As anyone who regularly reads this blog shall say and know, I do not like to leave my little writing space to linger for too long, so today, I am merely checking in as the weekend promises to be busy and I am unlikely to be able to find that spare half hour in which to sit on a computer and write.
It’s been a big week politically. The iconic Holden car brand has taken a huge hit in this country with it’s parent company pulling the pin on the manufacturing of cars in Australia, a move that will long reverberate across the suburbs of Adelaide and Melbourne.
I am no expert on the economy and have no real opinion on whether or not more government assistance should have been given to Holden to ensure they stay in the country. I do know however that it is a sad day for a nation that has hung it’s hat with pride on the Holden brand, a car designed, engineered and built in Australia by Australians.
The disappointing thing for me personally is the attack of the right wing elite and shock jocks on the working conditions of the employees in the manufacturing industry. People such as Alan Jones deriding the workers as being overpaid and demanding penalty rates be cut. I wonder if Mr Jones has ever had a real job in his life? A job that demands acquiescence to authority while completing the same task day in day out. A job that sucks away the light in your soul leaving you a syrupy mess of dread every morning knowing you have to face another day of monotony and boredom and overzealous, pompous twits lording it over you. A job that leaves a void in your imagination and makes you wonder how you can cope with it until that day, far into the future when you can call it quits, sit back on your laurels and retire and enjoy the good life you have worked so hard for. I doubt he has and I don’t think he knows what he is talking about.
I realise that industrial relations laws often work to the detriment of companies, particularly small business. Surely we can find some middle ground between protecting workers rights and promoting the company’s interests that compromises neither? The world is never going to be perfect, a bastion of right wing thought or a hot bed of leftist activity. Never will it be black or white. It’s shades of grey and always will be. Let’s give a little both ways. Sadly, it will never happen.
Unfortunately, I fear that our newly minted conservative government as it lurches from one crisis to another, will once again visit that great dream and ideal of right wing philosophy, industrial relations law. Once more the unions will be demonised and the lowest paid workers in the economy targeted by the filthy rich who, not being happy with the millions they have made, feel they have to exact vengeance for the money they have wasted on the rank and file of the labour movement and line their pockets with even more cash at the expense of those who can least afford it.
I am working in an industry which is dying, withering and being cut back. One cannot help but feel that the vultures will soon be circling and uncaring eyes will cast their gaze from Capital Hill onto the poor and woebegone denizens of my workplace and regard us as unworthy. When the day comes and the hammer blow falls, we will be no better off than those poor souls in the manufacturing industry who have given their lives to a company that cannot and will not return their loyalty. The future will be bleak.
Until then I will worry no more and concentrate on the task at hand and make sure our customers are satisfied with our performance as we slip steadily into the festive season.
But it is worth remembering those who sleep a little less easily nowadays, the workers of the Australian manufacturing industry. Tough days lie ahead for them. And my thoughts are with them.
Strange Notations From a Laborious Life 