Crikey has no idea who Delia Delegate is but she is filing amazing material every day. Check out this latest amazing piece on the war in the Victorian ALP which has the whole party buzzing.

Last week was a big week in football, as Eddie McGuire would say. It was an even bigger week in the Victorian ALP with many participants gladly welcoming the long weekend to celebrate the birth of our Sovereign and the elevation of Bill Shorten’s mates, the billionaires Pratt, in the Queen’s Birthday honours. Comrades from the red to the pink to the bluish ones with ties to proscribed conservative catholic organisations were recovering from the week and caucusing across Melbourne during the long weekend.

Some of Sword’s suburban supporters led by Tim Holding met informally to review progress in collecting ballot papers from State Conference delegates across the state.

The SL leadership is also understood to be reviewing its options, including proposals made by Sword and various ideas for how the branch will work in the future. Feeney-Shorten’s forces encouraged by the favorable treatment of Shorten in Friday’s Herald Sun and other one-sided coverage are hoping the worst has passed and of course also responded on Crikey with a blistering attack on Greg Sword, justifying his decision to leave in the first place.

The much anticipated Stateline on Friday night was dull, except for thesombre mood music in the background with Sword presenting the argument that the NUW’s decision was taken because of the union’s dissatisfaction with where the faction was heading. Sword’s critics say it is misleading for him to say it is only about what the NUW is doing when a whole network led by him and Holding numbering state MP’s, FEA delegates, federal MP’s and government advisers are supporting his moves.

The ABC’s Josephine Cafagna got some nice comments from Martin “Rent-a-quote” Foley, the ASU State Secretary normally well regarded Left winger who declared factionalism dead in his interview. All the factional members who publicly decry the role of factions is confusing to many branch members, 90% of them never join factions with their interest being in helping the ALP not Left or Right. Sword’s friends say that his move to a neutral corner is not necessarily an anti-factional move, it’s really an anti Labor Unity move which will have the effect of enabling the NUW/Network group play an honest broker role in the Party ensuring the promotion of quality candidates and the clearing out of branch-stackers.

Sword’s supporters including the Premier Steve Bracks say that Sword’s decision is more about ending factionalism as we know it than any temporary alliances that may have to be struck in the interim.

Feeney/Shorten’s allies question this arguing that the NUW is handing control of the Victorian branch to the SL, a challenge they say to the powerbase of Simon Crean and the electability of Bracks at the next election. The NUW view is that they are entitled to play a leadership role within the Party and that their honest broker role will enable the restoration of that role.

Sword says Shorten is responsible for supporting the contemptible Craig Johnston who is a destructive presence within the labour movement.

Shorten says he is about electing Labor Governments, supporting Crean’s leadership unlike Sword’s close ally Doug Cameron who has repeatedly attacked Crean’s 50:50 proposed rule change and talked up the prospects of disaffiliation ‘within two years.’

Shorten’s media offensive broadened over the weekend as he attempted to gee up his supporters who are demoralised and confused. The conservative windbags of the News organisation came to Bill’s rescue with favorable treatment in the Herald-Sun for three consecutive days.

Even on the ABC which should no better, the Insiders spent the entire length of the program bagging Kim Il Carr. Sword doesn’t think that highly of Kim Il Carr but he isn’t going to be bullied out of cleaning out the Party by a media tart or a nervous Parliamentary leadership or anyone else.

All the failings of the Cain-Kirner Governments have been visited on Carr and Sword by a media obsessed with blaming someone for its disappointments. This is stupid and unfair. Many forget Bill Shorten’s role as a Ministerial staffer for Neil Pope, the Minister for

Industrial Relations during this time. Feeney also worked as a staffer for big drinking Ian Baker, Minister for Agriculture. Many also forget that the Cain-Kirner years had problems but were years of great achievement in Victoria in education, social services and relationships with unions. It wasn’t a great time for Labor Unity due to several union election defeats but one union, the NUW, remained strong. Kim Il Carr while a divisive person in the media is a proven leader rather than a windbag like Shorten and has built an enduring coalition with Sword that no amount of undermining will undo, according to those close to Sword.

And to Jim Claven, the man most likely to follow on from Sword as State ALP President, he now says that he opposes Crean’s proposal for 50:50. This is inconsistent with his position in his epic “Centre is Mine” which as considered previously praises the sweeping changes made to the British Labour Party by the Labour Right which took considerable power away from union secretaries. Claven says he has been quoted out of context and he was merely describing what occurred in the Labour Party without imposing value judgements and that his submission to the Party Review of rules contains a clear and emphatic endorsement of 60:40.

Perhaps Comrade Claven would agree to sending the full text of his book on a disc to Crikey so he can publish the whole thing for the benefit of Comrades considering whether to vote for him. Some SL comrades would collapse at their PC’s with shock at how far Claven has strayed from the official line of Kim Il Carr.

Claven’s equivocating on Crean’s reform agenda makes the previously easy question of burying Shorten more difficult, say Sword’s allies in the Left particularly in light of Shorten’s typically cunning endorsement of Crean’s 50:50 rule change. Shorten’s supporters say that Sword who is on the record being open to 50:50 and supporting Crean too should support the only candidate for President who also supports Crean’s position. Shorten’s opponents particularly his old mates from Network say that Claven isn’t the only candidate but even if he was, his views would be irrelevant in Party forums as pro Crean forces would still dominate. Shorten’s scalp has been promised to the troops and must be given to them, they say.

Claven’s higher-ups in the SL, union leaders as diverse as Michelle O’Neill and Martin Kingham are known to be suspicious about his political judgement and believe he is an accident waiting to happen because of it if elevated to Party President. Kim Il Carr wants him to withdraw in favour of a compromise candidate according to some observers but Claven is holding firm. A cross-party view is emerging that someone committed to reform is required to lead the Party at this troubled time, not a publicly unknown unelected union hack like Claven.

Jim’s view on 50:50, 60:40, 0:100 may vary from time to time but he is obsessed with being President and believes that his own candidacy has played a role in restoring the Left’s fortunes in the past week. He has said this a few times. Each time without blushing.

Sword has strong views on Claven, it is believed. Sword likes to deal with serious people, not those who constantly work the media or change their position on issues or deal every six hours. He suspects Claven is not someone he will be able to support even though he is desperate to sink Shorten in the most public possible way. Sword is not convinced that the SL are united behind Claven given all the talk around town about his political unreliability from certain comrades in the Left.

Within his employer at CEPU, the Postal Workers think he’s a fool, the ETU don’t trust him and the Plumbers don’t either. Whether that leads them to support a NUW compromise candidate is the question for the week. A few are saying that moves against Claven’ own position as Policy Researcher in the national office are likely whether he’s elected President of the Party or not.

Elsewhere, at Westernport, ETU Secretary Dean Mighell is decrying the Big Australian (now British) BHP’s use of helicopters at their Hastings plant to intimidate striking workers and break picket-lines being run by the ETU and AMWU. Another Crikey contributor says that Dean Mighell’s girlfriend is the very well-paid Manager, Media Relations for BHP Billiton, defender of Ok Tedi and BHP’s boisterous IR practices, Ms Frostick. Not true. Firebrand Dean Mighell and Mandy Frostick are in fact married with two kids in a happy home happily transferred out of Dean’s name to guard against the effect of fines, lawsuits etc. There’s power in a union.

In Tasmania, an executive of construction company Fairbrother says that a Tasmanian official working for Mighell’s CEPU had threatened to bring a boatload of Melbourne thugs armed with baseball bats to Hobart. These claims are denied by Mighell who does not carry his pistol around with him in the glove-box of his union fleet car, according to informed sources. Several comrades found it interesting Mighell was on Friday accusing BHP of “putting a gun to the head” of his membership.

It’s right to assume that Dean Mighell is the only ever member of the Victorian Greens with a pistol licence who likes to hunt, shoot, root and stick in the boot. He always knew he was unique. Now we all know.

ends

Dealia’s update from Thursday June 6

Thursday’s stunning development in the War of the Right Wing was that the Workers First group controlling the AMWU in Victoria have backed off from their threatened legal challenge to the Federal AMWUappointing their delegates. This means it’s Bye Bye Billy time.

Craig ‘Conan’ Johnston’s lawyers advised him that he had no or limited chance of successfully appealing the Court decision which confirmed Doug Cameron’s right to appoint delegates if the State branch failed to do so. The most surprising thing is that Johnston actually listens tohis lawyers. In an Australia run by Craig Johnston, the lawyers would be shot at dawn.

The massive tactical balls-up by Johnston of not appointing delegates to the Conference has cost ‘Bye Bye’ Bill Shorten big. It is now all but certain that Jim ‘Softbelly’ Claven or a compromise candidate will prevail in the race for the ALP Presidency. It will be Bye Bye BillShorten’s first ever loss in an election, in the past he has got elected to everything without opposition. Bye Bye Bill has been pre-selected for the seat of Melton without an opponent, elected State Secretary of the AWU unopposed and then later elected National Secretary the same way. One thing is certain, that will never happen again. Sword’s restraint in the past in not tackling the AWU in Victoria is over, Shorten is fair game now, say several who’ve been planning an AWU campaign for some time. There is a sizable disaffected group of members in the AWU who say that Shorten is all style, nosubstance. By turning Shorten’s good press into bad press, any chance Bye Bye had of being re-elected uneventfully in a couple years has gone out the window. All’s fair in love and war.

Many are now saying that the Presidency is not a big deal and as it is almost certainly resolved against Shorten, the focus is on the current internal election for the Administrative Committee, the body that hires and fires State Secretaries. And that’s where the attention of ‘General’ Greg Sword and his increasingly friendly ally north of the 38th parallel Kim Il Carr is firmly fixed. Mar’n Ferguson has also indicated that he is ready to publicly defend General Sword for the brave but necessary actions that will need to be taken to restore decency and integrity to Head Office.

It is interesting to reflect that Craig Conan Johnston is not even a member of the ALP while playing a big role in its decision-making. Craig is a member of various fanatic left wing groups and is currently charged with a number of juicy criminal charges such as “threat to

kill”, “riot”, “affray”, and “criminal damage” to name but a few. Sword on Thursday outed Shorten’s ties with Johnston in the excellent Hannan/Carney piece in The Age. Although some in Workers First say they are not as favourable to Shorten as Shorten likes to think. Sword remains hopeful of Workers First support for a Broad Left group which would snatch control of the Party away from right-wing elements and purge the caucus of branch-stackers and dead-wood.

The lobbying of competing warlords continues furiously with the NUW/Network group making steady progress building ties with a growing network of state MPs, unionists, federal MP’s and FEA delegates. The Labor Unity group is disintegrating before its own eyes.

Bob Sercombe’s friends say it is too early to call whether he has jumped to the NUW/Network camp. Fortress Bob is clearly relishing the fact that everyone wants his support, restoring his powers to the days prior to Ian Baker’s botched coup attempt against John Bean-counter Brumby which cost Bob the deputy state leadership. Sercombe has been a bit-player ever since then, eking out a living as a suburban stacking specialist. Sword’s liberation of the Party from the shackles of bitter factionalism present Sercombe with many opportunities.

It is also understood that Tiny Tim Pallas, the Chief of Staff to the Premier, ably assisted by Network stalwarts Ben Hubbard and Rachel Dapiran beavering away in the Premier’s office, is working hard on ensuring that Premier Bracks stays absolutely silent on the question ofDavid Feeney’s future. The numbers on Admin are locked in to replace Feeney with a highly competent and appropriate successor. The Premier’s silence at the moment is speaking volumes and it’s saying “Off with his head.”

DELIA PART II

And in case you missed it, on Thursday night PM ran a story on the NUW led group leaving the Right and forming partnerships with the Left and significant parts of the Right to restore values at Head Office and shake up the branch-stackers.

The PM programme is interesting in that it quotes Premier Bracks welcoming Sword’s initiative to leave the Right and encourage decisions being made on their merits not on factional grounds all the time. This is the strongest statement yet from Bracks on the NUW move and is welcomed by Sword’s supporters as confirmation of support from the key decision-makers within the State Government.

PM is wrong about Sword being challenged for the Presidency, he is not running again for the Presidency. PM sensationally exaggerates the problems for Crean arising from the deathblow that Sword has struck the Labor Unity faction and the careers of Shorten and Feeney. Sword is not a Left-winger, he has said that he doesn’t have much in common with the people he was in a faction with. So he has every right to leave, as does the NUW.

Contrary to what was said on PM, the NUW group continues to totally support Crean, because he is willing to support the bold initiatives necessary to clean up Head Office and turf out incumbent MP’s suspected of branch-stacking and ties with conservative catholic groups. As many as five federal MP’s are being reviewed by Sword’s supporters for replacement in next year’s pre-selections. It represents an exciting opportunity to inject quality candidates into the federal caucus. The reshaping of the Bracks Cabinet is also under consideration, with the promotion of Tim Holding to the Ministry the most urgent priority with the immediate restoration of Monica Gould’s role to an appropriate level for her level of seniority after the unhelpful reshuffle earlier in the year. Talk of reopening the state pre-selections has been discounted as reckless by Sword, who has been managing well the enthusiasm and expectations of his more eager supporters.

There is no reason to doubt Crean’s or Bracks’ resolve. The change is underway.

ends

Delia’s earlier missive

Published June 6

Previously in the Right Wing: National and State ALP President Sword has initiated a stunning coup, where he leaves the Labor Unity group to form his own based around the NUW-Network coalition, plans to form an alliance with the Socialist Left and in so doing annihilates ALP Secretary Feeney and AWU Secretary Shorten in the process. Chaos results.

Wednesday’s sensation was Greg Sword’s first of many serious public attacks on Feeney-Shorten on the front page of the Financial Review. Greg’s swiftness and prowess has Feeney-Shorten hopelessly on the backfoot, stunned, worried and confused.

The only thing stealing the headlines from Greg’s decisive moves was the pathetic beat-up in The Australian quoting an un-named backbencher talking up a leadership challenge to Crean. Glenn Milne known in Canberra more for his festive approach to life after dark, particularly in taxis wrote it. Glenn Milne, the official spokesman of the Prime Miniature, as others on Crikey would say. It was gossip journalism at its lowest and most pathetic. There is genuinely no challenge going on and if one was, it wouldn’t be coming from Big Kim Beazley.

The only one crazy enough to challenge, Crean’s office thinks, is Latham and he’d be lucky to get one vote. Glenn Milne, paid a fortune to write that weekly column in the Australian and to serve up his nightly crap on Seven, wrote that article, it made big “follow the leader” news everywhere and it was based on nothing. It’s a sad indictment on Milne’s professionalism. That column is increasingly a joke, used as a snide and vindictive vehicle for the frustrations of a select few. Not unlike this one.

Nice to know there are still some serious journalists in the Gallery, which we saw in full force with the astute Tony Walker of the Financial Review’s coverage of the crisis in the Right. The Financial Review and rapidly circulating gossip around Parliament House on Wednesday confirmed what many had been conjecturing: that Bob Sercombe will be joining forces with the NUW-Network group, mainly as a reaction to the “unsubtlety” and “pushiness” of Shorten.

Shorten aspires to succeed Bob Sercombe in Maribyrnong. Sercombe aspires to collect as many years sitting on the plush green leather backbenches as possible. Therein lies a conflict of ambitions that has shattered any previous relationship. In the old set of factional alignments, Bob feared he was vulnerable to a Shorten execution. Now,in a world of chaos, front page assasinations and intrigue, Bob Sercombe is far more likely to prevail he thinks.

Bob is a crafty, rat-cunning individual who has a steady series of ommercial pursuits to keep him occupied while living the quiet life of a Club Fed backbencher. Where Sercombe exercises his brilliance is in the construction of “Fortress Bob,” an empire of a stacked FEA which would be impossible to out-stack. Bob’s local lieutenants know all, see all and recruit all to an extent that makes Marles in Geelong look like an amateur. Bob’s Public Enemy Number One has traditionally been Senator Steve Conroy but the emergence of Baby Bill Shorten as a local threat has meant that Steve has been relegated to Number Two. So Sercs will jump most think, and take with him his delegates which are probably 1 or 2% of the Party, adding further to the burgeoning anti-Feeney/Shorten alliance.

Again, Sword’s brilliance is at work when you consider that just a few weeks ago Sword’s supporters still regarded Sercombe as an implacabl enemy and as one of them said to me the other day, a branch-stacking oaf. Those same people say now that Bob is a magnificent builder of relationships with ethnic communities, encouraging them to participate in the democratic process. Bob is not the only suburbanite factional warlord jumping ship, dissatisfied with Feeney/Shorten or Conroy. There are many others pondering their future just at the moment that theballot papers for the internal Party elections are arriving in the mail.

All of this spells disaster for Shorten’s campaign for President, to say nothing of his Parliamentary aspirations. His flag is barely still flying, riddled with bullet-holes and mud and blood. His friends say he regrets ever running for President, suspecting that his over-reaching may have triggered the whole split of the Right. Twenty-twenty hindsight is perfect vision, Shorten says. Others I’ve heard say with what I suspect is wishful thinking that Shorten will prevail as he’s a more media-savvy candidate. Those reading his polite “no comment” in Wednesday’s Financial Review in response to some serious claims would beg to differ. Shorten is good on TV but his crisis management seems rather poor at the moment. He talks the talk of wanting to be PM, but is he any good under pressure? It appears not but the jury’s still out. The Network assessment of Bill is that he folds under pressure, and he’s certainly under pressure now.

The intensity of the fight within the Right Wing has led us to forget the plodding progress of our little mate and Socialist Left candidate for ALP President Jim Claven. With ballot papers for the Presidential ballot out there in delegate’s mailboxes, it is appropriate to pay this little man some attention as he seeks the highest office in the Victorian ALP and can be justly called at the moment the Frontrunner.

It’s just that he’s so damn dull, ineffectual and obtuse that I suspect no one cares. He’s like the Tortoise who has just passed the Bill Shorten Hare but he looks like winning by default so it is only fair that we examine his candidacy and past statements and see what the Victorian branch is in for.

In case you missed it, Jim took serious exception to being tagged “soft” in Crikey recently, asserting he was as well endowed a hardened left leaner as you could hope to find. Many in the Comrade’s Bar scoffed at his presumption.

Viagra is clearly present in the St John’s First Aid Kit in the Postal Workers Union national office, and is sorely needed. Recent reports indicate that Viagra was the possible cause of 14 deaths in Australia. Headaches, flushing, and abnormal vision were among the most common minor side effects reported by Viagra takers. Some thought the nervous Claven was exhibiting these symptoms at the State Conference at the World Trade Centre a few weeks and a lifetime ago. I thought the symptoms were caused by the evil eye of Senator Kim Il Carr of North Korea but it may have been from raiding the medicine kit to cure the dreaded soft apologist for the Right disease.

Jim’s employers who run the national office of the CEPU – let’s call them the Postal Workers – are some interesting operators from NSW. Students of the history of the Party will recall that some of the sleaziest contests in intra-union battles occurred in the Postal Workers in NSW, starting with the original Richo. Fred, father of Graham, was the State Secretary of the Postal Workers and withstood many conspiracies and attacks until his untimely death. The internal machinations of the NSW Postal Workers continue to be astonishingly nasty. If Jim wants, I will happily reveal more about this in the next exciting episode.

But interestingly Jim also rejected claims that his not exactly best selling book on his insights into the Blair Government was an apologia for the free market and poll driven policies of New Labour and the right as I ventured in my first ever piece for Crikey on the State Conference.

Claven’s rejection prompted Delia to take time out from other duties to pop in at the fount of all knowledge in the world, the Trades Hall International Bookshop on Lygon and Victoria Streets, Carlton. In this bookshop, it is possible to purchase everything from lesbian erotica to Che Guevara’s musings. Among the writings of Marx, Engels and Race Mathews, Delia was fortunate to stumble on a copy of “Centre is Mine: Tony Blair, new Labour and the future of electoral politics” by Jim “Ideologically Challenged” Claven. Over a camomile tea and hash cookie supplied by the comrades in the bookshop, I took careful note of what Jim had to say. In order to spareyou the visit to the Bookshop and the fragrant odour of the staff who “work” there, I offer you selected highlights so that you can be the judge of whether Jim has stayed loyal and true to his Socialist Left (Inoticed he called it Labor Left, it’s still Socialist Left last time I looked comrade) credentials.

The book is basically a cleaned-up version of his M.A. thesis. It’s a dull but wholesome account of Jim’s views on life and the British Labour Party. Congratulations to him for sharing them with us. Hopefully he won’t regret doing so after reading this. My comments may seem very critical of his work. They’re not meant that way, he’s right about the need to modernise – as is Crean – but he’s wrong to pretend to be a socialist unionist to the comrades in the SL when his views are in fact are sympathetic to the Right of the British Labour Party which is probably to the Right of the ALP Right. Claven’s attempt to spin-doctor himself as a hardened Lefty was totally misleading in that important way and must be seen in the context of his book. Jim’s comrades in the Socialist Left will find the book intriguing. While I enjoyed and agreed with most of what he had to say, I doubt they will. It all starts with a foreward from then Opposition Leader and decidedly right-wing conservative bloke Kim Beazley. Kim is anti-abortion, wants free-markets for all and while a decent big-hearted guy is a true blue ideological right-winger. Or so says Kim Il Carr.

Beazley writes “Jim has grasped the extent to which New Labour in Britain has been influenced by other social democratic governments around the world, including the Australian Labor Party of the 1980s and 1990s. Jim calls it new revisionism others call it the Third Way we used to call it government policy as did our colleagues across the Tasman. (That’s right, remember Sir Roger Douglas and his privatisation/deregulation of everything? Those were the days) Kind Kim continues: “Jim sees clearly as I do the opportunity for Australian Labor to continue to learn from the public policy innovation executive power is now fostering in the British Labour Party and to harness those lessons within our process of policy renewal.” So Beazley the right-winger loves his work.

That’s nice. Let’s see why. It’s simple, Jim in his book pours a big bucket of shit on the “Labour Left” while praising the “Right” and its leaders constantly. Maybe they shouted him more ales when Jim was hanging around Millwall (should that be Millbank, Millwall is a thuggish soccer team- ed) like an old smell. On page 29, he attacks the Left British Labour referring to an “ideological crisis” where in the Party’s 1983 policy it “reflected the demands of Labour’s Left-wing promising a massive programme of public sector led reflation to regain full employment and expand the public services, the reinstatement of exchange controls, the introduction of selective controls on imports, a comprehensive system of planning, and an isolationist and neutralist foreign policy based on unilateralism, withdrawal from the European Economic Community and the removal of US military bases…”

Now the above sounds not terribly dissimilar to what Kim Il Carr tells the comrades is his vision for the world.

And Jim goes on: “It can nevertheless be seen as representing the Left’s archetypal platform displaying sufficient radicalism to prove unacceptable to both elite and mass opinion.”

“Centre is Mine” continues with this theme, praising the Right and attacking the Left. Praising the Right’s Blair, Mandelson, Healy and sledging Left figures like Benn and others.

He talks joyously about how the “soft-Left” split away from and repudiated the nonsense of the “hard-Left” (page 38), signifying perhaps his approach to people like Carr and Johnston and O’Neill who don’t agree with Claven’s free-market poll-driven spin-doctoring approach. He lavishes praise on Labour for accepting Thatcher’s “labour law that constrained the trade union movement, as well as its extensive privatization program.”

And strangely given his claim to being a staunch job-defending public sector unionist, on page 68 he tears into affiliated trade unions and praises “reforms” which took voting power away from union secretaries and gave them to individual union members.

On page 133, he welcomes what he says is the fact that Labor’s “historic link with the working class was increasingly no longer considered of primary importance, with trade unions regarded as being entitled to no greater say in politics than other key interest groups.”

So forget 60:40 or 50:50, Claven wants the CEPU and other unions to have the same influence within the ALP as Amnesty International, Greenpeace and the Lions Club. 0:100. Removing the unions altogether from the Party’s decision making forums.

As I digested both my cookie and Jim’s unorthodox views, his approval for the most radical possible transformation of the Party in a way that would permanently neuter his union bosses and his SL union factional colleagues, my mind unable to deal with such revolutionary thought wandered aimlessly to the history of the Trades Hall building I was in and the old saw “if these walls could talk.” My inability to handle digestion of the cookie led only to digression. In the International Bookshop, the walls would slur “pass the bong” but elsewhere in the building it would be far more interesting. That building has seen it all. Bashings in the carpark, pushings down the stairs and even shootings and at least one murder form part of the history of the “worker’s parliament.” These days old hands say it is more “wanker’s paradise” than “worker’s parliament.”

Within its historic corridors, we have cynical opportunist Secretary Leigh Hubbard who a few months ago said he was pondering whether he’d be resigning his Party membership in sympathy with born again Greenie, hunter, Sporting Shooters Association member and coal burner Dean Mighell. Hubbard says he is still pondering. And we are still hoping.

But sadly when ALP membership renewals were due at the end of May, Leigh Hubbard, man of the people, champion of the dispossed and the unpreselected, quietly renewed. A wanker indeed.Brian Boyd, the bovver boy of the CFMEU (Come Fuck Me Union as Crikey calls it, although the Cole Royal Commission is proving that in construction at least they are more often the fucker than the fuckee) also works for Trades Hall as Policy Guru or some other title with no sense of Irony, under Hubbard. Only problem is that Boyd is sworn to the destruction of Hubbard and spends his waking hours slagging Hubbard to everyone who’ll listen in the Trades Hall bar. The numbers are dwindling. There’s always the Bookshop. Any talk of any revolt anywhere gets their blood running.

And there’s someone else in there. Trades Hall Assistant Secretary Nathan Neverthere Niven I think his name is but I’m really not too sure because I’ve never seen him in the office. As the token right-winger in a very Red Sea, Nathan prefers to be elsewhere. As I leave the International Bookshop and walk past a noticeboard adorned with posters calling on workers to join the armed struggle for (fill the gap) I don’t think anyone could blame him.

But the unanswered question of Jim’s Left Cred, always a serious issue with any good lefty remains clouded and not just because of his book full of praise for the “Labour Right”.

He works for a NSW Right dominated union, the CEPU. The CEPU includes Communications/Telstra/Aussie Post and Plumbers and Electrical Trades Union. He is regarded with absolute contempt by the harder left elements of the CEPU, headed by born again Green Dean Mighell of the sparkies. He enjoys the patronage of a federal secretary who couldn’t get a good spin doctor/campaign manager for the derisory salary he was offering. Instead he got poor old Jim Claven, failed candidate in Syndal in a campaign where the then Left controlled Head Office spent an absolute fortune on the campaign and Jim was running against the laziest Liberal imaginable who was in his late 60’s, Jim who served as an adviser to the hugely successful Cain/Kirner Governments and presents himself as a campaign expert who in fact has never actually run a successful election campaign for anything ever. He is a researcher, a job normally given to twenty somethings who’ve got a future. Jim is the wrong side of 45 and must be wondering whether he’s ever going to get his butt on the green or red leather, his sole reason for living apparently. His boss finds the thrusting ambitions of the hired help to be quite amusing, as long as he doesn’t impose his ambitious intentions on the union itself, he’ll keep Jim on for now.

And this is the person who wants to lead the Victorian ALP as its President, following the highly successful Presidency of Greg Sword. It’s laughable really. When the Left were looking around for candidates and Claven enthusiastically thrust his hand in the air, Carr and Griffin spent days looking for someone else. The more they looked, the more enthusiastic Claven got. Jim was perceived as pretty harmless, a quiet, somewhat cagey individual who could do OK as the Senior Vice President of the Party, the consolation prize for those who don’t win President. At that stage, it looked like Shorten had it all worked out so what the hell, give Jim the nod, it will make him feel better, they thought. With the Feeney/Shorten camp under siege from an increasingly triumphant Sword, Kim Il Carr and Griffin must be wondering what the hell they’ve done. There are a number of other candidates in the field, but none of them are as enthusiastic as Claven.

It’s almost enough to make you vote for Shorten, well, almost.

Delia Delegate.

ends

Now let’s look at Delia’s earlier piece this week:

Sword goes nuclear again Feeney and Shorten

Published June 4

By Delia Delegate

Since my last treatise on the farcical factional fracturings within the Victorian branch of the ALP many have speculated on my identity. Indeed, I have myself participated in water cooler conversations pondering who the leaker was. So convincing were some accusations that even I found myself persuaded of the guilt of others.

Like many comrades in Labor Unity, I am a little confused about my political identity myself now that Labor Unity Convenor, ALP National President, State President, National Union of Workers National Secretary and friend of Joe Gutnick, Greg Sword, on Monday announced that the Union has left Labor Unity to form an as yet unnamed grouping. In fact, the practically unknown State Secretary Charlie Donnelly made the announcement but the fingerprints of Dual President Sword were all over it.

So while I’m pondering my own future factional identity, I’ll share with you the background you probably won’t read elsewhere on the faction formerly known as Right.

After weeks of characters like Senator Steve Conroy, Small Business Minister Marsha Thomson and others trying to drag back in the departing comrades, there was a rather glum meeting of NUW officials at the NUW bunker at 552 Victoria Street North Melbourne on Monday. In the corner room with the spectacular view of the bitumen of Victoria Street, the officials of the union that once formed the faction Labor Unity formally resolved to leave Labor Unity. To be sure that all the niceties are observed, the matter is being referred to the Branch Committee of the union. But it’s a done deal as far as Greg is concerned.

Why? Why has Greg Sword taken this step?

The official line is “we don’t have much in common with the other parts of Labor Unity any more”. And that the union were so disappointed with the debate at the State Conference on the issue of whether the Metal Workers were allowed to vote that they couldn’t live with themselves.

The real reason as previously explained is the mother of all personality conflicts between Greg and his supporters and the Feeney/Shorten camp. Sword’s position is that Feeney has perverted the office of State Secretary of the Party and that he must be removed from the position forthwith. Certainly there has been much speculation throughout Melbourne about the pernicious dealings of Comrade Feeney, his ties with conservative Catholic organisations and his support for branch stacking.

Some with long memories will recall Comrade Feeney’s forced resignation from the office of then Opposition Leader John Brumby’s office for being implicated in the round of Macedonian branch-stacking occurring in the western suburbs of Melbourne. Many thought it was not cricket for someone in the Leader’s office to be using the office to recruit dozens of Macedonians, so after a spot of bad press, Feeney was banished.

Even his many critics would accept that Feeney showed astonishing tenacity and cunning, with the sponsorship of his conservative Catholic brothers in the NSW Right, from the more tolerant support base of the national office of the Transport Workers Union. Some speculated he was the first TWU official ever who was unable to drive when he took the job. That’s tolerance. Anyway, he continued his branch-stacking and also got involved in a couple of very nasty union battles. One of which was the Health Services Union. This came to bite him badly in the end when he was caught red-handed paying for a defamatory mailout against his opponents. They sued. There was a big settlement. That whole fiasco merits another story for another time.

Feeney’s ties with the NSW Right extend beyond the truckies. He is known to be very friendly with Johnno Johnson, former President of the NSW Legislative Council and former Senator and Party Secretary and frequent flyer at the SeaWorld Nara Resort, Graham Richardson. (Crikey: thanks for that $80 million loss for Trico on Sea World through Richo’s mate Peter Laurance.)

Sword and close allies like Martin Ferguson say Feeney’s days as State Secretary are numbered. Why? Because Greg Sword has decided that this NSW Right protected boy is a cancer within the Party that must be excised. Some say exorcised. The challenge, for the first time in living memory, of the Victorian branch of the NUW under way at the moment supported by the NSW branch of the NUW no doubt has heightened the anti-NSW feeling felt in Greg Sword’s bunker.

As previously mentioned the NSW branch of the NUW has a history that even colourful racing identities from Sydney would be proud of. It would frequently leave the NSW Right, leave the Party, threaten to leave the Trades and Labor Council. A couple of years back the NSW branch left the ALP as a result of its mishandling of the Davids dispute where the union had to pay huge fines and costs for ignoring court orders not to block trucks during the Davids strike. The late Frank Belan known for booking hookers on the Union American Express Card demanded the State Government “fix” his contempt of court problem which the Attorney General wisely refused. Frank, the Yugoslav born union official, also resigned from the NSW Admin Committee which did not diminish the quality of their deliberations.

Needless to say, many people attended Frank’s funeral in October last year to make sure he was actually dead. (Crikey: this is getting nasty.)

This is the calibre of those opposing Charlie Donnelly and Greg Sword in the imminent NUW elections. Greg’s critics point to allegations of close intra-office friendships (occasionally referred to in graffiti in the Trades Hall carpark), the crucifying of former state secretary Dennis Lennen for “irregularities” and the practice of holding massive fundraisers called Industrial Relations Seminars – at the Hilton Hotel where employers like Bonlac and many others hand over vast amounts of money to support Sword’s private election account. An account that has not needed to be used for NUW elections until now. Some of Greg’s tension I suspect is caused by having to use these funds to defend both Charlie Donnelly and his own position. The Sword campaign cost will exceed a few hundred thousand dollars so I can feel his pain. By the standards of his NSW brothers though, Greg is Mother Theresa and the Dalai Lama rolled into one.

So unless Feeney wins Tattslotto by the very unlikely Ray Gorman stealing the NUW State Secretary’s crown, Feeney faces one of the largest and long serving ALP affiliates and one-time cornerstone of the Victorian Right being absolutely sworn to his destruction and demise. Many of them believe that Feeney and Shorten are directly or indirectly assisting Gorman’s challenge.

Feeney boasts of his successes in leading the Victorian branch to victory in the September 1999 election and for raising tons and tons of money from likes of Kerry Packer and Tabcorp and Tattersalls since then. It is true that Bracks won the election. But Feeney had barely arrived in the State Secretary’s job when the Independents gave Bracks the nod. And as for raising money from those enjoying the millions of dollars of profits flowing from the pokies, I suspect the Party could have hired one of those muscular dystrophy sufferers who sell the Herald-Sun and Chupa-Chups to raise funds and got a similar result. Who wants to donate to a newly elected Government no one thought had a chance? Everyone. And strangely enough, everyone did. So while everyone thought Feeney would be focused on building up the fortunes of the Party and the Government, what concerns Sword is that Feeney has been focused on protecting his mates and building a Head Office culture like the NSW Right have.

Head Office staff show a disturbing degree of devotion to Feeney, even those from the Left seem to be caught in his spell of blarney and charm. Sword is also concerned that Feeney has been willing to accept funds from practically anyone, including developers with checkered histories and businessmen with close ties to the Liberal Party and the Kennett Government. Sword is upset that the socially conservative Shop Assistants Union gets its candidates up and its agenda heard while the NUW is just as big and is systemically shafted in almost every preselection contest.

He contends that Feeney/Shorten did not accept power-sharing within Labor Unity and that while the NUW/Network group were expected to stay loyal and accept results where they didn’t prevail that the same did not apply in reverse. He cites the Isaacs preselection fiasco which followed the tragic suicide of Greg Wilton.

Greg Wilton was very much a creature of the NUW culture, he’d worked for the Union for years and while not close to Greg was certainly aligned to him within Labor Unity. In the traumatic days following his suicide, the Union was appalled that Feeney/Shorten were claiming yet another seat for themselves. They proposed Natalie Sykes, someone very loyal to Feeney despite having worked for the NUW. It was regarded as a sneaky way of getting yet another Feeney/Shorten candidate up.

The NUW/Network group countered with their own candidate, Julie Warren who eventually won the Labor Unity preselection. Julie was a much stronger candidate. However, there was such a pattern of leaking and hostility about it that the National Executive seized control of the preselection which is where it really stuffed up. Opportunistically, the Left put up Blonde Bombshell Jill Hennessy who has contested more preselections than Garth Head has had hot dinners or indeed Double Whoppers with Cheese. The Centre Left on the National Executive didn’t want to vote for the Right and preferred Jill. But there was also local school administrator, non-factional Ann Corcoran who no one had ever heard of. Due to the skulduggery and deviousness of the Feeney camp and a series of stuff-ups no one could ever really explain without a Ph.D. thesis, Ann won.

Ann was then elected to serve in the House of Representatives and continues to have a look of surprise on her face. She shares the same happy look as One Nation Senator Len Harris, delighted with being paid probably twice what she’d get elsewhere. Without the hard work ethic of her predecessor it is inevitable she will return to school administration. We can only hope.

And interestingly, Natalie Sykes has ended up moving up to Sydney to be with her man NSW Right Senator and power-haircut TWU bovver boy Steve Hutchens. Jill Hennessy has had many personal problems and looks like not being a candidate again. She has taken a lot of time off work from the Premier’s office.

So the NUW/Network group were shafted again for nothing.

The systematic shafting of NUW/Network candidates is I believe the real reason why Feeney has incurred Sword’s wrath. Sword copped it sweet many times but has decided that enough is enough. Sword’s opponents would say that the quality of candidates proposed by Sword has been even worse than the already low average of Victorian ALP candidates.

Sword’s supporters in the branches, predominantly former members of the Network group are ready and primed to leave Labor Unity in response to Greg Sword’s call. They are very confident that their Supreme Leader will carry out his mission: destroy Feeney/Shorten once and for all.

Greg has the demeanour of a suburban accountant and the calming voice of your local GP but when crossed there is no more effective crusader in the ALP anywhere. Some close to Sword say that nailing Feeney is his final ambition in politics. I suspect Greg’s plan is to build a new group based around key allies like Ian Jones of the Vehicle Builders, Mar’n Ferguson from the Left, Doug Cameron from the AMWU, Dean Mighell from the ETU and others. How stable such a group would be is the big question, although Sword’s political management skills are excellent.

In addition Greg has excellent relations with the press, such as Paul Robinson of The Age, know by some as the official mouthpiece of the Socialist Left, particularly Kim Il Carr, although he does talk to all the major players. (And Crikey rates him as a good journo)

Feeney has much to fear say Sword’s supporters. The Left is united on little except how dangerous Feeney is to all of them. If you add their votes with the NUW/Network on the current Administrative Committee and the likely to be elected new Admin, then Feeney will be looking through the Saturday Age Situations Vacant. The Left’s concern with branch stacking is likely to motivate them to vote with NUW/Network to bump off its primary practitioner and beneficiary David Feeney. The atrocities in Geelong are just one of a long series of outrages encouraged by Feeney, where ACTU Assistant Secretary Richard Marles has thoroughly stacked Corio in anticipation of next year’s federal preselection which will probably culminate in a rare and gruesome sight: sitting MP Gavan O’Connor being electorally dumped in the Geelong Harbour with concrete boots supplied by Richard’s slippery mates from the Turkish community. The exploitation of ethnic groups is a common but not often spoken about characteristic of branch stacking.

Feeney is by no means the inventor of it, in fact the Socialist Left inspired the 1970’s round of ethnic stacking. You only need to read some of Frank Hardy’s work to know that stacking the ALP is an ancient art, some might say a primitive art.

The NUW/Network group is not just a splinter group, it includes the some of the most influential people in the right of the Party. From the top, Simon Crean while above the vulgarities of factional disputes as Leader is unquestionably aligned with the NUW having once served as NUW National Secretary. He employs a number of Network aligned people on his staff including Jamie Driscoll and has done so for years.

In the Premier’s office as well, the Chief of Staff Tim Pallas is an NUW member and Greg Sword loyalist. There are many other NUW aligned staffers in Bracks office and throughout Treachery Place. They considerably outnumber those aligned to Feeney/Shorten, something known to rankle at Head Office.

The third highest ranking Minister in the Government, Government Leader in the upper house Monica Gould, harshly criticised in Crikey last week, is a former NUW official. Also aligned in the move to dump Feeney are State MP’s Bob Stensholt, Matt Viney and the leader of the Network grouping Tim Holding.

My praise of Tim Holding in the past prompted an avalanche of accusation that Delia was in fact Tim in girl’s clothing. Not true. Tim’s critics say he is best known for leaking to journalists anything he hears in the Caucus room and for his leadership role in Network at a time when there was a minor furore over a bungled Young Labor operation where a room was established at the Downtowner Hotel (just down the road from the Trades Hall where the Young Labor conference was being held). Then Head Office organiser Roland Lindell raided the room but missed all that went on in there. No one can ever be sure what went on in that room, but the Melbourne University University Council resolved to call in the Police expressing concern at the large-scale production of false Melbourne University student cards which were being used to facilitate false voting in the Young Labor conference. Can anyone guess whose name appeared on the hotel reservation form, a document still in the files of a number of activists. I happen to think that despite the critics, that Tim is indeed highly capable and is potential leadership material of the Party, he is young and will have twenty years under his belt before getting his chance but he definitely has what it takes. He is the Victorian Paul Keating, in style and substance.

Anyway the NUW/Network group represent a very significant and influential grouping that is a key part of the Bracks Government and the federal leadership. It seems far more likely that Bracks will eventually side with the influential figure Greg Sword than the young but replaceable David Feeney. Sword has made it clear a choice must be made.

Just like the conservative Catholic Arch-Bishop fending off criticism from 60 Minutes, many in Sword’s camp believe there is an air of inevitability about Feeney’s demise. Feeney’s defenders say that this is the one job in life he always wanted and that if Sword wants to nuke him that he must get ready for some return fire. Those stuck in the middle like the husband and wife team Thomson, Conroy and faction Secretary Fiona Richardson must be feeling as nervous as the milliontroops along the Kashmiri line of control.

Time to duck and cover, I think.

Do ya best, Delia Delegate