The Digger No.48 December 1975

ISSUE

DECEMBER 30

1975

CENTS

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iPhoto by Euan Keddie

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THE DIGGER

Page 2

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Melbourne FREE ABORTION ON DEMAND, FREE CONTRACEPTION, NO FOR­ CED STERILISATION/ Rally Decem­ ber 6 at 10am, City Square. Info: 347-1564.

FILM,CO-OP, 382 Lygon Street, Carl­ ton. Rainbow Farm by Rod Bishop, On The Tracks o f Unknown Animals,

by Gordon Glen at 8pm, December 2January 4. Australian shorts at 10pm.

PRAM FACTORY, 325 Drummond Street, Carlton. From December 5-23 at 9pm, The Golden Holden Show — Tuesdays-Fridays.

In the Back Theatre frqrnJDecember 3^ 21 at 8pm — Three Monologues by Turgenev, Beckett, Chekov. Also Tuesdays-Sundays.

CICD Picnic — at Hanging Rock on December 14. Phone 663-3677 for further infor.

Concert to aid ABO RIG INAL LAND RIGHTS CONFERENCE. Wednesday December 17 at 8pm in the Monash Religion Centre. Folk, rock, etc^ SCR COMMUNITY RADIO commen­ ces broadcasting early 1976. Interested persons and organisations should con­ tact by writing Cl- P.O. Box 145, Northcote, 3070 or phone 48-7292 (ah) or 850-3467 (bh).

Volunteers will be needed to help run the station, finance needed to run it and programmes needed for broad­ casting.

FEM INIST BOOKSHOP, 68 Wynnum Road, Norman Park — now open.

WOMEN BY WOMEN PHOTO­ GRAPHY EXHIBITION, Schonell Theatre, University of Queensland.

Going til December 11.

Anyone (students particularly) interes­ ted in helping with the LABOR ELEC­ TION CAMPAIGN phone 371-1611.

To: Subscriptions, The Digger, P. Ò. Box 77, Carlton, V ic., 3053.

Name

POPULAR THEATRE TROUPE in association with the Queensland Festi­ val of the Arts present The White Man's Mission at The Music Box, 19 Dornoch Tree., West End, December 9-13 at 8.15pm. $2.50 (students $1.50) Enquiries: Phone 370-1010.

People who are interested in working with kids and in helping to turn a va­ cant lot in West End Into a playground, contact Jessica Mountwinter, 370-1010 WOMEN'S LIBERATIO N HOUSE, 102-106 Little Roma Street. Meetings: Tuesday 5.,30pm Yoga; 6.30pm Shelta sub-committee meeting; health sub­ committee; 7.30pm General Meeting

Address

CPA xmas breakup, December 18 4.30 til 7.30pm at Unity Hall, 636 Bourke Street.

INTERNATIO NAL HUMAN RIGHTS D AY, December 10 — Focus on Nambia. Demo at City Square at 5pm with march to Conzinc Rio T into of Aust.

FRIENDS OF THE EARTH are holding a seminar on Nambia and Australia.

A t the Methodist Centre, 130 Lt. Col­ lins Street, on December 5 at 8pm.

Speakers are Dr. Z. Ngavirui, Joe Camelliri and Cheryl Buchanan.

WOMEN'S DANCES-. December 5 in Lower Dining Hall at Melbourne Uni at 9pm. Proceeds for this one to go to the new feminist press in Sydney. Next dance same venue on January 9. Feel free to approach the organisers if you want one to go on to raise money for your (women's) group. Phone 3471564 for info.

GLASSHOUSE WOMEN'S DISCO. New Friday and Saturday night venue for women only. Glasshouse Hotel, 51 Gipps Street, Collingwood. $2 cover and surcharge on all drinks.

PICNIC — organised by The Salon, on December 7 at 12 noon at Yarra Bend Park on the banks of the Yarra at Fairfield. A mixed event — BYOG and everything else too. $50 to the most novel informal o u tfit and to the best informally dressed couple.

Brisbane WOMEN'S A R T CENTRE, 101 Wyn­ num Road, Norman Park. Also Wo­ men's Liberation Mother Hubbard's used clothes. Women welcome to drop in and talk.

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Wednesday: 11am Support and infor­ mation group.

Friday 11am Shelta staff meeting — others welcome; 7.30pm Open House — films, fun, etc.

Saturday: 2pm School students' group.

Sunday: 4pm Marxist-feminist group.

Rape Crisis Centre is open from Friday night to Monday morning. Operates from the Women's Centre. 229-5922.

VIDEO WORKSHOPS on Wednesday nights at 7.30pm (basic portapak); Saturdays at 11am (basic portapak); Saturdays at 2pm (advanced: editing etc.). Ring a few days beforehand to let people know you're arriving. Ph: 221-0987.

WOMEN'S RADIO COLLECTIVE and WOMEN'S F IL M AND VIDEO GROUP meet alternate Wednesdays at 7.30pm, respectively at Women's House, 102-6, Little Roma Street, Brisbane (phone 229-5922). and 109 Edward Street, (phone 221-0987). Ring and check dates. The Film and Video Group also have screenings (Fridays) at Women's House — films and video by and about women. | FILM-MAKERS' CO-OP screening on December 14 at 5pm at 109 Edward Street: Eisenstein's Battleship Potem­ kin and Ken Russell's The Boy-friend.

Timorese Independence undermined bv Indonesian invasion.

Give your widest support to Timor's struggle fo r self-determination.

TIMOR INFORMATION SERVICE First floor, 100 Flinders St. Melbourne,

Adelaide ABORTION R A LLY , December 6.

Phone Women's Centre, 51-6551 for details of place for assembling and times.

WOMEN'S ACTION GROUP - United front to defeat Fraser. For more info phone 42-2003.

S id n e y FEM INIST THEORIES - ABC Radio 2. Topics include Feminist Critique of Qapitalism; Revolutionary Feminism, Social ism and the Left and Revolution-' ary. Feminist Demands and the Present.

Listen at 10.10pm December 8,9,10 and 11.

WOMEN'S ABORTION ACTION CO­ A LIT IO N Rally, Australia Square then march to Hyde Park on December 6 at 10.30am. More info from Dominica on 61-9261 or Helen on 660-9596 or 31-3323.

A U S TR A LIA N WOMEN'S BROAD­ CASTING COMMISSION (AWBC) will be interviewing L/z Reid in New York

on December, 6 at 5pm. You can phone in and speak with Liz if you feel like it.

AWBC again — this time December 8 at 7.15 with Julie Rigg interviewing wo­ men from the major political parties on women's issues in the elections. Both this programme and the one. with Liz Reid can be heard on ABC Radio 2.

ALTERNA TIVE CRI M l NOLOG Y JOURNAL — a forum fo r the discus­ sion of issues such as crime, deviance, criminology, prison reform, etc.

Send subs to David Brown, C/- Faculty of Law, University o f NSW, P.O. Box 1 Kensington, NSW, 2033. More info phone 663-0351, ext.3380.

READINGS 388 L yg o n S tr e e t C a rlto n 3053 3476085

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DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

Page 3

THE DIGGER

Around th e world representative dem ocracy and capitalist econom ies are under great stress, and political freedom s are being attacked. Kerr’s sacking o f Whitlam in early N ovem ber is the first major attack in Australia.

Understandably a lo t o f people got pretty paranoid about the Kerr-Fraser coup. But, serious as th e situation is, fascism is n o t just around the corner.

Kerr m ay be a Hindenburg b ut Fraser isn ’t Hitler. (See Michael Hamel-Green on Page 10).

E conom ic system s and political institu tions can be changed if w e keep our heads together, our feet m oving and our m ouths free from cliches like ‘fascist’ ‘which add little to any ideas w e have for change. We think Boris Frankel’s piece in this issue (Page 8) helps us to understand the nature o f the system we want to change.

The Conservative Coalition is made up o f pow erful urban, rural and over­ seas vested interests w hich think th at w h at’s best for business is best for Australia. (See centre-spread on Fraser). T hey are desparate and are using all their powers o f absolute m onarchy and political skullduggery. (See piece on republicanism this page).

We support th e ALP in this election even though w e are sceptical about com p lete d evotion to the m echanics o f parliamentary dem ocracy. (See inter­ views on Page 4 and our election photos on Pages 5-7). Our view is that A ust­ ralians should have m axim um direct control over their lives. A form o f direct dem ocracy based on our com m unities and workplaces.

— The Digger C ollective

It’s tim e we chucked the Queen of Oz and her GG into the sea

REPUBLICANISM ominous parallel with Hindenburg’s role in the rise of fascism in Germany in the ’30s.

by the Digger collective “We// may he say 'God save the Queen’. . . for no thing will save the Governor General ” —Gough WHitlam, 11-11-75, on the steps of Parliament House just after the Governor Gen* eral’s official secretary had read a document dissolving, the 29th Parliament.

Australians now have their best chance of creating a republic since Peter Lalor hoisted the ‘Southern Cross’ and declared the Republic of Victoria at the Eureka Stockade in 1854. : Whether you like Ms Betty Windsor of London or not, her chances of retaining the title ‘Queen of Australia’ have been seriously diminished by the actions of her Viceroy at Yarralumbla Palace., Of course you won’t hear the Labor Party saying any­ thing about it during the election campaign but it’s sure to be-raised with some passion at the next Federal Conference.

Ms Windsor as good as abdicated when she wrote to the Speaker of the House of Representatives on November 17' saying: “ As We understand the situation here, the Australian Constitution firmly places the prerogative powers of the Crown in the hands of the Governor General as the representative of the Queen in Australia. “ The only person competent to com­ mission an Australian Prime Minister is the Governor General, and the Queen has no part in the decisions which the Governor General must take in accor­ dance with the Constitution. “ Her Majesty, as Queen of Australia, is watching events in Canberra with close interest and attention, but it would not be proper for Her to intervene in per- • son in matters which are so clearly placed within the jurisdiction of the Governor General by the Constitution Act.” On November 25, the day the text of that letter was published in Australia, Gough Whitlam told a press conference in Adelaide that Sir John Kerr was “ the last of the Viceroys”.

Being a monarchy never really meant much to the Australian people, although the League of British Empire Loyalists, the RSL and the Women’s Weekly seemed to get off on it. Radicals stopped attacking the royal set-up years ago because it seemed to give it credence. The system did provide us with a fairly neutral Head of State who, although hardly a national figurehead, was useful for planting memorial trees, opening House of Representatives. And this is Aust­ fetes and had a nice set of feathers in his ralia and we are living in the 20th century. official liat.

Moreover, the Queen’s Man still has all We only got angry when royalist the reserve power of an absolute monarch, Menzies insisted on appointing tired old theoretically subject to no restriction. He Pommie aristocrats to the position and can prorogue (discontinue meetings of) with the cost of maintaining seven of the Parliament, collude with the judiciary, de­ bastards (13 counting the State Lieutenant clare states of emergency and is supreme Governors) at our expense. All of them Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces. official representatives of a foreign power.

All these powers are said to be derived The realities of the monarchical system from God and, in exchange, the monarch have now hit us with a bolt from the is head of the established Church of Eng­ blu e. . . from which, hopefully, we never land and carries the spiritual title of recover. The Queen’s Man sacked Our Man Defender of the [Anglican] Faith. even though he was the elected Prime Min­ ister and ccurunandedia majority? in the # * * * * JUpde&tbeA^estrpiuster system of con-

WE MUST HAVE A REPUBLIC AND WE MUST HAVE IT SOON. A republic, by definition, is a state in which the government is carried on by the people or through its elected representa­ tives. The question all Australians should be asking themselves after the recent events in Canberra is not ‘should we have one’ but how and when the system can be introduced and what form should it take in the Australian context?

(Digger newspaper would like to con­ tribute to this debate and stimulate our readers to add their own ideas. Unlike monarchies which spring from the heavens, republics can only be inspired from the people. If you have any ideas on the sub­ ject, talk them out among your friends and workmates and then send your sugges­ tions to us.)

Talk of introducing a republican system must of necessity involve discussion of a new Australian Constitution and take into account the new political realities resulting from the December 13 election.

If the royalist Liberal-National Country Party coalition wins there will be no im­ mediate chance of constitutional change: If Labor wins it .is generally expected that the Governor General will resign and a party hack (Fred Daly has been mentioned) will be installed as a puppet Governor General. No one will argue with this because both Lord Casey and Sir Paul Hasluck were former Liberal Party minis­ ters and if the Governor of Queensland, Sir Colin Hannah, is not a puppet of Prem­ ier Joh Bjelke-Petersen then nobody is.

This line of action is not however a solu­ tion to the constitutional crisis but merely a stop-gap measure.

Kelvin Geddie

stitutional monarchy which we inherited from the Poms, these dictatorial powers of royal absolutism are supposed to be exer­ cised only with the consent of his elected advisors. J.Kerr sacked his and appointed M.Fraser to the position.

There is no point fucking around, we have lost representative democracy as we knew it. The Governor General has pol­ iticised the position he holds and crystalised the extraordinary state power of the ‘Queen of Australia’. This has extremely dangerous ramifications for the future o f Australian democracy, and Michael HamelGreen on Page 9 of this issue draws an.

What is needed is a new constitution which will finally abolish the powers of the monarchy, the Governor General, the Senate upper house, and the reactionary states. This new constitution must give power to the people — it must create a new federalism based on affinity regions, give referenda and popular legislative initiatives a realistic chance, and provide a workable system for future generations.

The Australian constitution cannot be changed through the existing formulae for referenda or through constiutional con­ ventions based on the governments of the old British colonies which drew lines all over our island continent last century.

Political authority in Australia derives its legitimacy from the Australian Consti­ tution Act passed by the Imperial Parlia­ ment in London, receiving royal assent on July 9,1900. That Act must now be ammended for good.

As radicals we make no apologies for proposing reforms within the system.

People wanting to build a more demo­ cratic alternative to capitalism can only benefit from extensions of democracy now.

Long live the Republic of‘Australia!- *-

Page 4

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

THE DIGGER

These interviews were taken with people: who don’t normally get their ideas in the media.

Their views were collected by Glenda Dover and Chris Bridley: Photos by Euan Keddie.

“I’ve always had doubts about our system but I didn’t think they’d go that far” M ARK HENSHAW is 31 and has worked in factories for most o f his working life.

When I heard the news about the government being sacked I was irate. After the people said twice that they wanted Labor in for three years. They tell us we live in a democracy and we say “ beauty” , and go and vote.

Then some old pompous idiot with a wig says, “ I don’t care what the people think — you’re in, you’re out.” That’s not demo’cracy. I’ve always had doubts about our system but I didn’t think they’d go that far. It’s nothing short of a dictatorship.

The capitalist upper crust think Australia might be their last stronghold, and it was getting more socialist than they liked, so they did something about it. They won’t win friends over it — I ,don’t think many people liked it.

With world-wide inflation and un­ employment I’d hate to think what it would be like with the Libs in. They might cut down inflation, but unemployment would double.

It’s better for "everyone to have a quid, even if it doesn’t go far, than for half to have a quid and the other half to have nothing.

Labor were treading too hard on the unions but on the whole you have to vote for them.

If you belong to a union you have more say over things, but we need to get more organised.

A lot depends on the individual really. I don’t see how the aver­ age person will be able to sit back and take things if Fraser gets in.

We’ll have to build up our organi­ sation.

It won’t happen over­ night and it must come . . . some sort of general strike or revolu­ tion — not everyone marching along with tommy guns, but using the power we have in our work­ places.

I was working on the wharf when it happened. I was listening to parliament, nothing much to do, transistor to my ear and they announced that Whitlam got the sack. At first I thought it was a plot by Whitlam and Kerr to get the bills through the senate.

But I’m now worried that it was planned weeks ahead — possibly in the Melbourne Club over a few drinks. The union representa­ tive came down at 3.20pm. He told us there was a demo in the city. We walked off the job and that was that.

I don’t think Fraser wanted this election. He was scared of a half-senate election — Labor might have got a temporary ma­ jority. I think Anthony pushed him, because if the electoral bill had got through then the Country Party would have been ratshit.

Let’s face it. The government don’t control this country. It’s a handful of multi-nationals and BHP. They just put stooges like Fraser in there^

GRAEME McALLISTER is a 2S year old mechanic, married with three children.

Even though I don’t like Whit­ lam, I thought it was a bit disturb­ ing when he was sacked. It shouldn’t have been allowed. I didn’t know it was possible for Kerr to do that until it happened.

We should be a republic like America. The country can’t get along without a parliament, but it’s a joke at the moment. I think we should have more say than we’ve got now — it should have gone to the people — a referendum. It’s awkward when the vote is so balanced and I think we should have more parties.

If Labor could have got their way it would have been alright.

The way everyone demonstrated TOMMY MERINO has worked over the government getting sack­ on Melbourne’s wharves for seven ed is stupid, why couldn’t they years and is a job delegate. He’s just wait until the vote and then 30, married with one child. He have their say. I always voted belongs to the ALP. Liberal till Labor got in, but now there’s no Liberal Party worth putting in. I like the Labor Party now, bufc not Whitlam — he’s a dictator. I don’t like Fraser and wouldn’t like to see the Liberals get in, but most people I know reckon that Labor has buggered up the country. So many people on the dole annoys me — half of them don’t want jobs. I think some politicians are just lazy basstards too, although I like Steele Hall. We need a PM a bit better than Fraser.

in Australia because* the majority of people are satisfied at present.

CATHY FARR is 17 and doing 5th year at Mornington High The Liberal Party is an upper class party and its representatives; come from the upper classes to serve their own interests. The Labor Party supports the working class, not altogether, but more than the Liberals. But politicians are out for themselves. Parliament doesn’t really represent the people.

I don’t think our system is very democratic because people don’t really have very much say about what happens. Policies voted for aren’t carried out.

I believe we should fight for a system with only one class of people with equal opportunity and equal say in things. I don’t think this could even come about through parliament — what hap­ pened last week shows that parlia­ ment hasn’t much power when it comes to the crunch. It will have to be fought for through striking and direct action. It must come through the people them­ selves. It will take a long time.

LORENZO CASTELLUCCI is a tailor who lives and works in Fitzroy. He came to Australia from Italy 26 years ago.

I was very angry when Whitlam was sacked. My friends, they were angry too. Twenty years of Lib­ erals bad for labouring people.

They always give chances to the rich people. For the last two years, I'ran better business under Labor. Liberals say that-if Labor stays in, many small businesses will stop.

Mr Fraser and Mr Anthony and bullshitter Lynch are liars. You tell them to come to me — I’ll tell them. I’ve had experience. You get off a tram and break an ankle or get hit by a bus. Did they help fix it? No! Will they change? You put com in the ground, the com come.

Maybe change a little bit, not too much, a little more pointed, a little more square — but the same taste, the corn!

DOROTHY FIDLER and MARG SMITH do domestic work at a large restaurant. Dorothy worked as a shop assistant before marrying and has had her present job for six years. She has two children. Marg, who has. three children, has only worked outside the home recently.

Marg: I used to think this was a democratic country but these recent events make you stop and think. The government was elected and then put out without con­ sulting the people. I think it’s time our parliament was brought up to date — the state govern­ ments aren’t necessary, and We should get rid of the senate.

We shouldn’t be having this elec­ tion — no country can afford elections all the time. I think Whitlam is a decent man, and so is Gorton, although I don’t agree with all his views. But if Fraser gets in I think working people will have to take action such as strikes to protect their interests.

We complain about the unions but it’s them who have brought us up to our present standards.

The Liberals will do nothing for

us and I think we’d do better under Labor Dorothy: When Whitlam got sacked I thought it was a bad thing. I couldn’t understand it but it didn’t seem right — he should have been allowed to finish the three years. I don’t understand much about parliament, but we don’t seem to have enough say in running the country — we didn’t have any say in whether Whitlam got sacked. I don’t find things so much different whoever gets in, although Medibank has helped. Some politicians are out for themselves but most seem decent. I just vote for the man who I like most. I voted Liberal last time because I like Mr Snedden —he’s good-looking. I’m going to vote Labor , this time because I prefer Whitlam to Fraser.

LINDA HAWKE and B A R R Y ISBESTER are both ’19 and vote in this election for the first time.

Linda is unemployed and living on the dole. Barry has worked as a brickies labourer for about four years.

Barry: I’m not really interested in politics — I just let them fight it out and if I have to vote, I’ll vote Labor. My family vote Labor.

It was a dirty trick to stop the budget. I don’t think we have, much of a say in the running of the country — the politicians are supposed to do that —but I don’t trust politicians — they’re in it for the money. Whitlam says he’s for the people now, but when he gets in he might change. I hope they keep their promises this time. I didn’t know anyone could sack him — I thought he ruled the joint. I didn’t even know the Governor Generai existed until this happened — it seems silly when it was Whitlam that put him into office. We should know more about the power of these people. I’d like to see us get rid o f the national anthem and all that goes with it.

Linda: I was shocked. I think Fraser cut his own throat because I think they might have got in at the next election if they hadn’t done this. The people choose the government and they shouldn’t be sacked half way through. It has made the Liberals unpopular.

Both parties make promises but they don’t keep them. They say what they’re doing but all they’re ever doing is back-stabbing each other all the time — Fraser talks about Whitlam and Whitlam about Fraser. Politicians are all rats, crooks — they’re not genuine, not really for the people — they’re in it for themselves. I don’t like Fraser’s ideas — l don’t like any­ thing he says. I don’t even like the way he talks. If Labor gets in I hope they keep their promises — I hope they control prices, help the pensioners and do something about so many people on the dole. It’s a bit unfair because many of them could get jobs and getting the dole encourages them not to. It’s fair enough for those; who really need it, but they should find out more about you.

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

Page 5

THE DIGGER

Euan Keddie

The anti-Lahor newspaper The Daily Mirror being trashed in Sydney

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Sjtake,put at t ^ Melbourne Club . . . the Black Lqnql RightStflgg, is raised Euan Keddie

Larry Meitzer

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DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

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DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

THE DIGGER

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THE DIGGER

Page 8

champions of private enterprise — and be­ hat had the Labor Govern­ cause it plays this contradictory role the ment done since 1972 to conservatives have tried to defeat Labor make the stock-exchanges a number of times since 1972. jump for joy when Kerr sacked Whitlam Behind all the talk about Budgets and on November 11? government policies the health of capital­ Ad hoc explanations have been flying ism is very much at stake. How many of us thick and fast among suppoters, sympa­ know what happens to the taxes we pay or thisers and left-wing critics of the ALP. the difference between tarrifs, subsidies, And there’s been a lot of hysterical talk deficits, etc. Yet the seeming endless haggl­ about fascism being just around the corner. ing over taxes In the oldest form of class However, few of the explanations offer­ struggle. ed to date have been very convincing.

Everybody wants a slice of the pie.

Everybody wants assistance from the gov­ For the past few months some people ernment.

Big business and the big farmers have been saying that Fraser really didn’t want subsidies, tax relief, protection, in- . want power at the moment because he’d vestment allowances etc, while workers be left with all the headaches of the econ­ want more health, education, housing,trans­ omy, and it would be better for him to port and welfare. There isn’t enough for wait about a year so that Whitlam could everyone under the present capitalist sys­ solve some of the problems and become tem. So only organisedatid militant de­ more unpopular. mands of the working "population prevents On the other hand, some people were capitalists from.getting everything they also saying that Hayden’s 1975 Budget want. , was “ the most reactionary in recent In other words the struggle between history ” and very similar to Liberal — thosewho own business and those who National Country Party policies. don’t proceeds just as much over which party controls government policies as it An argument which unites both ALP does in every factory and office where and L—NCP supporters is one that says workers confront employers directly. that the state apparatus ( i.e. parliament and the Govenor General) should be there THE BACKGROUND OF THE ALP for the benefit of everyone, standing GOVERNMENT majestically above all sectional or class interests. So we get Malcolm Fraser attack­ t is important to remember the spec­ ing Whitlam for accepting the deci­ ific historical period of Labors’s rec­ sion of “umpire Kerr” , while Whitlam ent term in office. During the 25 retorts that Fraser is undermining the years of the post war capitalist boom, legitimacy of parliament and the state by several West European countries exper­ ‘de-neutralising” it in his heavy handed ienced social reforms when social democ­ bid for power. ratic labour parties won power, especially But even the main explanations offered in the 60s. by opponents of capitalism who don't be­ But in Australia the 1955 ALP/DLP lieve in the neutrality of the state are ser­ split prevented a Labor government from iously flawed. Firstly, some claim that the gaining power until late 1972. These cru­ real power and decisions within the country cial 23 years out of government witnessed are not made by the elected government a major running down in social reform and but are made in the boardrooms of the public services, at a time when the private capitalists and that parliament is a farce, business sector was generally booming. a smokescreen for their devious actions.

By the time Labor won in 1972 the seemingly endless growth of the “affluent The second main view also says that society” was severly shaken, by a world parliament is a farce, but seees government capitalist economic crisis. Yet the working as the mastermind, the farsighted planner, class demands made, it impossible to ignore concerned solely with ironing out problems the implementation of better social welfare for the capitalists. They say that the ALP is there to make capitalism work more smooth­ — for example, education spending. Not only did the ALP miss more than 20 years ly and to fix up the social problems left of favourable economic conditions to untouched by the L—NCP for 23 years. implement reform (as in Europe), but In both of these views the ALP is little "more important the very nature of capital­ more than a sort of puppet government ism in Australia made highly likely that for the capitalists — so how, come there was ALP reforms would meet with strong opp­ such opposition to it from private enter­ prise? As we’ll see the stakes are so high that osition.

For 23 years the conservative govern­ at present it is absolutely important for the employers’ parties (L —' NCP) to control the ments had giver! Australian urban and rural capitalists plenty of financial help resources an power of the state again.

Employers, big farmers and multi-national The ALP definitely wants to keep the companies that invested in Australia, receiv­ capitalist system going and to this end ed plenty of soft-cushioning protection, tax diverts workers from militant opposition subsidies, hand outs of all kinds. Of course to employers and prevents a socialist soci­ employers always say that they are entitled ety from being created. But it is also doing to get help from the government because things which upset many capitalists —even they pay big taxes. though Gough, and Bill Hayden are the

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

■

BORIS FRANKEL ASKS

WHY

I

THE RECORDCOLLECTOR Father Christmas crept down my chimberly pot last night I thought he war a giant red wombat It gave me such a fright So I whumped him with my cricket bat and screwed his ears tight But ¿hen to my immense chagrin Isaw my gift fall from his pack a tinsel wrap with an L.P in from Gregory Young of Trak As Santa lay there dying I put my album on but the bloody thing was warped and all Another Greg Young con.

JOIN THE LINES OF WOOD DUCKS THIS XMAS FOR A RELIABLE CON AT GREG YOUNG’S RECORD COLLECTOR. R E C O R D C O L L E C T O R - T W O SHOPS: CNR. TO O RA K R O A D A ND D A V IS AVENUE, SO U TH YA R RA , 267.1885, AND 7 1 0 G L E N F E R R IE ROAD, HAW THORN, 819 .1 9 1 7 .

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But where do bosses get the money to pay the taxes in the first place? The an­ swer is that they mainly get it from the workers sweating all day to make their profits. So workers really pay double — on their wages and then the employers share as well.

Whitlam, Crean, Cairns, Hayden and company all ran the departments of Trea­ sury, Overseas Trade, Labour and Immi­ gration, etc., to help make Australian busi­ ness prosper. And they have also, like the LNCP governments helped Australian capi­ talism to expand in Asia and the Pacific.

DID THE ALP THREATEN TO ALTER THE BALANCE OF POWER ? o why did private enterprise get so upset? The answer is that while both the ALP and the L—NCP be­ lieve in a “ Mixed economy” of public and private business, the ALP also be­ lieves that employers should be good boys and play the game honestly — fair go mate and no punches below the belt. * For 23 years conservative coalitions had put very little control on the rules of the

S

game and the “big boys” were having a ball. They could cheat and rip-off workers much more than in other European capital­ ist countries.

The Australian constitution also allowed employers to get protection from even more conservative State governments in Queens­ land, Western Australia, New South Wales and Victoria. This is because the Federal government in Canberra was limited in its powers to make uniform domestic policies for the whole of Australia.

But the constitution can be interpreted differently, and the ALP set about to use its Federal power more strongly. In other words the ALP began to intervene in many important areas of the economy ^ n d society precisely at a time when private enterprise was entering into a recession.

Here are some of the things which upset many employers.

— New legislation to outlaw restrictive monopoly trade practices, give consumer protection and control prices.

— Greater control over foreign investment and minerals policy —buying back some of the farm.

— Greater efficiency of business by reduc-

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

Page 9

THE DIGGER

\l

for the man When Snedden bowed to Anthony’s pressure in 1974, he just failed to win the election because of open disunity in the Liberal Party. And in 1975 pressure from employers over inflation and the overseas loans (which were to be used to build a state-owned national mining industry) lyere too great too resist.

Capitalists think it is ok to raise loans for state electricity, gas, board of works activities, etc., because these and other government services subsidise private business.

be achieved in a capitalist society. They say business demands. The Departments of ing protection —cutting tarrifs and sub­ sidies.

Media, Urban Development, etc., had to be that if everybody gets a good education, — Setting up Public corporations to com­ welfare, etc., then social equality will be es- ; ¡stopped or abolished said the conservatives. pete with business, like the government This general attempt by the ALP to tablished gradually. They completely under- j estimate the forces opposed to any form tighten business rules and the increases in insurance office and expanding the role of the government investment bank, and hav­ social reform all came together at a time of social change. The reformist regime of ing the Australian Industry Development Allende in Chile paid the penalty for fail­ when economic recession was deepening.

Corporation. ing to recognise this fact.

Employers wanted more protection and Employers felt threatened by: subsidies-in 1973 to 1975, but the ALP The ALP has two basic tendencies wasn’t as generous as the L — NCP. The —Industrial policies ( before May 1974 ) within it. The first believes in central Country Party was very worried about which did not bash unions enough and bureaucratic planning to keep capitalism electoral distribution which would change allowed militant wage demands. going by making uniform policies on the odds of the game. Conservatives were —The undermining of the work ethic both economics, welfare, etc., in Canberra. worried about the Family Law bill, alter­ by increasing unemployment money (even This tendency upset many employers native radio stations, consumer protection, though it was still totally inadequate) and and conservatives hiding behind the pro­ less censorship, etc. Australia had been so by attempting to give public servants bet­ tection of the State governments such as repressed and conservative for decades ter wages, increased superannuation bene­ Bjelke Petersen, Lewis, Hamer etc. The that the ALP appeared to be too un­ ALP was threatening these forces by fits and conditions. This results in more pressure on private employers because settling. giving direct grants of money for urban their workers also want similar conditions and regional development, education and or didn’t want to do lousy and poorly paid HOW DID THE CONSERVATIVE by employing more technocrats, fat cats, jobs.

FORCES REACT ? etc,and centralising the laws making more —The National Compensation Scheme and and more employers deal with Canberra early everytime the ALP has National Superannuation Ftmd which meant instead of just their local conservative won government the conservative more protection for workers and more governments. forces have had to regroup. By costs for employers. And for the first time Life was becoming annoying and unpre - i the time McMahon was defeated in 1972 dictable for conservative bosses who wanted) the Liberal party was in open disunity. women doing housework were also to re­ ceive these benefits. to be left alone like in the good old pre-’72 ! The Country Party maintained its conser­ days. The other tendency in the ALP was It must be stressed that none of these vative form but tried to increase its even more upsetting to the conservatives. policies were intentionally anti-capitalist. strength by regrouping with the DLP There is a growing minority within the They were all designed to eliminate major which failed in most states. But the Lib­ ALP that believes in greater citizen partici­ eral Party was divided between hardline abuses carried on for years by Australian pation, and the abolition of many injustices Conservatives, such as Greenwood and employers. Not only were capitalists pro­ against women, blacks and migrants. This tected for 23 years, but Australia had one Fraser, pragmatic middle grounders such tendency advocated more local control and as Snedden, and the various “trendies”. of the lowest levels of spending on social people’s initiatives in community affairs, welfare in developed capitalist countries.

It was the “trendies” who wanted to ecology, and social affairs generally.

When Labor began spending more on edu­ move the Liberals close to many ALP social cation and welfare the public sector grew Conservative people and employers policies and in fact succeeded in a few areas. fastet than the private sector in catching up. were angry at growing demands for sexual It was only in 1975 when Fraser captured freedom, environment control, electoral Within the ALP there are people who the Liberal machine for the conservatives distribution and anti-racist, and anti big have the naive belief that social justice can that the ALP faced a unified threat.

H

After alL th£y don’t want to pay for elec­ tricity, roads, ports, sewage, if working taxpayers will foot the bill. But the Loans Crisis money was not the usual type of -loan to help the private sector.

The growth of the State in order to keep capitalists happy, and workers passive by giving them more social welfare, is a very tricky and contradictory process. That is why capitalist economists and politicians are divided on how best to solve inflation without creating major political crises. If they cut government spending too much, then umemployed workers may cause even more trouble. But if they spend more on .social welfare, then employers feel threat­ ened by tax costs, inflation and a drop in investment.

These divisions revealed themselves in the ALP and after confusion, incompe­ tence,'and experiments under Crean, Cairns etc., the technocrats such as Hayden and McLelland got control.

They’proceeded to attack workers by demanding wage control, abandoning or changing earlier policies on many things like foreign investment, national compen­ sation, the elimination of poverty and so forth. About the only thing that mattered was how to keep the private sector happy.

Whitlam believed that workers and the poor could be forced into carrying the burdens of problems created by the general crisis in capitalism.

The ALP had capitulated to pressures and was now trying to stay in office almost for the sake of power itself. But really hard line conservatives such as Fraser saw the writing on the wall for capitalism if expan­ sionary policies of greater social welfare were allowed to continue. A ‘mixed’ economy can only grow to the extent where it solves more problems for capital­ ists than it creates.

All governments must disguise what they are doing in order to keep people believing in the rules of the game. Everyday the L — NCP is bringinging out new polic­ ies which either give more power back to the States, water down the ALP policies or directly eliminate them. The only trouble is that even the L —NCP has to promise almost as much on social welfare as the ALP in order to gain power through elect­ ions.

Both Nixon and Heath were successful in reversing trends in welfare expenditure over a three to four year period. The L — NCP’s task is to implement a similar policy of reducing our standard of living.

Will Whitlam and Hayden go “ all the way with capital” as Harold Wilson did in Britain or will Fraser direct the forces of reaction?

One thing we can be sure of, the crisis will not end on December the 13th.

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

THE DIGGER

Page 10

Adolf’s coup was legal too ...

by Michael Hamel-Green What happened on Tuesday, November 11 was nothing less than a legal coup d’etat. Without forewarning to the Labor Government, Kerr effectively handed over political power and opportunity to a mino­ rity coalition representing big business, multinational, farming and other conserva­ tive interests in Australia.

Government “by and for the people” was suddenly replaced by government by and for a minority.

Many people will be wondering where they have seen this movie before.

The answer, in two words, is Germany, 1933.

Hitler came to power through a series of manoeuvres that strikingly parallel the way Fraser is now seeking power —or, more precisely, confirmation in power.

In July 1932, the German elections re-( suited in no party having an outright majo­ rity: the Nazis and their allies won 276 seats in the German Parliament (Reichstag) compared to 222 seats for the Social Demo­ crats and Communists and 97 seats for the Centre (Catholic) Parties. No viable govern­ ing coalition emerged, so the head of state, President Hindenberg, dissolved parliament and called fresh elections for November 6.

These elections changed the situation little, except for a small reduction in the Nazi vote. After much machination and secret negotiations between the leading right wing politicians, Hindenberg (himself a conser­ vative) eventually commissioned Hitler as Chancellor on January 30,1933. Hitler im­ mediately called new elections for March 5 and set about exploiting the government apparatus to the utmost to achieve an out­ right majority for the Nazi Party. As Goebbels wrote at the time (February 3): “The struggle is a light one, since we are able to employ all the means of the State. Radio

and press are at our disposal. We shall achieve a masterpiece of propaganda. Even money is not lacking this time.”

The climax of the whole campaign, in fact the real beginning of Hitler’s dictator­ ship, came when the Reichstag burned down on the night of February 27,1933.

There is evidence that the Nazis themselves set fire to the Reichstag, but at the time they blamed it on the communist move­ ment and pinned the action on a young Dutch ex-communist, van der Lubbe. Hitler claimed that the action was the start of a nationwide communist uprising and suc­ ceeded in inducing President Hindenberg to declare a state of emergency under Article 48 of the Constitution. On the night of February 28, the police rounded up all leading communists together with other anti-Nazis, making a total of 10,000 arrests all over Germany. In the election that fol­ lowed, the Nazis and their allies did in fact achieve a slight majority, winning 51 per cent of the seats in parliament, showing that their propaganda and intimidation through the state apparatus had not been in vain. Since 81 of the Communist Depu­ ties and 26 of the Social Democrat Depu­ ties elected had either been gaoled or for­ ced into hiding, Hitler was then successful in gaining a two-thirds majority necessary to pass an Enabling Bill granting his govern­ ment absolute powers for four years. From that moment on. Weimar democracy was over.

It should be noted by all those who are currently defending the Kerr-Fraser coup as perfectly legal and proper that at no stage of Hitler’s rise to power did he fail to gain legal and perfectly proper constitution­ al sanctions for his actions. In fact, there are grounds for thinking that Hitler had more legal justification for his moves than Fraser currently possesses. Certainly, the majority of the German parliament did not ;

pass a vote of no confidence in the new Chancellor in the same way that the House of Representatives has done with the care­ taker Prime Minister.

The parallels with the present Australian situation are ominous indeed. The right wing leader of a minority conservative co­ alition has been commissioned as head of the government by an equally conservative head of state. In handing power over to Fraser, Kerr was in fact more in violation of democracy than Hindenberg, since the latter could at least argue that no single party commanded an absolute majority and the Nazi Party did have the largest number of deputies; in Kerr’s case, however he quite blatantly took power away from the party with an absolute majority in the House.

With power in his hands, Fraser has not lost an opportunity to “employ all the means of the State” to guarantee his go­ vernment’s success at the elections he him­ self has called. The “caretaker.’ govern­ ment is already taking care to manipulate every branch of the government machinery for its own advantage.

It has already claimed Treasury autho­ rity for allegations that the Labor Party has concealed facts about the economy — al­ though it later transpired that nothing had been concealed. Sixty eight Treasury offi­ cials have already protested that they were being asked to carry out politically-motiva­ ted work. At the Ministry of Labour, the caretaker Minister, Street, has already asked his department to produce comments and recommendations on the Liberal-NCP industrial policy. Similarly, the Minister for Health, Chipp, has asked his Depart­ ment for costing of the Liberal-NCP wel­ fare policy. In Foreign Affairs, Peacock has reversed the Whitlam government’s decision to abstain on the Korean vote in the UN. And Fraser himself has demanded

from all departments information on the activities of the Labor government during the time that the Liberal-NCP senators were blocking supply.

The “ caretaker” government is naturally exploiting to the fullest the publicity that is automatically given: to special govern­ ment announcements and addresses to the nation — as the Fraser address on the eco­ nomy well illustrated. At the same time, they have monopolised all the political ad­ vertising time over commercial tv and radio.

The prior planning of the legal coup by Kerr and Fraser permitted the Liberals to book all the prime tv advertising time two weeks before the coup actually occurred. ~ Since the monopoly controlled media are only too happy to accommodate the Libe­ rals, Fraser would seem all set to achieve “a masterpiece of propaganda” .

So much for the ways in which the “caretaker” government is already ex­ ploiting government machinery for its own ends —and we still have three weeks to go . before the election.

But the most disturbing parallel of all may be seen in the letter bomb attacks that have just taken place against Fraser, Kerr and Bjelke-Petersen. The fact that such bombs were not accompanied by explanatory statements would seem to belie the infe­ rence that they were sent by a left wing radical with serious intent to protest the Kerr-Fraser coup; rather it would suggest that the bombs are the work of a right wing provocateur seeking both to win sympathy for Fraser and to provide him with the pre­ text for declaring a state of emergency and rounding up left wing opponents. In other words, the bomb attacks may well be de­ signed to serve the same function as the Reichstag fire served for Hitler.

That Fraser has not already moved to take some such action does not rule out Continued on Page 17

Authorised by: W. Tracy on behalf of Australian Labor Party, 11 Brunswick Sfrçet, Fijtzroy,f3Q65.t ,, , , „ 4

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

Page 11

THE DIGGER

Sunday Too Far Away reels out those old cliches.

The Australian Dream

by Tim Rôwse Sunday Too Far Away presents the popular mythological image the Australian labour movement has aboutthe ordinary Australian worker and about itself. And its socialism is the ambiguous, romantic va­ riety shown today in the popularity of Eureka and the flag of the Southern Cross.

The apparent sympathy for the Aust­ ralian working class in Sunday repeats old cliches about the Australian worker —cele­ bration as put-down —and turns the shearers in the film into objects of nostalgic contemplation. Sunday ’s workerism is sen­ timental —it endorses the shearers inas­ much as they embody certain patriotic, human values. It documents their lives vi­ vidly but gives us only a politically watered down understanding o f their hardship.

Not surprisingly the film has been re­ ceived sympathetically in most quarters.

The South Australian Film Corporation’s press release has comments by the makers and backers of the film which suggest that they were putting a myth of the working class onto celluloid. It is a well-established practice amongst Australian intellectuals to equate “the national character” with cer­ tain non-industrial working class life styles (shearers, wharfies, building workers — Nino Culotta).

Screenplay writer, John Dingwall, says “scratch an Australian and you’ll find a Foley” (Foley, the main character, well actedT)y Jack Thompson, is tough, impul­ sive, individualistic, a gambler, a drinker, warm and vulnerable).

Ken Hannam, the director, thinks the film expresses the Australian ethos, the outback and “that long line of nomads and ‘loners’ dating back to my grandfather and long before. I had the good fortune to have heard so many fresh stories from old lips in the sheds and hotel bars of my youth.

Dingwall’s treatment seemed to me then, to sum up all of this, and be a big leap forward in telling others about our Australian selves in truly international terms. I felt that any v itinerant worker in any part of the world would recognise and understand thèse people” .

Ian Laurie, vice-chairperson of the Ade­ laide International Film Festival commen­ ted that Foley “has in common with some of his more conventional fellow country­ men a beery asexuality and partisan loyal­ ties totally defined by the immediate in­ terests of himself and his work mates”. But “the familiar side of him does not disguise the face that Foley possesses everything that Australians have lost” .

For these three men the film illustrates the following familiar ideology: that the distinctive qualities of Australians are those nurtured in a certain harsh rural life style; that Australia is a culture of basically homo­ geneous values, those of a radical, egali­ tarian working class; that these values, noble but unsophisticated, innocent but admirable, are gradually disappearing “ih a nation which prides itself on its material progress, its political maturity and its rapid urbanisation” ^Laurie) Hannam feels this decline of a simple, sweaty, Australian heroism in his own in­ dustry. “ I strongly believe that Australia has too long fostered a tradition of creating without pain.”

There’s lots of pain in Sunday; nearly all of it occurs in working up big profits for a cocky who waits in his comfortable home­ stead, hoping the “scum” (shearers) don’t cut off the prick of his stud ram. The film is quite explicit in its sympathies, but the comments I’ve just quoted show what that pain is all about as far as the makers are concerned. Their film does not encourage us to link that cocky to the current prea­ chers of wage restraint or to Mr. Anthony.

It is not so much a documentary indict­ ment of a class system, as a myth of spiri­ tual heroism, of dignity for the sake of dignity, rough humour for the sake of

rough humour, earthy simplicity and lonely desperation because Australia is, or should be, about earthy simplicity, and because lonely desperation has been the seed plot of our most noble qualities: humour, prag­ matism, endurance, and no bullshit.

Are you wondering where you’ve heard all these sentiments before? Certainly it’s all in Henry Lawson and other “ Legend of the Nineties” writing. Sunday is from this tradition. Since 1920, Australian intellec­ tuals have evoked this myth as the past from which we’ve strayed. Every decade Australian intellectuals rewrite this lapse from pastoral heroism and each time they celebrate the qualities of working people as they were once, when they struggled for

something more than money. Why is the film about shearers in 1955 and not about waitresses, assembly-line workers and bus drivers in 1975?

Sunday's romantic myth of the Aust­ ralian national character can be documen­ ted a little more both as a tradition and as elements within the film.

The first element of the myth is its anti­ urbanism. For years Australian intellectuals of a literary, populist bend, have con­ demned the cities for extinguishing vital Australian qualities nurtured by the bush.

Vance Palmer said so in 1920. W.K. Han­ cock repeated the sentiment in his seminal Australia (1930). George Johnston revived it in 1966 in his bestseller, The Australians:

WHY DO A FUNNY,AMUSING ADVERTISEMENT ABOUT THIS SHOP OF OURS?

D .B. D E C .'7 5 T M N O T WORRIED’

“Most of us have already turned away from the brown heart of the old land to this new crescent on its rim, where we can make our shelters less uneasily. And outback people always talk wistfully, of taking their holi­ days by the sea, even when the sea is a thousand miles away. I have always felt both are a ritual to a more profound retrea t. . . ” In Sunday, the city is alluded to as.an alien, unsatisfying place. Firstly, it is the place where Foley has just come from, the Brisbane fish markets; Foley is back where he belongs, where,he is respected for his work. A more extended consideration of the city is in old Gary’s (Reg Lye) wistful memories of his son, who now works as a window dresser in Sydney. Gary couldn’t find him; his son is “lost”. “There’s an aw­ ful lot of windows in Sydney, Foley” , he says sadly.

Another element of the myth is that it contrasts the nomadic life’s bravado with a tamer domesticity. George Johnston again: “The legendary swagman is now a stranger in the country towns of Australia, where main street on a Saturday morning, when the farmers and their wives come in, has a quality of formality as precise and beautiful as a minuet.” This nomadic-domestic con­ trast can also be found in the frequent use of “ suburbia” as a critical term in descrip­ tive writing about Australia. In Sunday the “undomestic” nature of the shearers is a vivid sub-theme. Beresford (played by Sean Scully — remember Smiley?) is abused as “queer” because he writes to his wife, in one of the most stereotyped scenes in the film. Less conscious is the recurring theme that the shearers’ look is somehow different from the men. The first cook, an alcoholic (on lemon essence, rather than the ennobl­ ing beer and rum) can’t cook and is thrown out. The cook who replaces him is a great cook, but has a rather non-masculine -man­ ner and appearance and a sublimated “ero­ tic” relationship with his stove.

The final element in this myth and the one which the makers thought important enough to spell out is the theme of noble belligerence and competitiveness as character traits of a working class persona­ lity, rather than as responses to overriding material circumstances. The film’s epilogue appears in the final shot: “They struck for nine months. They won in the end. But it wasn’t so much the money as the insult.”

This emphasis on the subjective reasons for striking follows a well-worn tradition. In 1930 Hancock said that trade union mili­ tancy was an emotional thing, just like the feverish partisanship of sporting crowds. In 1958, J.D. Pringle, one-time editor of the Sydney Morning Herald said: “ One some­ times gets the impression that both sides rather enjoy a strike or industrial dispute because it gives them a chance to display their courage and fighting qualities” These evocative and ultimately trivialising senti­ ments continue to be expressed today.

I would not try to defend this viewing of the film as définitive. At one level Sun­ day is a very moving documentary of wor­ king class life and struggle, and if you are so motivated, you can generalise your sym­ pathy for them with a modern day sym­ pathy for the working class against not only Fraser, but Whitlam, Hayden and McLelland. However, the film pushes you to look at it another way too: the shearers as a human symbol, or a patriotic symbol, whose class character is essentially conser­ vative since it emphasises struggle, pain, etc. as the “human condition” which we’ve smugly forgotten, and to which we should all pay hommage. The Australian labour movement’s humanism and populism may be able to defend us against Fraser, but will Gough, if returned, be able to go any further than elaborate gestures of solidarity with little substance?

Sunday Too Far Away contains the ideological strengths and weaknesses of the Whitlamâ and the Dunstans who are now proudly distributing it.

/»Ah prastr’s family omnec/hn was wirking far him in If6 f as i f does roo/sy. /n m,#/- year, hd gronotfp/hcr te d made enough money ¡)j a merchant Of/h-t, Mb/orton yo/d diggufgs to /¿art- hVyihg runsIpfi/ptrt/es in tf/eensfond, toco/ond Victoria. Simon pvaser entered- Victoria's /•egis/ative i/j /tf? / eras 4

WHO'S WHO IN AUSTRALIA, 1974 FRASER, Hon. Jo h n Malcolm, M.A. Oxon., M inister for E ducation and Science since Aug. 1971, M.H.R. (Lib.) for W annon, Vic., since 1955 ; Minr. for Defence 1969-71 (res.)v for Educ. & Sci. 1968- 69, for th e Army 1966- 68 : son of late J. Neville Fraser, Nareen, Vic.; b. May 21 , 1930; ed. Meib. C.E.G.S., M agdalen Coll.

Oxford; Merab. Jo in t Parity. Cttee. on Foreign Affairs 1962- 66 ; Memb. Cl. Aust.

Nat. Univ. 1964- 66*, m . Dec. 9 , 1956, Tam ara, d. S. R. Beggs, 2 s. 2 d.; recrea­ tions, fishing, photography; /clubs, Mel-, bourne, Com monwealth (Canberra); ad­ dress, Parliam ent House, ' Canberra, A.C.T., 2600.

do/ey a te -to toe federal£eni/er)ta?n, w dsefecfect to to e fiirtS e n a te andtodtuecourse reo nu edh if /rn rp i/h ro d .

frt*jtees). o n e of-grounded's ¿es/j/tm fs was ft infirm iff, shartho/den o f toe, 6/yof/nc./iboi/me£anki'>i39-> tte/itw a s fhertvah/y joopd- The p a n f cd/mascd three mocks /«far despite tot. parhaiventananld regoes’t th a t not# s/hg/c .share. . . . be . . sold. .

2>reUorj and. friends ____ n G n f e n < 0 2 '/y- n>///f(>n of/he o f. is haae¿tengiven da'/pmi//i6n ¿finks funds- r'raJerf'Co. had- ¿omoweddete/ooc- 7he fraser//fam es' 1/ f -Jftmsnd ‘Tk'rVS’t*. father JdkJtnak* te h ad rd stoned msJ On O fJi, >d •->.fi± fs t rtsxr, Si Jin /9 k » /ftr ayphCatoon ndi/sS'kvAt/»J-k -Mr, n tf /rtC ifr s'capltdl.

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THE DIGGER

Page 14

earthnews Portuguese landlords get n asty

by Todd Darling Lisbon: The women and their children come to court, bringing whole neighbourhoods with them.

Inside, their chant, “ Houses yes, shacks no” echoes against the courtroom walls.

This is the scene being repeated in one courtroom after another as Portugal’s landlords try to regain control of their property from the thousands of poor families who have begun occupying it.

The mounting struggle between landlords and squatters is one of the little reported crises facing embattled socialist government in Portugal.

The movement began six months ago, under the communist dominated government of Fasco Goncalves, when popular agitation was at its height. Entire families, crammed into the shanty towns surrounding Lisbon and other large cities, began moving into vacant and better built houses in the cities. In many cases, owners had vacated these houses for the specific purpose of letting them rot. Once condemned and des­ troyed, the land itself could then be resold .at a profit.

As hundreds of such houses were seized each week, the left wing government moved to legal­ ise the occupations. Squatters who could afford a house or already had one were evicted, but others were allowed to stay provided they found the owner and negotiated a fair rent based on the building’s current value. In some cases neigh­ bourhood commissions were for­ med to find vacant dwellings, give them out according to need, and

locate the landlords. More often than not, desperation stretched these legal boundaries, as many went ahead and occupied housing on their own.

The present government was in­ stalled just as these ,‘irregular’cases began coming to trial. Called “moderate” by the foreign press, “reactionary” by its leftist opposi­ tion, and “socialist” by its suppor­ ters, this government is seen by landlords as their chance for vindication.

By now at least one case pei day is being tried somewhere in Portugal.

Ope of the first —involving a woman who had never negotiated a rent for her new dwelling — took place in Lisbon’s Palace of Justice.

Denouncing the judge as a fascist and the lawyers as liars, the crowd —including old women and young bearded activists — grew increas­ ingly agitated. One young man jumped the barricade separating the courtroom from the spec­ tators, grabbed the records of the case from the court clerk, and disappeared.

When the prosecuting attorney and the judge tried to leave, they were roughed up and their exit was blocked by crowds jamming the elevators. The civilian police, climbing nine flights to the court­ room, arrived out of breath and completely outnumbered.

The crowd dispersed of its own accord, after discussing tactics for subsequent hearings.

In the later hearing, held pri­ vately, the accused woman was found guilty but not given a sen­ tence. Today she remains in her new house, warmer, than she was last winter.

U.S. invades P an am a Two thousand additional US Marine paratrooper commandos arrived in Panama the last week of August, according to Panama’s Foreign Minister, Juan Antonio Tack. Speaking before represen­ tatives from 110 countries assem­ bled in Lima, Peru, for the Fifth Conference of Non-Aligned Na­ tions, Minister Tack accused the US of violating Panama’s sove­ reignty.

Immediately on their arrival, the troops allegedly began war manoeuvres, displaying the most modem and sophisticated arma­ ments.

According to Panamanian Am­ bassador Nander Pitty, these 2,000 troops form the vanguard of 40,000 soldiers of the 82nd Air­ borne Division which are training in Panama for a possible invasion of that tiny country of one and a half million persons.

The US military has not made a public statement on the landing o f t helsoldiers. _ _ ■__ ,

However, a call to their Emer­ gency Operations Centre resulted in a confirmation by a Captain Cornell that an undetermined number of paratroopers from the 82nd Division had indeed landed in Panama.

Captain Cornell revealed that “troops from the 82nd came down for a jungle operations course”.

When asked if this recent land­ ing was routine and normal, Cap­ tain Cornell said that he could not comment. When asked to respond to the Panamanian contention that this represents an “invasion” of Panama, Captain Cornell respon­ ded with the following story: “ During the Kent State killings by the National Guard there were those who said the army invaded the university. However, this was pure propaganda, as is this allega­ tion.”

Commenting on why the Pana­ manians would be concerned about the arrival of such troops, Captain Cornell asserted.that “this.

Another case recently involved a woman who occupied a vacant apartment and signed a paper police had told her would legalise her occupation. Several days later, she was told the paper she had signed ordered her to vacate the apartment or face two years in prison.

The scene at her trial was much the same: outraged spectators shaking their fists and calling for popular justice. This time the judge never appeared, and after waiting 45 minutes the audience announced it would hold a popular tribunal. The tribunal met in the patio of the courthouse, with people standing in a large circle, arms linked. The judge’s absence was taken as an indication of his own guilt in the proceedings. An activist in one of the revolutionary left parties addressed the group, warning that to defend the occu­ pations people would have to take up arms. The neighbourhood people cheered. An hour later, the judge and lawyers were asked to step forward to speak on behalf of the landlord. No-one appeared and the defendant, already home guarding her house with some neighbours, was declared innocent.

Ironically, the success of such occupations has created the begin­ nings of a serious shortage in the cities. With 300,000 people re­ cently returned from Angola and shanty town dwellers no longer content to suffer in their shacks,, there are few houses in Portugal left to occupy.

DECEMBER 30

H earst for H ollyw ood In the wake of the flood of newspaper stories, magazine ar­ ticles and books on the Patty Hearst case, can Hollywood be far behind?

Obviously not. No less than three full length feature films are soon to be released, all of them tales of a kidnapping in which the victim embraces her captors’ cause.

One of the Movies, called A bduction, has been filmed on a $300,000 budget, and will carry an “ R” rating.

A second movie called Snatch­ ed, will also be “ R-rated” , and will detail how the kidnap victim is seduced by her kidnappers.

The third film, however, will be very mueh “ X-rated” . It’s to] be called Patty and will feature druggings, torture and rape. The makers of Patty say that the final scene was hurriedly re-shot following Patty Hearst’s real life capture. They say the final scene of Patty “will show her locked up in the clink.”

—Berkley Barb.

Fem inist sharks A navy scientist is reporting — in the wake of the “Jaws Craze” — that sharks would much rather attack men than women.

Doctor Scott Johnson, a bio­ physicist at the Naval undersea centre in San Diego, says that a study of recorded shark attacks indicates that the human-eating fish prefer men by a nine to one margin over women.

The doctor says there is no known reason for this preference.

Johnson says one theory is that men give off a hormone secretion that triggers aggressiveness or even hunger pangs in sharks.

A relatively obscure and weath­ ered seafarer, Terry Cleary, says this theory is bullshit. Men get eaten, he says, because they swim in stupid places. All the same he: suggests that males wear a bikini and a wig just to be safe.

Todd, Darling is an American free-lance journalist based in Portugal,.

—Pacific News Service is pure propaganda relating to the treaty negotiations. Everything which happens in Panama these days relates to the Canal, which they want back”.

The Panama Canal Zone is the headquarters of the US Southern Command. In addition to the eco­ nomically and militarily important Panama Canal, the Zone houses 14 military bases.

The US government and mili­ tary employ over 40,000 people in the Canal, of whom some 15,000 are military personnel.

As to the specific actions of the 2,000 new arrivals, according to the Panamanian daily Matutino, “with modern arms and combat planes, they are engaging in ma­ noeuvres near our people in open provocation to intimidate our pea­ sants who have already suffered damage to their crops” .

Speaking of the 2,000 troops, Foreign Ministry advisor Julio Yao commented: “This is very serious.

When the US does such ma­ noeuvres it has national impact up­ on our peasants and the entire population. Peasants claim to have seen helicopters and had their crops, damaged by the military,

manoeuvres.”

Ongoing events in Panama help explain why the US might engage in the “provocative” landing of such troops. The US is negotiating for a new Canal Treaty. These negotiations are based on an eight point agreement signed by Secre­ tary of State Kissinger and Mini­ ster Tack on February 7, 1974.

In addition to these ongoing treaty negotiations and the week long Non-Aligned meeting in Lima another timely element was the timely announcement on August 28 by General Omar Torrijos, Panama’s head of governments that Panama had established rela­ tions with the government of South Vietnam.

Madame Nguyen Thi Binh, South Vietnamese Foreign Mini­ ster, commented in Lima that her country was proud to open rela-. tions with Panama because “the two peoples of South Vietnam and Panama have been struggling for the same cause”. She went on to add the support of her country to the struggle of Panama for con­ trol of their Canal and total sovereignty of all Panamanian territoiy,...

South Vietnam is one of the numerous Third World countries which has actively supported Pana­ ma in her claim over the Canal.

Since the March 197 3 meeting of thè United Nations Security Coun­ cil in Panama, this country has been rapidly accumulating support for her demands for total sove­ reignty. At that meeting the US was forced to cast a veto against a resolution favouring Panama’s position.

At a subsequent meeting in Panama on March 22, 1975, the Presidents of Panama’s neighbour­ ing countries — Colombia, Costa Rica, and Venezuela — issued a joint statement again favouring Panama. On August 17,1975, the Conference of- Latin American Bishops of the Roman Catholic Church issued a statement at its annual meeting: “ Panama has be­ come a symbol of Latin Americanness. We must all have solidarity with the struggle of this people to gain sovereignty over the Canal Zone. This is not only the hope o f Panama alone, but of all Latin1 America.” jriW ifL

~

. ~

• I

; Fantasies freed A women’s publishing group in Half Moon Bay, California, has announced plans to produce “non-sexist” pornography design­ ed especially for women.

The group, New Times Press, claims that all pornography today is published by men, and is based almost exclusively on male sex fantasies.

New Times Press claims “Wom­ en in traditional pornography are raped, subserviant and unreal, cat­ ering to male sexist fantasies. Men in traditional pornography are always perfect, able to give and take sex at any time, without problems.”

New Times Press says it is looking for female contributors to their new “non-sexist erotic journal,” to be called Ecstasy.

-Drummer

Page 15

THE DIGGER

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

Engineering genetic disasters Nevertheless, fear for the fu­ tious we ought to be.”

The risks from genetic engineer­ ture of science and humankind if Dr. Y, a cancer researcher, ing are in fact immeasurable. some accident does occur has led called in sick today. In his lab he Scientists have no way of knowing many scientists to agree to the has been growing cancer virus how their new microbes will be­ heed for controls. Temporary genes and attaching them to com­ have outside the test tube. While guidelines were set by scientists mon bacteria that live in the at this stage the potential for good last February at an international human gut. Today he is worried is enormous, so is that for mass conference in Asilomar, California. that instead of finding a cure for destruction.

These guidelines — which have no cancer, he has made a new kind of Many scientists soft pedal this force of law — prohibit experi­ virus that spreads the disease — factor, however. James Watson, ments with known deadly genes first to him and then to others. Nobel Prize winner for his disco­ and genes that spread resistance to This is the nightmare of cancer very of the “ double helix” con­ disease, and offer suggestions and other research involving “ge­ struction of genes, can’t under­ about “containing” other danger­ netic manipulation” — transplant­ stand why “they want to put ous material in the lab. After es­ ing the genes of one cell into people out of business for some­ tablishing the guidelines, the group another. With their new tools, thing you can’t measure” . Yet the rescinded an earlier moratorium — A survey by the US Army scientists can create forms of life new microbes are potentially de­ also voluntary — on all genetic indicates that 6,900 weapons and that nature never could by itself. vastating weapons of biological manipulations.

1.1 million rounds of ammunition To stop their nightmares from be­ war. As one observer points out: However, the weakness of the stockpiled by the US Army over coming realities, scientists have “The new technique offers a way guidelines raises for some the the past few years have simply issued moratoriums on the most of accomplishing what the biolo­ question of whether scientists can hazardous types of experiments vanished. gical warfare laboratories . . . tried be trusted to regulate themselves.

The survey, made public by and offered guidelines for safety. for years to do apparently without Both the NIH committee and the Representative Les Aspin, reveals But controversy still rages about much success — making significant Asilomar group consist, for the that from 1970 to 1974, enough whether they can be trusted to improvement in the deadliness most part, of genetic engineers M-16 rifles and other weapons regulate their own work when of harmful viruses and bacteria.” with vested interests in the field. were stolen to equip 10 combat public safety as a whole is at Even more science-fiction like Critics have urged representation batallions with small arms and stake. is the chance that at some time in from other scientists, the public Genetic manipulation has been ammunition. the future one could replace and laboratory workers exposed to Aspin, in releasing the study, hailed in the scientific community “socially undesirable” traits §g the experiments. “ Letting mole­ “revolutionary break­ adds that if security is so bad as a perhaps to create a super-race cular biologists regulate ‘genetic on small arms, who’s watching through” that could unravel the along the lines of the Nazi ideal — engineering’ research is like asking mysteries of cell reproduction and the nuclear bombs? by growing ‘good’ genes in a the tobacco industry to regulate —Drummer ultimately the origins of cancer. the sale of cigarettes” , says King Scientists have predicted they will person. But as for these social and of MIT’ __________________ alter genes to give living things the political questions raised by their work, scientists “ are reluctant to Linda Siskind, formerly news power to resist disease. Inherited consider it any of their business” , director o f a Pacifica radio station, diseases like haemophilia and di­ is feature editor o f Pacific News. abetes would be cured by replac­ Harvard’s Beckwith says. ing the ‘bad’ genes with enough ‘good’ ones. Or large amounts of A sign o f the times and o f insulin for diabetics would be detente: The Voice of America produced by programming bac­ since World War Two has been teria with the right genes to make bombarding Eastern Europe with it. anti-Soviet broadcasts, and has Others see more to lose than to traditionally been jammed by Rus­ gain if adequate safeguards are not sian transmitters. developed. They point to how far Ä cui 1 s uiu \ m rst \»np\kii»'s: Now, Voice of America reports off any decisive results are — even TO V> f.I'AR POW88 it may soon open a news bureau in the “war on cancer” — and how « ¡ IIP l’h,VST.Vi HWi-1i VJu'-TT.AUVNfciU 8 office —in Moscow. easily technological wonders could fR t'RVStUV TNqwm —Drummer. liIKt m \\U SOUTH XFRiin become fatal mistakes. lip s 1 MORD !

The polio vaccine given to millions of children; for example, was laterfound to be contaminated with a monkey virus that causes tumors in hamsters. Scientists were lucky, however —the virus appears not to cause tumors in people.

DDT, thalidomide, DES — “there have been tons of disasters from technology” , says Jonathan King, a biology professor at Massa­ chusetts Institute of Technology.

“The more we learn” , adds Har­ vard microbiologist Jon Beckwith, “the more we realise how cau­

by Linda Siskind

Vanishing arm s

Jam m ing together

O utraged aged Comedienne Carol Burnett shuffled across the tv screen play­ ing a bathrobe-clad, crotchety, senile old woman. A small group of Gray Panthers watched the videotape at their first national convention here recently. No-one laughed.

The Gray Panthers want to wipe out discrimination against the el­ derly in all forms. TV portraits of the aged as senile old men and silly old women — which most people take for granted — Pan­ thers say are inaccurate and mali­ cious and typify the kind of pre­ judice they are fighting.

The organisation was founded in Philadelphia in 1970 by Mar­ garet Kuhn after she was forced to retire from her job with a church social agency. In December 1973, Ralph Nader’s Retired Profession­ al Action Group merged with the Gray Panthers, and now the group has over 100,000 members ranging from teenagers to 90 year olds.

Chapters have sprung up from Tucson, Arizona, to Lincoln, Ne­ braska, to Camden, New Jersey.

Over 250 Panthers from 33 states attended the convention in Chi­ cago to plan their attack on man­ datory retirement, social security, health care for the aged and nursing home abuse.

“The television stereotype of an old person is a drooling, tooth­ less, bent-over idiot” , says Lydia Bragger, 72, the Gray Panthers’ National Media Co-ordinator. “In commercials old people are used as experts in aches and pains and headache and constipation reme­ dies, equating illness with old age.”

DOCTOR DUNCAN

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Page 16

THE DIGGER

No apologies

Vicient» machc-red Deep Purple

by Dale Brown So, Deep Purple reckon it’s “ good to be back” , eh? On Wednesday night last, they attempted to give us our $6.50 worth of electricity at the Melbourne Hall of Hor­ rors.

If they had one spare watt of integ­ rity left in their banks of amps and walls of speakers, or flagging imaginations, they would ditch Melbourne for its lack of app­ ropriate auditoriums.

So we take it as we get it at Festival Hall: Deep Purple gave us no choice. With ten tons of high voltage explosive behind them and clearly no idea how to control it, they blasted away indiscriminately in an irrational rage of violent, macho red and steely ice blue, the effects of which were supposed to have you coming down your leg, but only left your eyes bloodshot, teeth grinding into the neck in the chair in front.

Much was made of their skillful line-up and their Blitzkreiging jet-load of armoury.

What we haemorraged on last Wednesday was a dead weight of unimaginative volume about enough to compress you into a straightjacket.

Where was the harmony of sophisti­ cated lead instrumentals bolted on to highpowered, fast driving beat: the trade mark of the first and greatest musical engineers of heavy metal rock? It sounds like it went into history when Richie Blackmore went solo.

This has noticably left Jon Lord with his fingers tied, or so it seemed by his clear lack of invention; or maybe he’s just another poor boy in a band losing interest in its own music.

Only Ian Paice has managed to keep up the energy or enthusiasm it took to launch Britain into a nation; of warring heavy rock interpreters, and return the initiative and money to a less idealistic side of the Atlantic. Paice’s amazing control of rythm and beat transformed the constipated en­ thusiasm of 7,000 fans into awe and app­ reciation with an eight minute solo, leaving no doubt that the whole band could once operate at this level of extraordinary skill and precise reflex. It was the type of in­ spired spectacle that sometimes can drag a talented line-up out of depression.

Glenn Hughes’ bass was unnoticable, probably due to the impenetrable sludge of volume and flat noise (the only sound that was constantly clear was a shrieking amp hum). His vocals relied upon a high-keyed scream which he tried to bend without

breaking to convey a sense of cold-blooded angst and spine-chilling visions of balls and the inside of his tortured mind.

Dave Coverdale is possibly a good re­ placement for Ian Gillan, although the other guys didn’t give him a chance to show it. His vocal work was blotted out in­ to a tantrum of little apparent reason, but which obviously caused him a lot of trau­ matic pain and had him smashing up his mike-stand or hanging it like a limp and frustrated phallus from his groin.

Guitarist Tommy Bolin hails from a short list of mediocre American heavy bands, and reputedly toted a guitar, like a six-gun, giving that “razor-sharp guitar edge”. Actually, he did little more than lunge and goosestep around the stage, go­ ing out of his mind for the people. / And so it went, as it seems it always does with these English heavy, glam bands laying their stud appeal on you, nailing you to the floor, screwing you like you’re supposed to enjoy the pain. Of course, some people always do.

There is a definite tendency in Britain to enjoy many acts for their absurd, deli­ berate brutality.

But on Wednesday night, you just_ .couldn’t help bujt notice fear and nausea amongst the people.

Deep Purple really hurt.

This wasn’t fun, or music: it was murder.

I was surprised to find that you ceded to Mary Calcott’s lawyer’s demand that you apologise for my article oh the strike at the Hunter Valley Working Women’s Centre (see Digger No.46). The sarcasm, I suppose, intended by the heading ‘Apologise or Else’ was lost on some of your readers who ac­ cepted your statement, “The report was false and distorted the true situation”.

I must admit that my initial reaction was to demand an apology for the sugges­ tion that my reporting was “ inaccurate” .

But i suppose that would be as petty and as apart from the issues involved as Mary Calcott’s threat of a libel suit. , As I pointed out in the article, both Mary Calcott and her daughter, Barbara, refused to either verify or deny information I had been given or provide other facts.

However, as far as I, or it seems you, have been able to discover, the report was not inaccurate.

I understand that the threat was exten­ ded to me personally, as well as the publi­ sher and printer. I want to make it quite clear that I make no apology.

I I am aware of the precarious financial position of Digger. If inaccuracies had been demonstrated, I would not have objected to correction. However, it seems to me that despite the threat, Mary Calcott would be most unlikely to risk large amounts of money 4n a trial which she would probably lose, quite apart from the possibility that costs could well be awarded against her.

Even if she was successful, she would be most unlikely to collect any money from me, or I think, you. Since Digger does rely at the moment on the goodwill of those who write articles, I would have appreci­ ated being consulted on whether an apo; logy was appropriate, and if necessary, I would have arranged some other legal opi­ nion on the article. It does seem to me that if you are to be an alternative press in Australia, you must be able to withstand unsubstantiated attacks on your paper in the name of the libel laws. I am sure that some of the forces regularly exposed in Digger will have noted your reaction on this occasion.

In her letter criticising my article (see Digger No.47) Betty Pybus claims that I attacked the professional integrity of Mary Calcott, the administrator of the Centre.

My comments on Mary’s behaviour con­ cerned her withholding of information, continuous chairing of staff meetings, special privileges and financial advantages.

I was not questioning her administrative skills —her handling of money, her order­ ing of equipment, etc. I think that there is a distinction to be made between the pos­ session of those sorts of skills and the

Australia and Namibia PUBLIC MEETING ,FR ID A Y DEC. 5. 8P.M. M ethodist Centre, 1 3 0 Little Collins St. City Speakers:Dr. ZEDEKIAH N G A V IR U E, visiting representative o f th e Nam ibian people.

Cheryl Buchannan ,from the Black R esource Centre Melb.

Joe Camilleri, Politics D ept.,L atrobe Uni.;speaking on Australian G overnm ent role in U.N. Council for Namibia.

Richard Nankin, from Friends O f The Earth,speaking on m ultinationals operating in Australia and Namibia.

Sponsored by :U nited N ations A ssociation, International D evelopm ent A ction , A m nesty International,Cam paign Against Racial E xploitation, Friends o f The Earth, Black R esource Centre.

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

power over other people which so often automatically goes with those skills. That is a distinction which the. strikers also tried to put to Mary over some months.

At the Liverpool Women’s Health Cen­ tre, where I work, although we do retain areas of activity — research, education, nurnursing, etc. — we attempt to share our skills, our information and decision making.

As Betty Pybus points out, the removal of formal power structures can still allow sub­ versive ones to continue.

If equality is to exist in practice, these power structures also have to be exposed and criticised. As has often been pointed out in the women’s rpovement this year, we have to find ways of resolving, or at least coping with, conflict situations with­ out collectives disintegrating. However, this stage had nowhere near been reached at Newcastle where quite concrete barriers stood in the way of any sort of equality ^ Because of this, I feel Betty’s comments ignore the situation which I describe at the centre.

Betty believes that I had no right to ex­ pose an internal women’s movement matter in such a way and by doing so I was inter­ fering with the autonomy of the New­ castle Centre. What if the most blatant maltreatment of women coming to the centre was occuring? Would she then argue that there should be no publicity. Before the sacking of Barbara Curthoys I probably wouldn’t have written the article because the women themselves believed that the diffe­ rences might be sorted out. But with the future of the health centre at stake, which is'after all supposed to be for all the women of Newcastle, I felt that an accurate ac­ count of the situation might spread aware­ ness of what was going on so that more people might act in support of the fairly isolated and powerless strikers.

As it turned out unfortunately, the State Health Commission has allowed Mary Calcott to persist with her present policies and so the strikers did not return to work.

Wendy Bacon, Sydney.

Digger wishes to make clear that the apology printed in No.47 was an apology worded by Mary CalcotVs solicitors and not by Digger.

W hole people Lin Layram, in her description of her experience of breast cancer in Digger No. 47, talked about doctors’ treatment of her as a patient rather than a person. This ridi­ culous ignoring of her woman-ness in a breast removal operatior (!!), however, is only an extreme example of the general labelling of people in the care of profes­ sionals as specimens e.g. “woman, 28, carci­ nogenic” as Lin puts it. It’s definitely not only women being oppressed by males.

Think about “teenage spastic male” people brought up in the goody goody female filled world of an institution for instance.

I’m using this issue to let people know there’s a fairly new profession called Occu­ pational Therapy, whose students repeated­ ly have rammed down their throats that they are there to treat the whole person, to remember about the bits of the patient the other professionals forget, and to include the patient in the treatment team: “Pa­ tient” meaning anyone with something in­ terfering with what they want to do, i.e. anyone (whether O.T.s practise what is preached at students is a different matter).

(I’m also using the issue to justify the probability that next year I’ll become an O.T., a fully fledged interferer.)

Janet Fitzgibboris, O.T.III University o f Queensland

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

Page 17

THE DIGGER

A vintage fascist attacks a Labor rally — there aren't many o f them — but Australian fascism Won't look like this anyway.

A d o lfs coup was legal too.«.

by Paddy McCorry Stage shows in Queensland usually only hit the headlines when actors say four letter words or expose themselves to startled ma­ trons in the audience. But in the case of the revue recently presented by the Twelfth Night Theatre, You've Come A Long Way Baby, socialist feminist protesters made the news.

Right from the opening nights of You've Come A Long Way Baby, advertised as a special programme for International Wo­ men’s Year, protests were made against the revue. Sandra Grose, a Twelfth Night Theatre actress had refused to play in the production because of its sexism and its attacks on the women’s movement. At an early performance she shouted criticisms at the stage and walked out causing Jean Whalley, director of Twelfth Night Theatre, to respond that the play wasn’t for “extre­ mists” , but was intended to allow women the chance “ to laugh at themselves”.

Socialist feminists from a recently for­ med group, decided to attend the play and protest on October 17. By chance, there was a small audience that night and the protest was extremely effective — the per­ formance was eventually abandoned.

The first half of the show was a series of historic and literary sketches which gave a blanket portrayal of the ‘feminine charac­ ter’, submissive, rebellious, romantic, nar­ cissistic, flighty, gossipy, indolent — with no attempt at analysis of why women dis­ played these characteristics. Ironically, after such total lack of explanation, the final sketch was of Joan Whalley intoning a clarion call for women to rise up, organise and throw off the conditions of their opp­ ression, then stalking off dramatically into the darkening wings to the strains of ‘I Am Woman’.

Was this ‘historical’, section meant to indicate that times had changed and women were only like that in the dim, dark past?

If anyone remained confused about the direction of the play, their confusion was dispelled by the beginning of the second half, the revue section written by local media “personality” , Ken Lord. The first sketch was based upon the physical appear­ ance of Margaret Whitlam. The second sketch portrayed a slatternly housewife (a male actor) clad in a dressing gown, saying that no-one was going to treat ‘her’ as a ‘sex object’. The third sketch was of a pregnant housewife strap-hanging in a bus, prattling of how she was ‘liberated’ —her husband neglected the family, lived at the pub, wouldn’t do odd jobs round the house, and

Continued from Page 10______ - • bok demonstrations. And, in Canada, a this scenario. He may simply be waiting for country no less democratic in tradition than Australia, the Liberal Prime Minister, didn't provide any money for her and the further, more serious bomb attacks, which Trudeau, declared a state of emergency in kids. She had to do the lot — so she was would,enable him to claim that there is a Quebec Province at the time of the kidnapp­ ‘liberated’. “communist conspiracy” to disrupt the ing of the Quebec Justice Minister in 1970.

The sketches were remarkably similar elections and would thereby provide him Over 400 people, including unionists, stu­ to every vulgar insult about women and the with the pretext for declaring a state of dents, housewives and left wing parliamen­ women’s movement found in the ‘popular’ emergency. tary candidates were rounded up overnight press.

Many people find it inconceivable that and kept in gaol without charges or trial for This was as far as the show proceeded any Australian politician, even of conser­ up to three months. because women were interjecting, booing vative hue, would resort to such repressi­ In this situation, any person on the left, .and yelling, and finally they burst into a veness. Fraser, however, is on the extreme especially if their views are known, should chant —“ Women of the world, unite! one right of his own right wing party, and the take steps to protect themselves against struggle, one fight!” —the only showsudden arrest in night-time raids on their stopper Twelfth Night Theatre has ever had. very fact that he has been prepared to vio­ homes. As the 1971 Melbourne University At this point, the theatre went into uproar, late so many democratic principles and contentions to gain his present position Draft Resistance Seige illustrated, the Com­ the lights came up, the cast came onstage means that he will scarcely have scruples monwealth Police are perfectly prepared and hurled abuse at the protesters, black about violating the civil liberties of several to make dawn raids in carrying out political clad bouncers threatened women, the thousand left wingers (especially if he can arrests. Undoubtedly, the police have al­ audience, robbed of their paid-for-enter­ drive a wedge between such left wingers ready compiled lists of people who would tainment, screamed insults and Joan and the broader labour movement). be put under “ preventative arrest” in the Whalley dashed through the seats bargain­ event of a declaration of a state of emer­ ing — “stay quiet till the end of the show The pro-Fraser monopoly press are al­ and we’ll discuss it then” . The women gency. ready softening the ground for such a step On the broader level, the left as a whole, refused and demanded a discussion on the by deliberately sensationalising the bomb including the ALP, should forget all fac­ spot, so M/s Whalley called the police. attacks. Newspaper editorials might ponti­ tional differences and decide what defen­ Meanwhile, individual women were ficate about left wing politicians “ inflam­ sive action should be taken in the event of arguing fiercely with actors and audience « ing the emotions of the masses” , but the alike. Finally Joan Whalley advised the Fraser declaring a state of emergency, front pages of the very same papers are audience to go home. A male member of either before or after December 13. If there screaming out with huge photos and head­ the audience made a speech thanking the lines designed to create the maximum hys­ is any lesson to be learned from "the Wei­ actors and attacking the protesters, and mar Republic, it is that authoritarian teria over the issue. most people lefti developments can only be defeated by the It should be remembered that BjelkeDiscussion with cast and audience mem­ .Petersen declared a state of emergency in utmost solidarity between all democratic bers who were willing to talk insisted that Queensland merely to deal with the Spring- and left wing forces. as actors, they weren’t responsible for the revue’s contents, they didn’t agree with it, it was “just their job” . Audience members, in insisting that protesters had deprived them of their “ democratic right” to see the play and that women should have left if they didn’t like the play, dredged up the old notion of individual rights — a notion which only allows individual protests and in fact negates organised political action and politics as a whole. As socialists, the women took their stand on a conception of the necessity of collective political action.

The play expressed exactly the kind of St. Peters Lane, Darlinghurst, 31 3237 ideology which is the focus of women’s op­ pression, and the women were determined to cause the performance to be abandoned.

As usual, older women without male companions were most receptive to the protest —several were friendly and sym­ pathetic.

As a follow-up to the stopping of the performance, a pamphlet was produced and handed out at the next evening’s per­ formance, while a large picket was main­ tained at the theatre. Not the least impor­ tant aspect of the action was the basis of solidarity it gave for the socialist women to further consider and act upon the condi­ tions of women’s oppression.

filmmakers

cinema

fine films all thru Summer.

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

THE DIGGER

Page 18

M exican “bandits” stalk the Jolly Green Giant taken. Most of them have not condemned armed struggle in general, but they have criticised their own groups for being small Mexico City: Marguerita comes from a and isolated, made up of students and in­ wealthy Mexican family. In 1968, she was tellectuals who had tenuous connections active in the student movement and when with the urban poor. Their actions were demonstrators were shot and killed by the undertaken on behalf of the oppressed, and police she joined an urban guerrilla group. in their interest, but not with their help or And she wasn’t alone. A significant number their consultation. They were independent of her friends joined other clandestine or­ acts, often righteous but isolated. ganisations. When faced with government On the subject of armed groups there is machine guns and the incineration of radi­ general agreement among the radicals with cals it seemed that the only way to extend whom I have spoken. Though they are the radical tradition of Flores Magon and sharply critical of the guerrilla cliques, Emiliano Zapata was through the bomb they have high praise for Lucio Cabana’s and the rifle. rural guerrilla movement. Teresa, a woman Marguerita was married and had a son. active in the struggles of 1968 and who hid a guerrilla leader in her ap'artment for seve­ One night she came home and told her ral weeks (her introduction to clandestine husband that she would be leaving, that he life) told me: “ Unlike ours, Cabana’s move­ might never see her again, that he should ment was rooted in the peasant life of try not to worry about her and to please Guerrerro; it answered their needs, spoke take care of their son, Julio. She gave no to their dreams, and for this reason he was more information and though her husband protected by the people year after year. He had suspicions he asked no questions. That was so loved that he could walk down the night, Marguerita packed a suitcase and left main street of a town, unarmed, and be home. greeted with ‘buenos dias’ from every A week later, her husband read in Exquarter.” celsoir that an ambassador had been kid­ Mexico has an abundance of slain guer­ napped. When the ransom was paid and the rilla heroes. The government wants dead hostage released, the guerrillas distributed a guerrillas but it does not want martyrs and million pesos in cash to poor people buying legends, and it has done everything in its maize, tortillas and frijoles at the Coeasupo, power to prevent the growth of a Lucio the government operated store. The five Cabanas myth. But the government is los­ and 10 peso notes were wrapped inside a ing the campaign, not in dramatic battles, leaflet that talked about starvation and the high price of food, and shoppers received , but in a protracted war with many fronts, one as they entered the store. many small armies operating independently A few weeks passed and Marguerita was and with little direct contact with fellow captured by the police, probably because soldiers. of an informer. She had hidden a million “The problem we are trying to solve” , pesos under her mattress and this sum was Teresa said (she now works with an above­ confiscated by the police and shared by ground, left wing organisation) “ is to bring the officers themselves, though they testi­ peasants and proletarians into an organi­ fied in court that she had spent the money sation with ideology, discipline and stra­ frivolously. The guerrillas themselves boas­ tegy. Otherwise, though there are brave ted that another million pesos had been actions, too many people are needlessly spent on arms, and the government began a killed and nothing much changes.”

Despite the criticisms, despite the death frantic search for the weapons. of Lucio Cabanas, despite Marguerita’s long Marguerita is lucky : she is still alive. prison sentence urban and rural activity Many of her comrades are dead, and some goes on. It is a daily phenomenon, but it is of the bodies have never been recovered. difficult to determine the depth of this Most of the urban guerrilla organisations activity because the newspapers (largely that rose out of the student movement of controlled by the government, or right the late sixties have been destroyed by the wing) do not accurately report guerrilla government, and the survivors have re-eva­ activity. But sometimes information leaks luated their strategy and tactics. For the out. One morning I heard a news report on most part they are critical of the steps

by Pepe Delicado

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Pancho Villa — revolutionary “bandit” in 19th century Mexico the radio: government troops using heli­ copters were closing in on a small guerilla band in Guerrerro; the group was led by Lucio Cabanas’ son. And then there were no further announcements.

To find out about dead guerrillas or guerrillas in gaol is one thing, but to get hard facts on living guerrillas engaged in day to day activity and in hiding from the police, is another.

First of all the guerrillas themselves do not give away many clues. Second, the government gives away false or misleading information. They call anyone who carried a gun, robs a bank, shoots a policeman, a “bandit” , but that’s what they called Villa, Zapata, Cabanas. And if they aren’t called bandits they are labelled “madmen”, lite­ rally insane. Then, too, parts of the left are opposed to guerrilla activity and claim that the guerrillas are an invention of the govern­ ment.'.

-..C v ■ Meanwhile, the true guerrillas are now at work, and the guerrilla movement is growing for the same old reasons that guer­ rilla activity has always sprung up over­ night like the corn in the fields; The people are dying; they are dying of starvation, di­ sease, ignorance. There is fertile Mexican land, and there is corn in some cbm fields, but there is a bitter, bloody fight for con­ trol of the land. On one side are the rich and the powerful, and on the other side the poor and the powerless.

In the state of Chiapas, the Chamula Indians are dying of starvation. In the states of Guerrerro and Vera Cruz, there have been battles between peasants and caciques (local political chiefs) who more often than not are also tied to the big finan­ cial interests. These caciques are little dic­ tators, or cadillos, who want to become big cadillos like Porfirio Diaz, the dictator who ruled and robbed Mexico from 1876 to

1911. These caciques are greedy and their greed can be most immediately satisfied when they take the land of the small, in­ dependent Indian tribes gathered together on ejidos, the common or communal land.

A few weeks ago, the cacique in a town in the state of Vera Cruz shot down a few dozen Indians, burned their corn fields, levelled their houses and completely des­ troyed the government built school. Indian children were learning to read and write and were hecoming increasingly dangerous.

The Indians fought back.

The cacique was armed with a machine gun. The Indians charged him, he squeezed the trigger and held it there for a good 15 Seconds. Half a dozen men fell before their comrades reached the cacique and pointed his machine gun, still firing, into the ground. They captured him, tied his arms and legs to four work horses, drove the horses in four different directions and the cacique was no more.

All over Mexico there is a battle for land and for water, precious water, because without water there can be no crops and without crops no life. And this battle is not simply fought between the small ejidos and the local cadillos: there is a greater power at work. Over the Mexican land is the spectre of the multinational food corpora­ tion. The jolly green giant [a brand name for a giant US food corporation] and Del Monte stalk the countryside buying up land and changing the traditional agricul­ ture. Maize and frijoles [beans] áre disap­ pearing and cash crops for the world mar­ ket are taking their place. In the words of a . contemporary poet, there is “ No invading army/No napalm/No marines at the halls of Montezuma/But the slow coca cola poison of/Northem conquest.” from Berkeley Barb

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

Page 19

THE DIGGER

Diana Crunden has just returned from Vietnam and writes for us about re-construction

Wbmen’s Union takes over General Westmoreland’s H.Q. Vietnam has only known real peace for eight months. In the north and the south, in the countryside and the cities, the people are united and determined to rebuild Viet­ nam — heal the scars of war and forge a unified and prosperous nation. Much has been done in only eight months but the Vietnamese are very aware that the task ahead of them is a large and difficult one.

Nixon «topped bombing and mining the North in January 1973, and to a large ex­ tent the obvious effects of the aerial bom­ bardment have disappeared (with the ex­ ception of the area immediately to the north of the 17th parallel). Most of the bomb craters have been filled in; the dykes have.been repaired; hospitals, schools, fac­ tories and houses destroyed by the bomb­ ing have been demolished and rebuilding is taking place. Bach Mai hospital, hit three times during Nixon’s bombing raids is al­ most back to its former functioning capa­ city. However, rebuilding throughout the North is being significantly hampered by lack of money, suitable materials and to some extent technical expertise.

The great sacrifices made by the North to support the liberation struggle in the South has placed a huge strain on its eco­ nomy. Industrial and agricultural produc­ tion was almost entirely geared towards the war-effort thus keeping the North effec­ tively poor. Now, with peace in the whole of Vietnam, great emphasis is being put on agricultural and industrial development.

While the effects of war are no longer so obvious to the eye in the North, they arc dramatically so in the South. Flying from Hanoi to Saigon particularly over the Central Highlands, reveals huge areas of de­ foliated jungle and agricultural land pock­ marked with bomb craters.

On the agricultural level, 45 per cent of rice fields have gone to waste, half the fo­ rest land has been devastated by defolia­ tion, bombing and bulldozing. Many defo­ liated areas will take 10 to 100 years to re­ cover. In Cu Chi, a district 40 km west of Saigon, the US planes sowed a highly noxi­ ous week which by the time of liberation,. had taken over 50 per cent of the arable land.

The Thieu regime left behind 2 million unemployed. This number has swollen to 3 million with the ex-soldiers of Thieu’s army and civil servants employed in Thieu’s administration and Vietnamese employed by the US. Some forms of employment have disappeared, for example, prostitu­ tion. The shoe shine boys who derived their living from polishing the shoes of US per­ sonnel no longer have a clientelle.

The social consequences of US interven­ tion are enormous and clearly reflect the criminality of US involvement. The num­ ber of prostitutes are estimated at 500,000.

More than 100,000 people are suffering from VD, many victims being incurable because of the US policy of using a low dosage of penicillin to the extent that many prostitutes built up a tolerance and became immune to penicillin.

Drug addiction is a well-known legacy of US intervention. There are approximate­ ly 100,000 drug addicts, many of whom are adolescents. (The major drug network was headed by Thieu).

The US and Thieu left behind one mil­ lion widows and 500,000 orphans. Health services under the Thieu regime were geared almost entirely to the rich. Many doctors, fearful of losing their priveleges fled just before liberation. In Saigon alone, over 15,000 men, women and children suffer from leprosy and 10 per cent of the children have tuberculosis. Many children suffer from malnutrition and diseases such as conjunctivitis, dermatitis, etc.

Under Thieu, only the rich had access to a general education. As a consequence, overcoming illiteracy is an important task

By contrast with Saigon, Hanoi is a city o f parks and lakes where bicycles are the major form o f transport. facing the new government. The few pre­ schools and kindergartens set up by Thieu in order to receive international aid did not see any of the aid — it disappeared in­ to the pockets of top-ranking army officials, officials.

The use of toxic chemicals has not only had a disastrous effect on the environ­ ment —it is also manifesting itself in the malforhiation of foetuses.

In Saigon, the effects of US culture are everywhere. Luxurious apartment blocks exist side by side with slums. Neon signs are everywhere, advertising CocaCola, Kodac, stripbars — the list is endless. (They contrast oddly with the bright PRG and Democratic Republic of Vietnam (the North) flags which flutter from almost every building.) The dress of many ofithe young people is very western — tight fit­ ting flared trousers with platform shoes and fitted shirts for the men, skirts or jeans with halter neck tops for the women. The noise and pollution of the city traffic is almost overwhelming (Saigon has the high­ est pollution level of any South East Asian city). Hondas are everywhere and big Ame­ rican cars are.quite frequently seen.

The authorities are aware of the need to move slowly. They recognise that it will take some time to wean the middle class young of the effects of the American occu­ pation. .As part of this process, there is a defi­ nite movement to return to the traditional Vietnamese culture. Many women have re­ verted back to traditional Vietnamese dress and now in the streets there are almost as many young women wearing traditional dress as there are those wearing western dress. In the schools, programmes are being developed which educate the young in traditional Vietnamese culture —patriotic songs are sung, traditional folk songs and dances have been revived and traditional handicrafts are being taught again.

To ease the over population of Saigon, and at the same time tackle the unemploy­ ment problem, the Military Management

Committee plan to resettle 500,000 people out of Saigon into the country by the end of this year. By the end of 1976, they plan to move a further one million, thus leaving a population of two million.

To date, 300,000 have left Saigon. Most of these were former refugees from the country, forced into the city by the war and they have returned to.their homes. In many cases, such as in Cu Chi district where 40,000 people have been resettled, families have been provided with a house, materials and food for six months and half to one hectare of land for their own culti­ vation. At the same time, they participate in the local agricultural collective which is often concerned with redeveloping land which has not been cultivated as a result of the war.

Many of the buildings deserted by the US and Thieu’s regime are being put to use.

A number of preschool centres have been established in the houses of rich business­ men who fled the country. The former headquarters of General Westmoreland has been taken over by the Liberation Women’s

Union andthe residence'of the first secre­ tary to the Australian embassy has become the headquarters of the Saigon Women’s Union.

The task of enabling prostitutes to return to a normal, productive, non-exploited life, is an important priority and is being under­ taken by the Women’s Union. Many, have re­ turned to their homes in the country and plans are afoot to concentrate those re­ maining in the cities into boarding houses where they can be cured of their diseases, receive education and training for a job and receive adequate food. The administrators of the programmes are determined that no sense of blame be directed at the prosti­ tutes. They are regarded as victims of US imperialism and are to be treated with sympathy and understanding. To ensure that this attitude is widespread, members of the Women’s Union and the families of prostitutes are being involved in conscious­ ness raising sessions.

Restoration of the economy of the South is an uppermost priority. So far, 70 per cent o f industry has been nationalised.

Factories in the cities are being re-opened, thus easing unemployment. In the textile industry, raw materials are being imported from China, the Soviet Union and Czechoslavakia. Fuel is being obtained from Iraq and Algeria (the fuel shortage has had the positive effect of rationalising Saigon’s traf­ fic, many cars having been forced off the road. Once able to export sugar, farmers are being encouraged to recommencelts production. Local sources of. paper pulp are being re-established.

Contrary to mass media reports the mili­ tary situation is completely under control.

The few remnants of Thieu forces still re­ sisting are very isolated and their efforts are becoming increasingly sporadic. The Military Management Committee still pro­ vides these soldiers with the opportunity to surrender and play a normal civilian role in the reconstruction of the country.

Moves towards the reunification of North and South are well under way, and the success of the November discussions at the Consultative Conference held in Saigon (broadly representative of the North and South) have advanced the projected date for reunification to some time next year.

The task of reconstruction is an enor­ mous one. In the vital areas of health and education alone, lack of medicine and equipment is causing serious problems. The Vietnamese are deeply appreciative of the international solidarity they received dur­ ing their liberation struggle. Aid coming from Australia is greatly valued by them.

A Vietnam Reconstruction Project has been launched to enable people to contri­ bute and donations can be sent to: Viet­ nam Reconstruction Project, 208 Little Lonsdale Street, Melbourne, 3000 or Box 165, P.O. Carlton, 3053.

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THE DIGGER

Page 20

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

S.E.C. disconnects Yallourn’s future no vandalism in Yallourn a year ago; now we have the greatest percentage of vandal­ ism and juvenile delinquency in the Valley.

Last month the caretaker Prime Minister, There, are so many empty houses, the chil­ Fraser, appeared on television in an inter­ dren feel there is no future left in the place. view with Mike Willessee. In Yallourn They feel let down; they have gained anti­ North, a Housing Commission suburb social tendencies” , Dell said. where workers from the Yallourn West Only 10 people are on the Save Yallourn power station live, one man walked calmly Committee and the books of the treasurer, and surely across the loungeroom to his Ms. Crane, show a credit bank balance of television set and put his size ten work boot $160. “We have many people who talk to smash into the nose and mouth of the J§ us, but can’t join us” , Mr. Dell said. “People Liberal Party leader. who work- for the SEC are frightened they At the end of the week, about 2,000 will lose their jobs if they speak out against LaTrobe Valley workers and their families the SEC.” turned out to a Labor Party rally in the For* locally, the SEC has a colourful main street of Morwell. It was a mardi gras reputation for intimidating workers who sort of atmosphere; the kids in the “ We stand up against the bureaucracy. want Gough” shouts with the sort of en­ In the bad old days of the fifties, the thusiasm they chant their skipping songs.

SEC not only sacked active communists, but This is the LaTrobe Valley, where 40 per used Commission muscle men to cart them cent of the population: live in Housing to the edge of town to make sure they got Commission estates, where 25 per cent of the message. Stories are still told of com­ the population are employed by the State munists like Scotty Grey, Harry Burke and Electricity Commission (SEC), where 85 Billy Paterson, who got this sort of treat­ per cent of the blue collar workforce are A typical Yallourn home ment. Harry Burke apparently left the Martin Curtis union members and where one woman, country after his ordeal. asked why she thought the LaTrobe Valley happened to Princess Yallourn.

The SEC did its spade work well in |h e popular decision by choosing to back up a was a good place to live, gave as a reason “ Actors dressed as SEC officials carry area of industrial relations. In his report, call by 2,000 Yallourn residents for union the fact that her husband had good work the supposedly dead body of Princess Yal­ Life in the LaTrobe Valley, Dr. I. Puffin of help in preserving the town.

The rank and mates, and said nothing about any friend­ lourn.

The officials are so unscrupulous the Gippsland Institute of Advanced Edu­ file feeling was that Yallourn was a bosses’ ship of her own. they are prepared to bury her alive if need cation describes authority transactions in town.

In the centre of the valley lies the pretty be. Townsfolk object claiming there is no For while union and community move­ the Valley as a parent to child sort. “Adult little township of Yallourn, which produces reason why she must die. ments were developing in the neighbouring to adult authority transactions are rare” , 80 per cent of Victoria’s electrical power.

“The SEC officials see it differently. he says. centres of Traralgon, Moe and Morwell in It now sits uneasily on 128 million tons of Jeff Stewart Princess Yallourn, they say, must be a sacri­ the fifties and sixties, the people of Yal­ ficial offering to appease the Great Gods of lourn were stuck in an SEC welfare state.

Industry.

While the other LaTrobe Valley towns were “ ‘Yallourn must die’, they shout. ‘On fighting for essentials like kindergartens with the funeral’, they shout and shout. and infant health centres, Yallourn people “The loyal subjects of Princess Yallourn were collecting money for luxuries like a object and SEC officials pray for assistance swimming pool. from PROGRESS. This explains the gloom and insecurity “PROGRESS enters. Unfortunately he’s which hangs over the people of Yallourn got his good points, but the people soon today. For years they have been treated see he’s a bit of a dill. paternalistically by the SEC. Perhaps they “Princess Yallourn then wakes from a lost the power to question authority since deep sleep and her beauty and her goodness the SEC type of rule was so benevolent and astound the people and they drive out the secure. Now suddenly Yallourn people are nasty SEC devils. realising that the SEC wants many of them Hopefully, Princess Margaret has been out in three years. The future is now inse­ warned-and all rejoice in happy song.” cure and according to one source, many of THE END. the older residents of the town, especially The township of Yallourn was planned those on retirement and pension benefits Jeff Stewart by a. contemporary of Canberra’s Walter are worried sick about what will happen to It is easy to get pessimistic about Yal­ brown coal. That is between five years (ALP Burley Griffin, a gQvernment architect by them. For a 70 year old man or woman, lourn’s future. the name of A.R. Le Gerche. He planned a figures) or ten years (Liberal Party figures) the thought of leaving a home after 30 years However, it is important to note that social and aesthetic model town with cen­ supply of coal for the giant boilers of the is not pleasant. the SEC has told big fibs in giving its origi­ tralised shopping and community facilities, Yallourn West power station. And the SEC Joe Dell is president of the Save Yal­ nal reasons for the demolition of Yallourn. for the right or wrong reasons is determined radial street patterns which allowed varied lourn Committee. He has lived 11 years in For some reason the SEC wants to get rid block shapes and home positions, and he to start pulling the town down in three Yallourn as both vice-principal and princi­ of Yallourn. Perhaps it is tired of playing declared that 25 per cent of the town’s area pal of the Yallourn Primary School. Hje says years. landlord to 3,000 people. For it is a moot be green. This dream was achieved, and Princes Margaret visited the area recen­ there is no finer place to live. point whether Yallourn was built to be Yallourn today is unique for the lack of tly and was entertained by the Ye Old “ Originally, and during the Public pulled down, as the SEC and the Victorian garish neon shopping centres and used car Overburden Street Theatre Company to a Works’ Inquiry of 1970/71 into the cor­ Minister for Fuel and Power, Mr. Balfour, lots; there are no Jennings homes in Yal­ play called The Rape o f Yallourn. Here is rectness of the decision to remove Yal­ lourn or Housing Commission estates; every­ lourn, I stood back believing justice would the script: maintain. body walks around the town . . . to school, Why was the public hall, the comfort be done. When the Inquiry ended and I “The plot is simple but meaningful. station, the theatre, the library , the ambu­ saw how the SEC had used its overriding “Princes Margaret must be warned about to the shops, to the baby health centre, to the picture theatre, to the baths. lance and fire stations, the pub, the police powers to obtain its wishes, I stepped in. I dangerous SEC bureaucrats who have al­ In the fifties and sixties Yallourn was had the idea the SEC was controlled by the station, the post office, the medical centre ready murdered another fair princess — the the place to live in the LaTrobe Valley and , government and would do the right thing.. township of Yallourn. and the baby health centre built substanti­ “Whilst power hungry SEC officials con- . competition for a home there was fierce.

Before 19 7 1 1 did not see the SEC as being ally in brick if the plan for Yallourn’s re­ The SEC gave a good deal —cheap rent, no so callous as far as people were concerned” , dundancy was known? duct her around the works area no-one is rates, good amenities, and possibly the Also, what has gone wrong in the fantas­ able to get close enough to warn Princess he said.

Commission gave preference to favoured tic long range planning department of the Margaret about these nasty men.

Part of the SEC plan to get Yallourn employees. At any rate, the town got a SEC to permit drastic policy changes that “ Only the faithful subjects of Princess ready for demolition has been to leave have happened in regard to Yallourn? name as an administration town, especially Yallourn are able to penetrate the SEC’s houses vacant when tenants moved out.

When the Public Works Committee in­ among the blue collar workers, who saw Without upkeep the homes quickly deteri­ security screen by imitating the Street their foremen and paymasters living there. orate in the moist climate and the SEC has quired into the issue in 1970/71, the SEC Theatre Company on its way to Moe. Inter-town jealousy is a feature of the “Waiting for Princess Margaret to as­ also done little to deter vandals from having submitted that the town would be phased out between 1995 and 2000.

Valley, as is jealousy between neighbours fun with these empty houses. cend to Coach Road tower, her loyal sub­ However, soon after the Inquiry finished There are an estimated 200 people liv­ on the level of material wealth. jects (who are also the loyal subjects of ing in caravans in the LaTrobe Valley while (its findings sealed Yallourn’s fate), the Princess Yallourn because Princess Yallourn Union black bans on the removal or SEC announced it intended to double the the perfectly good Yallourn homes rot. is related to Princess Margaret because Queen demolition of homes in Yallourn were capacity of the Yallourn W power station “There was a feeling of entity here that called off last year by a 2/1 vote of rank Elizabeth once visited Princess Yallourn and would therefore need the coal under I’ve never felt anywhere else in Australia” , and bestowed honorary sisterhood on Prin­ and file unionists affiliated with the Amal­ the town by 1983. Demolition would start says Dell.

“People felt they belonged; now gamated Metal Workers’ Union.

Apparently cess Yallourn — whew!) spring into action in 1979. big brother has let them down. There was union leaders found they had made an un­ with a symbolic representation of what has ? *•

by Martin Curtis

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

THE DIGGER

Page 21

Continued from previous page

Yallourn And lastly, why, in 1974, did the Vic­ torian Minister for Social Welfare, Mr. Houghton, who sat as a member of the Public Works Inquiry, say that if the In­ quiry had been aware of the intended po­ licy change at the time, it might well have reached a different decision?

Yallourn lies on the western edge of the Yallourn open cut, where the coal for the Yallourn W power station is won. By taking Yallourn, the open cut would creep further toward the power station. In 1970 the SEC opposed the idea of extending the open cut to the east (cost and coal grade factors), thus saving the township. However, since the announcement that Yallourn W will be doubled, the east field will now be opened. ' It was also suggested at the time that the SEC take high grade coal from Morwell, 10 km away, to supplement the poorer east field coal, and thus again, save Yallourn.

No way said the SEC. The Commission stated that if more than 30 million tons of coal were taken from the Morwell field, that would prejudice the establishment of a second major power station on the Morwell open cut, plus the Hazlewood power station.

This objection is no longer valid because of the decision of the Commission to dupli­ cate the Yallourn W complex and to open up the Loy Yang coal field instead of estab­ lishing such a power station on the Morwell open cut.

Other complicated objections, to do with inter-connecting railways and fouling properties of Morwell coal are also no lon­ ger valid.

The situation was best summed up by the Labor member for Morwell, Derek Amos, in the Victorian parliament in 1974.

He said: “In the brown coal fields of the LaTrobe Valley there are 85,000 million tons of coal. Under the township of Yal­ lourn there are approximately 128 million tons of coal. The State Electricity Com­ mission has now stated that the duplicated Yallourn West power station and the ope­ rating Yallourn West power station could use some 25 million tons of coal a year, and that there were 128 million tons under the township. That would represent only five years’ supply of coal. In other words, it is proposed to destroy a community — more than just streets and houses — for five years’ supply of coal? when this could be obtained from existing open cuts at no extra cost.”

Mr. Amos stated that the SEC estimated it would save roughly $39 million by demo­ lishing Yallourn. However, recent investi­ gations show that allowing a conservative estimate of $10,000 for each block of land and a further $10,000 for each home, tak­ ing in the cost of providing facilities and amenities in the town and allowing $20 a square foot for every square foot of com­ mercial and industrial floor space, Yallourn would be worth between $30 and $40 million by present day standards.

Mr. Amos closed the 1974 debate, which was narrow, with these words: “If the government is sincere in its de­ centralisation programme it cannot allow the destruction of Yallourn to take place.

If the government is sincere about the quality of life, about protecting the en­ vironment and about providing housing to as many Victorians as possible, it should not allow the destruction to occur. Quality of life issues have been raised in parliaments throughout the Commonwealth and these are real issues. What honorable members have to consider is not tjie bulldozing of houses or the destruction of electric light poles; the government is talking about des­ troying a community.”

So there it is. Nobody seems to care much what happens to Yallourn. Many people prefer not to be reminded that the LaTrobe Valley even exists. To Melbourne people electricity comes when you flick a switch and the SEC is an office in Flinders Street that sends out a bill every three months. ' •

David Bowie, sometime rock 'n' roll singer and prophet o f the “third sex” has come out happens with tv — it doesn’t matter who at last. . . as a fascist! From America he gave the following interview to Anthony O'Grady. puts what in the tv, by the end of the year there’s a whole format that the tv put to­ It is reprinted from the New Musical Express. gether. The tv puts over its own plan. “ I just want to do some things I want So what’s the next step?

“Who says the space people have got no to do” , he says. “I’ve recently gone through “ Dictatorship” , says Bowie. “There will eyes? You have —you’ve got one in every some pretty interesting changes.” living room in the world. That’s theoretical be a political figure in the not too distant future who’ll sweep this part of the world “ I’d like to do something that’s actively of course *. . ” On the subject of Bowie’s own chame­ concerned with tryihg to clear up the mess. like early Rock and Roll did. leon character. . .

I have an idea, but I’d rather do it than say “ You probably hope I’m not right. But it. But as it is, the situation’s just nonsen­ I am. My predictions are very accurate .. .

“Well, I never had much luck telling always.” sical, it goes round in never decreasing cir­ people I was an actor, so I let everyone else cles. Rock and Roll certainly hasn’t ful­ figure it out. I don’t really want to go into “ You’ve got to have an extreme right filled its original promise. any of that. It’s been chewed around and front come up and sweep everything off its “ Like the original aim of Rock and Roll boiled around, I mean a man does what he feet and tidy everything up. Then you can when it first came out was to establish an has to do. get a new form of liberalism. alternative media speak-voice for people “Whatever thing I was doing at the time, “There’s some form of ghost-force who had neither the power nor advantage I adopted a character for it. I’ve said that liberalism permeating the air in America, to infiltrate any other media or carry any so many times now, I’m getting used to but it’s got to go, because it’s got no foun­ trotting it out. I might look like Zsa Zsa weight and cornily enough, people really dation at all, apart from a set of laws that needed Rock and Roll.

Gabor next month, or Marlon Brando, you were established way back in the bloody never can tell, ‘cause I don’t know what I “And what we said was that we were ’50s and early ’60s and have no bearing at only using Rock and Roll to express our will feel like then. all in the ’7 0s. vehement arguments against the conditions “If anything maybe I’ve helped estab­ lish that Rock and Roll is a pose. My state­ we find ourselves in, and we promise that we will do something to change the world “ So the best thing that can happen is for ment is very pointed —except it’s very am­ from how it was. W6 will use Rock and Roll an extreme right government to come. It’ll biguous. My statement is ‘Rock and Rols is as a springboard. walking all over everybody’.” do something positive at least to cause Really? i commotion in people and they’ll either “But it’s just become one more whirl­ “ Yes, really. Like, I tried to do a little accept the dictatorship or get rid of it. ing die ty, right? Going round that neverstretch of how it feels musically in this “It’s like a kaleidoscope” , says Bowie. decreasing circle. And Rock and Roll is J country, which is sort of . . . the relentless “No matter how many little colours you dead.” put in it, that kaleidoscope will make those plastic soul, basically. That’s what the last “Absolutely. It’s a toothless old wo­ album was.” colours have a pattern . .. and that’s what man. It’s really embarrassing.”

Page 22

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

THE DIGGER

Finger acupressure (continued) Finger acupressure is an effective, simple and harmless method of treatment which stimulates acupuncture points with finger massage.

In this issue we ĂĄre publishing treatment for toothache and palpitations.

If you use this method of treatment, there are certain directions to be followed regarding posture, pressure and so on. Make sure you read these directions first, on Page 15 o f issue No. 46 o f The Digger.

TOOTHACHE (both upper and lower jaw)

PALPITATION Point Sheri - man

Location and Technique Along the most marked crease of the wrist, on the inner side, in the middle of the tendon.

Subject should sit or lie down.

Use thumbnail to press hard.

Location and Technique Over the dorsum of thĂŠ hand, in between the 1st and 2nd metacarpal bone.

Subject should sit or lie down.

Use thumb to press against the 2nd metacarpal bone.

TOOTHACHE (lower jaw)

TOOTHACHE (upper jaw) Point Hsia - kuan

Point Ho - ku

Location and Technique In the depression about 1 inch in front of the tragus.

Subject should sit or lie down.

Use thumb to press hard.

Point Chin - che

Location and Technique Over the masseteric muscle.

Subject should sit or lie down.

Use thumb to massage hard.

THE DIGGER

DECEMBER 3 - DECEMBER 30

Page 23

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