Media Release

KATTER’S Australian Party federal leader Bob Katter and state leader Rob Katter have thrown their support behind the Transport Workers Union and its bid to ensure 1st Fleet workers made redundant are paid entitlements.

Mt Isa member Rob Katter said this issue was as relevant in Queensland as it is anywhere else.

"Smaller private enterprise is being swallowed up by larger corporations and this is inadvertently decimating the livelihood of many workers on the ground," he said.

Mr Katter said there was merit in the union’s belief that the company’s demise, which had traded since 1988, was a warning sign about the dangers of giving too much power to the major supermarket chains.

"One hundred and fifty people have just lost their jobs and another 650 people are also staring down the barrel of unemployment and the reason is simple – greed," Mr Katter said today.

"Coles and Woolworths’ market share has swelled to an unparalleled 88 per cent.

"Their growth is coming at the expense of choice and competition and it’s destroying the livelihoods of working mums and dads, truckies, farmers and transport companies to name just a few of the 1000s of businesses and families suffering because of the supermarket duopoly.

"The only way to stop the greed is to bust up Coles and Woolworths’ market share and reduce it to 20 per cent. If this does not happen, we will not see an end to companies and families collapsing under the weigh of corporate greed."

Mr Katter said TWU had his full support as it took on receivers de Vries Tayeh and made sure hard

‐working staff were paid all entitlements.

"When companies go bust, it is always the working mums and dads that get shafted and neglected," he said.

"The union has every right to rrigorously pursue the entitlements of former 1st Fleet workers and I support their efforts 100 per cent".