However, these areas of achievement have unfortunately, in global terms, left out far too many people. More than 150 million children forced to work. 125 million children who have never seen the inside of a classroom with many millions more who drop out before achieving basic education. There is now an incredible 880 million people who are illiterate. And 7 million children die each year as a result of the third world debt crisis.
Unions are institutions that stand for fairness and justice.
It is our mission to ensure a fair share for working people and their families. Yet even in this country, one of the richest nations in the world, we have increasing child poverty. More than 800,000 Australian children live in poverty and of the 100,000 added to this list since 1995 a quarter of them are children of working families. The emergence of a class of working poor in Australia is a shocking indictment of a corporate culture that denies working people a fair share. You need to understand the growing sense of powerlessness and alienation felt by Australians who know the reality of bank, school and hospital closures in their communities.