in family, communities and health services women suffer most from governments’ austerity cuts to services. Women are the first to lose jobs, job security, and full-time work and endure deteriorating working conditions. Many are thrown into precarious casual employment.
Legislation promoting equal opportunity and prohibiting gender discrimination in the workplace are important gains achieved by women on paper during the 100 years of hard struggle. But these are now more than ever hard to enforce as profit hungry big business mounts an offensive against workers’ rights and working conditions.
In Australia, the Business Council of Australia has said as much when it bleats about too many legal restrictions on their ability to maximise the exploitation of workers.
The women are resisting the erosion of their gains. They are defending the achievements and advancing their struggles for equality and the protection of hard won conditions of women workers and for the community.
Tax the corporations and banks, fund decent services for the people
On this International Women’s Day we pay special tribute to courageous nurses in Victoria in their struggles defending hard won working conditions, and the social and community sector workers in their protracted national equal pay struggle and victory.
Women workers dominate these two industries.
The nurses and community sector workers are battling for decent pay increases, defending and improving working conditions and the provision of decent health and community services for the public.
There is plenty of wealth around created by workers in Australia. Instead of these profits used to benefit Australian workers and the people, most are being syphoned off overseas by the multinational corporations.
A super profits tax on mining corporations and the big four banks would provide sufficient funds to pay decent wages and conditions for nurses, public sector workers, equal pay for social and community workers, public health, community services, education and more.
Victorian nurses defiant
Victorian Nurses are in the midst of a prolonged and powerful battle with the State Liberal government defending their working conditions and the health and safety of patients in the public hospitals system. The present nurse-patient ratio of 1 nurse to 4 patients in public hospitals has been achieved by nurses over more than 20 years of constant battles with intransigent Liberal and Labor state governments.
Successive state governments and top hospital administrators never give up on their dream to abolish the 1 to 4 ratio and take every opportunity to wind back the decent and safe working conditions for the hard working and dedicated nurses. The nurse-patient ration is a critical health and safety issue for the public hospital patients.
The nurse-patient ratios in public hospitals are now again under sustained attack from the Baillieu Liberal government and its lackeys in top hospital administrators who demand cutting back the ratio and replacing trained nurses with untrained assistants.
Leading up to the start of Enterprise Bargaining negotiations with public sector unions in 2011, the newly elected Baillieu Liberal government announced austerity measures that would wipe out 3500 or 10% of public sector jobs and services to the community. It refused to give more than 2.5% yearly wage increases to public sector workers.
Police of course are the exception and were immediately offered 4.7% annual increase, more than their union’s wage claim!
With their history of standing up for their rights as workers and women, for decent working conditions and their selfless dedication to proper patient care, the nurses refused to bow to threats and intimidation by the state government. For past 8 months, under the leadership of the Australian Nurses Federation (ANF), the nurses have been running a disciplined, organised and a widely supported industrial and public campaign for decent wage increases and the protection of the hard won nurse patient ratio.
Thousands of nurses have joined the battle, with hundreds campaigning non-stop in workplaces and communities, in city and country hospitals across all parts of Victoria. Rallies outside city and regional hospitals, in shopping and community centres, have drawn hundreds of supporters to the nurses’ cause. Petitions have been signed by tens of thousands of people.
The state government is refusing to budge, relentlessly treading the bosses’ well worn path to Fair Work Australia, demanding it to do its job and terminate all industrial action, make legal threats of fines, penalties against nurses and intimidate nurses to give up their widely supported fight. The Baillieu government has FairWork Australia working overtime issuing order after order directing nurses to cease unprotected industrial action, go back to courts and give up. But this only spurs more nurses to join the struggle and gathers wider support from the public. The arrogant state government and its lackeys in hospital administration were confident the prolonged dispute would tire out and demoralise nurses and force them to give up.
A state mass meeting of 3,000 nurses unanimously resolved to take further industrial action starting on Friday 24 February, if the government refused to an “independent umpire” to resolve the dispute.
The government refused and instead raced to Fair Work demanding it terminates any further industrial action. In the meantime the nurses carried out their mass meeting resolution and took industrial action of reducing nurse staffing to night shift levels in three major hospitals.
This represented the staffing levels of one nurse to 8 patients that the government wanted nurses to agree to. More than 700 nurses walked out defying FWA orders.
Fair Work again directed nurses to terminate illegal industrial action but nurses vowed to defy Fair Work orders and continue with their planned rolling stoppages.
Nurses’ courageous stand and defiance of the state’s legal threats and intimidation is an inspiration to the rest of the union movement and the public.
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