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An ongoing investigation by the Socialist Equality Party |
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Return to Record of the Workers Inquiry Union chief threatens to sue SEP In a desperate attempt at political intimidation, South Coast Labour Council secretary Paul Matters has threatened to sue the Socialist Equality Party and Peter Stavropoulos, the convenor of the Workers Inquiry, for defamation. Matters' threat, completely unsubstantiated and unspecified, came in a reply, sent on Labour Council letterhead, to a letter addressed by the SEP to the Labour Council's president on September 17. The SEP letter demanded that the Council condemn the actions of Matters on the evening of September 3 and take whatever measures were necessary to ensure that Matters was prevented from repeating them. On that night, Matters assaulted and abused Stavropoulos, a union delegate at the BHP steelworks Hot Strip Mill, and other SEP members outside the Warrawong Community Hall after a public meeting over the closure of Port Kembla hospital. The SEP's letter, sent by the party's assistant national secretary Linda Tenenbaum, stated that in front of a number of witnesses, Matters had elbowed and pushed Stavropoulos, snatched publications from his hands, and made abusive and threatening statements. Matters had also elbowed and shoved another SEP member. "Such behaviour on the part of a union official will simply not be tolerated," Tenenbaum wrote. "We hereby demand that the SCLC condemn the actions of Mr Matters, and further, that it take whatever measures are necessary to ensure that Mr Matters is prevented from repeating them." In his letter, dated October 16, Matters simply declares that the SEP's correspondence was "rejected". He provides no evidence that the Labour Council has conducted any factual investigation into the physical attack on Stavropoulos, who, as a union delegate, is a member of an affiliated organisation. Instead, he states that "legal action will be taken in regard to your and Stavropoulos' defamation". Matters' reply also follows a letter written by a Workers Inquiry commissioner Tony Barea, another steelworker, on behalf of the Workers Inquiry Committee, demanding that the Labour Council take appropriate disciplinary action against Matters. Barea's letter, sent on October 9, stated: "Such behaviour is of great concern to us. We hold both Peter [Stavropoulos] and his fellow Socialist Equality Party members in high regard following their ongoing work in the Workers Inquiry." This is not the first time that Matters has threatened to sue the SEP and those associated with the Workers Inquiry. Just three days before the Workers Inquiry public hearings in Port Kembla on July 19-20, he rang the SEP national office hysterically declaring that he would "sue you all" over a Workers Inquiry leaflet. Matters' threats highlight the unions' hostile response to the Workers Inquiry and the evidence it has produced, irrefutably linking the pollution of BHP, the former Port Kembla copper smelter and other major industries to the extraordinary levels of leukaemia, lymphoma and other cancers suffered in the areas surrounding the steelworks. In their report, Cancer and Industrial Pollution, the Workers Inquiry commissioners found that the Labor and trade union leaders were centrally responsible for assisting years of official cover-up of the leukaemia and cancer crisis. "For decades they have permitted BHP and other companies to continue using equipment, materials and work practices which endanger the lives and health of working people," the report states. "Union officials have systematically suppressed workers' struggles against unsafe conditions and colluded with management to hide cancer cases known to be caused by workplace emission." It is this exposure, documented in detail, that has prompted the physical attacks and legal threats. The SEP and Workers News will not be intimidated in the slightest by these antics. |