Thousands of furious workers
take protest to Barry O’Farrell
THOUSANDS of furious public sector workers – some from Dubbo and the Riverina – have descended on Sydney’s CBD, blocking off the street as they gather outside Parliament House to protest against the O’Farrell Government’s industrial relations changes.
Nurses, police, fire-fighters and other frontline workers stopped worked today (Wednesday) to attend the rally, turning Macquarie St into a sea of flags and banners.
A group of at least 6000 people chanted, “Back off Barry” and “Two, four, six eight, Barry O’Farrell you have no mandate”, Sydney media report.
They were also holding banners that read “Barry O’Farrell workers’ rights are human rights”.
Earlier, State president of the Fire Bridge Employees’ union, Darin Sullivan, addressed hundreds of fire-fighters from the top of a fire truck outside St Mary’s Cathedral.
“We don’t take this sort of action often,” he told the gathering.
“We’ve left ourselves a lot of room to escalate should we need to – this is just the first step.”
Their ranks were swollen by stonemasons, port workers and other public sector employees who marched from the Opera House.
Premier Barry O’Farrell’s controversial industrial relations changes are expected to be debated by the Lower House this week, possibly as early as tonight, after they were passed by the Upper House yesterday (Tuesday).
Politicians, mayors and possibly magistrates could also have their pay rises capped at 2.5 per cent, as the Government attempts to dilute criticism of its crackdown on the wages of nurses, teachers and fire-fighters.
The Government bill strips the New South Wales Industrial Relations Commission (IRC) of its powers to set wages and conditions for all frontline public servants.
The mostly male group marching from the Opera House carried red and while CFMEU banners and yelling, “What do we want? Fair wages. When do we want it? Now!”
Paul Connell from Public Works NSW said the conditions under the Government’s bill, which is set to be rubber-stamped by the Coalition-controlled Lower House, would not keep up with the cost of living.
“It doesn’t keep up with the cost of living which [is] more around four per cent and we can’t argue for anything more than two-and-a-half per cent,” he has told Sydney media.
Mr Connell says without the avenue of IRC, it will be harder to protect workers’ current conditions.
“They are already going after family, community services leave,” he says.
Mr Connell is concerned that the changes will make it harder to attract new stone workers to a craft that has already seen its numbers decline.
“There’s a limited supply of stonemasons as there is; we find it very difficult to get stonemasons and these changes don’t create any sort of incentive for people to work with the NSW Government.”
The stonemasons and port workers’ march was one of several to State Parliament.
Speaking on the sidelines, Unions NSW secretary Mark Lennon says the NSW Government should listen to the thousands of workers rallying and “withdraw” the legislation.
“You can see from the turnout here today that there is a lot of anger out there,” he says.
“We’ve already filled Macquarie Street; this shows how upset and outraged the public-sector workforce is about this proposed legislation.”
Mr Lennon says the ball is in the Government’s court.
“The Government still has the opportunity to rethink this legislation and withdraw it,” he says.
Rain has failed to dampen the spirits of the workers, who continued to chant and cheer.
Unions NSW president, Marilyn Issanchon, spoke to the crowd as the rain pelted down.
“No one is going to rain on our parade,” she said to cheers.
“We will fight for our rights at work.”
She thanked workers for coming from as far as Dubbo and the Riverina.
“The whole of NSW is represented here today,”
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