Young Labor Left NSW is a democratic organisation which believes that all people have the right to a home, to food, healthcare, a decent education and a satisfying life. We believe that the failures of neoliberalism demand radical solutions which shift power from big business to ordinary people. Democratic socialism is essential to achieving this redistribution of wealth and power.
We are members of the Labor Party because we think that electoral politics is one of many important tools for bringing about transformative change. Whether it's climate advocacy, worker's rights, welfare, housing, or First Nations justice, we are a space in Labor for young people invested in real progress.
At the core of our organising philosophy is that real change doesn't come from the top down, it is always created by everyday people. The great struggles of our time will require working people standing up together, and getting organised.
Below are some of the issues and policies we organise around:
1. Workplace Democracy & Ending Casual Work
The trade union movement is the lifeblood of the Australian Left. We support industry wide bargaining, the right of all workers to strike, closed shops, and secure work for everyone. We are active members of our workplaces, and believe that the trade union movement is the single most important tool in the arsenal of the working class against the divisive influence of billionaires. We support ending casual arrangements that do not guarantee regular employment, and support the ACTU’s work in campaigning against the chronic insecurity that plagues our workplaces.
2. A Public Housing Guarantee
The Australian housing affordability crisis threatens to lock our generation out of home ownership altogether. Despite housing costs increasing several times above wage growth, successive governments remain beholden to property developers and landlords in failing to address the problem.
We support solutions that address the cause of this crisis, including a much more ambitious public housing stock target to end housing waitlists, creating a legislated ‘Right to the City’ to keep public housing communities together, and working to end unfair advantages held by investors and landlords over owner-occupiers.
3. Transforming Justice
YLL remains committed to ending the carceral state, and developing democratic and community alternatives to it. Prisons and policing are harmful, oppressive, and are counter-productive to the cause of social justice and worker empowerment. We stand in solidarity with and support the work of First Nations and other communities in their struggle against oppression in our law enforcement and prison systems. We also advocate for the decriminalisation of drugs in NSW, and the treatment of drug use and abuse as a social and health matter.
4. No New Coal Mines & A Green New Deal
Young Labor Left supports a ban on new coal mines, coal seam gas, and oil projects. Whether we burn coal here or elsewhere, everyone suffers the consequences of coal mining. Urgent and serious action on climate change is essential in our lifetime. We cannot afford to leave the transition to the market; we need a publicly managed renewables plan that ensures economic security for communitites currently dependant on fossil fuels.
5. End Offshore Processing of Asylum Seekers & Boat Turnbacks
We believe that all people fleeing their homes due to persecution, war and climate catastrophe deserve our compassion. Australia should adopt a community processing solution for all refugees who arrive on our shores asking for help. Young Labor Left maintains an active involvement in the refugee movements both within and outside the ALP.
6. Building A Feminist Society
Young Labor Left is a feminist organisation, committed to achieving equality and liberation for women and queer people. The importance of a class-conscious feminism can be found all around us:
- Abortion may be legal, but our underfunded health system leaves reproductive rights inaccessible for many working women and queer people.
- Sex and consent education is archaic, fails young people, and perpetuates rape culture.
- Women continue to suffer at the fore of pay inequity and work insecurity, despite performing most essential work.
- Domestic violence services have been chronically underfunded under the Coalition, and women continue to suffer unjustly as a result.
- Internationally, Women are most acutely affected by climate change, war and famine, but mainstream discussion tends to present gender oppression as an independent political sphere to be addressed in isolation.
As socialist feminists we reject the arbitrary isolation of feminism from the economic and social issues which affect both men and women.
7. Labor Party Democracy
Young Labor Left believes that the ALP should adopt structural reforms which empower its members to take control of policy decisions and the election of Labor candidates. The Democratic Socialists of America and Momentum in the UK Labour Party have demonstrated the success of similar tactics: marshalling thousands of young people in the streets as activists, campaigners and at the ballot box. Engaged members are active members, and active members win elections. We believe that the more democratic our party is, the more vibrant, effective, and capable of transformative change our movement will be.
8. National Education Service
We support establishing a cradle-to-grave education service, free at the point of use. This includes ending funding for private schools, reversing the privatisation of TAFE, ending tuition for all tertiary education, and establishing public early childhood education services. We will support efforts of education unions to address the staffing crisis in NSW schools, and fight the casualisation of teaching.
9. Truly Universal Healthcare
Labor’s legacies in healthcare have been greatly diminished by decades of neoliberalism. We believe in a truly universal and comprehensive healthcare system that is free at the point of use, and includes:
- Expanding direct public health provision beyond hospital care
- Reversing cuts to Medicare and improving specialist and PBS coverage
- Expanding access to free and regular mental health care
It is important to emphasise the needs of women, queer people, CALD communities and regional communities in our under-funded system.
10. Consent Education in Schools & Ending Domestic Violence
We support and seek to escalate the achievement of mandatory consent education in NSW schools, particularly by protecting the rollout of these vital measures from reactionary attacks. We also support the establishment of a meaningful supply of specialised housing and support for women fleeing domestic violence, recognising the vital role that workplace power and the labour movement have in elevating the material power of women suffering from domestic abuse.
11. A Recovery for Working Women
We need to rectify the enormous costs women have sustained over the course of the pandemic, especially in suffering the bulk of underemployment, casualisation, and unpaid labour burdens. We must aggressively pursue gender equity outcomes, particularly for CALD, migrant, and First Nations women, who have suffered disproportionately from the economic effects of the pandemic.
12. Public Ownership
Ending privatisation, re-acquiring vital social goods like infrastructure and banking, and expanding democratic worker and community control of public corporations should be a priority of any Labor government. We engage in campaigns for free and publicly owned public transport, and the protection of domestic manufacturing jobs, particularly in manufacturing hubs like the Hunter. We support the establishment of co-operative models of organisation in public companies like the ABC and Transport NSW.
13. Queer Liberation
The rise of transphobic attacks on the queer community are a part of a movement that threatens the lives and security of queer people. This proto-fascist, reactionary surge poses a threat to all working people and our solidarity. We fight the right of our party to defeat legislative proposals that undermine the human rights of queer people.
14. Aged Care Reform
We support the findings of the Royal Commission into aged care, particularly the need to establish a “universal right to high quality, safe and timely support”. We need to reverse the privatisation of aged care facilities, and fight with nurses and other health professionals for strong patient-to-staff ratios and working conditions in aged care.