Kinda Like That - The Modern Union Movement: A Circus Lion

18/05/2022

Dan Kelly

Kinda Like That is a section of the Militant Monthly that relates the more niche aspects of our society to the wider class struggle, uniting the abstract with the relatable.

What do we mean when we say that the modern union movement is a circus lion? Is it an insult or attack on the quality of rank and file members? Far from it, for they are the victims of this caging, trapped and abused by those who were meant to protect them.

The union movement in Australia was once a powerful beast, adored in all its beauty by those who respected it, and feared by those who were its rightful prey. The bosses, politicians and thugs of Australian capitalism and colonialism were haunted by the union movement.

We had a union movement that stood up to imperialist designs at home and abroad, as we did with Japan in the Pacific and the United States in Vietnam. We had a union movement that fought for civil rights causes, as with the Gurindji Strike and queer liberation, and countless other issues. We had a union movement that would go to war for its workers, highlighted countless times over and over again. Yes, the union movement was a lion, armed with powerful jaws and razor sharp claws that would attack the masters of capital anytime they attempted to punch down, be it on workers or anyone else who was being oppressed.

"The union movement has been declawed and defanged, with the Labor governments and the union bureaucracies selling out our interests with the Prices and Incomes Accord"

But what do we have now? The union movement has been declawed and defanged, with the Labor governments and the union bureaucracies selling out our interests with the Prices and Incomes Accord. When unions supported Labor Prime Minister Bob Hawke in introducing the accord, he brought in a series of neoliberal changes to the industrial relations landscape that acted as a sedative to the lion of effective trade unionism. With false promises of a social wages and workplace benefits, Labor introduced these laws that made it near impossible for members to take industrial action. The union movement has since been sedated, starved and malnourished, trapped into a small space that makes it nearly impossible to fight effectively for the rights of workers.

The union movement is not allowed to feed on the glorious, buffalo-sized victories it once did, and has settled for small prey like pay ‘rises’ that can’t even match inflation and job security for nearly-retired workers, but nothing for the young workers coming onto the scene.

Saddest of all, this once proud independent beast has become tamed, dancing in a small ring to the tune of its ringmaster and the crack of a whip. Yes, the Australian Labor Party is this ringmaster that has killed all that was once great in the union movement, and made it a weak shadow of what it once was. Through its electoral fetishism, this ringmaster has taken upon itself to decide when the lion shall roar, when it shall run, when it shall eat.

But we are not defeatists, nor anti-union agitators. Not by a long shot. We don’t say shoot this caged beast, let it die a quick death and be done with it. On the contrary, we say break the locks and the chains and free this beautiful animal from the shameful conditions it has been subjected to for far too long.

Where they have taken the claws and the teeth, we shall put in newer and stronger ones. Let the lion feast on the victories and struggles against the corrupt, criminal bastards that have been allowed to operate without consequences for far too long. On the whole, the modern union movement as it stands is a circus lion. But we would see it roam free once again. Destroy the cage. Kill the lion tamer. Free the lion, and let its roars send shivers across Australian boardrooms again.