Federal Treasurer, Jim Chalmers, and Finance Minister, Katy Gallagher, are again aiming to slash the public service. Gallagher wrote to all agency heads last November, instructing them to find activities that they could stop doing! She called her proposed 5% cutback an “exercise in fiscal discipline.” For public sector workers this screams of looming job cuts and even more intense workloads. For all who rely on the essential services these workers provide, Chalmers and Gallagher’s “discipline” means reduced services and longer waiting times.
Faced with this instruction, the leadership of the Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) timidly pleaded that ministers “urgently clarify what they are proposing and release the letters they sent to agency heads about potential cuts.” Underwhelmed rank and file members, organised through the Democracy 4 CPSU caucus, held an emergency meeting which voted to establish an anti-austerity working group.
The caucus had organised the Members United (MU) ticket which contested the last union elections and is stridently opposed to austerity. MU believes in fully funded quality public services delivered by workers that enjoy high standards of living.
The caucus publishes the Members United CPSU Rank and File bulletin, which ran a cover story: “Austerity Haunts the APS” arguing that “a militant and proactive union would act now, to build industrial and community opposition to resist this threat.” As union members arrived for work, teams of caucus activists distributed the bulletin outside workplaces.
On February 26, MU hosted a well attended online panel discussion about what austerity is and what is driving it, who bears the cost and, crucially — how we can fight back.
Opening speaker was political economist Frank Stillwell, who contended that it is all about class when it comes to who bears the cost of austerity. It is working people who suffer when governments slash public services and welfare. Stilwell highlighted the important research done by the Centre for Future Work which clearly demonstrates that corporate profit, not wages, is the key driver of inflation, which then contributes to increasing budget deficits.
Attendees were also inspired to hear from John Stowell, a member of the Victorian state public servants’ union, CPSU – State Public Services Federation. In 2025, following the first contested leadership ballot in over twenty years, rank and file group, A Voice For Members, won 70% of the vote. The new leadership team is showing how workers, with community support, can build a fight back against austerity.
In the lead up to the election, A Voice For Members developed the Gold Review, its answer to the government’s cost cutting and job slashing “Silver Review.” Stowell also detailed how union members stopped significant cuts to services at the State Library. The union is currently leading a fight-back to save the world-leading independent health promotions unit, VicHealth, and has launched a campaign, Victoria Works Because We Do!
Three members of the Democracy 4 CPSU caucus addressed the forum. Firstly, Maryam Khzaeli-Dobson, a caucus member in Canberra, focused on organising by caucus members in the Australian Capital Territory Public Service.
Maryam was followed by Georgiana Lilly, a CPSU delegate in a direct service delivery role. She focused on how public service workers and users need to make common cause, saying, “as unionists, we should focus on building power so that when austerity measures lead to decisions which are harmful to those we serve, we are organised to get the word out, protect whistleblowers, and take action.” Georgiana explained that austerity measures result “in a loss of focus on delivering policy outcomes…[instead] success is measured by dollars saved.”
The final speaker was Christopher Warren, one of the four elected convenors of the Caucus. He made the case that different choices are needed: “we could be having discussions about revenue and tax to make sure we have the money we need to fund the expenditures.” He posed the question, “is it okay that mining and gas companies don’t pay their fair share while public servants have to absorb real wage cuts?”
Christopher powerfully made the case for Democracy 4 CPSU arguing that “we need a union leadership that empowers the rank and file. We simply cannot accept the broken ideology of ‘low expectations’ trade unionism,” an approach, which has driven the wages and conditions of public sector workers backwards.
Christopher concluded by stressing the need to “name the issue and call it what it is: austerity. From here, we can build a rank and file base to meet the challenge, build a better union and win the kind of wages and society we deserve.”
Both Georgiana and Christopher made the case that when workers and the poor are getting squeezed, there’s a risk that right wing populism and scapegoating start to get a wider hearing.
The Democracy 4 CPSU caucus is working to build an active and engaged rank-and-file with the goal of expanding union democracy, challenging low expectations unionism and mounting a fight back. It has members all around the country working in many different agencies. It meets monthly and warmly welcomes the involvement of all CPSU members. Contact: democracy4cpsu@gmail.com
Alison Thorne is a member of the Democracy 4 CPSU Caucus and the managing editor of the Freedom Socialist Organiser.
