'Workers Online' no more

There is also a number of research centres in universities, which provide accessible online working papers about labour related research, including the Centre for Research in Education, Equity and Work in the Hawke Research Institute for Sustainable Societies, the Industrial Relations Research Centre at University of NSW, Centre of Full Employment and Equity at University of Newcastle.

Other sites providing a source of labour movement perspectives on industrial relations include The Australian Fabians and the Victorian based Union Solidarity.

Several blogs from time to time address industrial relations issues. Occasional commentary is published on Billy Blog by Professor Bill Mitchell, Mark Bahnisch runs Larvatus Prodeo with some posts on IR issues. Tim Dunlop's The Road to Surfdom is probably the most consistent blog with IR commentary.

None of these provides a labour-oriented industrial relations news function.

Fee-paying subscription news sources for industrial relations are to be found at WorkplaceInfo, which is published by the employer association, Australian Business Limited. WorkplaceInfo has a limited number of links to media articles available without cost during weekdays.

Another subscription service, Workplace Express, provides access to industrial relations news exclusively to paying subscribers. A third, less well-known pay subscription source is Lawlex. Lawlex sends out a comprehensive weekly Industrial Relations Newsfeed email newsletter to subscribers.

The only comprehensive free service is IR Policy, which is an IR news clearing house, with some additional and irregular commentary and other resources. IR Policy, however, is a one-person operation and a decision is to be made about its future before Christmas.

Union members and other workers can also access union websites for specific IR news items. Leading the pack in accessibility and consistency in provision of federal industrial relations news to their membership are the Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union, the "white collar" unions - the Australian Services Union and the Community and Public Sector Union - and the Liquor, Hospitality and Miscellaneous Workers Union. However, many of the union websites either provide news accessible to members only or their web presence is out of date and spasmodic or under-utilised. The ACTU provides easily accessible information and resources for its Rights at Work campaign and its media releases on various topics.

Part of the problem with providing an ongoing and consistent labour movement-oriented news service is having the organisational backing providing staff and resources. Workers Online appeared to have both. However, its driving personnel appear to be adopting a policy development orientation.

While that is essential for the labour movement, especially while it is under attack from the neo-conservative ideological program of the Howard Government, workers also need to keep abreast of developments across the board. This is absolutely an imperative as the Howard ideology seeks to isolate workers from each other.