This is an abridged version of the speech given to the Wollongong May Day march on May 2 by Fred Moore.
Moore has been active in the union movement for nearly 80 years, since attending his first May Day march in 1932 as a 10-year-old.
He is a blood-brother to the Jerringa people and a life member of the South Coast Labour Council, the NSW Combined Pensioners and Superannuants Association and the South Coast May Day Committee (which he chaired for 20 years). He is also the first life member of the Miners Federation (now the Construction Forestry Mining Energy Union).
And because of his unstinting help and solidarity, he was made a life member of the Miners' Women's Auxiliary.
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We're on the street; and it's vitally important that we stay on the street because the right to march and demonstrate had to be won by the comrades that came before us.
They won it with blood and they were bashed. Just 100 metres from here up on that corner some years ago, the miners and the marchers for May Day were refused the right to march. They fought and battled and got bashed with batons.
Two of them, Paddy Malloy and Paul Martin got 12 months' hard labour. So we have to stay on the streets because the most important things have always been won on the streets.
While we are free to march on May Day here through our vigilance, we must not forget that many millions of people throughout the world are not. They suffer under ruthless regimes and governments dominated by greedy multinationals. This is what's coming to us.
We mustn't forget that prior to the last depression people that demonstrated were shot dead. When the miners arrived in their thousands to try and get the scabs out of the Rothbury mines, they were met with an onslaught and one miner was shot dead — Norman Brown. Others carried the scars and the bullets until the day they died.
Prior to that, on a picket line in Melbourne, when workers were trying to protect their rights, Alan Whittaker, a Gallipoli veteran, was shot dead by the police and died on the spot. For what? Just because he was on a peaceful picket line and told to move on. A fight erupted and the police opened fire.
We must at all times protect and demand the right to work and protect our hard won conditions because when we're on the street, that's where the action is.
The old timers said that governments will never move until they hear the voices of the workers on the street. That means that a thousand workers outside parliament house is better than all the lobbying you can do. We must never let them take us off the streets!
We know that we are now heading for more desperate times, with harsh government laws to crush us and turn us into a police state.
They have enough laws on the books to keep us down for 100 years. We've got crimes acts, penal clauses, terrorist laws, phone tapping, you could go on all day.
And they will use them when the time is right if we let them. But if we increase our numbers and fight back, they'll have a job on their hands because the workers have been through this sort of thing and they will fight on.
I'm getting old and probably coming to an end but the young people must now organise and fight back because you're going to face some of the most vicious things this country has ever seen.
The fiercest industrial and political battles are being fought to safeguard the conditions that workers have lost. One of the great banners that we carried said "Not a minute on the day, not a penny off the pay", but now people are working 12 hours and forced to work for flat rates.
All the great banners of the past are still there, like "United we stand, divided we fall". The old timers knew that wasn't just talk, it was there for a reason. If they could break you up into little groups they could annihilate you, but if you stand fast and fight back they have a job on their hands.
"What's been won must be retained", was always a very prominent banner. And while we're talking about laws, it's been 60 years next month since the 1949 coalminer strike when the Labor government turned vicious.
The NSW Labour Council and the ACTU left the workers at the mercy of the ruling class. They jailed the miners' leaders and did the unforgivable: they put troops into an industrial dispute.
So whether it's a Labor government or a Liberal one, once you take on the state it becomes a vicious fight.
The great banners called for unity and to safeguard what has been won. Once it goes this time it's gone forever.
So I say that the Militant Minority Movement should be reformed and their tactics employed because we're going to see mass unemployment.
They will attack the low-income earners and the pensions to balance their budgets and pass on the takings to the transnationals.
So long live the May Day tradition, long live the workers' battles. Always march in the streets and never give in!