Stick Together

On this week’s episode of Stick Together, we look at the struggle for decolonisation in Kanaky with Nic Mclellan. Plus some union news from Australia and the world.

Today we go down to one of the Stop the Ports Rallies held across the country by Unionists for Palestine to highlight the need for Australia to cease aiding and abetting the war on Palestine. In Melbourne thousands covered first at Station Pier then Sandridge Beach in a community gathering emphasising that Unions are not just institutions but made up of the sum total of the individuals that are members. Running underneath the surface of this show of solidarity was the awareness that in NSW members of unions and peace activists are facing criminal proceedings under new draconian anti-protest laws in that state for protesting at Port Botany earlier in the year.

On this week’s episode of Stick Together, we finally have an outcome at that ongoing struggle at DP World in a couple of states across the country, so we’ll have a chat to Aarin Moon, the Victorian State Assistant Secretary of the MUA. Also, a number of progressive trade unions moved a slate of pro-Palestine motions at the Victorian State Labor Conference over the weekend of 18 & 19 May. I spoke with one of the movers of that motion, Tony Picolo, the Victorian State Assistant Secretary of the AMWU.

Stick Together is a half-hour weekly show about workers rights and current affairs. On this week's episode host James Brennan brings us some union news from across the country. We hear about the reformation of the United Auto Workers union in the United States. As two organisers speak about how the union turned around the corrupt and conservative union into one fighting for workers rights and leading the largest strike in the industry in over 25 years.

Special May Day broadcast with featured speeches from the Sydney and Melbourne May Day rallies, as well as union news from Turkiye, Indonesia and Thailand.

This week's Stick Together is a feature on International Workers Memorial Day the 28th of April. First we go to the memorial held in Melbourne. A large crowd gathered on Monday 29th of April at 10.30am to remember the 55 workers who died in the last 12 months of work related injuries in Victoria. Then we go to the Melbourne Rally for Palestine held on the Sunday 28th where Jiselle Hanna from Australia Asia Worker Links (AAWL)  gave an international perspective to the memorial of workers who have lost their lives doing thier jobs.

Today we go into the murky side of the just transition economy where Powering the Future can sometimes mean unsafe conditions, and dodgy pay. We talk to Michael Wright, National Secretary of the ETU, about a better future.

The radical Jewish tradition – revolutionaries, resistance fighters and firebrands is a new book released by Interventions by Donny Gluckstein and Janey Stone.Janey Stone is a lifelong socialist and political activist, she has been a union delegate and participated in the student anti-Vietnam war and women’s liberation movements.As an anti-Zionist Jew she has written and presented about resistance to the Nazis in Germany and Poland by Jews and many other topics including women workers, sexual politics, the middle east and radical Jewish history.

Today four reports which give some insights into the changing industrial landscape in Australia. We hear some reflections from the MUA after the successful negotiations of the new eba with DP World and its ramifications across the world. We hear from Zac Smith, the new National Secretary of the Construction Division of the CFMEU on their new campaign to support a Public Housing Build in Australia, and we hear about related issues 'roster justices' and the right to disconnect'.

Workers at RMIT commenced a week of industrial action on Monday. The current EBA expired more than 1000 days ago, and the bosses at RMIT have spent much of that 1000 days attacking the conditions of workers. If you’re in the Melbourne CBD  this morning or tomorrow morning, head down to Building 1 on Bowen Street to join the picket line.