In early April, the Morrison government had been boasting that everyone in Australia would receive the first of the two vaccination doses, at least, by October of this year.

The staged vaccine rollout of the two vaccines that Australia currently has available, the AstraZeneca and the Pfizer, commenced on 22 February this year, organised through the Federal government. High risk, frontline workers and older or vulnerable Australians were to get immunized first. The rollout was supposedly proceeding well: those workers and members of the community in Phase 1a receiving the vaccines before anyone else.

Vanessa Born, member of the Australian Services Union (ASU)

How long have you been a union member?

10 years.

Why did you join the union?

I joined during the Equal Pay Campaign. My dad had always been a union member, but my feminist course at Uni made me think that unions only really helped out men. When an ASU organiser came to visit my workplace for the first time during the Equal Pay Campaign, I asked if I could come and listen to the meeting, and I suddenly realised that unions were for women too, so I joined immediately.

On 18 March 2021, the Fair Work Amendment (‘Supporting Australia’s Economic Recovery’) Bill passed the Senate in a version dramatically stripped-down from what had originally been contemplated by both the Morrison Government and their friends in big business.

The ACTU called this a win for workers, while at the same time acknowledging that the casual worker provisions that got up were a defeat. They celebrated:

“BREAKING: The union movement has successfully prevented the worst elements of the Morrison Government’s proposed anti-worker “Omnibus Bill”.

“Thanks to the hard work of tens of thousands of union members and supporters, of the five elements of these dangerous, extreme workplace laws, only one element was passed.” (Australian Unions email blast, 18 March 2021)

James, rank and file member of the NTEU

How long have you been a union member?

2 years.

Why did you join the union?

I joined the union for political reasons, and an understanding that all workplaces need a strong, efficient union to represent their workers’ needs.

“I am a volunteer in an information centre and am being asked to clean toilet facilities open to the public daily. Are they allowed to do this?”

Parvin Mohammadi is a 59 year old Iranian woman who is currently in hiding from authorities in Iran.

Mohammadi was born in a working class family and her formative teenage years were in the tumultuous years that led to the 1979 Iranian Revolution that overthrew the repressive dictatorship of the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

Born from the strike of women garment workers in capitalism’s early and brutal ascendancy, International Women’s Day (IWD) stands alongside May Day as a red letter date in workers’ global resistance.

On 8 March 1908, thousands of mostly immigrant striking women marched through New York City. They were demanding better pay and the end to the grueling and dangerous conditions, which included long hours and sexual harassment. After three months on strike, they won.

Kim Bullimore, NTEU Rank and file

How long have you been a union member?

I am a currently a member of the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU). I have been a rank-and-file member now for 5 or 6 years. However, I first joined a union more than 30+ years ago, when I was 19 or 20 years old and working in retail. Coming from a working-class family, I understood the importance of being part of a union, as they are the basic defence organisation for the working class. Trade unions allow us to collectively organise, to fight and defend workers right and to act in solidarity with oppressed and minority groups.

On the occasion of International Women’s Day, March 8, we pose the question: are women as equally protected as men under Australia’s OHS/WHS laws?

Australia’s OHS/WHS laws apply to all employee/workers equally – the laws do not discriminate and therefore everyone’s health and safety at work is equally protected.

When Chris Breen posted a Facebook event for the Refugee Action Collective (RAC) in March last year he didn’t anticipate he would end up spending nine hours in the cells of Preston police station.

But on the morning of Good Friday, 10 April 2020, he was arrested at his home. Police seized not only his mobile phone and computers but his teenage son’s laptop. By the time he was released from custody that evening he was facing a charge of incitement.