Yesterday in Sydney the ASU along with Unions NSW and other unions held a round table discussion with the Senate Committee examining the Federal Government proposal to offer state governments an incentive payment to privatise state owned assets.
The Government proposal is highly controversial as it will see state governments lose long term revenue from current state owned corporations such as electricity and place privatisation of anything from schools to hospitals on the agenda. The trade-off is short term infrastructure funding being pushed by business and conservative governments.
In the lead up to the round table unions lodged separate submissions to focus on their main areas of concern. All had in common: keeping public assets in public hands, total opposition to privatisation and declaring that the loser in privatisation is the Australian community.
Information on the inquiry can be located here: Privatisation of state and territory assets and new infrastructure
Click here for the ASU submission.