"It came out of bloody campaigns in the United States for the eight-hour day in the 1880s"

Actually...

The happy idea of using a proletarian holiday celebration as a means to attain the eight-hour day was first born in Australia. The workers there decided in 1856 to organize a day of complete stoppage together with meetings and entertainment as a demonstration in favor of the eight-hour day. The day of this celebration was to be April 21. At first, the Australian workers intended this only for the year 1856. But this first celebration had such a strong effect on the proletarian masses of Australia, enlivening them and leading to new agitation, that it was decided to repeat the celebration every year.

The first to follow the example of the Australian workers were the Americans. In 1886 they decided that May 1 should be the day of universal work stoppage. On this day 200,000 of them left their work and demanded the eight-hour day. Later, police and legal harassment prevented the workers for many years from repeating this [size] demonstration. However in 1888 they renewed their decision and decided that the next celebration would be May 1, 1890.

In the meanwhile, the workers' movement in Europe had grown strong and animated. The most powerful expression of this movement occurred at the International Workers' Congress in 1889. At this Congress, attended by four hundred delegates, it was decided that the eight-hour day must be the first demand. Whereupon the delegate of the French unions, the worker Lavigne from Bordeaux, moved that this demand be expressed in all countries through a universal work stoppage. The delegate of the American workers called attention to the decision of his comrades to strike on May 1, 1890, and the Congress decided on this date for the universal proletarian celebration.

From: Rosa Luxemburg "What are the origins of may day?"

It is interesting that the labor governments in every other state have privatised their electricity, leaving NSW as the only state where the industry is still government run. Of all the comments about privatisation, it think the best came from Ross Gittins, who is not known for his right wing views. His call for why it is being opposed is that the power unions are on a soft cop that the Iemma government wishes to end.

If the liberal opposition has the sense to support privatisation in parliament, it could pass with as many as 50 labor defectors. Let us hope so, as we need a more efficient power system to face up to the challenges of peak oil and carbon taxes, which will inevitably reduce our standard of living.

If the workers were insane enough to strike, I don't think it would take long for a number of chinese electrical workers to be brought in to run the system. Even labor governments do this if necessary, and older people can remember when Chifley brought the army into the coalfields in 1949 to break the strike organised by the communist unions. The days when a few unions can hold the community to ransom are long gone.

Thanks for expanding on the history Lev. I think the comment is still valid since the Second International chose 1 May because of the significance of that day in the struggle for the eight hour day in the US.

Plersdus says we should privatise to make the industry more efficient. I wonder what the results of privatisation in other states have actually been? More costly, not more efficient.

Passy,

If you think that the NSW Treasury is not currently extracting every cent it can from the state electricity system, then my name is not Michael Costa. For a government that is so desperate for every dollar it can lay its hands on that it is proposing a desalination plant mainly so it can make a huge profit on the electricity it sells it, you can be sure that no private dividend could compare. Coupled with the staff reductions that will be possible under private ownership, it is hard to see in a competitive electricity market how prices will rise more under privatisation than under the present system. Obviously, the proposed imposition of a carbon tax will cause the price to rise substantially over the next few years whoever controls it.

So is class dead? It looks like the NSW Government is trying to cook up some deal to buy off the union bureaucrats and through them workers across the State.

I think Labor is reacting to working class pressure from below. A small point but it does show to me at least that the majority of us sell our labour power and in that very arrangement we really run society. We just need to understand that, and that is the most difficult issue to address. But as we can see, time and time again workers do begin to understand the role they play in running society and that small things can spark massive upsurges of workers.

One thing the article didn't deal with is the role the ALP plays in society. Why does a so called Labor party attack workers, in this case power workers?

It is the same role Labor plays over and over again, always dashing the hopes of its working class supporters. It ends up ruling for the rich, ie managing capitalism and accepting the profit motive as the grundnorm of society.

Lev where did you find Rosa Luxemburg, is not she with Spartacus?
Lev if you met Rosa again tel her that Today workers are fighting for 50-60 hours per week, including the overtime, even without the overtime penalty!
Tel her she had right about the soviet union, it self demolished and the guardians for the communist ethos now are the oligarchs and Russia's mafia leaders!
Tel her now we do not need revolutions, the socialist, labors and social democrats have won the elections in many countries. In Australia, we had a problem, for many years extreme conservatives, but this happened because workers remembered the former labor government!
Today workers belong to the middle class!! (some unionists believe it) and have not reason to fight!
Forget the class fighting now we passed to a higher level, the employers order and workers execute, even against their own benefits. They are ready to signed Individual contracts with worst conditions as happened with Kevin wife's employees!
Today the unions found a better way to promote workers rights, instead to fight with employers they accept and legalize employers claims!
I am sure at the the unions would lose their members but this could be the best proof for their success!
Personally I do not know what is bad and what worst but my opinion do not count as I am migrant.
From little things, big things grow but not any more without hard fight