Bill Mason

  • Queensland Labor votes to sell TAB

    Queensland Labor votes to sell TABBRISBANE — The Queensland Totalisator Agency Board (TAB), the government-owned centralised betting agency, will be sold to investors in a $200 million privatisation endorsed by the ALP state

  • Beattie clashes with AWU, bosses

    Beattie clashes with AWU, bossesBRISBANE — Queensland Labor premier Peter Beattie is confronting ALP faction leader and Australian Workers Union state secretary Bill Ludwig over proposed new industrial legislation, which will

  • Job insecurity is growing

    Job insecurity is growingBRISBANE — Successive Queensland governments have boasted of being the nation's leading job creator. But 50% of all new jobs created in Queensland since 1988 were casual or part-time, according to a

  • MUA activists foresee bigger fights

    BRISBANE — Two men who took part in the Patrick lockout dispute as Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) members last year, former Queensland branch organiser Bob Carnegie and union activist Mick Fulton, spoke to 30 people after a

  • Strike at Sun Metals

    Strike at Sun MetalsBRISBANE — A strike by more than 1000 workers has halted construction of the $1.2 billion Sun Metals Zinc Refinery, south of Townsville. The action is over workers' right to choose their unions. A meeting of

  • One Nation collapse continues

    BRISBANE — Two more One Nation state MPs are out of the party, bringing its number in the Queensland parliament down to five — compared to 11 after the June state election. Member for Maryborough John Kingston and member for

  • Truss picketed at Centrelink

    Truss picketed at CentrelinkBRISBANE — Around 20 members of the Community and Public Sector Union and their supporters picketed the Centrelink Brisbane Call Centre on February 23 to protest against the presence there of Warren

  • Hanson warns 'traitor' MPs

    BRISBANE — The crisis in Pauline Hanson's racist One Nation party has deepened. Hanson attacked the Queensland state MPs who resigned recently as "traitors", and warned that One Nation candidates would stand against the defectors.

  • One Nation MP in row over CJC

    One Nation MP in row over CJCBRISBANE — Queensland One Nation MP Jack Paff has pledged to introduce bills to abolish the Criminal Justice Commission and its parliamentary watchdog, the Parliamentary Criminal Justice Committee.

  • Injury highlights mine safety crisis

    Injury highlights mine safety crisisBRISBANE — On January 20, mining apprentice Brant North had both legs amputated in a horrific accident at MIM's Oaky Creek mine, about 350 kilometres north-west of Rockhampton. North is in a

  • Brisbane River 'a sewer pipe'

    Brisbane River 'a sewer pipe'BRISBANE — The Brisbane River, and the Bremer River flowing into it from Ipswich, have become "sewer pipes", funnelling pollution, effluent and sediment into Moreton Bay, a report has revealed. The

  • Emergency call centre cuts

    Emergency call centre cutsBRISBANE — Telstra has been widely criticised over moves to close its 000 emergency call centre at Ipswich and divert all crisis calls to Sydney and Melbourne. The closure, planned for April, will cost