Beware of the Revolution
by
Gwendoline Blake
The unemployed of Australia have so far been amazingly docile, too oppressed by their
loss of self-esteem and by the demeaning poverty of the dole system to attempt to fight
for their basic rights. Without the network of the big unions, like the transport workers
for example, who can cripple the country in a few days, they have no easy means of
collaborating.
But for how much longer can we expect generations of unemployed to continue, without a
murmur of dissent, in this appalling life without purpose or dignity? Generations of young
people study so hard at school to pass their VCE, spending hours of time on projects and
assignments that previous generations would never have dreamed of.
Their aspirations are
stimulated by continuous advice and information about career options. But after
successfully completing a very comprehensive and carefully planned thirteen years of
study, these young people in their thousands leave school not to begin on the exciting
path of career development and the prospect of earning money but rather to eking out an
existence on the dole.
Their hard work, especially in country areas, results in nothing
but crushed egos as they compete for the few jobs on offer. A fast food chain opens a
store and the queues for interviews for a handful of menial jobs stretch down the street
and round the corner, and interviews span two days. A restaurant offers school-leavers
unpaid training and after days of unpaid work selects one or two of them telling them that
their slogan is "run and have fun". This is typical of the job situation for
young people in country areas today.
Wealthy old men, and people who understand nothing of the misery of unemployment and of
being obliged to live on social security, make pompous statements about "work for the
dole" schemes; "This is the opportunity for youth to give something back to the
community". How easily we fall for such glib jargon. "Give something
back..."!
What has the community given these young people in the first place?!
Absolutely nothing!
No recognition for their 13 years of toil at school and no hope for a
future. How outrageous to suggest that they should "give something back" to a
community which has given them nothing. Why should they display gratitude for a miserable
hand-out supplied by the people whose work they should be sharing in?
It is not only the teenagers who suffer, although theirs is the greatest suffering.
Their parents have in most cases sacrificed so much to ensure that their children have as
good an education as possible; information nights, school fundraising, school concerts,
extra-curricular lessons, competitions, excursions, extra tuition, parent-teacher
interviews, books, uniforms etc etc; everything done in the faith that their children will
be well-equipped for their lives. But what is at the end of all this mammoth effort? A
dream turned into a nightmare.
While unemployed young people spend their days writing endless letters, attending
interviews for jobs they’ll never be offered, filling out the dole forms inquiring
into every aspect of their lives and trying to maintain a brave face and some dignity in
the face of all these issues, the "fat cats", the 80% of the possible workforce
who are fully employed, go about their daily life complaining about the taxes they have to
pay to support the dole "bludgers".
But at the same time that they salve their
consciences by using words implying the unemployed don’t want to work, they are also
acutely conscious that there is indeed a large amount of unemployed "out there"
ready to take their job should they not be perceived to be performing as expected. And in
this climate of fear employers remove the privileges which unions fought to obtain.
Tea
breaks, even lunch-breaks, become a thing of the past. The thirty-five hour week in 1998,
after thirty years of frenetic computerisation of every imaginable work scenario, should
by now be thirty, or twenty-five. If the work had been properly shared among the workforce
(and computers), if workers had not been retrenched and school-leavers shunned, everyone
would by now be enjoying a shorter working week with the long-promised more leisure time.
However instead of a thirty or twenty-five hour week and full employment, the working week
has become, for huge numbers of workers, more like forty or forty-five or even
"open-ended". It is cheaper and more profitable for employers to squeeze an
extra 10 hours from an existing employee than to employ another and pay the subsequent
extra expenses. Training which was once undertaken even in a limited way by employers is
no longer offered. Not so long ago a new employee might be given a week to become
accustomed to the demands of a new job but today they are expected to be fully productive
from Day 1. School leavers don’t have much chance in such an environment.
The problems and obstacles preventing full employment must be removed. The big picture
must be addressed for the benefit of the whole country. The full employment (17 - 19 year
olds) of 1972 is not so very long ago. Generations build on the strengths of previous
generations and the strength of the country depends on the employment of our youth.
Workers with 35 + hours are working too much; they hold the lion’s share of a
force which no longer can offer 35 hours to everyone. The hours in the working week must
drop again - this time not to improve the lot of the employed as in the past (48 to 40 and
40 to 35) but to give a life to unemployed youth and hope for the future of this nation.
It is completely unacceptable that a proportion of the workforce must accept that there
will be no jobs for them, especially young adults. If this situation continues the whole
nation must sooner or later pay a very high price.
"Job creation" is a strange hot-air expression, which crept into the
dictionary of election-jargon of politicians a decade or two ago and has proven to be as
meaningless today as it first seemed to me then. Proper distribution of the tasks that
exist is the only way this country can function.... but what party can risk losing the
vote of the 80 % of employed workers ? We need politicians with vision, but it takes
voters with vision to support them.
Author:
Gwendoline Blake
