SA public sector workers fight for job security

Vanguard February 2013
Ned K.

(Above: SA public sector workers learned that a Labor government is no protection from massive cuts)

In 2013 South Australian public sector workers face a protracted struggle for job security.

In late 2012 salaried public sector workers represented by the PSA union agreed to a moderate 3% per year wage increase in their new collective agreement in exchange for no forced redundancies before June 2014 when their new agreement with the government expires. However the prospect of forced redundancies as a government policy beyond June 2014 looks a certainty.

The current Liberal Party ‘opposition’ flagged they want to sack many thousands of public sector workers. The current Labor Government has already said that 4,300 jobs will go under their no forced redundancies until June 2014 policy. Then, in December 2012 it announced a further 1750 jobs to go by the 2015-16 financial year.

The SA Government is also proceeding with outsourcing and privatisation of services. The latest victim is Zero Watch, a government recycling and environmental monitoring department.

Blue collar public sector workers hardest hit

While salaried public sector workers have been hit, the attack on their job security is nothing compared with the prospect of full privatisation of most blue collar public sector workers after June 2014.

That is why blue collar public sector workers and their unions are demanding job security and no more privatisation beyond June 2014  as a major claim in their  negotiations with government for a new collective agreement.

These blue collar workers who clean the hospitals, maintain the state parks, feed the hospital patients, care for  those with physical and mental disabilities are the ‘proletariat’ of the public sector workforce. They are ALP heartland voters. They represent the last remnants of the benefits that welfare state capitalism could offer a significant section of the working class in South Australia – job security.

If this is stripped away by government policy, especially by an ALP government, many workers will be looking for answers beyond the Liberal/ALP fictitious divide.

On the other hand, if these blue collar workers and their unions can take smart collective action and prevent the erosion and privatisation of their jobs, they will strengthen the position of the working class as a whole and win a significant victory on the world stage against so-called ‘austerity’ measures by governments on behalf of imperialism in all its different political manifestations.

The relentless trend towards job cuts, privatisation, and work intensification within the public sector is also intensifying contradictions between government leaders and the trade union leaders who put their Labor parliamentary colleagues into parliament to ‘restore true labour values’!