Original article by Paul Benedek published on saveourpublicassets.org.
350 people rallied outside Queensland Transport Minister Rachel Nolan's office on July 31, in protest at the Bligh Government's moves to sell off public assets. Unionists from the Rail Bus and Trams Union, the Electrical Trades Union, the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union and the Australian Services Union chanted "Queensland Rail - not for sale, Queensland Ports - not for sale, Queensland forestry - not for sale, Queensland motorways - not for sales, Queensland - not for sale".
That evening, 50 people attended an anti-privatisation forum which was addressed by Minister Nolan, along with officials from the RBTU, ETU, AMWU, ASU and the Deputy Mayor of Ipswich.
While Nolan defended her government's privatisation decision, the other speakers and the audience savaged the plan.
Ipswich Deputy Mayor Victor Attwood was cheered when he said "what the Bligh government has done is a bloody disgrace," adding that he doesn't "buy that the global financial crisis means you have to sell half the state!"
ETU Organiser Jason Young pointed out the Bligh Government will give $200 million to recently bailed out corporations Merrill Lynch and the Royal Bank of Scotland to advise on the sell off, outlining how such funds could instead address upgrades to assets like the Cairns Hospital.
Not one person at the meeting - besides Nolan - supported the sell-off. One audience member asked why Nolan "wanted to commit political suicide." Several of the union officials vowed that a pro-privatisation ALP would receive no union funds nor campaign support at the next election.
Note: as with the union protest of 5 July, this protest was not reported in the Courier Mail newspaper. The last on-line story about privatisation that I can find is "LNP MP Fiona Simpson kicked out of Estimates Committee" dated 22 Jul 09 (although the story "Queensland Government corporations paid fees to unions" of 26 Jul 09 does mention privatisation briefly in passing). The story was only 101 words long and didn't even make the effort to inform its readers why Fiona Simpson was ejected.
See also: "Minister claims rail sale will create jobs" in the Queensland Times of 17 Jul 09, "Angry retort on rail sell-off" in the Ipswich News of 23 Jul 09, "Opposition fires up over QR sale" in the Brisbane Times of 22 Jul 09.
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