AUSTRALIA'S Labor Party, in government since 1983, has been implementing austerity polices on working people with the support of the trade union bureaucracy. K. GOVINDAN spoke with DAVID FAGAN from Solidarity on the eve of the recent World Congress of the Fourth International. Solidarity is the new sympathising group of the International in Australia. out. What is the impact of the Labor government's policies on working people? OUR ATTITUDE to the government is summed up in the popular term "Over Ten Years of Hard Labor"! While the Labor Party's constituency is still the That's trade union moverfent and working people generally, its role has been to demoralise and demobilise the working class.
example is enterprise bargaining'. This device makes an individual workplace bargain for itself. Where there are large unionised units sound pollution. fied. sponded? a good deal is possible but in small factories and unorganised sectors, where women predominate, workers lose The other major issue is 'The Accord': a social conwhich will benefit. tract between the leaders of the unions and the government whereby industrial peace is promised in return for wage deals. In real terms the Labor Party. Government has hardly given anything and workers constantly lose out.
Unemployment is 8.9 per cent — that's a reduction! and inflation is quite low.
cited as proof that "The Accord' is working. The Party. politics of 'The Accord' has demobilised the official labor of the far left? movement so that the main struggles are in the community, especially in the state of Victoria. In New South Wales there has been an upsurge of activity against plans for a new runway which will be in a working class area, forcing Socialist Party (DSP) was evictions and increasing affiliated to the Fourth International until 1985, but There is no real left in the repudiated its Trotskyist Labor Party. Most socialists programme. The other is left it a long time ago. Its branches are small and ossi- the International Socialist Organization, (ISO) linked How has the far left re- to the British SWP, which is now the larger of the two. Both are fairly sectarian orONE OF the major debates ganisations, which abhor to be had with the comrades the united front and interof the Democratic Socialist vene in campaigns and Party (DSP) is their call for struggles solely to build unions to disaffiliate from themselves. the Labor Party. This is a The progressive and imdangerous move in the ab- portant part of the DSP and sence of a left wing alterna- the ISO which we in Solidartive to Labor. In the real ity are trying to learn from is world, where the right is to be more up-front about our ascendant, it is these forces politics and more professional about party-building. Just beA related disagreement we cause we have a correct prohave with the DSP is their call gramme doesn't mean we will for a vote for a bourgeois attract people to us. We have to fight for our politics and party, the Democrats, over the this is what we are beginning What the comrades do is to co pose an organisational solution to a political problem. The problem isn't the link between Labor and the unions but the policies of the Labor There was a regroupment conference of Trotskyists in Australia in April. What came of it? WE DECIDED to reassert the politics of the Fourth International in Australia by transforming ourselves from a current into an organisation called Solidarity.
We are a small group with members in Victoria and New South Wales but we are committed to building a section of the FI in 'Australia.
We are leaders and activists in a number of movements. from Central and Latin America solidarity work to the women's movement, and especially the lesbian and gay movement where we have a national profile.
We are beginning to take our responsibilities much more seriously and asked the Ernest Mandel opened the conference World Congress of the Fourth International for recognition as a sympathising group.
This is a good start for us. • To receive International Solidarity, the bimonthly review of Solidarity by air, send a cheque for A$15 to Solidarity, PO Box A105, Sydney South, Australia.