the radical history of Melbourne, Aus.

butcher · Jun 4, 2010

Ok, I know there a quite a few fellow melburnites on this forum, so thought I'd start a thread to share some stories of the radical history of this city of ours. Of course, feel free to contribute your own ones (looking at u Queerpunk).

I'll endeavour to reprint or write stories here on the Tramways dispute, the dole army, Union Solidarity, the Squatters Union, the IWW and the (successful) fight against conscription during WW1, Chummy Flemming, JA Andrews, the Melbourne Anarchist Club, and more as I have the time.

This first post is a brief overview of the fight for the 8 hour day in Melbourne. It is very important to note it was here in Melbourne where the working class first won this right. The below text is from an article i wrote for Melbourne Black #2, a monthly anarchist zine i co-edit. it is not entirely relevant, but sections are. I shall expand on this text in the future. I have put the relevant section in bold. I hope you enjoy it.

available: melbourneblack.wordpress.com

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May Day

May Day began in 1886 when workers all over the United States took strike action calling for the eight hour day. It was followed by the subsequent framing and false trial of 8 Anarchist and anarcho-syndicalist unionists who had played a key roll in the movement. Four men - August Spies, Albert Parsons, Adolph Fischer and George Engel were subsequently hung by the State. A fifth man, Louis Ling, committed suicide on the eve of his execution. The three remaining men had their sentences commuted to life sentences and the campaign to free them from prison, which was eventually successful, gave May Day its immediate resonance as a symbol of international workers solidarity. The Second International declared May 1st as International Worker’s Day, and May 1st 1890 set as the date for international strike action and demonstrations for the eight hour day. International Workers Day, May 1st, continues to be celebrated by workers to this day.

Of course, in Melbourne, the struggle for the eight hour day was won much earlier. Following working class organising and agitation, on April 19th, 1856 the committees in the Melbourne Building Trades made this provocative public announcement:
‘The delegates appointed by the different Committees connected with the Building Trades hereby give notice that it has been unanimously resolved, at their Trade Meetings, to commence the eight-hour system on Monday the 21st instant, by beginning work at 7 a.m., and leaving off at 5 p.m., deducting two hours for meals, till the 23rd of August of each year, and the remaining months from 6 till 4. The hours of meals during the winter months to be- Breakfast, from 9 till 10; dinner, 1 to 2: and from 8 till 9, and 12 till 1 in the summer.’

On April 21st, stonemasons, whilst building Melbourne University, downed tools and lead a winding march to Parliament House, attracting fellow workers on route, to demand the eight hour day. By May 1st, employers in the building trade had largely conceded defeat, agreeing ‘to pay the same amount of wages as formerly for ten hours’ labour’. From 1879, the eight-hour day was a public holiday in Victoria. Whilst the struggle for the eight hour day varies from place to place, May Day remains an important date for its internationalist traditions.

May Day should remind us that all the concessions wrested from the ruling class, like the eight hour day, have been due to working class organising, struggle and agitation, not from nice bosses or the right political leaders. With the continuing attacks on wages, conditions and job security through casualisation; the practical criminalisation of strike action; and the forces of a global market throwing thousands of Australian workers into unemployment and further entrenching poverty in the Global South; the need for working class self-organisation, and strong, Internationalist, fighting unions, is as vital as ever.

Events occurring on May Day in Melbourne this year are fantastically diverse. They include actions on Indigenous and refugee rights; an event against the ongoing femicide in Juarez, Mexico; an action against the Melbourne housing crisis; the traditional Sunday worker’s march; and all the usual piss ups and BBQs. The struggle against Capitalism should not only occur at the point of production. Those oppressed by Capitalism are far more diverse than Marx’s Industrial Proletariat (let’s face it, its euro-centric and male dominated). It is exciting to see such diversity represented this May Day, and can only help build a dynamic and multifaceted movement. In our desire to smash Capitalism and the State, and replace it with a free society, we must build a movement inclusive of the needs of all people who find themselves oppressed by Capitalist society.

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sauces:
Anarcho-Syndicalist Federation, May 1st: The International Workers' Day, 2009.
The Herald, Melbourne, April 19, 1856; Reprinted in Ebbels, R (ed.)., The Australian Labour Movement, 1965, p. 65.
The Herald, Melbourne, May 1, 1856; in Ebbels, R (ed), 1965, p. 68.

butcher · Jun 4, 2010

A History Of Squatting Campaigns in Melbourne
By Iain MacIntyre

this is an edited version of a talk given by Iain at Camp Eureka on Monday, 26th April 2010. The original unedited version is available online at melbourneblack.wordpress.com

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1946 Squatting Campaign

Inspired by a major campaign in the UK, where 100s if not 1000s of properties were taken over, the Communist Party of Australia (CPA) initiated a series of squatting actions to address the post war housing shortage.

The activists involved were able to tap into a number of key resources, not least the general ferment around gender and class based issues that were happening in the wake of the war. In doing so they were able to appeal to people’s fears of another depression and the general demand that they be rewarded for wartime sacrifices.

Although Cold War hysteria around Communism was about to begin, the idea that society should provide for the basic needs of all was a prevalent one at the time. Much of this was channelled into state based solutions and the creation of the welfare state, but nevertheless it allowed the squatting campaign to draw on ideas that many people at some level agreed with. Unlike today strong communities also existed and people knew their neighbours. Although this didn’t automatically translate into support for such campaigns it gave them a base from which to draw on.

CPA activists may have been using squatting to primarily advocate for more public housing rather than complete community control, but the idea of seizing unused properties on the basis of need was still a radical one. In this they were aided by Wartime Moratorium Regulations in which people were able to identify empties whose owners could then be compelled to rent them out. At the beginning of the campaign the prosecution of the regulations was weak and inconsistent, but they provided a policy that activists could point to and build on. In doing so they were able to argue that by squatting they were enforcing the spirit, if not the letter, of the law.

Lastly the various squatting actions had a core of organised activists who were willing to occupy properties and guard them for as long as it took. These troublemakers also had an existing support network in the CPA which boosted the neighbourhood committees that were set up.

The campaign probably started in January, but kicked off publicly in May when Returned Service League (RSL) and CPA members (possibly one and the same) seized the "Marranah" mansion in Kings Cross turning it over to a number of families. After a concerted campaign the local council was forced to recognise the occupiers as tenants and begin much needed repairs. In the same month four families with the assistance of the CPA, RSL, the Legion of Ex Servicemen and the Commonwealth Association squatted staff cottages adjoining a factory at St Mary's after the factory's manager rejected applications for legal occupation.

Further squats continued to be set up in Sydney and in June the campaign spread to Melbourne where the Box Hill CPA branch transferred a family from a cowshed to a house that had been deserted for three years. In the same month ex-servicemen and their supporters were arrested and heavily fined for wilful trespass after they refused to leave a property in St Kilda. In Hobart 2 families broke in and took possession of rooms in an empty private hospital. Within a month 53 homeless people had moved in including 27 children.

July saw similar actions in Melbourne and Sydney with several public meetings also held. The biggest action saw six families occupy vacant huts in the Royal Marine compound at Moore Park. The families and CPA members scaled a fence enclosing the Cleveland Street compound before police moved in and laid siege for a number of days. Unable to leave for fear of arrest and eviction the families were provided with food and blankets by locals. A campaign against the squatters was begun in the media with attempts made to brand them "communist dupes", but this failed to break either local support or the squatters' resolve. By the month's end victory was achieved when the squatters were finally given the opportunity to buy the huts with finance supplied by the federal government.
Similar actions continued and eventually also spread to Newcastle. By August the CPA claimed to have housed over 130 homeless people in Sydney alone.

Information on how the campaign wrapped up is limited. However it would appear that the squatters embarrassed various authorities into applying the wartime provisions more closely and that this is where the activists’ energy increasingly went. However squatting continued on into 1947 with families squatting a disused tennis pavilion in Williamstown where they converted the change rooms into living spaces.

Squatters Union of Victoria (SUV)

The Squatters Union ran from the early 1980s until the end of the decade. Judging from the Union’s magazine, and the people I’ve met who were involved, it was primarily an anarchist group. Unlike the 1940s campaign the Union’s activities were primarily run by squatters themselves. At times there was only a small core activists involved, many of whom were also unemployed.

Although payments were very low the conditions on the dole were far more lenient than they are today and this allowed some activists to go at things full time. The Union was also able to draw on a larger pool of squatters as well as people involved in the punk scene and unemployed activism. Many of the core Squatters Union folks were involved in all three.
The Union also had the advantage of there being many more empties available than today, particularly in the inner city and Ministry of Housing and Military Housing areas like Braybrook and Laverton. Early on the SUV often worked with housing groups and ran joint campaigns publicising the eviction of squatters from disused public housing and council properties. In doing so the Union generated a lot of media interest and established itself as a contact point for people needing solidarity or advice. The Ministry of Housing’s response was to trash empties and put any squatters they evicted to the bottom of the waiting list. Eventually under Jeff Kennett’s reign a portion of housing stock and many government buildings were flogged off.

The Union sometimes physically helped people set up squats and also picketed councils and real estate agents over evictions. It also joined in broader campaigns around gentrification and housing in St Kilda and North Melbourne. It organised its own anti-eviction campaigns in Northcote, Fitzroy and other areas and occasionally took part in physically resisting evictions.

The SUV also served as a media contact to comment on housing and squatting issues and claimed to have done 116 interviews in 1987, the International Year of Shelter for the Homeless, alone. Members of the Union presented a radio show, which eventually merged with the Unemployed Workers one to become SUWA. They also published 18 issues of Squat It! magazine.

The Union’s activities crossed over with mass squats and social spaces such as a warehouse in Wellington St, Collingwood, a squatted café on a pier in Port Melbourne, a squatted Orphanage in South Melbourne and the Community Fire Station in Fitzroy. The latter served as the Union’s headquarters in the late 1980s as well as the home of the Unemployed Workers Union, Koori Press and other groups.

The SUV also ran an advice service. According to some stats published in Squat It! they, along with the Western Region Housing Council, received 485 enquiries from people interested in squatting in 1987 and had 80 reports of empties which allowed them to build a list of 100s of properties. In the same year the Union claimed to have distributed 10 000 leaflets and pasted up 2000 posters. All in all the various people who moved through the organisation over the best part of a decade were a busy bunch. If you’re interested in finding out more about the organisation and its activities you can find copies of Squat It! in the Loophole library and the State Library of Victoria.

1990s Activism

My personal experiences with squatting activism in Melbourne during the 1990s weren’t quite as exciting as the campaigns of the ‘40s or ‘80s. I’ll talk about them mainly to illustrate what people have done in the quiet times and also to discuss the usefulness of large, sustained, public squats- something we didn’t have.

I moved to Melbourne in 1992 and got involved in the local scene after meeting local squatters at a public talk. The group I became involved with was originally called the Squatters Information Service (SIS) and later became the Squatters Information Network (SIN) because the acronym was cooler. We were auspiced by a housing lobby group called Shelter Victoria (SV) who had a relationship with squatters going back to the SUV days. They provided us with a phone and a listing in the White Pages as well as the use of their office on Friday afternoons.

There was a group of maybe 5-10 people who would do a once a month shift on the phone or hang out and use the photocopier. Around that there was a larger group of people who would call in with the addresses of empty houses which we kept in a file and would then pass onto people who called in. People were meant to call back if the place was being lived in or was a no go, but few ever did. We promoted the group via announcements on Radio 3CR and the SUWA show as well as through stickers and posters. A lot of callers simply looked us up in the phone book under “squatter” because they’d heard of the Squatters Union via its earlier campaigns.

Most of our callers were either mothers with kids who were about to be evicted and needed somewhere pronto or people who had been eyeing off an empty in their area for some time. Most weeks 2 to 5 people would call up and we’d do what we could to help them, which to be honest often wasn’t much. The laws provided no protection unless the police or someone other than the owner was trying to evict them and we weren’t in a position to provide physical solidarity.
Probably the most useful thing we did was to put out about 1000 copies of the 1993 Squatters Handbook. This was circulated through Housing groups and services as well as via various sub-cultural haunts. On the back of that some of us did talks with various groups. I remember running a workshop in Geelong talking with some homeless kids about their experiences with squatting and strategies for dealing with the police and landlords.

Nearly all of us were squatting. There were still a lot of empties around in the inner city then, probably an average of one every couple of streets. Although I had better luck in later years I tended to pick the ones which didn’t last long, but generally if you kept at it you could find one that did.

People were fairly upfront when I got involved that SIN was to be an advice line only although some in the collective did help people break into properties. The only time we planned on doing an action while I was in the group it ended in a near fatal split.

We’d been asked to do something during Housing Week by SV and we decided to squat a building in the city to highlight the number of unused properties in Melbourne. From memory (and it may be faulty) half of the small band who would be potentially involved decided they would only take part if we engaged in all out resistance. I can’t recall the exact reasoning, but I guess it would be a show of militancy. The rest of us had mixed feelings. Objections to a stand up fight included that it would be suicidal and/or stupid for a small group of people to tangle with the police over what was essentially a publicity stunt, that dealing with courts, etc would be a waste of our limited personal and group resources, and that we should wait and see how things panned out on the day. In the end everyone got huffy and nothing came of it.
Following our direct action debacle things with SIN slowly fizzled out. With the election of Kennett many of us got sidetracked into things like the Northlands and Richmond secondary school occupations. Some of us however continued to be involved with the SUWA show, which people still occasionally call for advice to this day. In 2001 SUWA folks put together a mini “No Frills” version of the SIN handbook and managed to get 1-2000 copies out as well as eventually set up a website.

Both SIN and I guess SUWA’s main contribution was in providing practical advice and promoting the idea of squatting to smallish numbers of people. Given the tiny crew who were involved in squatting activism and the diminishing pool of supporters around us that was probably the best we could do.
In the years since I’ve noticed that every time a large and reasonably public space has been squatted the overall interest and number of people squatting has also increased. In the mid 1990s a space was squatted on Wellington St which was dubbed the Brown Warehouse. The same space had been previously squatted as a café back in the 1980s. This time around it housed various people, many of them travelling back and forth from forest protests, and also held gigs and other events. There was also another place down the road called Fabryka which had a café night. Both spaces were evicted after about 3-6 months, but the Brown Warehouse caught a lucky break when the owners took the squatters to court instead of just sending the police around when no one was home. That allowed the occupants time to barricade which stalled the owners for a short while and later saw the police call off a planned eviction. It also got squatting and the campaign to save the space a lot of publicity. I guess it’s fairly obvious, but as in the 1940s and 1980s, the experience of the Brown Warehouse demonstrates that if you can show that a radical solution works then people will give it a go.

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butcher · Jun 4, 2010

Internment and fascism in Australia during World War 2 / The case of Francesco Fantin

During Australia's involvement in World War 2, internment camps were set up to imprison those with fascist or pro- Japanese political ties or beliefs. however, the net was flung rather widely, as such Italian migrants were targeted and imprisoned without much concern for their politics. The case was such for Francesco Fantin, an Anarchist and anti-Fascist organiser. His brother was reportedly a fascist, this created enough confusion or reason to imprison Francesco. Within the internment camp, an obviously hostile environment for an anti-fascist to find oneself in, he was murdered by a fellow internee. A little known story, but an important one for a political movement which tends to engage in hero worship (Durutti, Mahkno, Marcos, et al) a lot whilst advocating 'no gods, no masters'. (not that these ppl were 'masters', just that is important to acknowledge all anarchists and the work they do).

From Fantin Reading Group:
fantinreadinggroup.wordpress.com/

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Francesco Fantin

Francesco Fantin was 41 years old when he was murdered at the hands of fascists at the Loveday Internment camp on 16 November 1942. He had emigrated to Australia in 1924 along with his brothers and immediately launched himself into organising. He remained an anarchist, labour organiser and ardent antifascist throughout his life.

This reading group aims to assess both classic and contemporary anarchist texts, encouraging the reader to come to their own conclusions through collective discussion and, in doing so, honour the memory of Francesco Fantin.

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Anti-Fascism and internment: The case of Francesco Fantin
by Paul Nursey-Blay
www.takver.com/history/fantin_fransesco.htm

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When one says fascism one says horror, its crimes are known. Its infamies do not allow of attenuation. It is a tyranny which tries not without success in many parts of the world - to annul the civilised conquests which were attained during centuries of struggles and of progress in order to push back the human race into a state of shameful barbarism . ..

To those outside. To let them know that in this Internment Camp there are living friends, workmen who make common cause with them. Companions who have years of struggle for liberty, for justice, who have the same goal, and are cheered by their victories.

Francesco Fantin, Pensieri a Ricordi, Loveday Camp, Barmera, 1942.2

Francesco Fantin was an intelligent but not an educated man. He was a textileworker by trade who brought to political issues unsophisticated, strong convictions rather than a great depth of analysis. Yet in the fragmentary writings that he left behind there is clear evidence not only of intelligence, but of sensitivity, of sincerity and of a genuine concern for his fellow man. Fantin was a convert to anarchism who tried to live by its tenets of community, fraternity and liberty.

Yet we do not remember Fantin for his theories of anarchism, rather we remember him as an anarchist worker engaged in the political struggle. There is no corpus of work, no body of theory by which we can judge his views. Beyond a dozen or so letters and the few pages of the diary he composed in the Loveday Camp there is no record of his ideas. That he had ideas is clear, but he lacked the means of setting them out. The translator of his diary remarked: `The writer appears not to have been very literate, and the spelling and grammar are in places incorrect'.3

Fantin was an active member of the left, corresponding, acting and working against Fascism. He was one of the founding members of the Anti-Fascist Matteotti Club in Melbourne. But, unlike his friend, fellow Vicenziano, townsman and migrant, Frank Carmagnola, he did not play a leading part in the national organisation of the anarchist or antiFascist movements.4

It is undeniable that Fantin's chief importance lies in his death and the manner in which it occurred. Killed by Fascists in the Internment Camp 14A in South Australia in November 1942, Fantin, the anarchist and anti-Fascist, the victim of violence he had done little to occasion, lost his life for what he believed. It is for this that he is remembered, indeed revered. Fantin was, and is, viewed as a martyr by the political left in Australia, both within and outside the Italian community. As a significant event his death had both immediate and enduring effects. The immediate effect was on the politics of internment and the fate of the anti-Fascists in the internment camps. Beyond this, however, his life, his internment and his death have all come to represent something larger than the particular problems of internment. For many Fantin has come to symbolise the anti-Fascist struggle within the Italian community in Australia. His story helps to communicate to future generations some knowledge of that little known struggle and an understanding of the issues involved.

The Early Years

Francesco Fantin was born in 1901, to Giovanni and Caterina Fantin, in San Vito di Leguzzano in the Province of Vicenza. His father was a textile worker. He had two brothers, Alfonso and Luigi, and two sisters, Maria and Erminia. Francesco left school after only a few years of education and became a textile worker in the nearby town of Schio. At the end of World War I, when the conflicting social forces that gave birth both to Fascism and the Italian Communist Party were shaping the political life of Italy Fantin became active in Schio as a trade unionist and political militant. It was at this time that he adopted anarchism as his political doctrine and became a conscious and active anti-Fascist. Between 1921 and 1922 he served in the Italian army.5 In 1924 he migrated to Australia, arriving on 27 December6 on the ship Re D'Italia.7

From the time of his arrival until his internment in 1942 Fantin was employed in a number of positions, mainly as an agricultural worker. From 1924 to 1931 he worked in Queensland; as a cane cutter at Mourilyan from 1924 to 1928 and as a field labourer at Edmonton from 1928 to 1931. In that year he moved down to Geelong to work at the Federal Wood Mill, where he stayed for a year. He returned, to Edmonton in 1932 where he again worked as a cane cutter and field worker. In 1939 he was back at the Wood Mill in Geelong, only to return to Edmonton in in 1940, where he worked as a field worker in the sugar industry and on plots owned by himself and his brothers until his internment in 1942. It was during this period that he was active in anarchist, labour and anti-Fascist causes, activities that drew the attention of the Italian Consular authorities who were bent on securing the conformity to Fascism of the Australian Italian community.

The vigilance of the Fascist regime of Mussolini, and its activity in the promotion of the Fascist cause abroad, must never be underestimated. In the 1920s and 1930s there was a concerted effort to win over Italians abroad to the Fascist cause, to recruit them into Fascist organisations directly, or to gain their support indirectly by enrolling them in Italian language schools and Italian cultural organisations. The Statute of the Fascists Abroad was issued in February 1928, its aim being the development of the national consciousness of Italian communities abroad. There was a subsidiary aim of discouraging migrants from adopting a foreign, that is non-Italian, nationality. In Rome a Secretariat. of Fasci Abroad was established to co-ordinate the activities of Fascist organisations outside Italy and to promote, whenever and wherever possible, the Fascist cause.8 Some idea of the flavour of the ideology that was propagated, and the extent to which Fascists abroad were expected to replicate the attitudes and policies of the Fascist government at home while assuming its priorities as their own, can be gauged by the following letter, sent from Rome by the General Secretary of Fasci Abroad, De Cicco, to each secretary of a Fascio in Australia on 4 January 1939:

The Minister for Foreign Affairs has sent the necessary instructions to representatives of the Government with regard to discrimination of Jewish-Italian citizens resident abroad.

As far as concerns belonging to the Fasci, Jews may continue to take part, always provided they are worthy, and at no time and for no reason take any attitude against the Government.

But I remind you that such members of the Party tray not, even in exceptional cases, occupy any political or directive position in any Italian institution.

I also remind you that the problem of the protection of the rare should be put before our community abroad, and put as a problem essential to the future of a people that is returning to its imperial destiny, which has a new mission to fulfil [sic] in the world, and which therefore cannot consent to dangerous disfigurings in its body and mind, disfigurings which would change those racial characteristics that are carrying us to that imperial destiny and are calling us to that mission.

Italians abroad are more exposed than those at home to the danger of 'racial' deformation. They must be protected above all now, when so many are called by the Duce to return by degrees to the country of their origin.

Secretaries of Fasci, and all Fascists are henceforth pledged to this battle for the protection of the race, pledged to activity - not loud and clamorous, for that might give rise abroad to fake interpretation and bad reactions - but to a continuous. tenacious spirit of construction, little by little. The racial spirit of Fascists must be like a religious spirit which transfuses nonbelievers with the persuasion and force of its faith.9

In this political climate it is not surprising to find that Italian migrants of any anti-Fascist persuasion were spied on by the Italian consular authorities. As' Cresciani notes, it was the consul-general and the Melbourne consul who were chiefly responsible for spying on suspect members of the Italian community, in Australia. Files were kept on fifty antiFascists in Adelaide alone, that is ten percent of the Italian community in South Australia.10 Fantin was an early victim of consular-spying activities. Correspondence on Fantin, and his subversive character, took place between the Melbourne Consulate and the Italian Ministry of the Interior as early as September 1927. In April 1928 the Ministry wrote to the Consulate in these terms:

In the meantime you are informed that the subversive Luigi Francesco FANTIN, son of G. BATTA, born at San Vito of Leguzzano on 18th May, 1896, emigrated to Australia in March, 1922.

Right up to, the outbreak of Communism in San Vito he showed himself one of the most fiery exponents of the party programme. Nevertheless, owing to his limited education, he was never recorded as a dangerous person, he made no secret of his views, nor did he commit any acts which call for the particular attention of the Authorities.11

Correspondence is on file, regarding Fantin, between the Sydney and Melbourne Consulates, and between their offices and informants, dated as late as January 1940.12

It remains unproven, but one must assume that the Italian authorities followed, with respect to Fantin, their normal policy towards anti-Fascists in Australia; they denounced him as a subversive, a communist and an anarchist to the Australian Government. It was a policy begun by the ConsulGeneral, Antonio Grossardi, in, the 1920s and continued by his successors.13

What had Fantin done to merit this close and constant scrutiny? He was an anarchist and an active anti-Fascist. He was also active in the labour movement, particularly in Queensland, where he is credited with being part of the organisation of the caneworkers' strike of 1934. But it was Fantin's open anti-Fascism that was of concern to the Consular authorities. Fantin took an active part in the anti-Fascist struggle, although his lack of education no doubt hampered his rise to a prominent position. Clearly, however, he was a significant activist who continued to struggle against the forces of Fascism both before and after internment. In a letter to the Commandant of the Barmera Camp 14A where Fantin was interned, Frank Carmagnola, the leader of the Italian Anarchist movement, appealing for Fantin's release, supplies evidence of Fantin's active involvement in the anti-Fascist movement. 'I have known Mr Fantin', he wrote, 'for a number of years as a very staunch anti-Fascist worker and as one whose sympathies were entirely against the forces of fascism and nazism and who worked arduously and sincerely against such forces. During the period I was editor of the Italian paper La Riscossa, which was a very strong anti-Fascist paper, Mr Fantin was a correspondent for such paper in Queensland and also a distributor of same . . .'14 A Security Report on Carmagnola's request for Fantin's release, on the grounds of his known opposition to Fascism, notes a report from Sydney that presumably was based on an interview with Carmagnola:

Carmagnola stated that he went to Melbourne and with two other Italians, namely Francesco FANTIN, and Valintino CIOTTI, they opened the Anti Fascists 'Matteoti Club', at Spring Street, Melbourne. They also published a weekly newspaper known as La Riscossa. Carmagnola was the publisher and Ciotti was the editor, of the La Riscossa newspaper.15

An ironic footnote to this detailing of Fantin's robust anti-Fascism is provided by the fact that the Director General of Security was clearly persuaded by Carmagnola's appeal. 'I would like to review these cases', he wrote, 'in the light of the information obtained regarding Carmagnola, in order to decide whether Degli ESPOSTI and FANTIN could safely be released under appropriate restrictions, for it would appear unlikely that they would represent any danger to our war effort because of their antagonism towards Fascists.16 The letter was written on 18 November 1942, two days after the murder by Fascists of Francesco Fantin!

Arrest and Internment

Fantin appears to have first attracted the attention of the Australian authorities through a letter that he addressed to L'Adunata Dei Refrattori (Rebels Association) Roseville Station, New Jersey, a letter that was intercepted by the Commonwealth Investigation Branch, Brisbane. In the letter Fantin informs the association, of a change of address which he asks them to pass on to his various correspondents, and concludes, 'with hope and good will to live anew for Anarchy'.17 The Inspector of Police at Cairns was written to by the Commonwealth Investigation Branch in Brisbane asking 'if confidential enquiries could be made into the nationality, sentiments and activities of the abovenamed [Fantin]'.18 The result of these enquiries by Constable R.R. Kelly was a declaration that Fantin was harmless. 'From the inquiries made', wrote Kelly, 'I am satisfied that Fantin has no followers of Anarchism in this Division, and I also ascertained that he is a good honest worker, who is quite rational, when not speaking of Anarchy'.19 Despite this report, the label of anarchist, barely understood but construed as dangerous, was attached to Fantin.

In June 1940 a quite different accusation wars levelled at Fantin when he was accused, in a letter sent to the Aliens Registration Central (13-6-40) from one James McCarthy of 'Waverley', Wharf Street, Brisbane, of being a rabid Fascist. In the same letter McCarthy also indicted a number of other Italians. It must be presumed that the accusations reflected the prevailing anti-Fascist, and therefore, at this stage, anti-Italian sentiment of the broader Australian community. McCarthy stated that Fantin had 'openly expressed to me his hatred of England and Englishmen'. He called him 'particularly cunning and a most crafty type', asserting that in conversation he had said, 'I would sooner employ a Hindoo or an Afghan than a bloody Britisher'.20 It says much for the political climate of the time that this accusation was believed. Apart from all else the use of the terms 'Hindoo' and 'Afghan' clearly betray the psychology of someone brought up within the British Raj rather than that of an Italian worker. Nevertheless it was an accusation that was to do Fantin great harm.

Finally, Fantin was accused, quite separately, of communism. A letter from the Intelligence Officer Cairns to the Intelligence Services of the Australian Military Forces - Northern Command of 21 October 1940 noted: 'From a source which is considered to be reliable I have been informed that the abovenamed (Fantin is identified as Chico Fantini) is a Communist. . .'21 One is left to wonder whether that 'reliable source' was connected with the Consular spying activities. Whatever the source of the accusation it was one that continued to be made. The I.O. Cairns wrote to the Intelligence Service of the Northern Command on 4 November 1940: 'FANTIN is reported to be a rabid Communist and for a number of years to have actively spread Communist propaganda amongst the sugar workers in North Queensland'.22

This claim, that Fantin was a communist, was a damaging charge. Certainly it would have been one that would have drawn the attention of the authorities to Fantin. It must be remembered that at this time the Molotov-Ribbentrop Ponaggression pact between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany was still in effect`: and the Comintern assumed, and sometimes exercised, a broad dominance over the political direction and activity of communist parties outside the U.S.S.R.

The accusation further compounded the confusion concerning Fantin's political allegiance. We now have Fantin the Anarchist, Fantin the Fascist and Fantin the Communist all cohabiting the same 5'6" frame! Even the authorities, suspicious as they were of potentially subversive enemy aliens, were rather bemused. A letter from the Northern Command Section of the Australian Intelligence Core to the 1.0. Cairns written in September 1941 noted: 'As some confusion exists as to whether this man is a Fascist or a Communist, it would be appreciated if action could be taken to clarify the position, to enable further action to be taken'.23

However, clarification was not forthcoming. Instead, in an ingenious, administrative coup de main the tangled threads of the accusations against Fantin were pulled together into one damning indictment:

Fantin is a particularly cunning and crafty type of Italian alien who has been engaged in anti-British propaganda under various guises. He has been listed as an Anarchist, a Fascist, and a follower and teacher of Communistic doctrines. He has a bitter hatred of England and Englishmen and is definitely opposed to Democracy. Fantin has been in Australia since 1924' but has not at any time made application for naturalisation.24

At the end of 1941 Fantin was living with his brother Luigi at Sawmill Pocket, Edmonton. It was his usual place of residence in Queensland. On 18 December 1941 the house was searched by Captain. Brown, 1.0. Cairns and Sergeant Walsh of the. Edmonton police. Maps of the war zone and letters were seized to the disquiet of Fantin as Captain Brown notes in his report. He also notes: 'There was nothing noticed that would connect FANTIN with any organisation of a subversive nature'.25 Despite the result of this search the order for the internment of Fantin was made in Brisbane on 13 February 1942 by Major-General J.M.A. Durant. Fantin was arrested the next day and taken, via Townsville, to the Internment Camp at Gaythorne, Queensland.

On 28 February 1942 police officers returned to Fantin's place of residence at Sawmill Pocket and again conducted a search. The list of the material they confiscated at that time is worth reproducing as indicative not so much of the political persuasion of Fantin as of the attitude and approach of the Australian authorities. The Sergeant in charge reported that:

Hereunder is a list of articles seized at Fantin's room. (1) Autograph Book with foreign writing therein. (3) Booklets in foreign language. (4) News Papers in foreign language. (1) Booklet by Carl [sic] Marx. (3) Letters in foreign language. (1) Phamplett [sic] in foreign language. (1) Multi-coloured handkerchief with photograph of B. Durruti.26

An appeal from Fantin against internment was dismissed on 20 March 1942 and on 21 March an order was made moving him from Gaythorne to the Loveday Internment Camp in Barmera, South Australia.

Loveday 14A

The Loveday Internment Group of camps, situated at Barmera in the South Australian Riverland, was first established in July 1940. The first two camps, known as No. 9 and No. 10 were designed as individual compounds, one and a half miles apart, holding 1,000 persons each. In December 1941 the entry of Japan into the war raised the question of potential Japanese internees. A new type of camp was decided on involving four compounds. This camp was designated No. 14, and the four compounds labelled A, B, C and D.27 On 28 February 1942 ' 14A Compound with Capt. J.H. Richardson as Camp Commandant received 115 Italians from Gaythorne Internment Camp, Queensland'.28 One of that group of 115 was Fantin.

There were a number of fundamental problems that existed in all of the internment camps established under the general aegis of the Australian army in World War Il. They were problems that demonstrated an official ideology that was still based on national and racial characteristics, on a simple minded chauvinism that neglected the complexity of social relations. It was an ideology that paradoxically mirrored the racial and national obsessions of the enemy! It resulted in judgements that made all Germans Nazis and all Italians Fascists, regardless of their political persuasions. The disposition of prisoners between the compounds of the Loveday camp was made therefore on national, or indeed racial lines, rather than along lines of political affiliation. As Lt-Col E.T. Dean notes: 'Each of the main nationalities held, viz. German, Italian and Japanese, required special study, and a different method of handling and treatment'.

The Germans: Arrogant, appreciated strict discipline and firm control.

The Italians: Naturally temperamental, needed firm handling, but once shown who was in command had to be led like a schoolboy.

The Japanese: Subservient, were model prisoners. Their fanatical desire to maintain 'face' made them easy to handle in their eagerness to obey all orders and instructions to the letter.

For all these reasons, it is suggested that where possible people of different races be segregated.29

The result of this policy of segregation along racial or national lines, with a complete disregard for political differences, was bound to lead to tensions within the compounds. Nazis were interned with anti-Nazis because they were all German, anti-Fascists with Fascists because they were all Italian. In addition, the Nazi or Fascist majority, for the logic of the situation demanded that these groups would be the majority groups, were chosen by the Australian authorities to provide the leadership of the camps.

The internment policy of the Australian government can be criticised on two counts. In the first instance, it imprisoned individuals who were openly opposed to Fascism or Nazism simply because of their nationality, or/and because their political views were, while not right wing, regarded as dangerous. While it is obvious that, in the period in question, communists would be the subject of official scrutiny, particularly prior to the German invasion of the Soviet Union, nevertheless, internment of active anti-Fascists showed a lamentable lack of discrimination in the implementation of policy. This error was then compounded by the internment of the political opponents of Fascism and Nazism with Fascists and Nazis. It was; a misguided, misinformed and shortsighted policy that was bound to lead to disaster. It was Fantin's misfortune to be the particular disaster that was both to subject the policy to dose public scrutiny and to bring about necessary changes.

One result of the internment policy of the Australian government was the politicisation of camp life. This is not to suggest that all internees were politically active. Many would have espoused no particular political doctrine. But their affiliations, their loyalties became the battleground for the activities of political groups that sought to capture their allegiance. The enforced co-existence of these groups representing polarised political positions was bound to lead to conflict situations where each group would seek to assert its political and moral identity against the other. The intensity of this conflict was involved both with the obvious question of support for one side or the other in the war, and with related ideological issues of importance. At the broader level such issues involved the vital political and social questions raised by Fascism and the Fascist state. More specifically, for each national group, but particularly for the Italian community amongst whose members the Secretariat of Fasci Abroad had laboured hard to foster support, there was the question of loyalty or disloyalty to the Fatherland. These were issues that served tó accentuate and focus the political antagonisms of camp life. For the anti-Fascists the most significant additional feature of their position was the fact that they were, by the nature of things, doomed to be a permanent minority.

The situation in Camp No. 14A was made worse for anti-Fascists by the transfer from Camp No. 9 of Dr Francesco Piscitelli, an intelligent and able person, and a Fascist, who quickly assumed leadership of 14A. Valentino Ciotti, friend of Fantin and co-founder of the Matteoti Club, gave an account of Fascist activities within the Camp at this time in a statement made after his release.

During April, 1942, Dr Pissitelli [sic] was transferred from No. 9 Internment Camp and elected leader by the internees. He had been previously appointed by the Military Authorities as leader of the camp. Pissitelli [sic] is a strong Fascist and used to spread Fascist propaganda. The Fascists used to meet in the mess room and discuss the war news when the papers arrived at about 7 p.m. at night and the educated ones would read the papers to the masses, even if there was a reverse for the Axis Forces, it would be read as though there had been a victory for them. The Fascists were against Britain and her allies and did all they could to spread propaganda to assist Japan, Germany and Italy. When the Japanese submarines came into Sydney Harbour they spread the propaganda that the Harbour Bridge had collapsed and that Sydney was finished. The more prominent of the Fascist used to get around the camp and say that on one occasion the Japs were in Brisbane, another that they were in Townsville another time in Perth. I have known on occasions when the rumours of the Jap victories were questioned by the internees that the Fascists have told their questioners that the soldiers who brought in the food had given them the news.30

It was an unpromising situation for the opponents of Fascism who were considerably outnumbered. Ciotti estimated that, at that time, there were 'about 300 real Fascists in the 14A internment camp and about 70 or 80 anti-Fascists . .. not influenced by Fascist propaganda'.31 However, it is also clear that there was a job to be done with respect to countering the spread of Fascist propaganda and disinformation. As Ciotti notes, 'this type of propaganda influences the indifferent section and some anti-Fascists too. Many of the internees are ignorant and can be easily led by the propaganda held out to them by the Fascists'.32

Fantin and Ciotti took the lead in opposing Fascism and Fascist propaganda, trying to circulate accurate versions of war news, and expressing themselves in favour of victory for the Allies as a means of achieving liberation for Italy. It was the position that the Italia Libera Movement was to advance as the reason for its foundation in 1943. As Ciotti recorded in his statement, 'some of the anti-Fascists endeavoured to give the true facts of the news and to get sympathy amongst the internees for Britain and her allies, Fantin and myself were most active in this direction'.33 Ciotti's account also illustrates the intensity of the exchanges between Fascists and anti-Fascists. He recounts how one internee was talking to a Fascist, saying that he had been well treated in Australia, that he liked the Australian people and that Australia was a good country. The Fascist responded by threatening him. 'We have got you marked down', he said, 'and later on we will deal with you. You are a traitor to Italy' Ciotti intervened and defended the man who had praised Australia. A number of Fascists called him a low dog and a traitor, to which Ciotti replied: 'Down with Fascism, down with Mussolini, long live free Italy'.34

It is clear that Fantin was also involved in heated exchanges of a similar kind. A statement made by Giuseppe Paternoster after Fantin's death details an incident between himself and Fantin in August 1942. Pasternoster had been insulted by Fantin's attacks on Fascism and had taken Fantin by the neck of his shirt, saying: 'Respect me if you wish to be respected'.35

This confrontation between Paternoster and Fantin was only one of a series of incidents in August 1942 in which Fantin was abused, threatened and assaulted by Fascists. On 17 August Fantin wrote to Ciotti, who had now been released, detailing an assault on him three days earlier.

On the evening of the 15th of this month, at 10 o'clock, while I was in bed here in my tent, with my friend Coletti, two fascist ruffians, together with their assistant Catabbano called me outside with the firm intention of ruining me. They wanted me to give the fascist salute and shout 'Long live il Duce'. Having obtained from me neither the one thing or the other, they began swearing at me, saying that my mother is a big harlot, and so on. They went on with kicks, seizing me by the neck to choke me, finally telling me that if I say anything more, they will kill me. Now I shall see if the military commandant will take some steps. So, with other antifascist friends, we shall defend ourselves as we can. The aggressors are Manaelo Uazzolino [sic, probably Cazzulino] and Paternostro [sic], lately come from Camp No. 9.36

As a result of this attack, and the threats made, Fantin approached the Camp Commander; Major J.H. Richardson, reporting the attack while asking to be moved from the camp because his life was in danger.37 The request was refused, and, although Paternoster was charged the charges were dismissed because no marks of violence could be found on Fantin. At this time records show that Fantin informed the Camp authorities that he was an anti-Fascist, that Paternoster and company were Fascists and that he, Fantin, was being persecuted for his political beliefs.38

As the year of 1942 advanced the tension between Fascists and anti-Fascists increased, fed by the fluctuating fortunes of the Allied and Axis Powers. In late 1942 the tide of war was, at last, beginning to turn in the favour of the Allied forces. The Battle of Britain had dearly been won and Bomber Command had moved strongly onto the offensive; American forces had recently occupied the Vichy bases in Africa; the German onslaught on Russia was stalled at Stalingrad, and shortly to be driven back; most importantly, the British Eighth Army was pushing Rommel out of North Africa, having, decisively defeated the Italian forces. These events, and their promise of future Allied victories, clearly had a significant effect on the psychological atmosphere of the camps. The Fascists were experiencing a series of defeats for the first time, and perhaps contemplating, also for the first time, the possibility that the war might be lost. In such circumstances the experience of internment would acquire a new and bitter character; For the Italian internees of the Fascist persuasion this bitterness would have been accentuated by the total defeat inflicted on their armies in North Africa, an ironic reversal of earlier African triumphs.

In early November a party of Fascist internees arrived from camps in Western Australia. They were welcomed by the Fascist contingent with a communal singing of Giovinezza. Fantin derided the proceedings, and was struck, by Paternoster, with a back hand blow39 Aldo Formigomi, a fellow internee, later provided the police with an account. of this incident:

I remember the contingent of internees who arrived from Western Australia at the beginning of November 1942. The day after that I was passing outside the door of the but where the internees have breakfast, at about 7.30 a.m., and I saw Fantin come out of the huh. He had a trickle of blood coming from his left cheek. He then called me and said, 'I am going to make a complaint to Lieutenant Cross. Will you come and interpret for me?' We went over to Lt Cross and he said in English, 'Paternoster hit me in the face in the breakfast room and made it bleed'. Lt Cross then said, 'I will fix this up. It is too bad for him this time'.40

Despite this assurance no action appears to have been taken. Fantin wanted to report this assault to the Camp Commander but was advised by a fellow anti-Fascist not to press the matter since the attack was not serious.41 Fantin clearly believed otherwise, having, as his diary reveals, a presentiment of death strong enough to make him wish tó leave a will of sorts. 'To the companions', he wrote, Tanizzon, Ciotti, Carmagnola and others still. Seeing that the acts of violence continue, yesterday 7 November I received more blows. Why? Because without any baseness they saw me laugh'.

For the rest I was glad, one day I shall explain why. In short having among these Italians many enemies. The companions remember, that if it should be necessary to leave this Internment camp to go to the cemetery. The brother FANTIN (if they can) must give some money, the fruit of my long work.

Let this money be divided in this way. Two shares to the dear nephews, and nieces, and sisters for the care they have given my dear parents.

The other two shares libertarian press, and political victims.
Franck Fantin

In addition the sum of forty pounds sterling which they can take out of my bank book. A donation which I make between Red Cross and General Hospital of Cairns, Nth Queensland.

Thanking that hospital for the care given during my stay in the year 1929. F Fantin42

As the month of November advanced the pressure on the anti-Fascists in general and Fantin in particular grew. On 13 November, three days before his death, Fantin wrote to his brother: `During the present week the news is splendid on all fronts. You can hardly imagine how happy this makes me, only [sic] I have to tell you that even this joy I have to keep secretly in my heart. I have but a few friends with whom I can communicate. Here I have many enemies around me. When I hear them talking against the Australian people and all who are fighting fascism, you will understand the reaction of my feelings. At times tears fall from my eyes, and in so doing, gives me a feeling of relief'.

Sometimes I feel deeply down-hearted, a feeling I have never experienced during the previous years of my life. It is not because I am enclosed in this camp, for towards the Australian people, I have no bitter feeling, rather, I feel affectionately towards them. It is against these fascists and all Italians who have lost their sense of reasoning, whom I despise and feel a sense of hatred.43

Prelude to Murder

The conflict that precipitated the fatal attack on Fantin grew out of a campaign organised by the anti-Fascists to raise money for 'Sheepskins for Russia', a campaign associated with the defence of Stalingrad, and linked to a general appeal outside the camp. Fantin took a leading part in this campaign. At a time when the Fascists were dismayed by the reverses suffered by the Axis powers, this was taken to be a very provocative action. The amount of tension provoked can be gauged by a letter written by a German internee to the Swiss Consul:

. . . it pleases the authorities to keep in this camp a number of loyal Italians and German right in the middle of a devilish mixture of elements hostile and traitorous ... a group of communists, Jews, half Jews and others have subscribed to a list collecting money in aid of Russia. The Authorities do not only allow this continual provocation in the camp, but they make it appear as if we all here in this camp were traitors. This brings about unbearable tension the result of which may soon be serious.44

In all a sum of £9.7.0 was collected for Russia. The names of the internees who had contributed appeared as an item in the Mail, which reported on 14 November:

Internees Hope For Allied Victory

Admiration for Russia and hope for an allied victory have been expressed by German and Italian anti-fascist aliens in a South Australian Internment Camp.

In addition to sending a donation to the sheepskins for Russia appeal, they have forwarded a letter to the Russia Medical Aid Committee, in which they say that anti-Fascists in the camp have been following the heroic fight of the Red Army with great interest.45

There is a suggestion that it may have been Fantin who inspired this item in the paper. Certainly some Fascists believed this to be the case.46

The arrival of the newspaper in the camp at about 4 p.m. on 16 November produced great agitation and anger among the Fascists. Paternoster testified that he had discussed the matter after tea with two other Fascists, and they had agreed the internees in question should be killed. 'An Italian who contributed to such a fund would be a traitor'.47 A report of another conversation indicates that an internee called Manuele Cassolini said, 'This Fantin should be killed', to which Paternoster replied: 'He already stinks of death'.48 A friend of Fantin, Giovanni Pattanaro, notes in his testimony that before Fantin's death between 300 and 400 Fascists - the numbers reflecting the arrival of the Western Australian contingent on 3 November - met in the mess room, after the papers had been delivered, to discuss the war news. They sang Fascist songs, in particular Giovinezza, hailed Il Duce and gave the Fascist salute.49 The camp leader, Dr Piscitelli, attended this meeting. In their testimony the Fascists represented this gathering as a meeting of the confidential friends of Piscitelli, and claimed that the object was, given the newspaper report of the collection of money for Russia, to make an application for the removal of the 'red shirts' (friends of Russia) from No. 14A Compound. Any plan to injure Fantin was denied.50 The North Queensland Guardian published an account on 19 February 1943 that confinues the story:

Paternostro [sic] then addressed the crowd saying 'Those engaged in anti-fascist activity in this camp must be got rid of'. One in the crowd asked, 'Who are the men who must be got rid of?' Paternostro replied, 'The four flying foxes that hang around the camp every night'.

By this remark he referred to F Fantin, Mario Cazzulino, R. Degh [sic] Esposti and V. Lavagna.

THAT B MUST BE KILLED

After tea in the but we beard whispering coming from the other side of the partition but we could not hear what was being planned.

About 6 o'clock three of us went for a walk around the camp, keeping together for protection. After going about 60 yards we met Fantin, who was on his own. One of us said, Tantin, come with us, we are going to keep strolling but pick up something with which to defend yourself, because we have every reason to believe that the fascists intend killing us'.

Fantin replied, 'I just passed Dr Pisatelli [sic] and Mario Deluca. As I passed them Deluca said to Pisatelli [sic] 'That .. . must be killed'.

We again asked Fantin to come with us. but he replied that he would go and watch a game of bowls for a while as he did not think they would attempt to kill him while it was still daylight, and that he would get into his hut before night fell.

Fantin was in a very nervous state. We again implored him to walk with us, but to no avail.51

At about 6.30 p.m., as Fantin was drinking alone, the confrontation with Giuseppe Bruno Casotti took place that led to Fantin's death. It is significant, given the suspicion of a conspiracy at least to injure, if not kill Fantin, that his assailant was unknown to him. Casotti was in fact one of the Western Australian Fascists who had arrived earlier in the month. His traditional tormenter Paternoster would have seemed a more likely candidate for the role of assailant. Obviously conflicting interpretations are possible. It can be argued that the fact that Casotti did not know Fantin supports the argument against conspiracy. If a conspiracy is suspected, however, then the use of Casotti can be seen as a premeditated and calculated attempt by the Fascist contingent to catch Fantin off guard, since he would not have suspected an attack from someone he did not know.

The Murder of Francesco Fantin

At 6.30 p.m. on the evening of 16 November Fantin was approached by Casotti as he was drinking alone from a compound tap. Two versions of what happened next need to be considered, the Fascist and the anti-Fascist accounts of Fantin's death. The Fascist version suggests that, after an altercation, Casotti pushed Fantin who fell, striking his head against the tap support. Other evidence suggests that Casotti struck him with a large piece of wood, and, when Fantin fell, kicked him in the body and the groin.

Just after 6.30 p.m. Fantin was carried to his tent. He was unconscious and bleeding from the mouth. Three minutes later Piscitelli came into the tent. Pattanaro said to him: 'Doctor you had better send this man to hospital straight away because he has no pulse'. Piscitelli replied: 'What do you know, he is alright'.52 But a few minutes later Fantin was carried to tire Camp hospital, where he was put in charge of another internee, Dr Adriano Muggia. Muggia diagnosed that Fantin's neck had been broken, his skull fractured and several ribs cracked.53 The Military Medical Officer attached to the 33rd Garrison Battalion at the Internment Camp, Loveday Dr Luke Verco, was called in. His diagnosis was cerebral hemorrhage, caused by a fracture to the skull, and a decision was made to move Fantin to the Base hospital in Barmera. Fantin died of his injuries act 10.25 p.m., the night of 16 November54 At the Coroner's Inquiry, on 27 November 1942, it was argued that his injuries were consistent with falling over and striking his head with great force against some object, or with being hit, as was alleged, with a piece of wood. The lack of abrasions on Fantin's neck told against this latter hypothesis at first. It was noted however that, as Fantin wore a cap over the back of his neck, a blow could have been struck without causing abrasions.55

The nature of Fantin's injuries and the discussion of them at the Coroner's Inquiry relates to the two accounts of the manner of his death. There was a confusion deliberately fostered by the Fascists, and one that coloured both the trial of Casotti and the nature of his sentence. There were a great number of testimonies on both sides of the question, although, not unexpectedly, given the disparity in numbers between Fascists and anti-Fascists, the bulk of evidence was, greater in defence of the Fascist version of events. It can be strongly argued, h owever, that the weight of the evidence favours the view that Fantin was murdered.

The Fascist version of the events of 16 November is represented by the testimony of Casotti himself:

Stated that he had met Fantin for the first time on the evening of 16 Nov 42. He had met him at the top of and between Huts 3 and 4. He had been hailed by Fantin and had got into conversation with him. Casotti said that Fantin has said that he was very pleased that the Italians were being killed at the war and that they were killing all the fascists. Casoti had replied that it was no good Fantin talking that way. Fantin had started. to insult Casotti's father and mother and his country. He had called Casotti a son of bastards (figlio di bastardi). Casotti had pushed him, on the chest with both hands. He had not intended to kill or injure Fantin, but to give him a fall. Fantin in falling had struck his head on the tap standard. Many internees had seen the incident.56

It was this version that was strongly supported by a large number of internees, presumably of the Fascist persuasion. At the Coroner's Inquiry Domenico Riso stated that he was sitting with half a dozen other internees when Fantin approached the tap and met Casotti. He stated he heard talk of Fascism, Communism and Italy, and that he witnessed an argument between Fantin and Casotti. 'I hear Casotti say', he stated, ' "leave me alone" and then the other chap said "Fuck you, your mother, family and everyone". I saw Casotti raise his hand and hit Fantin. I could not tell where he hit him. Fantin fell over backwards. I could not say if he struck his head or body against anything... When Fantin was on the ground I did not see Casotti strike him in any way I did not see him hit Fantin with a piece of wood or kick him'.57

The evidence suggesting Fantin was murdered is very strong. Despite the equivocation at the Coroner's Inquiry, the nature of his injuries would appear to be inconsistent with a fall, even a fall occasioned by a push or blow. The damage to the ribcage as well as to the head and neck is more consistent with the evidence supplied by those who identified Casotti as a murderer. Augusto Pretti made a clear statement on 26 November 1942:

CASOTTI, Bruno, is the murderer who murdered FANTIN. He murdered him with a piece of wood, 3 x 2 x 2, the first blow struck him on the head. and he fell on the ground. Another blow in the ribs while he was on the ground, and afterwards he gave him a kick in the stomach.58

Domenico Franchini gave evidence that he and three others saw Fantin walk across to the tap followed by Casotti, and that 'Casotti hit him on the head with a baulk of timber 3 x 2 x 2 pushed him over, kicked him over the heart; on the ribs and groin and private parts'.59 Felice Masserano stated in his testimony: 'After the killing of Fantin some of the Fascists said "It is good to kill that Bastard because he is a communist". I have heard persons in mobs say that Fantin had been murdered with a bit of wood. Some of the Fascists said that he fell down [sic] and struck his head. My opinion is that Fascists murdered Fantin'.60 Giuseppe Petrilli reported that the morning after the death of Fantin, Casotti had said, in response to a question about the events of the night before: 'I gave him a crack on the head with a stick as he was drinking water'.61

A report by the Security Service in February 1943 summed up matters: 'Nevertheless, from the enquiries made it appears to that it was universally accepted amongst the internees that Fantin was murdered by PEZUTTO [sic]'.62

There are then, on the one hand, clearly competing accounts of what happened to Fantin on the evening of 16 November. However, it was the final opinion of the Coroner, Mr Appleton, that, whether Fantin had been 'violently pushed or knocked down' by Casotti, the latter was 'guilty of murder'.63 On this basis he committed Casotti to trial.

In the aftermath of Fantin's death there were numerous attempts by the Fascists to intimidate witnesses who might testify to the murder of Fantin. Giovanni Pattanaro claimed that as he was walking about the camp on the night of 16 November a voice behind him called, 'Those who speak will die, one Fantin a day from now on, all Communists should be dealt with in this way'.64 Giovanni Colletti in a statement made in February 1943 noted: 'After the murder the fascists terrorised the anti-Fascists by continually saying, "Death to those who speak, one Fantin a day. Anyone who talks will go the same way".'65 A report compiled by Constable First Class A.T. Hughes on Fantin's death and conditions in the Internment Camp, filed on 10 February 1943, confirms these statements. 'It also seems apparent', Hughes noted, 'that Dr Pissitelli [sic]; the Camp Leader, did all he could to prevent the true facts being brought out, and that the Fascist section sought to prevent evidence reaching the Authorities by terrorist methods'.66

This intimidation, and the suppression of evidence it involved, is one factor explaining the rather curious nature of the trial that followed in December 1942. There is another important factor, however, which appears to involve an official attempt to cover up the Fantin incident in order to spare the government the embarrassment that might result from a public discussion of its internment policy.

The Trial of Bruno Casotti

On 22 December 1942 Casotti appeared before Mr Justice Richards in the Adelaide Supreme Court. He pleaded guilty to manslaughter. Clearly at this stage there was not sufficient evidence available to the Crown Prosecutor regarding the assault on Fantin to allow him to challenge this plea and argue for a charge of murder. This is perhaps an indication of the success of the Fascist campaign aimed at the suppression of evidence. It was also suggested by Joan Finger of the Political Rights Committee that the military authorities, desirous of presenting the case as an accident hurried it into court 'to forestall attempts to probe it further'.67

R.F. Newman, counsel for Casotti, made a plea for leniency, arguing that Fantin's death had been caused by a push from Casotti delivered under great provocation.68 Before the judge could pass sentence, however, the Crown Prosecutor, R.R. Chamberlain, received information that the case was 'more serious than first appeared',69 and asked for an adjournment. This was granted and enquiries were set in train. It was these enquiries that produced the statements from Ciotti, Masserano, Pattanaro and Colletti, cited above, and the report on Fantin's death and the conditions in the Internment Camp by Constable Hughes. Hughes, in fact, found witnesses willing to testify that Fantin was murdered:

In regard to the alleged FANTIN murder, the statements of PATTANARO and COLLETTI have produced very little direct evidence, that of CIOTTI, none, but information has been received that Secondo ROMANELLO, Attilio CURRAZZOLLO (nicknamed among the Italians, Baracca), Lorenzo AVALLI and an internee named Della BONNA are in a position to throw much light on the actual killing. ROMANELLO is credited with being an actual eyewitness and is said to have intervened when PEZUTTO [sic] was kicking FANTIN after having struck him a blow on the rear portion of the neck with a billet of wood . . . Attilio CURAZZOLLO and Lorenzo AVALLI are said to favour the anti-Fascist group. It is suggested that these two, if interviewed away from the Internment Camp and given a guarantee of transfer from it subsequently, would volunteer information; but their fears of maltreatment and battery must first be allayed.70

On the basis of this new evidence it would appear that the Crown Prosecutor would, when the trial resumed, have a prima facie case for the alteration of the charge from manslaughter to murder. It is at this point that political rather than legal considerations became important. The Government, the Army and the Commonwealth Security Service all wished to get through the Fantin affair with a minimum of fuss. They wanted as little public attention as possible directed to the policy of interning anti-Fascists with Fascists. A change in the charge to murder would highlight, in an unequivocal manner, the level of tension in the camps produced by that policy.

K.H. Kirkman, Deputy Director of Security in South Australia and also Master of the Supreme Court, wrote to the Director General of Security in Canberra, BrigadierGeneral W B. Simpson, on 6 February, in response to an inquiry from the latter of 22 January. 'The Crown Prosecutor', he wrote, 'has informed me unofficially that as the result of further investigations at the Camp he considers, he can sustain a charge of murder. He is now considering the legal position in view of the previous indictment for manslaughter'.

In view of this development, I have conferred with the Commander of S.A. L of C Area and it has been decided not to pursue an order under Regulation 71. It is felt that the new charge might involve difficult questions for the Minister to answer and that an order under Regulation 71 might produce protests and further complicate matters whilst not materially assisting the method used to convey the information from the Camp.71

It is clear from a letter that Simpson wrote to 'My dear Kirkman' on 26 February that the issue had been discussed with the Crown Prosecutor, and that, as a result of these consultations, a decision had been made, which was subsequently communicated to the Commonwealth Attorney-General, that Tantin's murderer [sic] could not be charged with Murder, as he had already been indicted and pleaded guilty to Manslaughter'.72 It is also clear, however, that the Attorney-General, Dr HY. Evatt, was still anxious about the outcome of the trial, for General Simpson proceeds:

The Attorney [General] is particularly anxious that, when the hearing takes place, it should not be such as to offer unnecessary criticism of the Army's management of Internment Camps. I was instructed to pass on these views to you; expressing his desire that you should do what you could, tactfully, to see that these were carried out.

I gather he felt that Kirkman, Master of the Supreme Court, might be able to suggest this tactfully in the right quarters, where Kirkman, the Deputy Director of Security, might fail.73

In a letter of 2 March to 'My dear Director General', Kirkman is very reassuring. 'I had a word with the Crown Prosecutor', he writes, 'along the lines suggested in your 3744/ 43 of 26th February',

He does not consider that the particular trial judge is likely to offer any comment on the aspect you mention, and from my personal knowledge of the judge I think he will refrain from doing so. The Crown Prosecutor, however, will make contact with him.

The Crown proposes to take the line that since the adjournment further investigations have shown that the accused's actions strongly point to murder, but that on account of the majority of the witnesses being aliens it has been considered advisable to proceed with the charge of manslaughter. The Crown are placing al l the circumstances before the Court and will urge the imposition of a heavy sentence in view of the information since the adjournment.74

Thus it transpired. The trial was resumed on 16 March 1943. While the Crown presented the new evidence bearing on the proposition that Fantin had been murdered with clear intent, it did not ask for a change of the charge 'in view of possible legal difficulties', but 'tendered the new evidence in answer to the plea for leniency'.75 On 19 March Casotti was sentenced to two years imprisonment, with hard labour, at Yatala Labour Prison, the sentence running from December 1942 Criminal Sessions, that is 30 November 1942.76 The curious and ambiguous nature of the trial, the accusation and the verdict can be detected in the speech of Mr Justice Richards in sentencing Casotti:

The more serious charge of murder could have been laid against you, but the responsible authorities, acting, no doubt, on the assumption that there may have been truth in your statement that you acted with great provocation, decided to charge you with the lesser crime of manslaughter . . .

Witnesses for the Crown have now given certain evidence from which, if this were not a criminal matter, the Court might well conclude that you struck Fantin on the back of the head with a stick and that that killed him... Then there is the evidence of another man who says you admitted to him that you hit Fantin with a stick. But for reasons that need not be stated I regard it as safer not to act on his evidence. After hearing all the evidence, I informed your counsel that I did not intend to assume that you did use a stick, and in spite of what has already been said, I adhere to that intention. Although the restrained nature of their evidence about a stick gives one some confidence in their evidence as to kicking, I am not assuming that you did kick Fantin after he was down, thereby showing malice.77

Kirkman was satisfied. He wrote to Simpson: 'Casotti is today sentenced to two years hard labour. A copy of the judge's remarks when imposing sentence are attached. From these you will see that nothing eventuated that is likely to cause any difficult situations'.78

The Public Outcry

Despite the best efforts of the security services, Fantin's death did become, almost immediately, a matter of public scandal. Indeed it is possible that the light sentence visited on Casotti and the fact that a charge of murder was not pursued, exacerbated rather than eased the situation. But even before the sentence in March, the death of Fantin had attracted considerable public notice, and drawn attention both to the fact that Anti-Fascists were interned and to the fact that they were interned with Fascists. At the same time, the extreme nature of the events attending the Fantin murder, caused a reconsideration of internment policy within official circles. The result of these two developments, both directly linked to Fantin's death, was a gradual change in the policy of internment, producing a release of AntiFascists.

Public protest was led by the left in general and the Communist Party in particular. Joan Finger, for the Political Rights Committee, protested to Dr Evatt as early as December 1942. ' We are concerned', she wrote, 'that (1) anti-fascists should be interned at all, (2) that anti-fascist and fascists should be interned together, and (3) that there is maladministration in the Internment Camp at Loveday, which the military authorities are attempting to cover'.79 J. Healy, General Secretary of the Waterside Workers' Federation, also wrote to Evatt in December 1942, raising the Fantin case.80

The North Queensland Guardian, the paper of the Queensland branch of the Communist Party, in discussing the Fantin case, asserted:

All anti-Fascists must be separated from Fascists in the camps. This is a first demand to which Dr Evatt must attend without delay. No anti-Fascists should be in internment camps.

FREE ANTI-FASCISTS

Since Labour came to office the internment of anti-Fascist Italians and others practically ceased. But that is not enough. Known anti-Fascists should be released. Where there is any doubt about a prisoner's bona-fides, the Government should bear the cost of the investigation.81

The Anglican Bishop of Goulburn, Dr E.H. Burgmann, was written to in December 1942 by T Sairane, on behalf of, he stated, the anti-Fascist community. Citing the Fantin case he asked the Bishop to do all in his power 'to seek the separation of all anti-fascist fighters from the fascist in the various Internment Camps in this country'.82 Burgmann wrote to the Prime Minister, enclosing the letter from Sairane, and stating: 'If the enclosed is true, as it seems to be, it is obviously important. If we intern anti-fascists with fascists we must expect murder'.83 The Anglican Coadjutor Bishop of Sydney Bishop C.V Pilcher, approached the Minister for the Army, F.M. Forde, on two occasions. On the second of these occasions he enclosed a description, written by an eye-witness, of Fantin's death. "The state of things which the documents reveal', he commented, 'is at once cruel and intolerable. I am sure that you will agree with me that under the circumstances, immediate and effective action is called for on the part of the government'.84

In the same period some measure of disquiet was also being evinced in official circles. Simpson wrote to the Deputy Director of Security in Queensland on 16 December 1942 informing him of the death of Fantin, and noting that the Fascists took strong exception to Fantin's admiration for Russia. 'It also appears', he wrote, 'that DEGLI-ESPOSTI, who is a friend of FANTIN's shares the same view and, as pointed out to you in another memorandum, it was decided to release him in case the ardent Fascists in the camp decided to attack him also'.

No good purpose will be served by mentioning this matter further, but I would like to point out that these camp reports do show that there are some anti-Fascists interned.85

In reply, the Deputy Director of Security for Queensland, J.C. McFarlane, drew the lesson to be learned from the Fantin case in even sharper terms:

This case [Fantin] can be used as an example in support of the suggestion made by Lieut Mather on his return from Cowra, that all the Fascist and known disloyalist element should be separated from the anti-Fascists and Communists in order to avoid the spread of anti-British propaganda amongst those willing to work under supervision, and furthermore to prevent acts of violence taking place.

I strongly recommend that the matter of segregation in the internment camps as mentioned above, be given serious consideration.86

Under this dual pressure, of public opinion on the one hand and a rethinking of issues by the authorities on the other, some changes in the official position on the internment of anti-Fascists is detectable. It is a change that, over time, became linked to a change in policy, allowing for the release of the anti-Fascists, either completely or into work teams under supervision.

In early part of January 1943 the Attorney-General, Dr H. V Evatt, under pressure to provide some explanations of Government policy, wrote to the Minister for the Army asking him for details of the segregation of internees at Loveday. Ford replied on 8 January providing the, relevant information and noting that 'it is anticipated that those whose claims are genuine will be released from internment as the result of the review of all local internees now being conducted by the Security Service'.87 On 19 January 1943, A.J. Dalziel, Private Secretary to Evatt, wrote in reply to a Miss Shaw, who had addressed Evatt over the Fantin case, stating: 'The control of internment camps comes within the jurisdiction of the Department of the Army. It is understood that the question of separating Fascists from other internees is at present tinder consideration by that Department'.88

To Bishop Burgmann, John Curtin, Prime Minister of Australia, wrote on 24 February 1943: 'Although segregation is effected primarily according to nationalities.', it was 'the policy of the Department of the Army to adjust such segregations, within the limits of security and of camps available, to ensure the maintenance as far as possible of reasonable harmony amongst the internees themselves'.

Commonwealth authorities are at present engaged in investigating the cases of local Italian internees with a view to their release for employment and it is anticipated that this investigation will result inter alia in any genuine anti-Fascists being released.89

By 15 March Simpson, Director General of Security, was able to assure the Secretary of the Mareeba Zone Committee of the Communist Party that the circumstances surrounding the death of Fantin were being fully investigated and that 'It is the policy of the Security Service to carefully investigate the cases of all internees who are reported to be antiFascists in order to decide whether they should be released'.90

Thus, even while the authorities were trying to minimise the effect of Fantin's death on their public credibility, there was a move towards a modification of the policy on internment. Increasingly anti-Fascists were released if they could satisfy the authorities that they posed no threat. It is worth noting that when the testimonies of Degli Esposti, Masserano, Coletti and Pattanaro, all cited above, were taken in February 1943 they had all been released. Other internees deemed to be loyal were released into work schemes of various kinds. The Deputy Director of Security, S.A., wrote to Simpson in April 1943, with respect to internees who were naturalised British subjects: 'The final classification of these internees was to the effect that they would be released if suitable employment could be found for them in this State'.91

By July 1944, when the Australian Civil Rights Defence League wrote to Evatt about the segregation of anti-Fascist from Fascist internees, again making reference to the death of Fantin, Simpson could reply in a confident and challenging manner. 'If you will be good enough', he wrote. 'to supply me with the names of civilians still interned whom you regard as Anti-Fascist I shall be pleased to have their cases fully investigated'.92

From Reluctant Hero to Political Myth

It is clear that Fantin's death had an immediate effect on internment policy in Australia, particularly where it touched the lives of anti-Fascist internees. But that is not why Fantin is remembered today. He has become something more than an historical figure whose death was a catalyst for changes in internment policy. Without being a mythical hero, he is both a hero and a myth.

To describe him as a hero is not to depict him as a grand figure bestriding the passage of history. Fantin was hardly that. Fantin did not want to die. He did not want to continue to confront Fascism. Had he had his choice he would, as he made clear, have moved away from the aggression in Loveday 14A. But when his choices were denied and his options limited by forces beyond himself he did not deny his beliefs.. He affirmed them. He was a hero despite himself; a reluctant hero and therefore a real hero. As Umberto Eco has observed:

Real heroes, those who sacrifice themselves for the collective good, and whom society recognises as such (maybe some time later, whereas at the time they are branded as irresponsible outlaws), are always people who act reluctantly. They die, but they would rather not die; they kill, but they would rather not kill; and in fact afterwards they refuse to boast of having killed in a condition of necessity.

Real heroes are always impelled by circumstances, they never choose because, if they could, they would choose not to be heroes.93

In all these senses Fantin was a hero.

Yet more than a hero Fantin has become a political-myth. Use of the term myth here in the sense of a collective belief that legitimises political activity.94 He represents, for those who have lived since his death, the whole anti-Fascist movement. Fascism captured the imagination and the hearts of much of a generation, not only in Italy but in Australia too. It was a dominant ideology with potent myths and symbols that at times seemed irresistible. The history of the period is for many the history of Fascism. To understand that period not only as Fascist but also as anti-Fascist, to understand not only the symbols of power and dominance but also the spirit of resistance and hope for liberty, there is need for an alternative set of symbols and myths. The history of Francesco Fantin provides a source for such political myths, a source for an alternative ideology. In looking back to Fantin we look back to anti-Fascism and to the spirit of resistance. We also look forward in hope. As Fantin himself wrote in his diary:

And do not forget. That the most mild and lawful progress has been gained over long centuries of struggle. For every step that humanity has advanced there have been necessary torrents of tears and of blood, hecatombs of victims sacrificed for the happiness of future generations.

Only then with the good seed, harvest of good healthy brains and generous hearts, shall we have good germination. Even though the good seed should have still to remain for long; long winters hidden under the clods. And since life will go on always let us seek not to drown altogether in a sea of mud.

And before the bitter reality of every day, before this deep darkness.

Let us try to stand up for the light, and for the truth.

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A brief(er) biography also by Paul Nursey-Blay
adbonline.anu.edu.au/biogs/AS10154b.htm

Nobody ↑ :

FANTIN, FRANCESCO GIOVANNI (1901-1942), labourer and anti-fascist, was born on 20 January 1901 at San Vito di Leguzzano, Vicenza, Italy, one of five children of Giovanni (Battista) Fantin, textile worker, and his wife Catarina, née Manea. After a brief formal education Francesco adopted his father's trade. Against a backdrop of conflicting social forces that were to engender both fascism and the Italian Communist Party, he became active as a trade unionist and political militant, with anarchism as his political creed.

Reaching Melbourne on 27 December 1924 in the Re d'Italia, Fantin was employed mainly as an agricultural labourer and cane cutter in Queensland, where his brothers Luigi and Alfonse had a cane farm at Sawmill Pocket, Edmonton. At Mourilyan (1924-28) Francesco joined the Australian Workers' Union. In 1931-32 and 1939-40 he worked at the Federal Woollen Mill at Geelong, Victoria. Known as Frank or 'Chico', he was active in the labour and anti-fascist movements, attracting the unfavourable attention of the Italian consular authorities. In 1939 he was involved with Frank Carmagnola in opening the anti-fascist Matteotti Club in Melbourne, and was a correspondent for the anti-fascist newspaper La Riscossa.

In 1940 Fantin was denounced to the Australian authorities as a fascist, possibly the result of confusion with his brother Luigi; paradoxically, Frank was also accused of spreading communist propaganda among the cane workers. He was arrested on 14 February 1942. In his appeal against his detention he gave his religion as atheist, and stated that he was married to Maria, née Zamon, a textile worker, living at San Vito, Italy. On 20 March Fantin was moved to Loveday Internment Camp 14A at Barmera, South Australia. A peculiarity of the internment system was that inmates were segregated by nationality rather than by political affiliation. The result in Camp 14A, where the Italians were interned, was a forced integration of anti-fascists with fascists and a consequent politicization of camp life. Taking a leading role in opposing the fascists, Fantin was abused, threatened and assaulted.

Matters came to a head late in 1942. At 6.30 p.m. on 16 November he was drinking alone from a water tap when he was approached by Giovanni Bruno Casotti, a known fascist. There are two versions of subsequent events. The fascist version suggested that, after an altercation, Casotti pushed Fantin who fell, hitting his head on the tap support. Anti-fascists argued that Casotti struck him with a piece of wood and kicked him in the body after his fall. Fantin died from his injuries later that day in the military hospital.

In the Supreme Court, Adelaide, in December Casotti pleaded guilty to manslaughter. Moves to change the charge to murder were opposed by the government, the army and the Commonwealth Security Service, since a charge of murder would have further fuelled the public outcry at Fantin's death and the internment policy. Casotti was sentenced to two years imprisonment. Public pressure, however, brought about changes in the policy: increasingly, anti-fascists were released if they could satisfy the authorities that they posed no threat. Fantin's death made him a martyr, and a symbol of the fight against fascism waged by a substantial proportion of the Australian Italian migrant community.

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butcher · Jun 4, 2010

The Dole Army

"It's time to End our Isolation - it's time to arm the unemployed"
"John Howard wouldn't know a battler if he reversed over one in his limousine."

THE.BEST.HOAX.EVER.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0fSeLZ0Jj4

www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxVk5L_J-BQ

www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ap_8bPl8DI

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q625xwjl_GI

Nobody ↑ :

Group owns up to media hoax
Now to a story that reads like a script from the satirical Frontline program. They dwell in the storm-water drains under Melbourne, a group of masked anarchists called "The Dole Army", urging fellow Australians to defraud the Government of welfare benefits. It sounds too far fetched to be true but that didn't stop channels Nine and Seven from falling for the story hook, line and stinker. Today the group of pranksters in Melbourne owned up to the hoax, screened last night on the Nine network's A Current Affair and Seven's Today Tonight. The group says the stunt is revenge for the news media's portrayal of the jobless and other disadvantaged groups in society.

---------
Compere: Tony Jones
Reporter: Mark Tamhane

A CURRENT AFFAIR JOURNALIST: This is life in the so-called dole army. If it wasn't real, it would almost be comical.

MARK TAMHANE: The only problem is, it isn't real and, yes, it is comical. A group of Melbourne anarchists hoodwigged two of the nation's tabloid programs, with a fantastic story about a gang who live underneath our major cities, scavenging food and plotting to rort unemployment benefits, recruiting new members to the cause via a subversive website.

WOMBAT, THE DOLE ARMY: John Howard wouldn't know a battler if he reversed over one in his limousine.

'A CURRENT AFFAIR' JOURNALIST: At meetings like this, they talked tactics, recruitment, how to extract more money from taxpayers and survival, talk about work, and the dole army claiming a membership of 70 gets defensive.

WOMBAT: It's not like we've been leeching off the welfare system for years or anything. I choose not to work now.

MARK TAMHANE: Today, the anonymous pranksters behind the Dole Army came clean, admitting they'd pulled off an elaborate hoax, even getting one of the stations to pay them for their bogus story.

WOMBAT: In the end, it was basically to put the tabloid journalists down, which is in the gutter.

A CURRENT AFFAIR: I work really hard, I pay - half of my salary goes in taxes every week, I promise you that, I work really hard, sometimes too hard.

ACTIVIST: Do you call this working hard?

A CURRENT AFFAIR: Yes, it is hard work sometimes, not all the time. But why should I support you?

MARK TAMHANE: As well as the fun of fooling the two TV programs, the groups say there was a serious point behind their media prank.

WOMBAT: Those tabloid news programs basically will show anything that fits their point of view and we fitted their point of view because we were for them a bunch of dole bludgers living down a drain and that's their interpretation of unemployed people are.

MARK TAMHANE: A Current Affair and Today Tonight can't say there weren't clues that the dole army wasn't quite all it seemed. Right at the top of the front page of their website, a small picture of Bill Gates with a custard pie on his face. In fact, the legend of the Dole Army owes much to a new form of protest sweeping the world called culture jamming. It's linked to the anti-globalisation and anti-capitalist protests we've seen in cities around the world in recent years.

IAN WALKER, DIRECTOR, THE HACKTIVISTS: Especially younger activists feel quite powerless within the mainstream media. They see this as a way of getting their message out quite cheaply, creatively and by using the media against itself, it's creates quite a powerful message.

MARK TAMHANE: Ironically, the only person who seemed to have an inkling that the dole army wasn't exactly what it seemed, was the group's supposed sworn enemy, the Federal Minister for Employment Relations, Tony Abbot.

TONY ABBOTT, FEDERAL MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS: They think they're being smart. I think they're being smart alec.

MARK TAMHANE: Tonight, in scenes reminiscent of the ABC comedy Frontline, the networks were mad as hell but defended last night's stories.

A CURRENT AFFAIR: Like jobs in the dole army, morals seem to be in short supply. First they demanded we buy them a generator, we refused, then as we continued to film them, they continued to demand some form of payment.

MARK TAMHANE: Some of the hoaxers say they have paid jobs, others don't, but they say they undertake community work with unemployed people. And they warn they may strike again. Mark Tamhane, Lateline.

Click to expand...

Nobody ↑ :

If it wasn't true ...

It was a great victory for struggle street. The Nine Network's A Current Affair and the Seven Network's Today Tonight programs recently featured competing stories exposing a group of dole bludgers who lived in Melbourne's drains, surfacing in balaclavas to scavenge food and use a website to cheat unemployment benefits.

"And now to a group that don't work", announced the lead-in to the story on Nine's A Current Affair : "they don't believe in working or paying taxes; instead, they rort the system, so they can live off the taxes everybody else pays." "They call themselves the Dole Army", boomed the program's anchor over the sound of drumbeats, "and they say they are on the march". Meanwhile, two channels down, the Seven Network's Today Tonight announced "one of the country's best kept secrets: a rebel army working deep beneath the city". "They live in drainage tunnels under Melbourne", Seven's reporter, Norm Beaman, told his viewers, "and their goal is to teach people how to rip-off the welfare system". "If it wasn't true", boomed Beaman, "it would be almost comical."

As widely noted the next morning, Beaman was half-right. The story wasn't true, but it was funny. In a hoax reminiscent of the famous wartime Ern Malley stunt, a group of activists doing voluntary work on behalf of Australia's unemployed had fooled the two giant networks. The so-called 'Dole Army' had emailed A Current Affair with a two-line story, parodying the program's own stereotyped attitude toward the unemployed, and the producers had swallowed the bait. No sooner had Channel Nine's promos gone to air than the Army also ensnared Today Tonight, which paid $1000 for the same story. Going to air almost simultaneously in prime time on Monday 4 February, according to a review article in the Sydney Morning Herald, both programs did their work "in a manner befitting their trademark outrage".

The Dole Army exposed the hoax the next day. "Last night the big guns of Tabloid TV fell victim to their own sleazy set-up tactics", announced the Dole Army's press release. "We presented them with exactly the kind of story they love and they lapped it up like dogs. They enjoy nothing more than victimising the poor and unemployed".

Click to expand...

t-bag · Jun 4, 2010

Quite a fascinating read,i must say. I May have to do some research on sydney when i get the time.

Peace.

butcher · Jun 4, 2010

t-bag said:

Quite a fascinating read,i must say. I May have to do some research on sydney when i get the time.

Peace.

Click to expand...

thanks heaps
checked the Dole Army vids? do it, fucking hilarious.

butcher · Jun 4, 2010

Chummy Flemming (1863 - 1950)

On being expelled from Trades Hall Council in 1904, Fleming made the following statement: "...I am going to be expelled because I am an anarchist. I am in the company of Tolstoy, Spencer and the most advanced thinkers of the world. Workers will never get their rights while they look to Parliament. A general strike would be more effective than all the Parliaments in the world. I have got a fine stick and I am going to use it. Expel me if you like. I am an anarchist. We have been hanged in Chicago, electrocuted in New York, guillotined in Paris and strangled in Italy, and I will go with my comrades. I am opposed to your Government and to your authority. Down with them. Do your worst. Long live Anarchy."

Chummy Flemming - A Brief Biography
by Bob James

Nobody ↑ :

John Fleming, generally known as 'Chummy', was born in 1863 in Derby, England, the son of an Irish father and an English mother who died when JW was five years old. His (maternal) grandfather had been an 'agitator' In the Corn Laws struggle and his father also had been involved In Derby strikes.1

' ... At 10 he had to go to work in a Leicester boot factory. The confinement and toll broke down the boy's health and whilst laid up with sickness he began to reflect and to feel that he was a sufferer from social injustice...'

Fleming attended the free thought lectures of Bradlaugh, Holyoake and Annie Besant, before coming to Melbourne. Jack Andrews, an anarchist colleague, recorded his early period in Australia this way:2

'...(He was) 16 when his uncle invited him to Melbourne. He arrived in 1884 and for a time he was a good deal more prosperous than later, getting work as a bootmaker'.

He attended the 1884 (2nd Annual) Secular Conference held in Sydney, but more importantly was soon regularly attending the North Wharf Sunday afternoon meetings, illegally selling papers there. The regular speakers at the time were Joseph Symes, President of the Australasian Secular Association, Thomas Walker, another free thought lecturer, Monty Miller, a veteran radical, and W.A. Trenwith, an aspirant politician, bootmaker by trade.

Fleming's prosperity did not last long, as by early 1885 it appears he was already in the ranks of the unemployed, perhaps because of his role in a lockout, 3 and graduating to the platform as speaker in his own right. Via Andrews, he described his first arrest:

'... I was amongst the unemployed. Mr White finished a violent speech concluding with remarks about Brutus, and we started in procession to the Treasury buildings, with a banner on which was 'Bread or Work'. Immediately we arrived the police attacked us. Messrs. Williams, Boon and de Ware were arrested, and I received a summons. (The others were) fined'.

This summons appears to have been issued by the Melbourne Harbour Trust for trespassing on their North Wharf property. Discharged on account of his youth, and advised 'to stick to his last by the magistrate Mr. Panton, he was back on the Wharf the following Sunday where, Andrews says, he stuck to his comrades by collecting the money to secure their release.

' ... Afterwards he went to Ballarat for about six months, where he worked as a bootmaker and took part In the local free thought movement and had the experience of being stoned by bigots In the main street along with another agitator named William Lee ... '

He was elected Secretary of the Ballarat Branch of the ASA, but by August, 1885 was back in Melbourne where he was nominated for the ASA Executive. 4

Within the ASA he did not follow his Anarchist Club colleagues in totally repudiating Symes when that person tried to distance himself from Anarchism following the Haymarket furore and the Club's establishment in May, 1886. He appears supportive, initially, at least of Symes' efforts in related struggles such as freedom of speech, and not immediately Interested in Anarchism or the Club. Until a 'People's Forum' was permanently organised at the Yarra Bank, attempts to conduct debates at public spaces such as the North and Queen's Wharf areas were constantly under threat from police, bigots and toughs. Free Speech campaigns, 1885 to 1890 provided Symes, Fleming and numerous others with their first experiences of Melbourne arrests and threats of arrest. 5 Fleming had tremendous drive and enthusiasm and carried agitational ideas into practice where others held back. He didn't have Andrew's intellect or writing ability, or David Andrade's single-mindedness about mutualist-anarchism, the dominant strand in the Club early on, but he had great feeling for practical politics and worked with whatever materials were at hand. This has made his early philosophic evolution somewhat difficult to track and his commitment to and understanding of anarchism difficult to assess.

During the early Club meetings he perhaps shared David Andrade's ideas but later on became more closely associated with the communist anarchism articulated by Andrews, Larry Petrie and Robert Beattie. In August, 1886, as a result of arrests of leaders of the unemployed campaign, Fleming 'promoted and conducted' the first Anarchism meeting held on the Wharf. 6 Such meetings, combining theory and pragmatic concern with the issues of the day then became a feature, with 'Chummy' closely identified with both for the next 60 years at different locations.

Haymarket protests and memorial meetings were regularly organised by him. In 1889, with Andrews he addressed the Richmond Young Men's Society to try to counter the heavy broadsides against anarchism in general and the Haymarket group in particular. 7

With the demise of the Anarchist Club's Co-operative Home in late-1888 as a result of the split within the Club over the question of communism, individualism and the nature of revolution8 the 'socialists' of Melbourne combined to establish a Melbourne branch of the Australian Socialists League which had, as in Sydney, strong anarchist leanings. There were still differences of opinion and Fleming continued to work outside the ASL with those anarchists like Andrade who opposed the communist strand. He played a major part in the establishment of the ASL, opening the first meeting, 9 January, 1889, with an address on the objects of the League and readings from Kropotkin's 'Appeal to the Young'. 9 He seemed to see the ASL as a branch of the MAC, and he contributed to the last issue of the Club's paper, 'Honesty', and probably attended the last meeting as David Andrade tried to keep it going in early 1889, before allowing it to go into recess for 16 months. Fleming also attended the Club 'Reunion' in July, 1890. It is not clear what part he played in the formation of the Social Democratic League, July 1889, which superseded the ASL through the efforts of Rosa and Flynn, two non- anarchists. Fleming is reported as a Committee Member in June, 1891, when a re-organised SDL was discussing a possible Co-operative Company. 10

His involvement with wider issues also continued. In late 1889, as an organiser of the Sunday Liberation Society, and addressing the crowd on the need to open the Public Libraries and Museums on Sundays, Fleming concluded by saying that he was 'Just going up to the Public Library (closed by church pressure) to look at it from the outside'. Many from the meeting followed him: 11

'...On the few Sundays following, the ceremony ... was repeated with set purpose but with smaller numbers. Then came a Wednesday meeting near the Working Men's College...'

Andrews tells of this meeting appointing a deputation of five to Parliament House. But many from the crowd followed, and others joined in till there were 6,000 people surging along the street. The police tried to stop them, to break up the procession, but the crowd surged up the steps, where they were stopped. Failing rain dispersed them and later newcomer Rosa, Fleming and John White received summonses for 'taking part in an unlawful procession'. Each was imprisoned for a month. The movement achieved success but the libraries etc. weren't patronised enough, and eventually closed again on Sundays for 40 years.

A letter written subsequently to the 'Liberator', on 4 January, 1890, from jail (for 'obstruction') says that he, Fleming, had been studying the prison regulations and found that the sanitary arrangements were less than required. So, he stopped the Governor on his weekly rounds, 'lectured him for an hour' whereupon the Governor ordered immediate improvements'. 12

Yet another initiative for which Fleming is credited is the first collection in Victoria for the relief of the striking London dockers, eleven pounds. "The movement spread and it is a matter of history how many thousands of pounds were sent from Australia".

One of the most surprising pieces of evidence for Fleming having a wider view and, most importantly, a recognition of the part played by individuals in mass reform, is his concentration in MAC (Melbourne Anarchist Club) debates on women's rights and the need for sexual freedom. Not a great paper giver, he is first recorded leading a debate in September, 1886 and in October he spoke for 'Free Love'.13 The debate had been adjourned from the previous week so that 'ladies' could participate in what had proved to be a 'stimulating discussion'. On the Sunday preceding 27 February, 1887 he spoke on 'The Subjection of Women', and continuing his interest, on 'Marriage, Prostitution and the Whitechapel Murders' on 15 December, 1888.

The as-yet-unsighted 'Liberty' pamphlet 'Free Love - Explained and Defended' issued by the Club without the author's name in 1886 or 1887, may therefore be Fleming's, or a resume of the discussion in September-October, 1886, but is most likely to be David Andrade's as all the others but one are.

It appears 'Chummy' never married and I have no information on any romantic or sexual interest in his life.

When the movement for an Australian Republic prompted meetings in Melbourne, in 1888, at which even Monty Miller spoke in support, 'Chummy' asked the question, 'What will it do for the workers?' dampening the enthusiasm of quite a few. Nevertheless in 1892, he was quite prepared to support an anti-Royalty resolution before 4,000 people on the Yarra Bank, where his 'stand' was already recognised as an institutions.14

Each year, around the onset of winter, the numbers of homeless, destitute people became more acute and tactics were adopted by agitators as seemed appropriate. Fleming and John White were mainstays of this struggle from at least 1885 to 1900. Some incidents cannot be dated exactly:

'One of Fleming's own devices which, if it could have been carried into effect might have been at any rate a means of calling attention to the distress existing in Victoria, was to have the unemployed marching in the Eight-Hours procession with a special banner, but this was objected to, and did not come off, and as only a small number of unemployed were ready to take part in the manner he wished, it is quite possible that the effect might have been just the reverse of what he intended...'

A letter from Fleming in 'Labor Call' 6.4.1933 refers to an unemployed meeting and march, which perhaps is 1889:

'...The unemployed meeting was held on a piece of land near the Workingmen's College. At the conclusion of the meeting, old John White and I carried the calico banner which had written on it: 'Feed on our flesh and blood, Capitalist hyena; it is your funeral feast'. When the unemployed arrived at the Trades Hall they were attacked by unionists. During the fight the banner was destroyed. The police came and ended the fight ...'

On an earlier occasion, during August, 1887, 'Chummy' had work but that didn't stop him addressing a crowd of 2,000 unemployed men, in rain and cold, and with John White, leading a deputation to Mr. Nimmo for work. The next week he denounced the MP's who had boycotted a meeting at the Temperance Hall for unemployed, and announced he was going to Ballarat for a further meeting. Fleming's first recorded action with 'his' union, the Victorian Operative Bootmakers, (VOBU),15 was an amendment he moved on 21 June, 1886. The second reference was not till November, then there Is a gap to 17 February, 1890, when he received his first nomination as VOBU delegate to the THC. He was again just out of jail, indicating why there were so many gaps. He does appear to be acting as organiser for the union during September and October 1888, and collecting 1/- per week levies for the Northumberland (NSW) miners then on strike.

From 1890 his union activities clearly were very important to him. He rarely missed a meeting, despite his other activities, unless detained 'at Her Majesty's Pleasure' or ill, until he was finally expelled from the THC in 1904, ostensibly for disloyalty, but in reality for being independent minded and espousing anarchism. His unionist conscience role went into high gear in 1890 when he opposed Trenwith, who was quickly rising to leadership of the emerging Victorian Labor Party, about working conditions, and accused the moderate THC bureaucrats of 'working with blood-sucking capitalists.'

It is possible that he was unemployed because of blacklisting through a lot of this period. His politics certainly made him invaluable to the 'Out of workers', but a thorn in the hands of Trades Hall officials and opportunist 'labor' politicians who apparently failed to see the connections between trade unions and the unemployed.

Dr. A.G.Serle In his article 'The Unemployed Movement of 1890' refers to the unsuccessful work of the Social Democratic League with the unemployed in 1889 and to 'several thin meetings' organised by Fleming In 1890. He says the movement took on a different tone when Rosa took it up in 1890, and led a 'highly original campaign of protest'. His 'highly original' strategy is no more than Fleming's and others' tactic of strolling processions, but Serle like many academic researchers, obviously hasn't done his homework.

Serle also referred to the very strongly supported 'Anti-Unemployment League' which 'for years had campaigned' for a free labor exchange. Elsewhere, Fleming is credited with beginning the Anti-Unemployed League in 1889, and Rosa the Labor Liberation League in 1890, which Serle only just manages to mention as getting 'little support'. He credits Knipe and Carpenter with leading the Anti-Unemployed League.16

As it happens, Carpenter quickly disappeared altogether and both Knipe and Rosa were shown to be opportunists, the first going to jail for fraud, the second lobbying for Parliament under various disguises but consistently failing to impress. It is also possible that Rosa was an establishment spy and agent provocateur. Both in any case are fly-by-nights as far as the unemployed are concerned, while Fleming and John White are consistent campaigners.

In August, 1890, the unemployment movement was overtaken by the Maritime Strike and radical and anarchist focus shifts north. Rosa 'drops out', ostensibly for 'business reasons', and many agitators were forced to leave town to find jobs. Fleming chooses to stay.

'Chummy' is credited, with Petrie, with bringing the semi-secret Knights of Labor to Melbourne. This is usually shown by way of a Petrie called public meeting in October, 189017 on the occasion of the visit of W.W.Lyght, U.S. Knights of Labor organiser to the antipodes.18 Churchward suggests a united front operating around 1890-3 between the Single Taxers, Knights of Labor and the unemployed against the Protectionist bureaucrats of the T.H.C. and certain sections of the P.P.L. movement. Churchward insists that Fleming was one of the two chief spokespersons for the Knights of Labor in Melbourne up to 1895 though he also records19 Fleming saying that the "Knights of Labor had little influence because of ceremonial mumbo-jumbo". Fleming struggled to have the Knights of Labor admitted to the 1891 Labor Conference and to have it affiliated to the T.H.C. in 1893. It was opposed affiliation, particularly by Trenwith, on the grounds that as a secret organisation it could not be organised industrially. He gave a figure of 30 members, which Fleming did not dispute at the time. He attempted to have the constitution of the T.H.C. amended to admit the Knights of Labor but lost the voter.20

The point at error in the Churchward story of the Knights of Labor is its arrival in Australia. Lyght was in Melbourne by July, 1890, perhaps to organise branches, but an Assembly of the Knights of Labor had been established in Melbourne in June, 1889. Andrews was not impressed:

'The Knights of Labor is alright for anyone who had no ideas of the struggle between Socialism and Capital but no good for Socialism'.21

Andrews was then sounding out the possibility of establishing a Communist-Anarchist group, as the A.S.L. (Melb.) broke up. Certainly the program of the Knights of Labor as summarised In 'Labor's Pioneering Days' isn't quite as bad as Andrew's assessment, but it is certainly not anarchic:

* securing 'all unearned increment' of the land by taxation;
* old age pensions;
* equal pay for both sexes;
* government ownership of any means of transporting intelligence, passengers or freight' and of the mines;
* State fire Insurance;
* industrial legislation;
* a national monetary system;
* free school books;
* industrial arbitration;
* co-operative institutions, etc.

Internationally, anarchists had long been associated with the Knights of Labor. In the USA the Knights 'officially' adopted the Single-Tax philosophy while still wrestling with the question of anarchist socialism; thus the single-tax debate became the vehicle for the thrashing out of the arguments between the centralisers and the decentralisers. In Melbourne virtually nothing is known of the Knights from June, 1889, until May, 1892, when Fleming, representing them, chaired the first public, outdoors May Day gathering in Melbourne. Meetings which can be called May Day Meetings had been held in 1890 and 1891 in the parliamentary rooms of radical MP Dr Maloney with Fleming as Treasurer of some sort of celebration committee. 1 suspect that the 'Little Doctor' chaperoned the early Knights meetings also. Fleming supported Max Hirsch, President of the main Single Tax organisation In Australia, in the VOBU22 from March 1891 beginning a personal association lasting at least until 1896.23 Because of the people in attendance at and supporting Fleming at the 1892 May Day gathering and the people involved in the related groups it would seem reasonable to suppose a loose radical / libertarian coalition operating on a number of fronts.24

In September, 1890 Fleming was elected for the first time to be delegate of the VOBU to the THC, but he continued his lack of concern with the Eight-Hour Day celebration regarding It as a sham. Twelve months later he was elected, unopposed, President of the VOBU for a 6-month term, and for a similar period as President of the Fitzroy branch of the Progressive Political League, the fore-runner of the ALP. Around the same time also, the Democratic Club in Lonsdale Street resurfaced, as a gathering point for radicals.25

Fleming, in the V.0.B.U. and T.H.C. supported inter-colonial strikers, female organisation, and agitation for piece work rates as opposed to a minimum wage which the employers were after. On a number of occasions he as President, asked leave to vacate 'the chair' at V.O.B.U. meetings to attend 'urgent business' elsewhere. This would appear to be largely P.P.L. business, but could have been less public activity. Certainly 1891 Is a comparatively quiet year for Melbourne, especially for J.W.F. Then, there occurs a great burst of 'street' activity, perhaps indicative of a period of clandestine organisation, or else just frustration and anger.

Firstly, pre-dating the Active Service Brigade In Sydney was the 'Industrial Army'. The 'Australian Workman' for December 5, 1891 has the following item probably from Fleming:

'The very latest here is the 'Industrial Army'. It put out an announcement on Thursday, 'Reading of the Articles of War Mobilisation of Troops'. As soon as the Army is sufficiently strong, Society on the Bellamy basis, is to be established in Victoria. Then it will march north to the redemption of N.S.W. and Queensland. On Sunday afternoon they drew up in line of battle at Studley Park. They called to their ranks all workers irrespective of occupation. They would organise men politically and industrially. They would have a labor sheet and a Labor Bureau, through which members could get employment free of charge. Next week they promise to have a march past, a first class band and a big banner.'

Needless to say the grandiose aims remained unachieved. The subsequent appearance however of the Salvage Corps battling bailiffs, police and landlords to seize back furniture of families unable to pay rent suggests where the energy was going by the winter of 1892. Fleming's suspicions about Rosa had in February come to a head as the two competed for pre-selection in the Fitzroy PPL. Although the contest eventually became physical and though both failed to gain pre-selection the lasting penalty was the stigma attaching to anarchism as conservative candidates and persons with scores to settle with Rosa heaped abuse on him and by association all labor reformers, continuing the 'anarchist' hysteria generated by the Haymarket trial and execution. In the short term Fleming also lost the Presidency of the Fitzroy PPL.26

The conservative opposition alarmed, began to retaliate directly with Fleming as a prime target. At an April Fitzroy Town Hall meeting called to discuss the election of 'labour' members of parliament, a certain Mr Best, a lawyer and M.L.A. for the area said 'agitators of the Fleming type should be exterminated like rabbits'. Fleming got up to reply, was thrown off the platform, rose again with help, and moved a motion, that was passed, to the effect that Lawyer Best and Capitalist candidate Tucker were unfit to represent the workers. Outside the hall a further meeting was held, 400 people were enrolled in the P.P.L. and only then did Fleming go home to bed where he remained for a week with a sprained ankle and a bruised hip.27

Reports of the salvage agitation, which continues until the end of July, contain more mentions of grass-roots initiative than before or later. Women hold their own organisational meetings and are more prominent while the gap between the militant unemployed and the protectionist THC bureaucrats becomes far more obvious. The police often intervene, Trenwith, recently elected leader of the Victorian Labour Party, is publically repudiated at Fleming-chaired meetings, groups forcibly recover furniture from warehouses, and canteens and soup-lines are established as part of self-help networks. In all of this Fleming's influence is obvious. He was also working on behalf of the Broken Hill miners then on strike,28 actions stepped up when union leaders were arrested and jailed in Septernber-October.

Early in 1893 he worked with Mrs. Rose Summerfield from Sydney, originally Rose Stone, from Melbourne, reorganising the female bootmaking machinists. Complaints against him to the Trades Hall Council and V.0.B.U., generated by his attacks on do-nothing 'labor' representatives were effectively neutralised by a V.0.B.U. meeting clearly on his side.

At a Knights of Labor meeting in 1893, Chummy moved the motion for what was subsequently the first May Day procession in Melbourne. At the meeting after the march, Max Hirsch, President of the Single Tax League officiated for the 5,000 people present and heard delegates from the Knights of Labor (Fleming), the Democratic Club, the Single-Tax League and the Unemployed move motions. Chummy's motion read:

'That this meeting demands legislative recognition of the absolutely equal rights politically of every adult member of the community; strenuously protests against monopoly and privilege in every guise; and that while declaring the solidarity of the interests of all workers everywhere, pledges Itself to strive for the substitution of a co-operative for the present immoral wage system of labor'.

W.Dudley Flynn and Dr. Maloney are also rightly credited with being centrally Involved in the organisation of this first May Day march, but no-one has matched the consistency of Chummy's participation thereafter. At least into the 1940's he was a feature every year the march was held, and from about 1905 his flag 'Anarchy' and his bell were associated with it.

He travelled to England in July 1893 at his aged father's request to see him, and in November, back in Melbourne reported on UK conditions particularly with regard to the introduction of machines and the replacement of men with women and boy-labour. He took up his Yarra-Bank meetings again and spoke regularly elsewhere. During 1894, '95 and up to April 1896 he spoke up to four times a month on behalf of the Single Tax. Abruptly, these meetings stop, coinciding with Jack Andrew's return south. Then one meeting in October and one in December when they stopped for good. 'Beacon' January 1896, rejects a letter from Andrews critical of the Single Tax and encourages Fleming not to 'slip back' to anarchism. His involvement with trade unions affairs continued, he being partly responsible for the Executive and Co-operative Committee of the V.0.B.U. recommending in June 1895 that the V.0.B.U. adopt the principle of Village Settlement and Co-operation. He also continues to press for a co-operative boot factory. Not a lot is achieved in these areas,29 mainly because of a lack of resources.

In September that same year, at a very big meeting at Melbourne Town Hall to consider 'the sweating evil' he and John White moved a motion that the Mayor, Sir Arthur Snowden who was to chair the gathering, not be permitted to do so because of remarks he had made supporting very low wages. Upon their resolution being carried, the Lord Mayor ordered the hall cleared and the lights turned out. 'Tocsin' (Andrews) for 27 July 1899 suggests that because of this action, White and Fleming forced words to become deeds and brought the Factories Legislation 'whose fame is worldwide'.30

Towards the end of 1895 with White and Andrews, he, Fleming, participated in an attempt to revive the Melbourne Anarchist Club. This came to nothing. Crowds had dwindled also on the Yarra Bank, but authorities continued to harass speakers.31

No mention of Fleming appears In reports of the 1896 May Day events, but in 1897 he is back again. In that year, Trenwith appeared to be instrumental in having him dismissed, forcing him to open his own bootmaking shop. This hold occurred in similar fashion three years before. From V.O.B.U. records it's clear that the bootmaking industry and unions are in a bad way and 'Chummy' is not getting much support in battling against the structural changes taking place or the attempts (usually successful) by employers to peg or reduce wages. He reported to the V.0.B.U. in August 1897 urging unions to support the unemployed and continued his attacks on Trenwith, some of which end in physical clashes.

In 1898 he led the May Day procession down the footpaths in the face of a ban on street marches by the Melbourne City Council. In 1899 along with delegates from the Women's Land Reform League, the Village Settlers Association, Our Fathers Church, the Sunday Free Discussion Society and the Unemployed Committees, he organised the march and prepared resolutions.32

In July, 1899 he and John White were arrested for selling the workers' paper 'Tocsin' on Sunday, becoming embroiled in an attempt by the detective force to close down a paper which was investigating their involvement with sly grog and betting shops.33

Later in the year he delivered a eulogy to Henry George, Single Tax guru, despite 'Tocsin' having pointed out that George had repudiated the Haymarket 12 at a time when he was in a position to mobilise great support.

In his bootmaking work he is described in 1899 as a 'maker' not a 'finisher' but as Merrifield says, he still found employment difficult to get, so by 1902 he again had his own shop, in 6 Argyle Place, Carlton. This remains his home and workshop until his death. To take what seems an average year for his union involvement, the records for the Operative Bootmakers Union for 1889 show Fleming elected that year to the 8-Hours Committee, nominated also for the new union executive (was on old executive) and elected a T.H.C. delegate.34 Subsequently the same year, he was elected to the executive of the Trades Hall Council.35 In that position he agreed with other speakers that unionism is on the decline in Victoria and said his own trade was in a very bad way with union members suffering great distress. The T.H.C. adopted his motion to appoint a Committee to devise re-organisation.36 The 'Tocsin', for 11 July 1901 records that the Organising Committee had managed to bring a number of unions into existence and strengthen many old ones.

A letter from J.W.F. in an 1899 Tocsin37 shows another area of his agitation. He asks the paper to note the release of Sarah Robertson whose only crime was poverty (she then 'abandoned her child'). Fleming, White, Edwards, and Herold, assisted by Fitzgerald, Miss Purnell and Mrs. Beeby managed to get her sentence shortened by five months. When she came out she was 'skin and bone'.

In 1901 he is reported to be very ill, Andrews for one38 believing he would not recover. But he does, with the aid of money raised for him39 and gets straight back into work, particularly as chairperson of the unemployed movement. He and White were receiving donations for relief and Fleming was part of a deputation to the Lord Mayor, in April 1901, with Labor M.P.'s, for permission (!) to have a May Day Procession. The Lord Mayor refused their request for Sunday, but on Chummy's request grants a Wednesday. Fleming's central position is acknowledged by his being given the task of moving No.1 Resolution on No.1 Platform (opposing war, wagedom, etc, sending fraternal greetings, etc.). The mover of No.3 Resolution on the 2nd Platform was Symes.

Also In May, Fleming took his unemployed agitation to the point of rushing onto Melbourne's Prince's Bridge to halt the Governor General's (Lord Hopetoun) carriage which was crossing through 'cheering crowds' on his way to open the first Federal Parliament. Hopetoun told the police not to interfere and listened to Fleming put the case for the unemployed.40 Later, on the evening of 'the big spread' (the Exhibition Banquet), Fleming represented the unemployed again by strolling into the hall, had "a friendly confab with one or two Labor members who greatly enjoyed the idea, (then) proceeded to luxuriate in the toffiest part of the whole assemblage. His presence was a grief of mind to Detective Macnamany who assiduously tailed him up for 3 hours and a half. At the end of that time Fleming got tired of the sport and considerately gave the officer an opportunity of showing him the door ... "41

The departing Governor-General later 'entrusted' J.W.F. with the distribution of gifts of food and champagne to the unemployed. Lord Hopetoun had apparently been told by G.M. Prendergast that Chummy was 'the most honest man I know' and that he had an unofficial directory of unemployed. There is, again, some uncertainty about details for this story, as George Blaikie says the gifts came from the Governor-General as a kind of round-about slap at the establishment for refusing to pay Hopetoun what he thought he needed.

In any event 1/- was given to each married man who attended distribution day, June 24, 1902, outside Fleming's shop, and 6d to each single man. The next day 300 bottles of champagne augmented by 6 hogsheads of 'Fighting Beer' from Shamrock Brewery were distributed. Though it went smoothly for a while, the distribution of the booze became a riot, according to some. Fleming, who neither smoked or drank lost some days in the task but took none of the money for himself either.42 On a more practical level, Hopetoun is credited with pressuring the government to speed up government work projects. Out of the original encounter came a friendship which endured after Hopetoun returned to England. While still in Australia, he is said to have visited Chummy's house, which was built with money he loaned to Chummy, the house bearing the name 'Hopetoun' when completed.43

In 1901, another attempt had been made to stifle 'the Bank' speakers and it's clear that by this time Fleming on his Freedom platform was already an institution. He conducted the meetings on the Yarra Bank,44 and continued his work there, on what was virtually a private stand until his death. Fleming and White also kept the Free Discussion Society going, Fleming using this venue to speak on the Paris Commune in March, 1902.45 A letter from him to Tocsin, 26 September 1901 says that the T.H.C. flag "is at half-mast for President McKinley's death, why? and why not on all occasions when workers are shot down, etc?" In November, he moved a motion that the T.H.C. "protest against the reduction of old age pension from 10/- to 8/-". Fleming wondered why people had not risen against the move, and attacked Trenwith and others. Pewen in 'Randomania' mentioned that Fleming's motion at T.H.C. to debar trades unionists from becoming professional soldiers lapsed, and comments that it should have been passed unanimously.

It would seem that after a long period of working with trade union and shall we say 'legitimate' channels, his uncompromising anarchism reasserted Itself. The 'Peoples Daily' (of 1904) records 'Anarchy, Its Teaching and Objects' by him which begins a series of exchanges through the paper resulting In his being expelled from the T.H.C. for attacks on Labor parliamentarians'46 (disloyalty to Labor). He spoke in support of communist anarchism at this time47 and of dynamite 'overcoming dual opposition of police and military'48 On 'the Bank', according to the Daily Telegraph he referred to Labor Parliamentarians including Dr. Maloney, as tyrants, said people should seize Parliament House, burn title deeds to property and erect an anarchist community. He also spoke of an attempt to raise funds to tour Victoria and to rent a room as his headquarters in the city.49

On his being expelled, Fleming 'demanded a hearing ... then became heroic':

'... I am going to be expelled because I am an anarchist. I am in the company of Tolstoy, Spencer and the most advanced thinkers of the world. Workers will never get their rights while they look to Parliament. A general strike would be more effective than all the Parliaments in the world. I have got a fine stick and I am going to use It. Expel me if you like. I am an anarchist. We have been hanged in Chicago, electrocuted in New York, guillotined in Paris and strangled in Italy, and I will go with my comrades. I am opposed to your Government and to your authority. Down with them. Do your worst. Long live Anarchy'.

Other private publications included a Manifesto and a response to a letter from Kropotkin which itself is a result of Fleming's continuing contact with the international anarchist movement. As 'Anarchist Leaflet No.31 Fleming published Kropotkin's letter which he claimed had been suppressed by the T.H.C. The pamphlet reads in full:50

'Comrades,
The following letter was suppressed by Messrs. Barker and Scott and the executive of the Council. In fairness to Mr. Dobson, one of the executive, I wish to state he expressed surprise, as he heard no mention of the letter at the Executive Meeting, although Mr. Scott had one, two weeks before the meeting and Barker several days.

Barker informed the Council that the Executive did not think it wise to read it to them. While the Barkers and Scotts are scheming after fat Parliamentary jobs, with six or eight pounds a week income to while away the time on soft cushions seats, the misery of the workers is almost beyond endurance. Workers awake! Free yourself from Political Shysters. Don't vote! Declare for the General Strike. 'The Political Labor Party's dead slow'- Tom Mann.

Etable, France.
Viola,
Bromely, Kent.
Dear Comrade,
Thank you very much for your letter. Things must be worse than I thought, if the labor organisations are entirely in the hands of politicians. I have still the hope that apart from those workingmen who lay their hopes into Parliament there are men who will understand that the progress of Labor Unions is not politics, but what in Latin countries is described by the working men as Direct Action.

Do you follow the movement in France? The Syndical (Trades Union) movement which for a number of years was in the hands of political socialists, is now freeing these bonds, and we see really a new birth of what was the International Workingmen's Association before the Franco-German war; their aim is the Direct Action against Capital and Philistine Rule. Even when they want to obtain something from Parliament they think - quite right - that it would be better to impose their will, by strikes etc, instead of begging. They prepare, as you know, the General Strike for May 1, 1906. What are you doing in Australia for this eventuality? It is time to think of it. I would be so happy to go to Australia and to help the Labor Movement in any way. But since I have had an attack of the heart I have had to give up all lecturing. Are you receiving regularly 'Freedom'? There is a general revival of the movement in Europe.

With best brotherly greetings, P.Kropotkin.

I am for a few weeks in France but return to Bromley about 10th of Septernber.'

This is probably 1905.

Tom Mann, as Chummy's reference above shows, was another agitator with international connections who was less than impressed with Australia. The snide piece, 'Anarchists at Home' reported a meeting held by Fleming, White and Mann with 200 or so others, but which T.H.C. speakers decided to boycott. Apparently an election was due:

'Comrade Mann girded a good deal at his masters of the Trades Hall. He dared them to make a martyr of him for worshipping openly instead of secretly at the sacred shrine of anarchy... Tom passionately embraced the red flag of anarchy which hung limp on the breezeless platform ... '51

In 1908, continuing the work, 'Chummy' and Percy Laidler, a Marxist, led the unemployed into Federal Parliament, stopping it for one and a half hours.52

In 1907, according to her autobiography, 'Living My Life', Chummy had invited Emma Goldman to tour Australia and had raised money for her fare. She says that at the time she could not have faced the long journey alone, but 12 months later, deeply involved with Ben Reitman, she made preparations to go.

'Ben was wild with the idea of Australia; he could talk of nothing else and was eager to start at once. But there were many arrangements to make before I could go on a two-years tour'.

Their departure for the 'new land' was set for January, 1909, and 1500 pounds of literature was despatched. A struggle for free-speech in San Francisco forced a postponement, and in the Melbourne 'Socialist' In April, 'Chummy' announced that Emma had left Vancouver on the 'Makura' on 26 March for Australia. But she had not embarked.

A report In the London-based 'Freedom' for May 1909 emphasises the cost of travel as the impediment to an Australian tour at that time, yet also refers to 'an ominous report that the police are striving to hunt her altogether out of the States.'

In fact, she had received a telegram at the last minute which, she claimed in her memoirs, meant allowing the Government to alter her plans and make her a virtual prisoner In the United States until those same authorities decided to deport her to Russia ten years later. From an abandoned marriage of years before she had gained what she thought was US citizenship but the Immigration Department had revoked her husband's papers on a technicality in order to declare her an alien. Thus if she had left the country she may not have been permitted to return. Not wishing to take the risk of becoming a stateless person she says she cancelled the trip.

'It was a bitter disappointment much mitigated fortunately, by the undaunted optimism of my hobo manager. (Reitman)'

The question here of Reitman's part in Emma's decision is an intriguing one. Recently, Candace Falk, now director of a mammoth attempt to document Emma's life, found a cache of love letters between the two in a music-store trunk in California. Falk found, in the letters, how, at the time the Australian tour was being arranged, she and Reitman were at odds over his promiscuity and her apparent inability to cast him aside or to get him into context.

'Although Emma's espousal of the ideal of free love kept her from condemning his behaviour on political grounds, her letters revealed a tortured effort to reconcile her bitter disappointment and anger with her ideology ... Australia seemed to promise an escape from the forces sapping her spirit, and by considering going without Ben, she acknowledged that he was one of those forces'.

Falk quotes from one of Emma's letters to Reitman as she struggled with the need to continue her public efforts and persona, while racked with a deep pessimism that threatened her life's work:

'Life Is a hideous nightmare, yet we drag it on and on and find a thousand excuses for it ... I am strongly contemplating giving up everything ... and going to Australia, travelling a few years alone. 1 can get the money tomorrow, this minute, if I can only pull up strength and go. I want to do it, as I see in that the salvation out of my madness'.

Falk concludes that It was Emma's indecisiveness and submission to Reitman's 'power to determine her emotional stability' that kept her in the United States.

On the other side of the world and well away from any knowledge of the emotional interplay, yet obviously still in contact by cable and letter 'Chummy' continued to believe that a trip was possible. In a letter to her of 16 December 1909, he wrote,

'With regard to your visit I am doing all I can'.

She clearly did not contradict him for in 'Mother Earth', the magazine she edited in the US, nearly twelve months later, she quoted from another of his letters:

'Comrades in Sydney and Adelaide are anxious for you to come, and are organising into committees to raise funds and arrange meetings. You can look forward to a successful tour'.

In Melbourne, the baby of two unmarried members of a local anarchist group was named Goldman by 'Chummy' at his speaking platform on the Yarra Bank. Towards the close of the ceremony, Catholic rowdies rushed the platform throwing stones, howling 'like hyenas' and attempting, as they had before, to destroy this venue for divergent opinions. In his 70's, nearly 30 years later 'Chummy' was still being roughed up by the same sorts of people.

He could not have known that at about the time he was christening the baby, Reitman was heading into probably the most traumatic experience of his life, and one which probably ended any chance there was of Emma leaving him for Australia. In 'Living My Life' she describes how, nearly three years after the free-speech fight that caused the Australian-tour postponement in 1909, her lecture tour brought her back to the same area, in particular to San Diego. There, at the height of another burst of anti-radical hysteria, a group of Vigilantes abducted Reitman at gun-point, stripped and beat him, burnt the letters 'IWW' into his skin, tarred him and comprehensively humiliated him. It will be some time, perhaps never, before history can make conclusions about the consequences of such an experience on the emotional state of the two, and on, for example, their willingness to leave the United States.

But how might Australian society have dealt with the phenomenon of Emma Goldman in its midst, urging birth-control and free love, opposing conscription and joining forces with the antipodean scourge of religious bigotry and labor opportunism? Would Australia have been a means to refresh her spirit, would it have proved equally as brutal, or would she have quietly slipped into a far less controversial and far more private role, seeking as she said in 1909, to give up everything?

Also in 1909, Fleming had continued active on behalf of Harry Holland jailed during an industrial struggle in Broken Hill, through the Release League. Meetings continued each month, collecting money for Mrs. Holland and children until Holland's 2 year penal sentence was reduced and he was released in October.53

He was active in the anti-conscription struggle during the first World War, being with the IWW prepared to take definite attitudes. In Port Melbourne Town Hall for example, he spoke on 'the Rich Man's War and the Poor Man's Fight'. During this period he was frequently arrested, jailed and threatened with being deported by the authorities, or thrown into the river by roughs and on at least one occasion was thrown in, being saved by Laidler.54 He formed some connection with the Paris-based Groupes D'Etudes Scientifique which brought together, as the Australian Anarchist Group, a network of otherwise isolated activists and anarchist sympathisers in Sydney and Melbourne during what was a very low point for anarchism.55

I haven't yet been through all the newspapers or possibilities56 sources of letters for the period 1900 to 1950 when JWF died, and there is much yet to be found out about this man.

'As he became older he felt he had a proprietary claim on the day (May Day) and insisted on leading it with his flag (red, 'anarchy' in white diagonally across it). The May Day march and celebration was revived after some years in 1924, and JW, after Percy Laidler unsuccessfully tried to talk him out of leading it, walked about half a block ahead.'57

Ron Testro wrote later:

'Counter demonstrations were often staged by the Irish and on one occasion one Irish bandsman hit Chummy over the head with a trombone. Fleming counter attacked by renting the Hibernian Hall for his Anarchist meetings. The Hall at this time was privately owned'.58

In the thirties when the Communist Party was the main factor in organising the May Day it did not welcome 'Chummy' and his flag leading it. So, he started a block ahead, going so slowly the march caught up with him, or sometimes he started back In the ranks and gradually edged to the front. In 1933, he was invited to make what may have been his last public speech, apart from those on the Yarra Bank. The C.P. Congress Against War and Fascism asked him to address the delegates. Characteristically he provoked criticism by, among other things, taking the organisers to task for their doctrinaire approach.

There is also heresay evidence that he continued talking to university students up to the 1939-45 War and to have formed an Anarchist group. In a 1933 letter to Nettlau he claimed to have celebrated the memory of the Haymarket anarchists 'every year' since their assassination in 1887.59

Photo of Fleming on the Yarra Bank 1947 Smith and Bertha Walker both record the sadness of the almost alone J.W.F. getting older but continuing to do what he could, in particular maintaining his pitch on 'the Bank'.

'... Every Sunday until his death... he took his stand under a tree at the Yarra Bank and summoned a few cronies with a tattered cow-bell. Draped on the branches of the tree above were two faded red flags with 'Anarchy' and 'Freedom' worked on white. The little man with his trousers rolled at the cuffs would preach in a quavering voice at the inequities of government and religion. With his milky eyes fixed beyond his listeners he would tell of the coming reign of earthly happiness and brotherly love.'60

He died at home aged 86, on 25/26 January 1950, in somewhat squalid conditions: '... none of his personal effects were of any value whatsoever'. 'Recorder, 1962' shows Jim Coull and Percy Laidler as executors of Fleming's will, his cottage and money going to two English relatives and a Professor Joad, while his papers were taken by police.61

'On the eve of May Day after (his death) it was suddenly recalled that Fleming had asked that his ashes be scattered on the Yarra Bank on May Day. They did not have the ashes. Said Laidler quizzically 'Does It matter what ashes they are?' A member of the Butchers' Union took the hint and came along with a large biscuit tin full. (Laidler) got up and made a speech about Fleming, punctuating it with the throwing out of handfuls of ashes which blew in the Melbourne wind all over the crowd'.62 '...to the very end respected and esteemed by the radical elements in the labor movement because he was sincere, courageous, indefatigable... Bernard O'Dowd was not the only man who learned something from him. Percy Laidler ... told me that a number of men prominent in the labor movement had learned from 'Chummy' Fleming'.63

Bob James,
October, 1985.

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sorry bout all the numbers, i can't be fucked going thru all the text and getting rid of the referencing.

butcher · Jun 29, 2010

ALL POWER TO THE DEPOTS!
The Melbourne tram dispute and lockout 1990 (Excerpt)

The history of the January-February 1990 tramways dispute in Melbourne, Australia which saw transport workers, under anarcho-syndicalist influence, taking control of the trams and running them for free before power was cut off by the bosses. Includes a short introduction with information about the anarcho-syndicalist tram workers grouping involved.

Nobody ↑ :

Introduction

The 1990 tramways dispute is one of many industrial disputes in which rank and file unionists displayed the courage and daring to take control of their working situation. Workers Control raised its head for week or two. In this dispute, like many others, the union bosses sold out their members, through a deal done with the State Labor government. But the real story is how a small group of militants succeeded for a few years in setting the agenda amoung rank and file workers in the public transport industry in Melbourne.

A small number of anarchists had been working in public transport for some time. In 1985 a small group of rail workers put out a news sheet called Stopping All Stations. This transformed into a broader journal, called Sparks, covering public transport workers in rail, tram and buses. The Melbourne local of the Anarcho Syndicalist Federation (ASF) published the first issue of Sparks in May 1986. In February 1987, the Public Transport Workers Association was admitted to the ASF and continued to publish 'Sparks' which became the most popular publication in Melbourne's public transport industry with a circulation of over 5,000. A core group of four to seven people published and distributed Sparks, with many more contributing news and donations to cover its free distribution.

Sparks provided transport workers with a means to communicate to each other. The tone of the journal was down to earth, humorous, and always willing "to take the piss" out of management and union factions and officials. The journal advocated direct democracy and anarcho-syndicalism, and built up a substantial readership by workers in the public transport industry in Melbourne. In fact, the journal had far more street credibility than the official union journals. This was dramatically indicated when just before a tramways division union election, one union faction republished an entire issue of Sparks with the addition of a middlepage election insert - no other text or graphics were changed. This just highlighted the bankruptcy of traditional union factions.

The influence of anarcho-syndicalism became most apparent during the 1990 Tramways occupation where workers occupied their depots and ran the service for free before the government cut the power to the system. The Anarcho Syndicalist Federation (ASF) initiative of establishing Passenger Support Groups was another major innovation which allowed members of the community to show their support for the trammies.

One tram depot during the dispute, South Melbourne, at one stage even seriously debated leaving the ATMOEA and joining the Anarcho Syndicalist Federation. Even the fact that such a motion was seriously considered and debated by a 100 odd workers in a depot indicates the amount of cynicism of the ATMOEA union leadership; the attraction of syndicalist ideas of direct union democracy and solidarity; and the influence Sparks and the Anarcho Syndicalist Federation had on the militancy of the dispute.

The last issue of Sparks, issue 27, came out in early 1991. By the end of 1991, the anarchist militants had all left, or been forced out of, the public transport industry.

A New South Wales version of Sparks is still published as "the rank and file transport workers' paper", which advocates anarcho-syndicalism. This magazine, while informative, is very serious and lacks the humour and inspiration of the Victorian Sparks.

Ten years down the track, the beloved Melbourne connie is a memory, and the Melbourne tram system has been privatised. There has been a major social cost to eliminating conductors. The ticket machines that have been introduced are often faulty. Fare evasion is a common occurrence, despite the increased number of ticket inspectors employed to bully those without a valid ticket. Disabled users now have difficulty boarding and disembarking on trams; and using the ticket vending machines, if they can actually get to the machines. With driver only operation, there is less safety and security for passengers and the driver.

A pamphlet by Jura Media Publications, Sydney 1997
Distributed by Jura Books
PO Box N32, Petersham North, NSW 2049, Australia

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Complete available at: libcom.org/library/melbourne-tram-dispute-lockout

Please note: It may interest ppl to know that Sparks is still operating, largely NSW based now though. Their website is here: sparksweb.110mb.com/
They have archived editions on the page, but only as far back as 2007, good luck hunting copies from the time of the strike down they are around...

butcher · Oct 17, 2010

Nobody ↑ :

Reflections on AWOL and the WEF protests, Melbourne, September 2000

The ‘Autonomous Web of Liberation’ (AWOL) was a Melbourne based ‘networking hub’ that brought people together to share skills, network and exchange ideas in preparation for protests against the World Economic Forum in September 2000. This experience does not have the recognition it deserves, not only in terms of the blockade, but also the later networks that sprang from people having come together at this time, and the wider effects this experience had on their subsequent political practice.

For a long time I’ve been thinking about relaying my experience. I’ve hesitated because I’ve not felt that one person’s perspective can do justice to this subject. Many of us were involved in this experience: at times, up to 100 participated in the meeting/doing/happening that was ‘AWOL’. I’m hopeful that others will seek to collaborate on a larger piece, comment on this one publicly, or write their own story, in order to develop our history and our theory.

I have so many comrades that I still have some contact with who were involved in this project, but also those that span off from it at later times. It is rare I think in political movements over time to have such a sense of shared experience. I still feel that many of you out there got my back, that I can rely on many of you, that I share levels of affinity with many of you that I could not have anticipated at the time. That said, there is a fair bit of hate still around from people who felt left out, or who didn’t have great affinity to begin with, or that grew apart as time went on. There are yet others that I have no idea where they are or what they are up to now, and some I should try to catch up with more. I hope that some of what is said in this ramble will get us asking question about relationships of affinity and questions of organisation, then and now.

There was a sense among us – well, I can only speak for myself really – that the organising method of the ‘S11 Alliance’ was really problematic: it was too slow, it tried to speak for everybody, and meetings didn’t achieve much but rather served as a space for the pursuit of various agendas belonging to various little political parties, fighting about the demands appropriate to a united front. This had very little relationship to my politics, or those of the Seattle events that it claimed to be building on. The authoritarian left really did not get it. Or maybe they did, but wanted to use the rhetoric of Seattle for other ends – mainly building the parties and personality profiles of select others.

Back in early 2000, a number of ‘direct action folk’ – anarchists, autonomists, forest blockaders and other ratbags – had started attending the organising meetings for the protests against the WEF. Many of us found the authoritarian politics of the Alliance impossible to work with, and called a meeting for an alternative networking space. This became S11 AWOL.

Precisely when S11 AWOL began is debatable, as a number of people with roughly the same ideas had meetings at around the same time, but at the first meeting I attended (held in a little tin shed) we wrote ‘Who We Are’, and with some further brainstorming came up with the name AWOL. (“I want the word autonomy to be in it.” “Er, um what about ‘network’?” “Can we use the word web instead?” asked one beloved, bearded forest blockader. Bingo! ‘Autonomous Web of Liberation’: AWOL.) I thought to myself, how funny, this is exactly what we’ve done: gone AWOL from the traditional left.

I was pretty happy with the name and statement of ‘Who We Are’: it focussed on practice and not names or political identities but rather how we organise and what we are against, rather than ‘we are anarchist’ or ‘we are autonomist’ or we are this or that group. In so doing, and with some hard work, it became a very efficient, practical space for getting stuff done for a broad section of largely anti-statist and anti-capitalist types that avoided shit fights between people with very different politics. It changed how I saw things in a big way, and I think for many people in it, the relationships that went onwards into other projects are something we should not forget.

Who We Are

S11 AWOL is non-hierarchical, decentralised and autonomous. It aims to facilitate actions, hold skill-sharing workshops, and empower peoples with information and knowledge, to enable us all to most effectively shut down the World Economic Forum and say NO to global corporatisation and capitalism…

S11 AWOL gives a big thumbs down to those with racist, sexist, ablist, homophobic or nationalistic agendas.

I’d been involved in some stuff when I lived in London – the G8 protests, the ‘carnival against capital’/J18 protests – and we had all been surprised by Seattle. It really felt like something big was kicking off and for several years it did. Then came the slow recuperation and decline of the movement, as well as many of its limitations being reached in the changing times of the ‘war on terror’, the shite politics of the anti-war movement, the rise and fall of the detention centre actions … WorkChoices, followed by global recession, the pseudo-left ‘pink tide’ in Latin America, and now bio-crisis, climate change and the rest.

I’ve had a number of years where I haven’t been involved in much, and I’ve had little new to say: I’ve felt ideologically and practically stuck. For some of the people I still have contact with from this time, I don’t think I’m the only one who feels this way. Maybe some joint reflection will spark some debate and action!

Click to expand...

sauce

butcher · Dec 2, 2010

Anti-Fascism in Melbourne: 1990s

Nobody ↑ :

Introduction

In Melbourne, during the early- to mid-1990s, a number of campaigns in opposition to the establishment of a fascist presence in the city were conducted, largely in response to attempts by one, now-defunct group called National Action (NA). NA was formed in 1982, under the leadership of a man of Lebanese descent named James — later Doctor — Saleam. Following his imprisonment in May 1991 for organising a shotgun assault upon the home of Eddie Funde (then the ANC representative to Australasia) on January 27, 1989 — “[NA] members Jason Frost and Michael White… both implicated Saleam, telling the court he had given them a balaclava, gloves, a shotgun and eight dollars each for a drink to steady their nerves” — leadership of the group was assumed by a neo-Nazi from Adelaide called Michael (De) Brander, the son of Spanish fascist migrants.

“Saleam was born [on September 18, 1955] in Maryborough, Queensland, of Lebanese migrant parents. He joined the Nazi Party (the National Socialist Party of Australia) in 1970. Two years later, aged 17, he was found guilty of fire-bombing a Maoist bookshop [East Wind] in Brisbane and put on a four-year good behaviour bond. He moved to Sydney and enrolled at university where he helped form National Resistance in 1977. That became National Alliance in 1978, attracting some old Nazis.

In 1981, National Alliance merged with the Immigration Control Association to form the Progressive Nationalist Party. After that collapsed, Saleam and others formed [NA] in 1982 [and which was officially launched on Anzac Day, April 25]. In August 1984, Saleam was found guilty of insurance fraud; an appeal is pending [1989]. He was given a good behaviour bond for three years in 1985 as well as a $5,000 bond for possession of a prohibited article, namely a large nail-studded club.” ~ Lyndall Crisp, ‘Harvest of Hate’, The Bulletin, April 4, 1989

Northcote

One of the first public expressions of opposition to NA took place in Northcote in November 1993. Following a number of racist and homophobic assaults in the area, on November 20 a rally marching under the banner ‘Action Against Fascism’ took place. The demonstrators, who numbered about 130, met at the corner of Arthurton Road and High Street in order to scrub out racist graffiti in the area. A group of 6 boneheads heckled the crowd, but were then forced to flee when a segment decided to speak more directly with the boneheads regarding their political and racial anxieties. After a long chase, and a number of full and frank discussions, police eventually managed to secure their escape through Northcote Plaza (Jim Simmonds, ‘[Boneheads] row with marchers’, Herald Sun, November 22, 1993; ‘Protesters clash with neo-Nazis’, Northcote Leader, November 24, 1993).

Brunswick

Several months later, on March 5, 1994 — Brunswick Community Day — NA, with the support of AAFI, decided to hold a public rally at Brunswick Town Hall. NA spokesperson John Ruger claimed that the rally was intended to “oppose all efforts (including race-hate laws) to limit the rights of Australian nationalists” (Scott Whiffin, ‘High noon looms in Nazi showdown’, Brunswick Sentinel, February 7, 1994). Interestingly, Senior Sargeant Colin Barnes stated that the ISO was to blame for “bringing the National Front [sic] into Brunswick”; a reference to the previous action in November (which he also erroneously describes as having taken place in December; Rosemary West, ‘Forget the violence: family day plea to rivals’, The Age, March 5, 1994).

In reality, the background to the rally was a number of incidents of verbal abuse by boneheads of local community members (Muslim schoolgirls, Turkish women and others, including public transport workers); violent assaults (upon a Vietnamese man, a Somali man, a group of teenaged Asian schoolgirls and others, including a group assault upon a Maori man outside of a Brunswick pub); and a campaign of racist graffiti and vandalism (largely directed at local churches, businesses and the cars and residences of ‘known’ or suspected anti-racist and anti-fascist activists).

As it happens, on the day of the NA rally — which managed to attract just 30 or so boneheads, and which was again addressed, unsuccessfully, by Brander — almost 1,000 rallied in opposition. After coming under a barrage of rotten eggs and horse dung (one egg landed, quite spectacularly, in Brander’s mouth, footage of which featured as Goal of the Week on that week’s edition of The Footy Show), the neo-Nazis were soon forced to flee the site, under police escort, to a specially-commandeered city-bound train. And while Brunswick Mayor Glenyys Romanes expressed a desire for the media “to play it all down”, Peter Murray replied “…that’s all very well if you’re a white Anglo councillor, but it’s not very good for the Somali woman who, a few weeks back, had her arm broken by these thugs in Northcote” (Fran Cusworth, ‘Anti-Nazi rally voices its anger’, Brunswick Sentinel, March 21, 1994).

Note that during this period, the Sarah Sands Hotel on Sydney Road, Brunswick, acted as a venue for the neo-Nazis; a role which is now being fulfilled — with the support of a small number of local punks (notably Bulldog Spirit and Charter 77) — by the Birmingham Hotel in Fitzroy.

Adelaide : In March 1994, NA also engaged in an infamous anti-Asian pogrom in Rundle Street Mall, when approximately 20 or so NA members, boneheads and their allies, shouting Nazi slogans and dressed in Nazi paraphernalia, assaulted 15 people. The injured were treated for broken bones, severe bruising and facial injuries, and one (Asian) man “was kicked more than 30 times about the head and body” (‘Neo-Nazi street rampage’, Herald Sun, March 28, 1994). Brander subsequently denied NA involvement, defended the racist mob’s actions, and was quoted as stating that “I don’t see neo-Nazis as being detrimental to our group” (Shane Maguire, ‘SA Gangs At Flashpoint’, Sunday Mail, April 3, 1994). A subsequent rally held on the steps of the Prospect Town Hall was addressed by Brander, accompanied by about 50 or so NA members and sympathisers, and Nazi marching songs. A crowd of several hundred, including a number of WWII veterans, assembled in opposition to the neo-Nazi rally.

Fawkner

The next few years were slightly quieter for NA in Melbourne, although both Barricade (which opened in February 1995) and a number of other groups and individuals were targeted for reprisals. This included an assault by Brander against a counter-protester at another NA rally outside Parliament House on March 18, 1995. (Brander was convicted in September.) Aside from internal disputes, their main stumbling-block was to be the emergence of The Wicked Witch of Ipswich, Pauline Hanson, who continues to dance her way around Federal and State politics, TV, and women’s magazines.

In January 1997, NA tried to establish a firmer presence in Melbourne by opening a bunker in Tyson Street, Fawkner. Several months later, on March 15, a demonstration protesting its appearance was organised by local Trotskyists (among others), many of whom had previously been involved in the protests in Brunswick.

As NA described it, the protest consisted of “communists, homosexuals and fringe malcontents”. NA, on the other hand, forewarned and forearmed (as Saleam might say), assembled on the roof of the bunker dressed in clown suits and — to the sound of circus music — threw lollies to (and shit on) the malcontents gathered below. The neo-Nazis also shared the rooftop with members of the Force Response Unit (FRU), armed with video cameras and a pathological aversion to the troublemakers below.

On the ground, police were also very much present: one antifa was arrested for allegedly assaulting a cameraperson who had refused his request not to be filmed. This arrest triggered a minor fracas in which another two antifa were arrested while attempting to prevent the police van in which the first had been placed from leaving the area. Having succeeded, police offered to release the first person apprehended if protesters agreed to piss off to a local park. The self-styled leadership agreed to this proposal, but — after having been pressured to by others present — the proposition was put to a vote. The overwhelming majority of protesters voted to remain until the antifa was released — and he was immediately thereafter. (To the best of my knowledge, the other two antifa arrested by police subsequently went to court and received fines for their misbehaviour).

The coalition Campaign Against the Nazis (CAN), which drew the support, among others, of local Labor MPs — including the ALP member for Wills, Kelvin Thompson, as well as Carlo Carli, ALP member for Coburg, Tony Sheehan, ALP member for Northcote and Doug Walpole, MLC for Melbourne West — organised further protests on April 19, May 31, July 12 and August 9, 1997; each one smaller than the last.

das Ende der Geschichte?

Tired of the protests, subjected to attacks from other, rival neo-Nazi groups, and unable to pay their rent, NA finally gave up and took their bat and ball home to Adelaide in April 1998; barely 15 months after they began. As for Brander, he enrolled at LaTrobe University and, having completed his MA in history, has since been welcomed with open arms by the ‘neo-conservative’ / reactionary Quadrant magazine, which re-published his MA thesis on ‘Alexander Solzhenitsyn and the West’ in the March 2005 edition. Brander also addressed a post-graduate conference organised by the University of Sydney in July 2005, and is currently alleged to be publishing a zine called Australian Resurgence. Interestingly, veteran racist Colin Wuttke stood for the SA seat of Ramsay in 2006 as an ‘Independent’ sponsored by ‘Australian Resurgence’; a long time between drinks for Wuttke, who last contested a seat in 1980.

Saleam, on the other hand, after his release from jail, attached himself to the white supremacist Australia First Party; and to this day remains their Fuehrer.

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