Union Songs
Australian songs dealing with IR laws
On December Ist 2005 the Australian Government rammed through Senate its draconian anti-union laws with the appropriately Orwellian name WorkChoices. By March 2006 the details of the fine print and regulatory powers associated with these laws revealed their fascistic nature: laws of a corporate state. The laws were devised at the urging of corporations and make use of the Corporate Powers section of the Australian constitution.
These laws had a trial run a few years earlier in Western Australia (where they were so unpopular that the Liberal party has had to remove them from their State agenda in order to have any chance of re-election!) and since that time a significant number of songs and poems have dealt with the issues raised for workers and the union movement
Songs and poems dealing with AWAs or Individual Contracts and other provisions of the new laws are listed in this selection from the Union Songs collection. They show how well the union movement has been served by the pens of Australian poets and songwriters
union songs..........a selection by mark gregory