Victory seems within reach for Victorian building workers as they campaign for a 36 hour week (a 9 day fortnight), a 24% wage increase, and improvements to superannuation and redundancy pay. Militant delegates and members must keep alert however that sections of our leaders do not accept a lesser offer. We've got the bosses on the run, it's no time to compromise or run scared of the courts. Employers have asked for a two week truce, but the union has rejected this as a stalling tactic. The bosses want a breathing space to prepare further legal attacks. The lockouts have been dismal failures as subbies refuse to do the dirty work for the big contractors who employ few workers but rake in most of the profits. Why should we call a truce when we're winning? This battle is significant in that it is an offensive battle by the union, taking advantage of the economic upturn, and comes after years of retreat. The campaign has won big support from members. We believe 24% over 3 years is necessary to cover us financially for the cost of the GST and the rise in inflation. We are at the peak of a boom and right now the bosses are making big dollars from our labour-we deserve a bigger cut. A 36 hour week is also very important, as a lot of us are working 50 to 70 hours a week to meet tight deadlines. A shorter working week will give workers more time with their families and will create more jobs by sharing out available work. It is wrong that some of us work 70 hours a week and other sit on the dole awaiting a call from a labour hire firm. In France, Germany and other European countries there have been moves made to shorten working weeks, even down to a 35 hour week. Ironically Peter Reith's Department of the Employee Advocate work a 35 hour week! But in Europe the shorter working week has meant a cut in wages. That's why the 24% pay claim is so important.

The campaign was endorsed last year at mass meetings of members, as well as at shop steward and branch meetings of the union. We will not go down the road of the leadership of the NSW CFMEU branch that accepted a 12.5% pay rise and no 36 hour week without a single shot fired in anger. This deal went against a previous decision for branches nationwide to stick together on this claim.

In Victoria the ETU and plumbers union have won substantial pay rises and will fight for a 36 hour week later on in the year when the Victorian Building Industry Agreement is renegotiated. The Socialist Party believes it would have been better for these militant unions to fight for the 36 hour week at the same time as the CFMEU, but unlike the issue with the NSW CFMEU leadership this is a disagreement over tactics and not over whether or not to fight. In any event the ETU and plumbers have been loyal supporters of the CFMEU members in their current battle. The Alliance in Victoria (these three unions plus the AMWU) will not be using the 36 hour week as a bargaining tool for a little more money. We have learnt again who are real friends are. Early on the Bracks Labor government came out against a 36 hour week. Why do we still donate money to this party?!

There has been a propaganda war waged by the Master Builders Association (MBA) and the bosses' media against the 36 hour week. They claim it will lead to a collapse in investment in Victoria and the end of the world as we know it. This scare mongering is always used by bosses when we ask for something. It was used when we fought for a 44 hour week, a 40 hour week, and for equal pay for women. Shopping centers have been on a 36 hour week for some time and it is a booming part of the industry.

We have been implementing workbans to force the bosses to agree to our demands. The union is offering an interim to those bosses that break ranks with their mates. Everyday more employers are signing up. The bosses' tactic was the lockout until it collapsed. Under the current industrial relations laws there is limited protected action for both unions and bosses while EBA's are being negotiated. In reality the law is stacked up against unions.

The most aggressive employers are the big contractors, precisely those who can most afford our claim. They only employ a handful of workers on each site. They are using the reluctant sub-contractors as their battering ram against the union. The bashing of shop steward Colin Reddie by thugs paid for by one or other boss was not let go. Workers walked off the job and marched to the MBA in their hundreds. The MBA's bitter anti-worker propaganda (saying we'll earn over $100,000 a year if we win our claim) gives confidence to their members to try it on violently. If the lockouts return the $10 levy on all members will be key. It will need solidarity bans on overtime and work bans to force the bosses to retreat. Currently we are fighting a tactical battle, but it still might get to an all-out strike. It won't be easy, as nothing good comes easy. But if we don't win a decent pay rise and a 36 hour week during this economic upturn we'll find it much harder in the next recession. The Socialist Party has differences with sections of the Victorian CFMEU leadership. We believe this dispute would be best co-ordinated by the elected officials and a disputes committee of key, trusted militant delegates elected by the delegates themselves. Any final offer must be passed at a delegates meeting and then a mass meeting before being accepted.

The campaign desperately needs more literature to explain our case to members and the general public who are forced to read the lies of the Herald Sun and other right-wing media outlets. There is also need for a rally of building workers to show to ourselves and others our collective strength and to boost morale. With increasing industrial action by the rank and file, with rallies, with a well organised levy, more regular delegates and branch meetings, and a dispute committee, this campaign can and will benefit all workers in Victoria. A victory for one is a victory for all and other unions will follow our lead if we win. If you don't fight, you lose!

There were 351 heroin-related deaths in Victoria alone during 1999. The Australia-wide death toll of 1999 has not yet been published, however it is expected to be more than 1,000 dead. The frightening fact is that these death rates are doubling every three years. The actual deaths from heroin-related causes are just the tip of the iceberg as far as harm to the community from current drug policies is concerned. Blood born viruses, in particular hepatitis C, are affecting many of the injecting drug users because of insufficient needle exchange services and lack of supervised injecting facilities. The Howard government's $500 million "Tough on Drugs" policy has failed to control the epidemic of hard drug use in Australia.

In Victoria some reforms have been promised by the Labor government, in particular a proposal to set up between three to five supervised injecting facilities is being researched by a committee headed by Professor Pennington. This enquiry is due to report in March about where and how to best set up the safe injecting rooms. The State government has promised to proceed with a trial of safe injecting facilities provided that local councils and communities continue to support the proposal. The Community Campaign for Heroin Reform (CCHR) is determined to continue the struggle for reform of laws and policies relating to heroin in order to minimise the harm to the community. CCHR actively campaigns for safe injecting facilities, broad based drug education programs, for increased needle exchange programs, increased drug rehabilitation and treatment facilities and the intoduction of legal heroin trials (ie the use by addicts of heroin prescribed by doctors as part of a carefully regulated treatment program). CCHR also advocates that drug testing services be available at the injecting facilities so that users will be aware of nature and strength of the drugs they are injecting.

CCHR has recently announced that it intends to call an on-going series of monthly rallies. These rallies will occur on the first Friday of each month from 5pm-7pm at the main entrance to the Melbourne Town Hall near the intersection of Swanston St and Collins St in the city. The first rally is due to take place on Friday, March 3rd. The purpose of the rallies is to mourn the loss of lives in the previous month but also to demonstrate the support in the community for reform of heroin laws and to educate and inform the public about the issues. The rallies are thus intended to provide a focus around which a strong, organised and effective campaign will grow.

It is envisioned that similar rallies will soon start to take place in other cities as part of a nationwide campaign to persuade the federal government to scrap the futile "Tough on drugs" policy and replace it with a comprehensive harm minimisation strategy. The Howard government's policy is based on the US govenment's so-called "war on drugs" and "zero tolerance" policies. These policies have resulted in a rapid growth in the prison population and a boom in the private prison industry. Almost two million U.S. citizens are now in prison, the majority of them for drug related offences. Prison labour paid at token rates is taking jobs that could otherwise go to unionised workers on the outside. The war on drugs has also increased the powers of police and drug law enforcement agencies and has compromised the civil liberties of all citizens.

The experience in countries such as Holland and Switzerland is that government control and regulation of the drug supply and the circumstances where drugs are used results in dramatic reductions in harm to the community from drug use. This approach has in fact proven to be more effective at containing the spread of drug addiction than the most draconian attempts to eliminate the supply of drugs. Provided the demand is there, and hence huge profits to be made, there will always be those willing to take whatever risks involved to supply the drugs. Also once they are addicted users often find it necessary to become dealers themselves and actively market the drugs to new users in order to support there own habits. Because of the vast profits available the potential for corruption of police is also always there. Sometimes it is necessary to fight fire with fire and also to choose the lesser evil. The experience in Switzerland where heroin was supplied to addicts as part of an experimental treatment program was so successful that a referendum was held and voters endorsed the heroin assisted treatment program by an overwhelming 70% majority. Such programmes are now official goverment policy and are offered to users alongside a range of other treatment and rehab options.

The Socialist Party intends to continue to fully support the Community Campaign for Heroin reform and calls on other working class parties, unions and organisations to endorse the aims of CCHR and publicise and attend the monthly rallies. We see the struggle for measures to reduce the harm from illicit heroin use as necessary to save the lives of thousands of working people and youth who are turning to heroin from, despair, peer pressure, alienation or just plain boredom. We do not wish to condone or be seen to be encouraging drug use. In fact we are struggling for a world where people find life comfortable, satisfying and indeed joyful without recourse to drugs. In particular meaningful work, decent housing, education and health care must be available for all. Capitalism has demonstrated that it cannot provide this. The struggle for socialism is the struggle for a world where all people will have confidence that life is worth living.

Sydney MEMBERS of the Socialist Party launched the campaign for further heroin reform with a succesful information stall outside the gates of the Big Day Out Concert at Sydney Showground. Hundreds of signatures were collected and the many donations will help kick start a broad based community campaign for further drug reform in NSW. Many youth and workers supported our demands for:

* More safe injecting facilities in Sydney's western and south-western suburbs.

* A Community Campaign for further drug reform.

* Increased drug awareness and rehabilitation programmes. Including heroin by prescription, instead of methadone programmes, linked with decent job and social training to enable users to re-enter society.

* More apprenticeships, jobs, access to tertiary education and affordable decent housing for youth.

On the first Friday afternoon of every month on Parramatta's Church Street (under the railway bridge) the Socialist Party will be holding regular info stalls to coincide with heroin reform actions taking place in other cities.

For further information contact by mail PO Box 1256 Parramatta 2124, email: sp@mira.net or talk to us at the info stalls.

The higher education sector is once again in the midst of enterprise bargaining. In Melbourne, RMIT and Monash are both gearing up for strikes in the second week of semester. Settlement has been reached over agreements at some notable universities, setting the standard for other institutions. Sydney University has become somewhat of a benchmark, with staff winning a 14.7% compounded pay increase over the next 3 years, retention of award conditions through their rolling over into the EBA, and a commitment from the university that there will be no net job losses during the life of the agreement. The federal government has stepped into the fray and is trying to impose its industrial strategy on the tertiary sector. They have waved the carrot of an extra 2% funding under the noses of the Vice Chancellors, conditional on the university meeting several restrictive criteria. Enterprise agreements must include erosion of award conditions, individualised agreements (ie no pattern bargaining), use of AWA's, easier ways to sack people and other regressive measures in order to qualify for the 2% 'grant'. A subsequent grant will be paid if the institution is able to demonstrate how they have put the agreement into practice. One can only wonder at how that is to be judged-how many staff were successfully denied their entitlements perhaps? Staff morale is at an all time low, but the fighting spirit still remains amongst committed unionists to achieve the NTEU's primary objective of protecting terms and conditions for staff in this EB round.

We have seen time and again how Howard and Reith support the push by private enterprise to further exploit their workforces. In the case of the higher education sector, they are the ones pulling the strings in this round of EB. Staff will do well to resist the moves by universities to dance to the tune of economic rationalism. If not in their own interests, then in the interest of quality education for those still able to afford to attend university.

Uni Students slugged again by Howard University students will take to the streets in 2000. On Christmas Eve the Federal Government made a sneaky announcement of more cuts to tertiary education-cuts now equal to $1 billion since 1996. These cuts lead to university administrations making up the loss by increasing student charges and taking on more full fee paying students. By 2002, one third of university revenue will come from these sources. No wonder accumulated student debt is expected to reach $7.9 billion in 2002-03, up from $5.4 billion in 1998. Annual student payments to HECS will reach $1.25 billion in 2002-03 from $925 million in the last financial year.

Trade unionists in Western Australian's Pilbara region have been involved in a protracted dispute with BHP management. The mining company insists it's workers accept individual contracts. In November 1999 BHP began offering huge incentives for workers to accept individual agreements and give up union representation. BHP refused to negotiate with award-based unionists that wanted similar benefits. The refusal to negotiate led to widespread action across the country. The five unions representing the Pilbara workers feared a loss there would lead to a flow on throughout the company's steel and coal divisions. The decision by BHP almost caught unions with their pants down. The union leaders naively expected the cosy relationship with the bosses would never be betrayed. BHP's break from it's traditional industrial practices follows intense pressure from the Federal Workplace Relations Minister Peter Reith for the company to abandon its "co-operative" policies in favour of confrontation. BHP's actions should be a lesson to all unionists and especially union leaders. Regardless of how much unions "co-operate" with the bosses, given half a chance the bosses and their government will swiftly move to 'disorganise' the workplace leaving workers at their whim and mercy. NSW Industrial Relations Commission ordered workers at BHP's Port Kembla and Rooty Hill steelworks to abandon planned strike action. Over 5,000 workers in NSW failed to comply with the order striking for 24 hours. BHP claimed the action cost the company over $3 million.

Across Victoria 1,500 union members working for BHP took legal action in support of collective bargaining. International metal and transport worker's federations the IMF and ITWF threatened to block BHP trade to Japan and South Korea if the company continued to take advantage of the "extreme right-wing government's anti-union legislation." The workers in two of WA's iron ore mines Port Hedland and Mt Whaleback at Newman turned out in their hundreds to union meetings rejecting BHP's individual contract offers. CFMEU official Gary Wood reported in the miner's journal, Common Cause, that "The company blitzed the media with its propaganda trying to sell the line that those who signed individual contracts would reap a financial bonanza." He continued, "However, a closer examination of the detail shows they were asking workers to sell their right to collectively bargain fairly cheaply, the worker is expected to self fund [pay increases] by putting in additional hours." Union members voted in favour of a four day stoppage to force BHP to negotiate collectively with the workforce. The picket swelled with supporters coming from all over the state. Two buses transporting scabs into the mine at Mt Whaleback were prevented from crossing the picket. Police moved in swiftly following this incident and in scenes reminiscent of the 1998 wharfies dispute violently clashed with pickets. Nine protesters at Port Hedland and a further eight at Newman were arrested. Paul Asplin an AWU official was arrested twice on the picket. He eventually resigned from his job after the union leadership made a deal with police to allow scabs to cross the picket.

Parallel to industrial action the unions involved lodged an application in the Federal Court against BHP, accusing the company of breaches of the freedom of association provisions of Reith's Workplace Relations Act (WRA). The ACTU and BHP workers began discussions around a strategy for widening industrial action including the possibility of an 24 hour nationwide stoppage of all BHP workers. Confidence amongst the workers and unions alike strengthened after threats of international action. The International Metalworkers Federation (IMF) and International Transport Workers Federation (ITWF) responded to the bosses and the Governments attacks on worker's rights by threatening to stop trade of coal and ore to Japan and South Korea. Yet despite the groundswell of support and activism the union leadership once again hung it's hopes on a favourable court decision. The workers were sent back to work and the unions went to court. As in the 1998 waterside dispute a court decision against individual contracts has been claimed as a tremendous victory by the unions. Nonetheless, BHP, CRA and Rio Tinto's long battle to shift all their workers onto individual agreements have not been effectively stopped. Unless confronted with effecive industrial action the companies will continue the onslaught allowing them to freely attack the rights, wages and conditions of the workers.

However, this is not the greatest fear of the ACTU and union leaders. Their main fear is that of losing representation in the mines. The courageous collective activism seen on the docks during the MUA dispute allowed wharfies to march victoriously back to work. However workers quickly realised the leadership of the MUA had bargained member's conditions and rights away in order to retain representation of workers on the wharves. In retrospect the Socialist Party and many workers believe what was seen as a great victory was in reality quiet hollow. It would not be unexpected if any or all of the leaderships of any of the unions involved in the BHP dispute strike similar deals to gain control in the mines. Bitter infighting and member poaching are common amongst the five unions. Some workers, who have accepted individual agreements, have blamed union leaderships of shooting, "themselves in the foot by infighting and trying to pinch each other's members."

Workers must remember that the collective strength of our solidarity is what makes us powerful not the leaderships of the unions. The dispute around the individual contracts at BHP could explode at any time. BHP has not yet gone into negotiations with unionised members and in fact has lodged an appeal in the Federal Court. For the first time in many years there could well be the opportunity for workers from different unions to stand side by side in struggle against the bosses and the Government. For years the union leadership and in particular the ACTU has been nothing but a talkfest. The threat of five of it's big guns losing representation in the mines may force it into action as did the wharfies dispute in 1998.

In any event the union leadership must learn the lessons of the wharfies dispute. The same mistakes must not be made again. Workers and the union leaders should not be diverted from the core of the struggle. That is for improved conditions and wages. The bosses, government and their media drum up the issue of union representation creating a smokescreen. Allowing them to slash away at conditions and wages with union leaders deceived by their smokescreen. Albeit breaking the unions would be the icing on the cake for the bosses and Reith.

It is time for the unions to get up off their hands and knees and fight for the conditions, wages and rights of their members through industrial and political struggle and solidarity. In doing so they won't need to rely on the courts to allow them representation in the mines, wharves, factories and elsewhere. The working class will demand it and fight for it.