Neanderthals Wake
THAT $22 million: it wasn't given just to benefit the Labor Party and it was only nominally given for the benefit of the union members from whom it was purloined. It was also an investment in political leverage within a new Labor government. Now the Maritime Union of Australia - an organisation whose historical antecedents are synonymous in the national memory with communism, Nazi-Soviet Pact double-dealing, Digger-endangering war-time sabotage, economy-wrecking, a storied indolence, violence, "colourful" wharf identities and, in its modern incarnation, hatred of Zionism - has come knocking. Knocking on the government's door looking for favours. Specifically, the MUA wants "Coalition strategy documents" pertaining to the waterfront dispute of 1998. The union says the material will somehow prove a "conspiracy" existed between Patrick Stevedores and senior figures in the Howard government to smash MUA influence on Australian wharves.
Julia Gillard has told the union the confidentiality of the documents is now a legally settled matter. She also took a half-hearted swipe at the instrument the previous government used - and successfully, as far as the High Court was concerned - to settle it. "It was a tool used by an arrogant, out-of-touch government and is now part of the past," she said. "Labor's election policy to stop the use of conclusive certificates in the [Freedom of Information] process stands." Forget wharves for a moment. Just how seriously Ms Gillard's FOI gras should be taken is exemplified by Anthony Albanese's refusal to release any documents relating to the government's use of the Parliament. Also, when the Opposition and various journalists sought access to legal advice that supposedly backed Prime Minister Rudd's argument that saying sorry to the "stolen generation" would not make the Commonwealth liable to compensation claims, he refused to make it available.
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Ms Gillard's rhetoric aside, the government is probably very pleased to have the High Court's decision in the McKinnon case available to shut down the MUA's attempt to re-write history. Not because of an admirable compunction about exposing the Liberal Party, of course. Rather, the government doesn't want to give any encouragement to the kind of industrial radicalism that would take the self-administered Howardian shine off Kevin Rudd or the moral oomph out of Treasurer Wayne Swan's puritanical inflation boogie-monster. Even so, there is a worrying element to this story - one that may eventually undermine the balance and the robustness of Australian democracy. With Labor governments now reigning coast-to-coast, and all of them - especially federally - in financial-political hock to the unions, what would have stymied the MUA's attempt to grab Coalition papers if it wasn't for the McKinnon case? (Assuming it is a precedent if tested).
Actually, what chance is there now of Labor papers being accessed by those ambitious to record something far more historically conclusive than what is being pursued by the MUA? To wit, that the Labor Party always sought to benefit politically from the thuggery and last-gasp victimhood of the wharfies - to the detriment of an untold number of livelihoods and at a great cost to the entire country. The MUA, we're told, is "using its influence inside Labor" to hustle up those Coalition documents. Now that actually sounds like a conspiracy. How does a union like the MUA get face-time to raise "the issue informally" with the Acting Prime Minister in the first place? Even Don Corleone had the shame to ask "is this necessary?" when Luca Brasi came calling. Former blogger and now docklands truther Chris Sheil might be able to answer these questions, even if his last historiographical triumph was the discovery of a hitherto unknown federal election.
Julia Gillard has told the union the confidentiality of the documents is now a legally settled matter. She also took a half-hearted swipe at the instrument the previous government used - and successfully, as far as the High Court was concerned - to settle it. "It was a tool used by an arrogant, out-of-touch government and is now part of the past," she said. "Labor's election policy to stop the use of conclusive certificates in the [Freedom of Information] process stands." Forget wharves for a moment. Just how seriously Ms Gillard's FOI gras should be taken is exemplified by Anthony Albanese's refusal to release any documents relating to the government's use of the Parliament. Also, when the Opposition and various journalists sought access to legal advice that supposedly backed Prime Minister Rudd's argument that saying sorry to the "stolen generation" would not make the Commonwealth liable to compensation claims, he refused to make it available.
Ms Gillard's rhetoric aside, the government is probably very pleased to have the High Court's decision in the McKinnon case available to shut down the MUA's attempt to re-write history. Not because of an admirable compunction about exposing the Liberal Party, of course. Rather, the government doesn't want to give any encouragement to the kind of industrial radicalism that would take the self-administered Howardian shine off Kevin Rudd or the moral oomph out of Treasurer Wayne Swan's puritanical inflation boogie-monster. Even so, there is a worrying element to this story - one that may eventually undermine the balance and the robustness of Australian democracy. With Labor governments now reigning coast-to-coast, and all of them - especially federally - in financial-political hock to the unions, what would have stymied the MUA's attempt to grab Coalition papers if it wasn't for the McKinnon case? (Assuming it is a precedent if tested).
Actually, what chance is there now of Labor papers being accessed by those ambitious to record something far more historically conclusive than what is being pursued by the MUA? To wit, that the Labor Party always sought to benefit politically from the thuggery and last-gasp victimhood of the wharfies - to the detriment of an untold number of livelihoods and at a great cost to the entire country. The MUA, we're told, is "using its influence inside Labor" to hustle up those Coalition documents. Now that actually sounds like a conspiracy. How does a union like the MUA get face-time to raise "the issue informally" with the Acting Prime Minister in the first place? Even Don Corleone had the shame to ask "is this necessary?" when Luca Brasi came calling. Former blogger and now docklands truther Chris Sheil might be able to answer these questions, even if his last historiographical triumph was the discovery of a hitherto unknown federal election.
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