Mit einer Demonstration in Wien will die Gewerkschaft ein öffentliches Signal für „faire Lohnerhöhungen“ für Arbeitnehmer auch in wirtschaftlich schwierigen Zeiten setzen. Angesichts
stockender Verhandlungen über die Kollektivverträge von knapp 400.000 Beschäftigten haben fünf Fachgewerkschaften für Mittwochnachmittag zu einem Protestzug aufgerufen. Unter dem Motto „Wir verzichten nicht“ wenden sie sich gegen Aufrufe aus der Wirtschaft zur Verschiebung der KV-Gespräche, Lohnverzicht und Nulllohnrunden.

Protest against Salary Freeze In Vienna

VIENNA (AFP)–Some 25,000 people gathered in Vienna on Wernsday to protest against salary freezes prompted by the global economic crisis. Many protesters arrived from different regions of Austria to take part in manifestation.
Mobilized by Austria’s five main trade union organizations, the protesters chanted slogans demanding “more purchasing power to overcome the crisis”. Many companies had earlier announced a salary freeze this year due to the global financial crisis, as well as partial lay-offs to cut losses.Loud and colorful with drums, whistles and red balloons, the protest remained peaceful as it made its way to the Austrian Economic Chamber headquarters for a final rally.
Photo by Galina Toktalieva. Red ballons with slogans float above the heads of protesters, with magnificent monument for Soviet solders in background

Alfred Gusenbauer, the tenth chancellor in the history of the Second Austrian Republic, will be remembered for his short time in that position.
Gusenbauer has been Chancellor for 545 days. With an early general election likely to be held by the end of September, he will have been Chancellor for slightly more than 700 days before stepping down.

Austrian Times, 08.07.08

We were waiting for a long time outside of social democrats party quarters. It rained.
When at last we were let in, it was hard to find the place to photograph, as reporters and TV operators stood like a wall. One of securities shoved me, when I tried to cross the room behind the backs of three party leaders.
Gusenbauer looked much older than two month before when I last photographed him, and he was throwing nervous side-long glances at journalists. Everybody who takes position of responsibility must be prepared his achievement and smallest failures will be equally magnified, when he gains power and loses it.

Rudolf Hundstorfer, President of Austrian Federation of Trade Unions (OeGB)

In October 2003 Rudolf Hundstorfer became vice president of the OeGB (Austrian Federation of Trade Unions). After resignation of Fritz Verzetnisch as president of this organization in March 2006 because of the BAWAG scandal, Hundstorfer took the presidency provisionally. On September, 8th 2005 as a representative of all BAWAG stockholders he signed an agreement, that the OeGB will adopt the BAWAGs debts of 1.53 billion Euros. Hundstorfer kept this fact in secret until June 2006. When he was asked by journalists for reason doing so, he told he did not know, what he had signed. Translated by G.T

Managers found guilty in Austrian BAWAG trial (Vienna) All nine defendants in the BAWAG bank were found guilty on Friday in the trial on Austria’s biggest banking scandal on Friday, as the bank managers were held responsible for high losses arising from speculative investments. Former BAWAG CEO Helmut Elsner, 73, and other bank managers were deemed guilty of having hidden losses around 1.7 billion euros (2.7 billion dollars) from off-shore investments between 1995 and 2000. US-based investor Wolfgang Floettl, 52, had carried out the unsuccessful financial deals in the Caribbean on behalf of Austria’s fourth largest bank. The scandal reverberated beyond the financial sector as the losses of Austria’s fourth-biggest bank severely weakened one of its former owners, the Austrian Trade Union Federation.

In December 2006 the ailing BAWAG was sold off to the US-based hedge fund Cerberus. All nine defendants face prison sentences of up to 10 years, as most of them were accused of breach of confidence and balance sheet fraud. DPA

Governor Franz Voves drinking Styrian wine

In politics one holds no promises
“The head of Styrian government Voves can not be surpassed in incredibility”, told OeVP family speaker Ridi Steibl commenting SPOe-forcingup of prices in Steiermark. On the 1st of July the electricity prices will be raised by 15 percent.
OeVP-family speaker reminded to audience the fact of numerous election campaign pledges given by Voves. Before the elections Voves had promised , in particular, that electricity price would not be raised. Steibl told: “You failed, Mr.Governor! With all your broken promises. Voves is fully responsible for the antisocial SPOe politics and it is incomprehensible why he demands SPOe at the national level to be the other, when his own local policy does not correspond to this fundamental principle.” ots.at
Electricity price increases, the trust to politicians decreases
From the 1st of July the Energy Styria raises the electricity price. It means a rise by 4 percent for average household. As the KPOe has already stated before, every rise digs deep in population pockets. This is the third rise since 2006.
Ernest Kaltenegger, club chef of the KPOe issued critical comments on this fact in the Styrian Landtag:� “Other local enterprises who manage to go on without nuclear power are definitely cheaper than the Energy Stieremark. The last one seems to obtain tactics to put stress on population at regular intervals. At the same time, the politicians of OeVP and SPOe at the local level intend to increase their own salaries up to 1000 euros monthly. In this way the trust to politicians is systematically destroyed.” KPÖ (more…)

Minister Doris Bures and Werner Faymann (SPOe) with Westbahnhof under reconstruction in background.

I must confess I had sent emails to representatives of all Austrian political parties offering my services as photographer, and Franz Voves – governor of Styria (SPOe) was the only one who replied. Thanks, Franz! When I photographed you, I was fantasizing how it could be to travel together with you in one compartment of Trans-Siberian express. Usually there is rather pleasant vibration in the trains